Expert unveils 'pre-history' of emoticons; ; Medieval Roots; Symbols are 'literally putting the human touch on the text'
Jenny Wagler
2 June 2008
National Post
For all their slick sheen of modernity as a by-product of the computer age, the roots of the emoticon can be traced as far back as the days of dank medieval castles. New Zealand scholar Sydney Shep, who set out to track the emoticon's "pre-history," found reports of similar "pictorial reading cues" in medieval times, and stumbled on her first emoticons in a 19th-century typographic journal at St. Bride's Printing Library in London.
There, on the page, were "faces" constructed of punctuation marks. The expressions were labelled: faithful, grumpy, indifferent and astonished. An explanatory note in the 1882 journal said that contemporary typesetters were creating these humorous punctuation marks in the United States and in Germany. "It just jumped out of the page, and I said, 'Oh my,' " she said. "I thought, 'Hey, these guys have thought about emoticons much before it came to the computer world.' "
The emoticon is generally attributed to computer scientist Scott Fahlman of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh who first used :-) on his computer screen on Sept. 19, 1982.
"The emoticon is really -- some people cringe when they seem them -- but it's literally putting the human touch on the text that surrounds us," said Prof. Shep, a senior lecturer in print and book culture at Victoria University of Wellington, who presents her research this week at the annual humanities congress in Vancouver.
Writers, and often readers, she said, would annotate medieval manuscripts with drawings of pointing hands to emphasize particular passages. "It's a human hand saying , 'Look, I'm here and I'm reading this with you,' " she said. "They're saying, 'Hey, this is me in the text,' and 'Let's have a conversation.' "
With the invention of movable type, she explained, typesetters began to use punctuation to their own ends. The punctuation portraits of expressions that she discovered at St. Bride's Printing Library are an example of this. "It was mostly done humorously," she said. "The printers or the typesetters [are] saying, 'Look what I can do with the stuff in my [type] case -- I don't just have to deal with gossip reports or dry technical information, I can actually have fun on the page.' " This playful, creative impulse, she said, is the same one present in modern emoticons.
Mr. Fahlman's :-) quickly morphed into a complex range of punctuation drawings. "You have a cat or a koala, you can have an angel or the pope, you can have Elvis with his lock of hair or Marge Simpson with her hairdo," she said.
But even as these punctuation-based drawings have evolved into complicated graphic icons, writers still use modern emoticons for the same primary purpose as they did in medieval days -- to give stage directions or cues to readers. "It's almost as if you [the writer] were there in body, in flesh, but you're not there," she said.
Saturday, June 07, 2008
Scientists measure mercury level in human bones from medieval times
Scientists measure mercury level in human bones from medieval times
2 June 2008
Asian News International
Scientists have measured the levels of mercury in human bones from the medieval period. Kaare Lund Rasmussen and co-researchers from the University of Southern Denmark in Odense, The Institute of Anthropology, Archaeology and Linguistics in Hojbjerg, and the Christian-Albrechts University in Kiel, studied bones that had been interred in Danish cemeteries. Two Franciscan friaries, a Cistercian abbey and a parish churchyard at various locations were also examined.
The Middle Ages, often referred to as medieval times, spanned a long period in history from the 5th to the 16th centuries. During this time, European society and culture enjoyed many advances and it could be argued that the quality of life improved beyond recognition.
One area that progressed steadily was medicine and the treatment of disease. One substance in popular use was mercury, used variously in gilding of jewellery and weapons, in inks and as medicines.
Most Europeans would have had some mercury in their bodies, a lot more than background levels today, but those working with mercury compounds or being treated with them suffered far greater exposure. Mercury was used to treat diseases with symptoms that manifested themselves on the skin.
One such disease was syphilis, which was widespread at the time and was treated by the administration of mercury vapour and a mercury-containing skin tonic. Leprosy was another common disease with skin lesions, so might well have been treated with mercury.
The researchers identified leprosy and syphilis by the type of bone lesions observed and a third condition, known as focal osteolytic syndrome that was identified as recently as 1996, was also detected in some of the skeletons.
Individual specimens from 12 individuals were radiocarbon dated by gas proportional counting and the more sensitive technique of accelerator mass spectrometry. The ages were adjusted to allow for the effects of diet. The mercury concentrations in many bones were determined by atomic absorption.
Typical background mercury levels in individuals exhibiting no sign of disease were about 30-50 ng/g, although individual levels could be affected if the person worked with mercury, as a pharmacist, for instance.
In the syphilis group, six individuals had markedly raised levels of mercury in their bones, from about 150-600 ng/g, which the research team took as evidence of mercury treatment. The other individuals may not have received treatment, so their mercury remained at background levels.
