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Saga and East Scandinavia: Preprint papers of The 14th International Saga Conference

Saga and East Scandinavia: Preprint papers of The 14th International Saga Conference

Edited by Agneta Ney, Henrik Williams and Fredrik Charpentier Ljungqvist

Gävle: Gävle University Press, 2009

In August 2009, Uppsala University hosted the 14th International Saga Conference. Papers from the conference have now been made available online and can be downloaded as PDF files in two parts:

Part 1 – pages 1 to 550

Part 2 – pages 551 to 1081

Here is a list of English-language papers which have been published in full in this volume:

Part 1

Karelia, Finland and Austrvegr, by Sirpa Aalto and Ville Laakso

Dancing Images from Medieval Iceland, by Aðalheiður Guðmundsdóttir

Outlaws, women and violence. In the social margins of saga literature, by Joonas Ahola

The Formation of the Kings’ Sagas, by Theodore M. Andersson

Why be afraid? On the practical uses of legends, by Ármann Jakobsson

Writing origins: the development of communal identity in some Old Norse foundation-myths and their analogues in Guta saga, by Robert Avis

Individuality and Iconography: Jakob Sigurðsson’s Renderings of Codex Upsaliensis f.26v, by Patricia A. Baer

St. Óláfr and his Enemies in the Saga Tradition, by Sverre Bagge

“Gofuct dýr ec heiti”: Deer Symbolism in Sigurðr Fáfnisbani?, by Massimiliano Bampi

Muslims in Karlamagnúss saga and Elíss saga ok Rósamundar, by Bjørn Bandlien

Byzantium in the riddarasögur, by Geraldine Barnes

The World West of Iceland in Medieval Icelandic Oral Tradition, by Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough

What do the norns actually do?, by Karen Bek-Pedersen

Ásmund á austrvega: The Faroese Oral Tradition on Ásmund and its Relation to the Icelandic Saga, by Chiara Benati

The ‘Other’ and the Noble Heathen: Ambiguous Representations of Grettir and Finnbogi, by Lisa Bennett

The Good, the Bad and the Devil! On rewriting a Religious Motif in some Virgin Martyr Legends, by Kjersti Bruvoll

Negotiations of Space and Gender in Brennu-Njáls Saga, by Katrina Burge

The Secret Lives of Lawspeakers: the portrayal of lögsögumenn in the Íslendingasögur, by Hannah Burrows

Vatnsdoela saga and Onomastics: the case of Ingimundr Þorsteinsson, by Jörg Büschgens

Sagas and Archaeology in the Mosfell Valley, Iceland, by Jesse L. Byock

An Icelandic Genesis, by Betsie A.M. Cleworth

Poets and Ethnicity, by Margaret Clunies Ross

Passing Time and the Past in Grettis Saga Ásmundarsonar, by Jamie Cochrane

Editing the Fornaldarsögur Norðurlanda, by Matthew J. Driscoll

Anatomies off the Map: “Secret and distant freaks” and the Authorization of Identity in Medieval Icelandic and Irish Literature, by Amy Eichhorn-Mulligan

Which came first – the smith or the shaman? Volundarkviða, craftspeople and central place complexes, by Leif Einarson

Love affairs versus Social Status: A Theme in Kormáks saga?, by Elín Bára Magnúsdóttir

The ethical map of the Hrólfs saga Gautrekssonar, by Alexey Eremenko

Reception and function of stories about the East, by Stefka G. Eriksen

From saga to Chronicle: Motif Migration inside Medieval Scandinavia, by Fulvio Ferrari

Narrative Trajectories between Nodal Points in the Cultural Landscape – The Eriksgata of King Ingjald, by Svante Fischer

Snorri Sturluson and oral traditions, by Frog

The Good, the Bad and the Undead: New Thoughts on the Ambivalence of Old Norse Sorcery, by Leszek Gardeła

Sensory deceptions. Concepts of mediality in the Prose Edda, by Jürg Glauser

On the Reception of Eastern Europe in Pre-Literate Iceland, by Galina Glazyrina

Saintly Exile: the commemoration of King Óláfr inn helgi in the poetry of Heimskringla, by Erin Goeres

