Where the Middle Ages Begin
This paper was part of a very interesting session on the Early Middle Ages. The papers covered Eastern European Infant Burial, the archaeology of medieval feasting and conversion. This paper contrasted the conversion policies of Charlemagne versus those of Louis the Pious.
The marriage of Margaret of Denmark and King James III of Scotland may not have been very happy. But the union had a significant impact on the territorial gains of Scotland.
This incident has been fatally embroidered by many local historians, taking their cue from various sources, so that the popular accounts have distorted what was already a confusing set of events.
In the Middle Ages, the Kingdom of Norway was larger than it is today, where the former Norwegian districts of Jämtland and Bohus are now parts of Sweden. In 1380, the Norwegian throne was inherited by the Danish king, and for the rest of the Middle Ages, Danish monarchs ruled Norway, but even though the kings often made use of Danes in the administration, the Norwegian kingdom did in fact remain as an independent part of a so-called double monarchy.
Reading the excursus alerts the reader and raises the question whether there is any foundation in the rune-stones for such revision as Birgit Sawyer argues for. One should bring along these doubts when turning to the two chapters dealing with rune-stone inscriptions as expressions of claims to inheritance of property.
A quick glance at the regnal list of fifteenth-century Sweden shows that members of the nobility were at each others’ throats more or less all the time, especially from the 1430s and onwards.
Nineteenth-century romanticism had a special interest in both the medieval world and primitive, untainted rural culture. As the nineteenth century progressed and turned into the early twentieth, the Danes fell more and more under the nostalgic spell, tending to look upon the Icelanders through increasingly romantic and patronizing eyes
Even if the various Orders of Knighthood reached Scandinavia somewhat later than most of the Christian civilization they soon became important religious institutions in Scandinavian societies in the same way as they already were in the rest of western Europe.
This paper, in examining the reigns of the Ethelred, Canute, Harold Harefoot and Hardicanute, and Edward the Confessor, will show how they came to power, the legacy each left – if any — and how the events during each reign ultimately led to the Battle of Hastings, with William the Conqueror’s victory changing England forever.
Our knowledge about which plants were cultivated in Denmark in the antiquity and in the Middle Ages is still improving, because of new excavations, studies of archives, better dating methods and macro- and micro- fossil analyses in old cultural layers.
Tacitus’s two important treatises, vital as sources for our knowledge of the life of the Anglo-Saxons, represent a people who know their limits and stick to them.
The first mention of Canute in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is in the entry for 1013, where it is recorded that his father Sweyn, after taking hostages from the conquered territories of Northumbria, Lindsey, and the Five Borough Towns,
Accompanying discussions of the runic system’s graphical origins are arguments concerning its geographical origins. Von Friesen’s theory that runes derived from Greek characters looked east to the Gothic territories, while scholars arguing for North Italic origins have pointed towards the Alps. Moltke, who looked to a largely Latin source for the runic characters, suggested a runic origin in Denmark.
A new project is underway to analyze population, life, health and culture of the people that lived in the German-Danish border land during the Middle Ages (AD 1050 – 1536).
Jesus never laughed or smiled. Holy people behave like Him: they tend to be solemn, austere, and their body language is restricted. They ought in any case to behave like Jesus. But in late medieval Danish wall paintings some holy people rebel, and St Laurence even jokes.
The Viking Age lasted roughly from the eighth century to the eleventh, with the Viking attacks on Europe beginning around 750 AD. The Scandinavians were excellent sailors, and they had impressive ships and navigational skills that carried them as far as North America (‘Vinland’) long before the arrival of Columbus in 1492.
But whatever Ohthere and his English hosts exchanged in the way of news and information, the re- corded account keeps closely within ränge of its objective: a geography of unknown and little known areas of Scandinavia and their inhabitants.
There is no source quite like the Beowulf manuscript, as it is the longest poem and the only epic composed in Old English which has survived to the modern era, and thus is central to any understanding of Anglo-Saxon literature.
Examines how Christianization of the Norse in the tenth and eleventh centuries was the effect of a premeditated mission strategy borne from the experiences of converting the Anglo-Saxon English in the seventh century AD.
In 1981 Danish archaeologists revealed a remarkable Viking Age grave mound in the village of Gerdrup.
This paper focused on the Anglo-Saxon writs, and charters of Bury St. Edmunds.
What was the relationship between material wealth and social status? Did portable wealth convey to social status for elites?
Ships, Fogs, and Traveling Pairs: Plague Legend Migration in Scandinavia By Timothy R. Tangherlini Journal of American Folklore, Vol.101 (1988) Abstract: This article examines the various forms the plague assumes in the legend traditions of Scandinavia. Eight new legend types are proposed in an effort to expand the existing type-index to more adequately describe the […]
Nails, Rivets, and Clench Bolts: A Case for Typological Clarity Zori, Davide (University of California) Archaeologia Islandica 6 (2007) Abstract This paper reevaluates the current terms and typology used for small functional iron artifacts from medieval northwestern Europe and discusses the advantages of a more uniform terminology for understanding the morphological and functional differences between nails, rivets […]
How you can Follow Us!