This limited study suggests that 40% of the Danish population that were affected with syphilis so severe that it showed up in the bones were administered mercury. In the leprosy group, a similar argument revealed that 11 out of 14 sufferers (79%) were treated with mercury-containing medicine.
2 June 2008
Asian News International
Scientists have measured the levels of mercury in human bones from the medieval period. Kaare Lund Rasmussen and co-researchers from the University of Southern Denmark in Odense, The Institute of Anthropology, Archaeology and Linguistics in Hojbjerg, and the Christian-Albrechts University in Kiel, studied bones that had been interred in Danish cemeteries. Two Franciscan friaries, a Cistercian abbey and a parish churchyard at various locations were also examined.
The Middle Ages, often referred to as medieval times, spanned a long period in history from the 5th to the 16th centuries. During this time, European society and culture enjoyed many advances and it could be argued that the quality of life improved beyond recognition.
One area that progressed steadily was medicine and the treatment of disease. One substance in popular use was mercury, used variously in gilding of jewellery and weapons, in inks and as medicines.
Most Europeans would have had some mercury in their bodies, a lot more than background levels today, but those working with mercury compounds or being treated with them suffered far greater exposure. Mercury was used to treat diseases with symptoms that manifested themselves on the skin.
One such disease was syphilis, which was widespread at the time and was treated by the administration of mercury vapour and a mercury-containing skin tonic. Leprosy was another common disease with skin lesions, so might well have been treated with mercury.
The researchers identified leprosy and syphilis by the type of bone lesions observed and a third condition, known as focal osteolytic syndrome that was identified as recently as 1996, was also detected in some of the skeletons.
Individual specimens from 12 individuals were radiocarbon dated by gas proportional counting and the more sensitive technique of accelerator mass spectrometry. The ages were adjusted to allow for the effects of diet. The mercury concentrations in many bones were determined by atomic absorption.
Typical background mercury levels in individuals exhibiting no sign of disease were about 30-50 ng/g, although individual levels could be affected if the person worked with mercury, as a pharmacist, for instance.
In the syphilis group, six individuals had markedly raised levels of mercury in their bones, from about 150-600 ng/g, which the research team took as evidence of mercury treatment. The other individuals may not have received treatment, so their mercury remained at background levels.
This limited study suggests that 40% of the Danish population that were affected with syphilis so severe that it showed up in the bones were administered mercury. In the leprosy group, a similar argument revealed that 11 out of 14 sufferers (79%) were treated with mercury-containing medicine.
Bodleian Library announces the release of the online collection of Medieval Manuscripts and Early Printed Books
Medieval Manuscripts Uploaded Into The 21st Century
6 June 2008
M2 Presswire
The Bodleian Library announces the release of the online collection of Medieval Manuscripts and Early Printed Books. Started in 2005, the digitization initiative is a collaboration between the Bodleian Library and the non-profit organization, ARTstor.
Including a large proportion of the illuminated manuscript leaves from Bodleian manuscripts through the 16th century, as well as selected 19th and 20th- century manuscripts in the medieval tradition, the entire digital collection consists of 25,000 high-quality images. The project also includes a selection of significant bindings, illuminated initials, and text pages.
With about 10,000 volumes, the Bodleian Library's Department of Special Collections and Western Manuscripts has one of the greatest collections of western medieval manuscripts in the world. The online collection will feature well-known works such as the Romance of Alexander, the Ormesby Psalter and the Ashmole Bestiary.
Richard Ovenden, Keeper of Special Collections and Associate Director, Bodleian Library, said: The Bodleian Library is delighted to add this important new online resource to its growing digital collections. As a result of our collaboration with ARTstor, this remarkable electronic archive will become an essential online tool, accessible worldwide, for medievalists, art historians and scholars in related disciplines.'
James Shulman, ARTstor's Executive Director, said: "The Bodleian Library's medieval and renaissance manuscript collections are legendary. We at ARTstor are delighted to help make their artistic content more readily available to scholars, teachers and students."
Founded in 1602, the Bodleian Library is home to over 8 million volumes and a large number of manuscripts and rare printed books. It is the largest university library in Britain and the second largest library in the UK. More information about the Bodleian Library and its activities can be found at www.bodley.ox.ac.uk
ARTstor is a non-profit organization which aims to develop a rich digital library that will offer coherent collections of art images and descriptive information as well as the software tools to enable active use of the collections. The ARTstor Library's initial content includes approximately 500,000 images covering art, architecture and archaeology. This community resource will be made available solely for educational and scholarly uses that are non-commercial in nature. More information can be found at www.artstor.org
The collection is also gradually being made available free of charge on the Library's own site at www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/medievalimages
6 June 2008
M2 Presswire
The Bodleian Library announces the release of the online collection of Medieval Manuscripts and Early Printed Books. Started in 2005, the digitization initiative is a collaboration between the Bodleian Library and the non-profit organization, ARTstor.