Recreating Tradition: Sigvatr Þórðarson’s Víkingarvísur and Óttarr svarti’s Hofuðlausn, by Jonathan Grove

Alternative criteria for the dating of the sagas of Icelanders, by Guðrún Nordal

Ansgar’s Conversion of Iceland, by Terry Gunnell

Egill Skalla-Grímssonr on the Library Site in Trondheim?, by Jan Ragnar Hagland

More inroads to pre-Christian notions, after all? The potential of late evidence, by Eldar Heide

A Short Report from the Project on Codex Upsaliensis of Snorra Edda, by Heimir Pálsson

Law recital according to Old Icelandic law: Written evidence of oral transmission?, by Helgi Skúli Kjartansson

Hjarta sjónir. Ekphrasis and medium in Líknarbraut, by Kate Heslop

The Herjólfr Legend from Härjedalen and Its Resemblances to the Stories of Landnámabók, by Olof Holm

Sörla saga sterka and Rafn’s edition, by Silvia Hufnagel

Odin – an immigrant in Scandinavia?, by Anders Hultgård

The Gosforth Fishing-Stone and Hymiskviða: An Example of Inter-Communicability between the Old English and Old Norse Speakers, by Tsukusu Itó

Aldeigjuborg of the sagas in the light of archaeological data, by Tatjana N. Jackson

The Sea-Kings of Litla Skálda, by Judith Jesch

Royal Women and the Friðgerðarsaga Episode, by Jóhanna Katrín Friðriksdóttir

Biörner’s edition of the Friðþjófs saga ins froekna, by Vera Johanterwage

Where Old West and Old East Norse literature meet. A project outline, by Regina Jucknies

Sweden of the Sagas, by Kári Gíslason

Sweden and the Swedes in English language surveys of the Viking period, by John Kennedy

Celtic and Continental handicraft traditions; Template use on Gotlandic Picture Stones analysed by 3D-scanning, by Laila Kitzler Åhfeldt

When small words make a big difference: On adaptation and transmission of texts in Late Medieval
manuscripts, by Elise Kleivane

Rune stones and Saga, by Lydia Klos

Sverris saga in Uppsala De la Gardie 3, by James E. Knirk

When was the Battle of Helgeå?, by Annette Kruhøffer

Frithjof and Röde Orm: Two Swedish Viking impersonations, by Hans Kuhn

Part 2

Mirrors of the Self – Deconstructing Bipolarity in the Late Icelandic Romances, by Hendrik Lambertus

Troll and Ethnicity in Egils saga, by Paul S. Langeslag

Stjúpmoeðrasögur and Sigurðr’s Daughters, by Carolyne Larrington

Scribal Presence in Eggertsbók and Modern Editorial Attitudes, by Emily Lethbridge

Gendered memory – Rune stones, early Christian grave monuments and the Sagas, by Cecilia Ljung

The Gutnic runkalender and the ancient system of time calculus, by Maria Cristina Lombardi

Óðinn’s Role as a Guarantor of Law and Order in Norse Texts, by Lorenzo Lozzi Gallo

Royal Descent from Odin, by Emily Lyle

“Archaic” Assonance in the Strophes of Ragnarr Loðbróks Family and Other Early Skalds, by Mikael Males

The kauphús of Peter the Apostle in leiðarvísir: A Market or a Scribal Error?, by Tommaso Marani

Kenn mér réttan veg til þess kastala er Artús konungr sitr í: References to Kingship in the Old French Conte du Graal and its Old Norse and Middle English Adaptations, by Suzanne Marti

The Valtari story in Þidriks Saga af Bern: sources and parallels, by Inna Matyushina

Overcoming Óðinn: the Conversion Episode in Njáls saga, by Bernadine McCreesh

Alu and hale II: ‘May Thor bless’, by Bernard Mees

Óláfr soenski and his skalds in Old Norse tradition, by Jakub Morawiec

Time-reckoning, ritual time and the symbolism of numbers in Adam of Bremen’s account of the great sacrifice in Old Uppsala, by Andreas Nordberg

Imagining the Kalmar union: Nordic politics as viewed from a late 15th-century Icelandic manuscript, by Hans Jacob Orning

