Tag: Magic in the Middle Ages

Articles

“A Swarm in July”: Beekeeping Perspectives on the Old English Wið Ymbe Charm

At the same time, however, their differing responses to the remedy attest both to the variation of beekeeping practices and the multivalence of Wið Ymbe itself. The fact that two beekeepers interviewed within two days and two hundred miles of each other can respond differently to the charm’s advice on swarms suggests that we reevaluate unilateral assertions regarding what the text might have meant across the hundreds of years that we now know as the Anglo-Saxon period.

Articles

Runic Magic

A witty, not to say mischievous, Viking archaeologist has defined the first law of runic studies as ‘for every inscription there shall be as many interpretations as there are runologists studying it.’