Including a large proportion of the illuminated manuscript leaves from Bodleian manuscripts through the 16th century, as well as selected 19th and 20th- century manuscripts in the medieval tradition, the entire digital collection consists of 25,000 high-quality images. The project also includes a selection of significant bindings, illuminated initials, and text pages.
With about 10,000 volumes, the Bodleian Library's Department of Special Collections and Western Manuscripts has one of the greatest collections of western medieval manuscripts in the world. The online collection will feature well-known works such as the Romance of Alexander, the Ormesby Psalter and the Ashmole Bestiary.
Richard Ovenden, Keeper of Special Collections and Associate Director, Bodleian Library, said: The Bodleian Library is delighted to add this important new online resource to its growing digital collections. As a result of our collaboration with ARTstor, this remarkable electronic archive will become an essential online tool, accessible worldwide, for medievalists, art historians and scholars in related disciplines.'
James Shulman, ARTstor's Executive Director, said: "The Bodleian Library's medieval and renaissance manuscript collections are legendary. We at ARTstor are delighted to help make their artistic content more readily available to scholars, teachers and students."
Founded in 1602, the Bodleian Library is home to over 8 million volumes and a large number of manuscripts and rare printed books. It is the largest university library in Britain and the second largest library in the UK. More information about the Bodleian Library and its activities can be found at www.bodley.ox.ac.uk
ARTstor is a non-profit organization which aims to develop a rich digital library that will offer coherent collections of art images and descriptive information as well as the software tools to enable active use of the collections. The ARTstor Library's initial content includes approximately 500,000 images covering art, architecture and archaeology. This community resource will be made available solely for educational and scholarly uses that are non-commercial in nature. More information can be found at www.artstor.org
The collection is also gradually being made available free of charge on the Library's own site at www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/medievalimages
Review of A Great and Terrible King: Edward I and the Forging of Britain by Marc Morris
King and country: The Hammer of the Scots was an implacable warrior, discovers Helen Castor: A Great and Terrible King: Edward I and the Forging of Britain by Marc Morris 462pp, Hutchinson, pounds 20
Helen Castor
31 May 2008
The Guardian
In the royal roll-call of English history since 1066, Henrys and Edwards have had a tendency to follow one another with apparently remorseless inevitability. But, as Marc Morris points out, to the French-speaking aristocrats of 13th-century England Edward was a name every bit as unfamiliar, in its Anglo-Saxon ungainliness, as Egfric. Henry III's idiosyncratic decision to name his eldest son after his favourite saint, the pre-conquest king Edward the Confessor, was both an act of piety and an acknowledgment of England's Anglo-Saxon heritage - a canny piece of political rebranding for a dynasty that had lost its Norman homeland to the resurgent French in 1204.
Much more disconcerting to modern readers is the discovery that, from 1274 to 1284, Edward's heir was his son Alfonso, who had been named for his maternal uncle, the king of Castile. Morris makes little of it, but the haunting presence of this phantom monarch, kept from the throne by an early death, emphasises an underlying theme of the narrative: that the complexities of Edward's reign cannot be fully understood unless we lay aside the teleological certainties of little Englandism.
When Henry III died in 1272, Edward was 1,000 miles away in Sicily, on the way back from a crusade. For the next 30 years he dreamed of returning to the Holy Land, only to find his ambition thwarted by warfare closer to home. As ruler of both England and Gascony, Edward shared the continental preoccupations of his Norman and Angevin forebears; but, however much instinct might direct his gaze across the Channel, it was to the west and the north that fortune pushed him.
The Hammer of the Scots began by hammering the Welsh - a wild and barbarous people, according to their English neighbours. When their native princes tried to throw off English overlordship, Edward responded with a war of conquest. Scotland, initially, was a different matter: an independent kingdom, its monarchs were allies and relations by marriage of the English crown. But an unexpected succession crisis gave Edward the chance to act as arbiter between the rival claims of Bruce and Balliol. Indefatigable to the last, it was on his way to hunt Bruce down that Edward died, just outside Carlisle, at the age of 68 (declaring, legend has it, that the flesh should be boiled from his body so that his bones could be carried at the head of his troops). This implacable warrior - hard to love by modern standards, easy to admire by medieval ones - was equally unyielding in his treatment of his English subjects. For 20 years he demonstrated how powerful a king could be who understood that royal rights were underpinned by the provision of good government to his people. But when in the 1290s war loomed simultaneously on three fronts - against Welsh rebels, Scottish resistance and a French king determined to annex Gascony - his hard-pressed subjects were for the first time driven into outright opposition by Edward's obdurate insistence on advancing in all directions at once.