Runic Literacy and Viking-age Orality, by Rune Palm

West Slavic toponyms in Knýtlinga saga: orthographic adaptations or orthographic mistakes?, by Aleksandra Petrulevich

The East as a Model for the West: Translation Method and Aims in Alexanders saga, by Jonatan Pettersson

Hair Loss, the Tonsure, and Masculinity in Medieval Iceland, by Carl Phelpstead

The Thidrekssaga and the birth of the first Russian state, by Alessio Piccinini

Suffering a sea-change: poetic justice in Egill’s Sonatorrek, by Debbie Potts

Betrothal and betrayal: the eddic tradition’s treatment of Sigurðr, by Judy Quinn

Grettir the Deep: Traditional Referentiality and Characterisation in the Íslendingasögur, by Slavica Ranković

The women and Óðinn, by Margareta Regebro

A Hagiographical Reading of Egils saga, by Philip Roughton

Coming to Grips with the Beast, by Carrie Roy

Brenna at UpsÄlum: the Denial of Cosmos., by Giovanna Salvucci

The “Wild East” in Late Medieval Icelandic Romances – Just a Prop(p)?, by Werner Schäfke

Man as the Measure of All Things: The Relationship Between Mankind and the Gods in Eddic Wisdom Poetry, by Brittany Schorn

Germanic alliteration and oral theory, by Michael Schulte

Saga Accounts of Violence-motivated Far-travel, by John Shafer

Per sortes ac per equum. Lot-casting and hippomancy in the North after saga narratives and medieval chronicles, by Leszek P. Słupecki

Fornaldarsögur and the concept of literacy, by Terje Spurkland

Aspects of editing skaldic verse: The case of Hávarðar saga Ísfirðings, by Rolf Stavnem

Sigurðr Fáfnisbani as commemorative motif, by Marjolein Stern

Is Óðinn really ‘alles fader’?, by Mathias Strandberg

Though this be madness, yet there’s method in’t: aspects of word order in skaldic kennings, by Ilya V. Sverdlov

Centre and Periphery in Icelandic Medieval Discourse, by Sverrir Jakobsson

The Versions of Böglunga saga, by Þorleifur Hauksson

Magic in sagas: the curses of Katla and Glámr, by Bernt Øyvind Thorvaldsen

Earl Hákon of Orkney’s Journey to Sweden, by Maria-Claudia Tomany

“Ærið gott gömlum og feigum.” Seeking death in Njáls saga, by Torfi H. Tulinius

Sturla the trickster, by Úlfar Bragason

The Genealogies of West-Icelandic Family Sagas and their relation to the Sturlung family, by Jens Ulff-Møller

From the History of the Obscene: Evident and concealed meanings of the nickname Þambarskelfir, by Fjodor Uspenskij

Hrólfs saga kraka – A History of Editing, by Tereza Vachunová

The Archaeological Material Culture behind the Sagas, by Helena Victor

The reproduction of Old Icelandic close front rounded vowels (, <ý> and ) in a 17th c. manuscript (AM 105 fol) of a part of Hauksbók (AM 371 4to), by Francesco Vitti

Further Remarks on Ohthere’s Beormas, by Vilmos Voigt

Estranged Bedfellows: Saga Scholarship and Archaeological Research in Iceland, by Elisabeth Ida Ward

Kormáks saga and the naming of Scarborough – a likely story?, by Diana Whaley

The Development of Skaldic Language, by Tarrin Wills

Parody and genre in sagas of Icelanders, by Kendra Willson

Towards a Diachronic Analysis of Old Norse-Icelandic Color Terms: The Cases of Green and Yellow, by Kirsten Wolf

Kenning construal as a criterion for the stemmatic analysis of the Codex Upsaliensis in the transmission of Snorra Edda, by Bryan Weston Wyly

Hildibrandr húnakappi and Ásmundr kappabani in Icelandic sagas and Faroese ballads, by Yelena Sesselja Helgadóttir-Yershova

Håkon Jarl Ivarsson and Roðr, by Torun Zachrisson

On the symbiosis of orality and literacy in some Christian rune stone inscriptions, by Kristel Zilmer

12 Feb 2010
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Communities and Crisis: Bologna during the Black Death

Communities and Crisis: Bologna during the Black Death

By Shona Kelly Wray
Brill Publishing, 2009
ISBN: 978 90 04 17634 8

Bologna is well known for its powerful university and notariate of the thirteenth century, but the fourteenth-century city is less studied. This work redresses the imbalance in scholarship by examining social and economic life at mid-fourteenth century, particularly during the epidemic of plague, the Black Death of 1348. Arguing against medieval chroniclers’ accounts of massive social, political, and religious breakdown, this examination of the immediate experience of the epidemic, based on notarial records–including over a thousand testaments–demonstrates resilience during the crisis. The notarial record reveals the activities and decisions of large numbers of individuals and families in the city and provides a reconstruction of the behavior of clergy, medical practitioners, government and neighborhood officials, and notaries during the epidemic.

Shona Kelly Wray, “Children during the Black Death,” in Children and Youth in History – a teaching module based on her research in Bologna

3 Feb 2010
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Out of the Dawn Light

Out of the Dawn Light

By Alys Clare

Publisher: Severn House

ISBN: 9780727867636

England, 1087. On her sister’s wedding day, Lassair meets an attractive and enigmatic stranger who brings a breath of the fascinating outside world to her backwater Fenland village. When he asks Lassair to use her unique talents to help locate a mysterious treasure she accepts, despite the dangers. But this is no ordinary treasure hunt; the object of the perilous search is five hundred years old and has a terrifying power of its own . . .


Click here to visit the author’s website

Click here to read reader reviews from Goodreads.com

2 Feb 2010
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The Oxford Encyclopedia of Medieval Warfare and Military Technology

The Oxford Encyclopedia of Medieval Warfare and Military Technology

Edited by Clifford J. Rogers
Oxford University Press, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-19-533403-6

From the Viking invasions to the Crusades to the Hundred Years War, wars were crucial agents of change in medieval Europe. They fostered many economic and political changes. They also affected the science, technology, religion, and culture of the parties involved.

This two-volume encyclopedia, with over 1,000 signed A-Z entries by 200 international scholars, examines all aspects of warfare and military technology in medieval times. Featuring the latest research from the leading experts in medieval military history it provides an exhaustive and accurate view of how and why wars were waged throughout Europe, the Byzantine Empire, and the Crusader States from circa 500 CE to circa 1500.

See also our section on Medieval Warfare

19 Jan 2010
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Shakespeare and the Middle Ages

In 2009 two books were published, each with the same title. Here is some details about both books:

Shakespeare and the Middle Ages: Essays on the Performance and Adaptation of the Plays with Medieval Sources or Settings
Edited by Martha W. Driver and Sid Ray
McFarland Publishing, 2009
ISBN 978-0-7864-3405-3

Every generation reinvents Shakespeare for its own needs, imagining through its particular choices and emphases the Shakespeare that it values. The man himself was deeply involved in his own kind of historical reimagining. This collection of essays examines the playwright’s medieval sources and inspiration, and how they shaped his works. With a foreword by Michael Almereyda (director of the Hamlet starring Ethan Hawke) and dramaturge Dakin Matthews, these thirteen essays analyze the ways in which our modern understanding of medieval life has been influenced by our appreciation of Shakespeare’s plays.

Shakespeare and the Middle Ages
Edited by Curtis Perry and John Watkins
Oxford University Press, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-19-955817-9

Shakespeare and the Middle Ages brings together a distinguished, multidisciplinary group of scholars to rethink the medieval origins of modernity. Shakespeare provides them with the perfect focus, since his works turn back to the Middle Ages as decisively as they anticipate the modern world: almost all of the histories depict events during the Hundred Years War, and King John glances even further back to the thirteenth-century Angevins; several of the comedies, tragedies, and romances rest on medieval sources; and there are important medieval antecedents for some of the poetic modes in which he worked as well.

Several of the essays reread Shakespeare by recovering aspects of his works that are derived from medieval traditions and whose significance has been obscured by the desire to read Shakespeare as the origin of the modern. These essays, taken cumulatively, challenge the idea of any decisive break between the medieval period and early modernity by demonstrating continuities of form and imagination that clearly bridge the gap. Other essays explore the ways in which Shakespeare and his contemporaries constructed or imagined relationships between past and present. Attending to the way these writers thought about their relationship to the past makes it possible, in turn, to read against the grain of our own teleological investment in the idea of early modernity.