Morris tells Edward's story fluently and conveys a compelling sense of the reality, and the contingency, of personal rule; but we rarely see the king in intimate close-up. We know that the man nicknamed "Longshanks" was uncommonly tall, a fearsome presence despite a slight lisp, and - disappointingly, for readers in search of intrigue - a devotedly faithful husband to his wife, Eleanor of Castile, who bore him 15 children. It is on the subject of the "forging of Britain" that Morris is most consistently thought-provoking. Edward would be delighted to know that his conquest of Wales was never reversed, despite its legacy of deep cultural scars. He would be much less amused by the irony that Scotland - driven into the arms of France for the next 300 years by his aggression - was eventually united with England under Robert Bruce's bloodline, rather than his own.
Helen Castor
31 May 2008
The Guardian
In the royal roll-call of English history since 1066, Henrys and Edwards have had a tendency to follow one another with apparently remorseless inevitability. But, as Marc Morris points out, to the French-speaking aristocrats of 13th-century England Edward was a name every bit as unfamiliar, in its Anglo-Saxon ungainliness, as Egfric. Henry III's idiosyncratic decision to name his eldest son after his favourite saint, the pre-conquest king Edward the Confessor, was both an act of piety and an acknowledgment of England's Anglo-Saxon heritage - a canny piece of political rebranding for a dynasty that had lost its Norman homeland to the resurgent French in 1204.
Much more disconcerting to modern readers is the discovery that, from 1274 to 1284, Edward's heir was his son Alfonso, who had been named for his maternal uncle, the king of Castile. Morris makes little of it, but the haunting presence of this phantom monarch, kept from the throne by an early death, emphasises an underlying theme of the narrative: that the complexities of Edward's reign cannot be fully understood unless we lay aside the teleological certainties of little Englandism.
When Henry III died in 1272, Edward was 1,000 miles away in Sicily, on the way back from a crusade. For the next 30 years he dreamed of returning to the Holy Land, only to find his ambition thwarted by warfare closer to home. As ruler of both England and Gascony, Edward shared the continental preoccupations of his Norman and Angevin forebears; but, however much instinct might direct his gaze across the Channel, it was to the west and the north that fortune pushed him.
The Hammer of the Scots began by hammering the Welsh - a wild and barbarous people, according to their English neighbours. When their native princes tried to throw off English overlordship, Edward responded with a war of conquest. Scotland, initially, was a different matter: an independent kingdom, its monarchs were allies and relations by marriage of the English crown. But an unexpected succession crisis gave Edward the chance to act as arbiter between the rival claims of Bruce and Balliol. Indefatigable to the last, it was on his way to hunt Bruce down that Edward died, just outside Carlisle, at the age of 68 (declaring, legend has it, that the flesh should be boiled from his body so that his bones could be carried at the head of his troops). This implacable warrior - hard to love by modern standards, easy to admire by medieval ones - was equally unyielding in his treatment of his English subjects. For 20 years he demonstrated how powerful a king could be who understood that royal rights were underpinned by the provision of good government to his people. But when in the 1290s war loomed simultaneously on three fronts - against Welsh rebels, Scottish resistance and a French king determined to annex Gascony - his hard-pressed subjects were for the first time driven into outright opposition by Edward's obdurate insistence on advancing in all directions at once.
Morris tells Edward's story fluently and conveys a compelling sense of the reality, and the contingency, of personal rule; but we rarely see the king in intimate close-up. We know that the man nicknamed "Longshanks" was uncommonly tall, a fearsome presence despite a slight lisp, and - disappointingly, for readers in search of intrigue - a devotedly faithful husband to his wife, Eleanor of Castile, who bore him 15 children. It is on the subject of the "forging of Britain" that Morris is most consistently thought-provoking. Edward would be delighted to know that his conquest of Wales was never reversed, despite its legacy of deep cultural scars. He would be much less amused by the irony that Scotland - driven into the arms of France for the next 300 years by his aggression - was eventually united with England under Robert Bruce's bloodline, rather than his own.
Review of The Siege, by Ismail Kadare
An empire falters at the castle of crossed destinies
MARK THOMPSON
6 June 2008
The Independent
The Siege By Ismail Kadare, trans David Bellos CANONGATE £16.99 (322p) £15.29 (free p&p) from 0870 079 8897
The Ottoman pasha leads a vast army towards Albania, where a lone castle stands amid plains. When his first attack is beaten back, great cannons are cast to smash the walls. The Christian defenders, cunning as well as fanatical, resist. The pasha tries tunnelling under the wall, tipping cages of diseased rats over the parapets, then cutting off the water supply. Nothing avails. Finally, he hurls his men at the castle in serial assaults, where they break like waves on the stone.
The Albanians' mysterious leader, Skanderbeg, appears invincible. The army is recalled, the despairing pasha kills himself, and the survivors wend their way back to Constantinople through the autumn rain.
The elements of Ismail Kadare's novel are so sparse, you may wonder how they can sustain a novel. Pushkin or Borges would have turned them into brilliant tales; Kafka, into a parable no bigger than a matchbox. As in his other books, Kadare operates by packing a slender plot with dread and uncertainty. The pasha does not know if this campaign is his best chance of glory or a poisoned chalice. How can he be sure that his advisors don't want him to fail? They all have their protectors and motives. Clashes in the war council are deadly. Power flows and ebbs around the tent.
The novel pairs the pasha with a chronicler, Mevla Çelebi, sent to immortalise the victory. A humdrum civilian, terrified of unconventional thoughts, Çelebi is our everyman wandering timidly through the Ottoman camp, witnessing the cruelties of war. Kadare renders his characters' compulsions and fearful intuitions like a Fauvist painter: boldly, without finesse. The setting is medieval, but if you want documentary, go elsewhere. The Siege is a pastiche epic, artfully crude, depicting situations so shorn of specificity that they feel elemental.
The figure who most appals and attracts Çelebi is the enigmatic Quartermaster, who torments the writer with heretical confidences. Kadare is always skilled at conjuring the fearfulness of people and surroundings that cannot be known. The atmospherics are insistent and fateful, like film noir. You believe it was like this in the upper echelons of the Albanian communist party, a milieu that Kadare knew from inside.
Big writers from small countries often want to champion their neglected homeland or, alternatively, to disown an identity that claims too much. Kadare is a fine case of the first kind. He revels in the otherness of Albania; it fires his imagination to set conceited foreigners down in his alien landscape and monitor their reactions as bafflement turns to ruin. The Pasha has one word for the place: "horrible". But Albania has the last laugh. How odd that by the end, after so much gloating bloodshed, cosy patriotism comes to seem the novel's only flaw.
MARK THOMPSON
6 June 2008
The Independent
The Siege By Ismail Kadare, trans David Bellos CANONGATE £16.99 (322p) £15.29 (free p&p) from 0870 079 8897
The Ottoman pasha leads a vast army towards Albania, where a lone castle stands amid plains. When his first attack is beaten back, great cannons are cast to smash the walls. The Christian defenders, cunning as well as fanatical, resist. The pasha tries tunnelling under the wall, tipping cages of diseased rats over the parapets, then cutting off the water supply. Nothing avails. Finally, he hurls his men at the castle in serial assaults, where they break like waves on the stone.
The Albanians' mysterious leader, Skanderbeg, appears invincible. The army is recalled, the despairing pasha kills himself, and the survivors wend their way back to Constantinople through the autumn rain.
The elements of Ismail Kadare's novel are so sparse, you may wonder how they can sustain a novel. Pushkin or Borges would have turned them into brilliant tales; Kafka, into a parable no bigger than a matchbox. As in his other books, Kadare operates by packing a slender plot with dread and uncertainty. The pasha does not know if this campaign is his best chance of glory or a poisoned chalice. How can he be sure that his advisors don't want him to fail? They all have their protectors and motives. Clashes in the war council are deadly. Power flows and ebbs around the tent.
The novel pairs the pasha with a chronicler, Mevla Çelebi, sent to immortalise the victory. A humdrum civilian, terrified of unconventional thoughts, Çelebi is our everyman wandering timidly through the Ottoman camp, witnessing the cruelties of war. Kadare renders his characters' compulsions and fearful intuitions like a Fauvist painter: boldly, without finesse. The setting is medieval, but if you want documentary, go elsewhere. The Siege is a pastiche epic, artfully crude, depicting situations so shorn of specificity that they feel elemental.
The figure who most appals and attracts Çelebi is the enigmatic Quartermaster, who torments the writer with heretical confidences. Kadare is always skilled at conjuring the fearfulness of people and surroundings that cannot be known. The atmospherics are insistent and fateful, like film noir. You believe it was like this in the upper echelons of the Albanian communist party, a milieu that Kadare knew from inside.