A third group of essays reads texts by Shakespeare and his contemporaries as documents participating in social-cultural transformation from within. This means attending to the way they themselves grapples with the problem of change, attempting to respond to new conditions and pressures while holding onto customary habits of thought and imagination. Taken together, the essays in this volume revisit the very idea of transition in a refreshingly non-teleological way.

17 Jan 2010
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Medieval Dublin IX

Medieval Dublin IX

Edited by Seán Duffy

Four Courts Press, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-84682-171-4

This is the ninth volume of published proceedings of the Friends of Medieval Dublin Symposia held annually in Trinity College Dublin. It contains, as usual, reports on recent archaeological excavations and papers of historical interest. Claire Walsh reveals what she found when she excavated an important site at Chancery Lane just south of Dublin Castle, including an early-medieval stone-lined well and a remarkable pre-Viking roadway, which may be related to the early monastic site of Duiblinn from which the city takes its name. Franc Myles reports on a millpond, watercourses and seventeenth-century defences along Ardee Street in the Liberties. Linzi Simpson suggests that the graveyard known as Bully’s Acre may have been part of the early-medieval monastery of Kilmainham. And Melanie McQuade describes the findings of her excavation at the site of the later-medieval castle at Meakstown near Finglas.

Other papers include Professor Peter Harbison’s revelation of neglected illustrations of St Doulagh’s medieval church at Balgriffin in north County Dublin, done over a period of two centuries. Dr Bernadette Williams reveals her extraordinary discovery in a manuscript in the library of Trinity College Dublin of the lost coronation oath of King Edward I. Dr Peter Crooks casts new light on the place of Dublin in the political crisis that paralyzed English government in Ireland in 1369-79, towards the end of the reign of Edward’s grandson, King Edward III. And Grace O’Keeffe assesses the role played in the life of the medieval city by its largest hospital, that of St John the Baptist just outside the Newgate in Thomas Street.

The volume concludes with Tríona Nicholl’s chronicle of her journey from Roskilde to Dublin as one of the crew of the Sea-Stallion of Glendalough, a reconstruction of a Viking-Age longship that has been excavated in Denmark but which may have been built in Dublin almost exactly a thousand years ago.

Review: ‘Duffy has collected a diverse group of essays that showcase recent research into the history and archaeology of medieval Dublin … of special interest is Tríona Nicholl’s chronicle of her journal from Denmark to Ireland as crewmember on the Sea-Stallion of Glendalough, a reconstruction of a Viking Age longship that may have been built in Dublin a millennium ago. Generously illustrated (and surprisingly readable for non-specialists), this book should appeal both to academics and to general readers interested in Irish history or archaeology’, Reference and Research Book News (November 2009)

Click here to go to the Publisher’s website

Click here to go to Friends of Medieval Dublin website

9 Jan 2010
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Great Houses, Moats and Mills on the South Bank of the Thames

Great Houses, Moats and Mills on the South Bank of the Thames: Medieval and Tudor Southwark and Rotherhithe

By Simon Blatherwick and Richard Bluer

Museum of London Archaeology Service, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-901992-83-0

Regeneration in the 1980s-90s on the south bank of the Thames resulted in archaeological and historical investigations at Platform Wharf, Rotherhithe, and next to London Bridge, in Southwark. The development of both sites from the 14th century is of major interest.

The Rotherhithe property was acquired c 1349 by Edward III and the existing house rebuilt by him in 1353-61 with two courts, including a riverside range of apartments. Royal interest ceased after Edward’s reign, and the house passed to Bermondsey Priory in 1399. The fragmentation of the site into smaller properties, including ones with industrial uses, is charted.

The Southwark site contained three notable residences during the medieval period and tidal mills on the waterfront. The 14th-century moated house of the Dunley family and a pleasure-house built by Edward II, the Rosary, were both acquired by Sir John Fastolf for his own grand London residence in the 1440s. In the later 16th century there was massive immigration into this part of Southwark and by the mid 17th century the former moats and gardens were built over with small properties and alleys. The moat infills produced exceptionally rich assemblages of domestic artefacts and ceramics, the waterside location preserved a wide variety of plants, timber structures and woodworking evidence.

Click here to go to the Museum of London Archaeology Website

9 Jan 2010
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Conquest: The English Kingdom of France 1417-1450

Conquest: The English Kingdom of France 1417-1450

By Juliet Barker
Little Brown, 2009
ISBN: 9781408700839

Author of the best-selling AGINCOURT, Juliet Barker now tells the equally remarkable, but largely forgotten, story of the dramatic years when England ruled France at the point of a sword.

Henry V’s second invasion of France in 1417 launched a campaign that would put the crown of France on an English head. Only the miraculous appearance of a visionary peasant girl – Joan of Arc – would halt the English advance. Yet despite her victories, her influence was short-lived: Henry VI had his coronation in Paris six months after her death and his kingdom endured for another twenty years. When he came of age he was not the leader his father had been. It was the dauphin, whom Joan had crowned Charles VII, who would finally drive the English out of France.

Supremely evocative and brilliantly told, this is narrative history at its most colourful and compelling – the true story of those who fought for an English kingdom of France.

Video: Juliet Barker talking about her previous book, Agincourt, and writing about the history of this period

Juliet Barker’s description of Conquest:

“The most difficult thing about writing a book is usually finding the subject, especially after a major success like Agincourt. I had toyed with the idea of writing about Joan of Arc but my publishers said they wanted to know what happened after the battle of Agincourt and I realised I didn’t know myself. My knowledge of the period ended with Henry V so I was aware that he had invaded France a second time, conquered much of northern France and forced Charles VI to recognise him as his heir. After that, I realised I had only the vaguest notion of what had occurred. In fact I’m ashamed to admit that I thought the English were expelled from France as a result of Joan of Arc’s appearance on the scene. It was therefore a major revelation to me to discover that she was just a blip in the story of the English occupation which continued for another twenty years – twice as long as before her arrival.

“It was only after I began my research that I discovered that I was treading new ground: amazingly, there has never been a narrative history dedicated to the last thirty years of the Hundred Years War. This gave me a major headache in that I had to create a chronological structure out of a huge number of conflicting sources and I often found that I had to rewrite passages in the light of newly discovered information. On the other hand, I had a wealth of new material describing not just the epic battles and sieges but also the personal stories of those who defended the English kingdom of France and those who lived under occupation.

“What fascinated me – as with Agincourt – were these human stories which remind us that that these were real people no different to ourselves. The poor French girl Jehanette Roland, for instance, who fell in love with an English herald and was all set to marry him just at the point when Charles VII reconquered Paris: the new government forcibly intervened to separate them, insisting that marriage with the enemy could not be allowed. Or Robert Stafford who complained that it was impossible for him to defend his fortress since his sole gunner was absent, the only cannon was in need of repair and there was just one crossbow left in the armoury – and that had no string. In our own time there is a horrible familiarity in the plight of those on the ground, fighting and often giving their lives to defend the English kingdom of France whilst denied the men, money and equipment they needed by the politicians who had sent them there in the first place.

Conquest tells an extraordinary story – and one that ought to be remembered.” – see her website for more information about the author

Book Review by Suzi Feay, The Independent

31 Dec 2009
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Anchoritic Traditions of Medieval Europe

Anchoritic Traditions of Medieval Europe

Edited by Liz Herbert McAvoy

Boydell Press, 2010
ISBN: 9781843835202

The practice of anchoritism – religious enclosure which was frequently solitary and voluntarily embraced, very often in a permanent capacity – was widespread in many areas of Europe throughout the middle ages. Originating in the desert withdrawal of the earliest Christians and prefiguring even the monastic life, anchoritism developed into an elite vocation which was popular amongst both men and women. Within this reclusive vocation, the anchorite would withdraw, either alone or with others like her or him, to a small cell or building, very frequently attached to a church or other religious institution, where she or he would – theoretically at least – remain locked up until death. In the later period it was a vocation which was particularly associated with pious laywomen who appear to have opted for this extreme way of life in their thousands throughout western Europe, often as an alternative to marriage or remarriage, allowing them, instead, to undertake the role of ‘living saint’ within the community.