Big writers from small countries often want to champion their neglected homeland or, alternatively, to disown an identity that claims too much. Kadare is a fine case of the first kind. He revels in the otherness of Albania; it fires his imagination to set conceited foreigners down in his alien landscape and monitor their reactions as bafflement turns to ruin. The Pasha has one word for the place: "horrible". But Albania has the last laugh. How odd that by the end, after so much gloating bloodshed, cosy patriotism comes to seem the novel's only flaw.
Dunwich, the medieval English port swallowed by the sea
Off the coast of sleepy Suffolk, Britain's own Atlantis is about to yield its secrets
Adam Fresco
5 June 2008
The Times
As a great port on the East of England, Dunwich was nothing short of a medieval metropolis. Eight churches, eighty ships, five religious orders - including the Benedictines, Dominicans and Franciscans - and prosperity to rival London from its trade in wool, grain, fish and furs. Such was the city's prestige that, under Edward I, it was granted two seats in Parliament.
But that was before Dunwich was swallowed by the sea. This morning, more than five centuries after the last of a succession of storms and sea surges battered the Suffolk city into little more than a village, a research team will set sail to discover the secrets of a British Atlantis.
Using the latest acoustic imaging technology - designed to penetrate the high silt levels that have reduced visibility in the water at the site, a mile off the coast, to inches - the researchers hope to reveal Dunwich in its prime. For Stuart Bacon, a marine archaeologist who has spent 30 years studying how Dunwich disappeared, it will be a momentous day. Mr Bacon has explored the site by touch, using a map from 1587, on more than a thousand dives, but with limited success.
Now with a team from the University of Southampton, led by Professor David Sear, he hopes to locate and catalogue 16 large structures dating back to the 14th century, including at least two churches, a monastery and a palace. Professor Sear said that the team hoped, over the course of the next two days, to identify structures that could be correlated with ancient maps and documents.
Planning for the Pounds 25,000 project has taken more than two years, backed by funding from English Heritage and the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation. "We will be scanning the sea floor, going up and down in grids," Professor Sear said. "We know from maps and documents that many structures existed, but we do not know where they were, and this will solve that puzzle."
He added that the expedition did not expect to find any standing structures because most buildings had fallen from cliffs into the sea. Dunwich had a prominent entry in the Domesday Book. By 1173 it was a place of such substance that Robert de Beaumont, Earl of Leicester, attempted to land 3,000 Flemish troops on its beaches in an attempt to depose Henry II and replace him with his son.
In 1205 there were five royal gall- eons in the city - a similar number to those in the Port of London - while in 1242, when the truce between King John and the French monarch broke down, Dunwich was able to muster 80 ships to go to the King's aid. The demise of Dunwich, perched 14 miles south of Lowestoft, gathered pace in 1286 when a huge surge hit the East Anglian coast. Within 50 years hundreds of houses and other larger buildings had been consigned to the shallow reaches of the North Sea.
Another fierce storm in 1328 destroyed the Benedictine cell, an offshoot of Ely Cathedral, and swept away the Franciscans' Greyfriars priory and the Dominicans' Black- friars priory. Two decades later a tempest swept 400 houses, two churches and various shops and windmills into the sea. In 1510 a pier was erected as a breakwater when the sea approached the market place. The churchwardens at the cruciform church of St John the Baptist sold off all the plate to raise money to build another pier to deflect the waves from their church, but it, too, went over the cliffs in 1542.
And so it went on, until Suffolk was left with the Dunwich of today, a coastal village of shingle beaches, tourists and much local legend - including the sound of midnight tolls of church bells coming from beneath the waves.
Mongol: The Rise of Ghengis Khan
film reviews
gary slaymaker
6 June 2008
The Western Mail
Mongol: The Rise of Ghengis Khan, 125 mins
*****
Sergei Bodarov's Oscar-nominated feature, Mongol: The Rise of Genghis Khan, (pictured above) finally reaches our shores after glowing praise from American critics. Now it's our turn to see why this film won such acclaim from the Academy's voters., The story begins in 1172 AD with the young Khan celebrating his ninth birthday, before the next 25 or so years of his life leads us into an intriguing tale of warring tribes, hardships and an intended bride (Khulan Chuluun) who turns out to be Temudzhin's greatest asset as wife, strategist, rescuer and moral compass.
Add to this a finale in which the warrior (Tadanobu Asano) is on the path to immortality through his conquests, and what you have is the most vivid and exciting history lesson committed to film in a long time.