This volume brings together for the first time in English much of the most important European scholarship on the subject to date. Tracing the vocation’s origins from the Egyptian deserts of early Christian activity through to its multiple expressions in western Europe, it also identifies some of those regions – Wales and Scotland, for example – where the phenomenon does not appear to have been as widespread. As such, the volume provides an invaluable resource for those interested in the theories and practices of medieval anchoritism in particular, and the development of medieval religiosity more widely.

Contents

Introduction, by Liz Herbert McAvoy

Anchorites in the Low Countries, by Anneke B. Mulder-Bakker

Anchorites in German-speaking regions, by Gabriela Signori

Anchorites in the Italian tradition, by M. Sensi

Anchorites in the Spanish tradition, by G. Cavero Domínguez

Anchoritism in medieval France, by P. L’Hermite-Leclercq

Anchoritism: the English Tradition, by Mari Hughes-Edwards

Anchorites in late medieval Ireland, by Colmán Clabaigh

Anchorites in medieval Scotland, by Anna McHugh

Anchorites and medieval Wales, by Liz Herbert McAvoy

17 Dec 2009
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The North Atlantic Frontier of Medieval Europe

The North Atlantic Frontier of Medieval EuropeThe North Atlantic Frontier of Medieval Europe

Edited by James Muldoon
Ashgate Publishing, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-7546-5958-7

Discussion of medieval European expansion tends to focus on expansion eastward and the crusades. The selection of studies reprinted here, however, focuses on the other end of Eurasia, where dwelled the warlike Celts, and beyond whom lay the north seas and the awesome Atlantic Ocean, formidable obstacles to expansion westward. This volume looks first at the legacy of the Viking expansion which had briefly created a network stretching across the sea from Britain and Ireland to North America, and had demonstrated that the Atlantic could be crossed and land reached. The next sections deal with the English expansion in the western and northern British Isles. In the 12th century the Normans began the process of subjugating the Celts, thus inaugurating for the English an experience which was to prove crucial when colonizing the Americas in the 17th century. Medieval Ireland in particular served as a laboratory for the development of imperial institutions, attitudes, and ideologies that shaped the creation of the British Empire and served as a staging area for further expansion westward.

Contents:

Part 1 The Viking Age

A note on the Norse occupation of Ireland, Jean I. Young

Vikings in the West Atlantic: a model of Norse Greenlandic medieval society, Christian Keller

The political policies of Cnut as king of England, Laurence M. Larson

Part 2 Creating an Empire Along the Atlantic Frontier

The beginnings of English imperialism, John Gillingham

‘Keeping the natives in order’: the English king and the ‘Celtic’ rulers 1066-1216, Rees Davies

Overlordship and reaction, c.1200-c.1450, Robin Frame

Part 3 The Conquest of Britain

Lords and communities: political society in the 13th century, Michael Brown

Kings, lords and liberties in the March of Wales, 1066-1272, R.R. Davies

The Normans and the Welsh March, J.G. Edwards

Part 4 Expansion Overseas: The Coming of the English to Ireland

Strongbow, Henry II and Anglo-Norman intervention in Ireland, Marie Therese Flanagan

The Bull Laudabiliter, Kate Norgate; The character of Norman settlement in Ireland, Jocelyn Otway-Ruthven

Conquest and settlement: patterns of Anglo-Norman settlement in North Munster and South Leinster, C.A. Empey

Urbanisation in Ireland during the high Middle Ages, c.1100 to c.1350, Brian Graham

Part 5 Governing Medieval Ireland

The native Irish and English law in medieval Ireland, Jocelyn Otway-Ruthven

Les Engleys nées en Irlande’: the English political identity in medieval Ireland, Robin Frame

The Irish Remonstrance of 1317: an international perspective, J.R.S. Phillips

England against the Celtic fringe: a study in cultural stereotypes, W.R. Jones

Part 6 Sailing West from the British Isles at the End of the Middle Ages

The argument for the English discovery of America between 1480 and 1494, David B. Quinn

13 Dec 2009
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