Bodarov's direction is note perfect, combining the bleakness of the terrain with the early struggle of Khan to survive his formative years. He also brings depth to the characters, while producing some highly impressive battle scenes (even if they do borrow a little from the stylised slow motion of 300). While juggling all these elements, Bodarov draws fantastic performances from his cast, with Asano and Chuluun supporting each other beautifully as Mr and Mrs Khan.
It would be easy to compare this couple with Shakespeare's Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, but there's a greater tenderness and respect between the Khans and one provides balance and understanding for the other.
The quietly confident performance from Asano is essential in making this movie work so well, because without that human connection, you would be left with some nice locations shots and a few bloody battles.
A great blend of cast, story and visuals put this right near the top of the list of best foreign language films you're likely to see this year - miss it and miss out.
The warrior and his wife
DAMON SMITH
6 June 2008
Birmingham Mail
KAZAKHSTAN'S entry for this year's Academy Awards as Best Foreign Language Film is an epic chronicling the rise of Genghis Khan from orphaned boy to bloodthirsty leader of men.
Mongol may not sound like the most appealing prospect - a two-hour, subtitled history lesson filmed on location in China, Mongolia and Kazakhstan - but Russian filmmaker Sergei Bodrov knows how to engage his audience.
He focuses on the characters and in particular the relationship between the legendary warrior and his wife, contrasting the tenderness between the couple with the fiery determination that drives a man to conquer an empire.
Showing at Cineworld Broad Street, the film looks stunning.
Beautifully photographed by cinematographers Sergei Trofimov and Rogier Stoffers, it includes some spectacular battle sequences that hint at the hack and slash to come in successive films (this is the first part of a proposed trilogy).
Spanning more than 30 years, the story begins in 1192, the year of the black rat, with Temudgin (Tadanobu Asano) - the man who will become Genghis Khan - encrusted in grime and languishing in a crude prison cell.
Blessed with a sweeping orchestral score by Tuomas Kantelinen, augmented with authentic Mongolian melodies, Mongol unfolds at a canter for an engrossing and visually stunning two hours.
Dialogue is kept to a minimum, ensuring British audience won't have to wade through a sea of subtitles, relying on Asano and his co-stars to convey their characters' emotions with a lingering, anguished glance.
Skirm is hes between Temudgin and his rivals are breathlessly paced, complemented by a tense escape from the prison cell and a desperate horseback chase to escape the vengeful Merkits.
The warrior's defiant final words - "Mongols need laws. I will make them obey, even if I have to kill half of them!" - set the scene tantalisingly for Temudgin's date with destiny.
More to Khan than wrath
Peter Howell
6 June 2008
The Toronto Star
The greatest achievement of Mongol, an impressive first chapter to a planned film trilogy on the life of Genghis Khan, is separating the life from the laugh track. Khan's name registers in Asia as an ancient warrior of skill and vision, but elsewhere he's often reduced to a punch line for bad jokes about corporate chicanery. Russian filmmaker Sergei Bodrov has long wanted to bring Khan's life and legend to the screen, both as homage and image restoration.
His dedication extends to the visual. Mongol was shot on the same Central Asian plains, in China and Kazakhstan, that Khan and his Mongol followers roamed in the 12th and 13th centuries. There's an aura of authenticity about this picture that makes up for the few lapses in narrative.
Even if you can't completely follow the plot, you also can't take your eyes off the scenery, the thrilling horse chases and the throat-slashing battles. Mongol has Hollywood verve with a distinctly non-Hollywood cast, many of whom are non-professional actors.
It begins with Khan as a 9-year-old in 1172, known then as Temudgin, being taken by his father to choose a bride from the rival Merkit tribe. In a gesture indicative of the youth's singular determination, he instead chooses a girl named Borte whom he meets on the way. Tribal tensions violently conspire against happiness. Temudgin's family is torn by tragedy and he grows to become a hunted man (played by Japan's Tadanobu Asano) who is constantly at risk of enslavement. He finds an ally and blood brother in the like-minded Jamukha (China's Honglei Sun), a warrior of strength and good humour. But even there, loyalties fray and violence erupts.
Temudgin's brief reunions with Borte (Mongolia's Khulan Chuluun) are the source of both joy and dread, since both know that death could come at any time. Credit goes to Chuluun for making her mark in a movie that is overwhelmingly macho.
A portrait emerges of Mongol of a warrior slow to anger and quick to forgive, but ruthless in punishing friends and eliminating foes when humbler options fail.
He has a personal philosophy that isn't so far removed from all those bad jokes, after all. "Mongols need laws," he says. "I will make them obey, even if I have to kill half of them."
The movie ends with Temudgin officially taking the name Genghis Khan. Can you imagine what parts 2 and 3 will show?
Regional Identities In North-East England, 1300-2000
REGION'S MODERN IDENTITY LACKS HISTORICAL BASIS, SAY RESEARCHERS
By Hugh Macknight
2 June 2008
Press Association National Newswire
The North East regional identity is a modern invention, the authors of a new book have claimed. Far from being bound together by a sense of themselves as one people, historically "north easterners" have seen themselves as being from either Durham or Northumberland. And a person's regional identity today is tied more to their home city than to anything else, researchers said.
The book, a collection of short essays entitled Regional Identities In North-East England, 1300-2000, delves into historical records over 700 years, from the Middle Ages to the present day. It shows that the term "North East" has only been in mass use for the past 50 years and that the region was traditionally split in two.
The editors, Dr Adrian Green of Durham University and Professor Tony Pollard of the University of Teesside, said the finding had wider political implications when considering regional devolution. Dr Green, of Durham University's Department of History, said: "The book focuses on the period from the later Middle Ages through the Reformation and Industrial Revolution, 20th century and up to the present. The use of the term North East began to appear in the late 19th century, initially to refer to the industrial zones on the Tyne, but was only slowly adapted by business and labour organisations. It was then used by the press and the Great North East railway in the early 20th century. It was only with the advent of regional broadcasting in the 1950s that our current sense and popular usage of the North East appeared. Our research continues to inform the developing political agenda for regional devolution. Since the Regional Assembly failed there has been a move towards promoting 'City Regions', such as Teesside and Newcastle, and our research would provide a stronger historical basis for these separate areas than a single North East region."
Prof Pollard added: "We were surprised to discover that the research by our contributors pointed to a more fragmented region than recent commentators have supposed. There may be implications for planners in that the smaller city regions now in vogue, based on the Tees Valley and the Tyne and Wear basin, have very ancient, pre-industrial roots. History might even provide a justification for splitting the region."
The book, which is launched tomorrow, is published through the North-East England History Institute and presents the findings of the Arts and Humanities Research Council Research Centre for North-East England History, which ran from 2000 to 2005 and involved researchers from all five North East universities.
By Hugh Macknight
2 June 2008
Press Association National Newswire
The North East regional identity is a modern invention, the authors of a new book have claimed. Far from being bound together by a sense of themselves as one people, historically "north easterners" have seen themselves as being from either Durham or Northumberland. And a person's regional identity today is tied more to their home city than to anything else, researchers said.
The book, a collection of short essays entitled Regional Identities In North-East England, 1300-2000, delves into historical records over 700 years, from the Middle Ages to the present day. It shows that the term "North East" has only been in mass use for the past 50 years and that the region was traditionally split in two.
The editors, Dr Adrian Green of Durham University and Professor Tony Pollard of the University of Teesside, said the finding had wider political implications when considering regional devolution. Dr Green, of Durham University's Department of History, said: "The book focuses on the period from the later Middle Ages through the Reformation and Industrial Revolution, 20th century and up to the present. The use of the term North East began to appear in the late 19th century, initially to refer to the industrial zones on the Tyne, but was only slowly adapted by business and labour organisations. It was then used by the press and the Great North East railway in the early 20th century. It was only with the advent of regional broadcasting in the 1950s that our current sense and popular usage of the North East appeared. Our research continues to inform the developing political agenda for regional devolution. Since the Regional Assembly failed there has been a move towards promoting 'City Regions', such as Teesside and Newcastle, and our research would provide a stronger historical basis for these separate areas than a single North East region."
Prof Pollard added: "We were surprised to discover that the research by our contributors pointed to a more fragmented region than recent commentators have supposed. There may be implications for planners in that the smaller city regions now in vogue, based on the Tees Valley and the Tyne and Wear basin, have very ancient, pre-industrial roots. History might even provide a justification for splitting the region."
The book, which is launched tomorrow, is published through the North-East England History Institute and presents the findings of the Arts and Humanities Research Council Research Centre for North-East England History, which ran from 2000 to 2005 and involved researchers from all five North East universities.
Charles the Bold exhibit in Berne, Switzerland
Charles the Bold exhibit recreates medieval glory
3 June 2008
Reuters News
By Jonathan Lynn
A new blockbuster exhibition in the Swiss capital Berne brings together treasures from the Middle Ages to illustrate a turning point in European history.
The show, running until Aug. 24, recreates the times of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, who poured his vast wealth into diplomatic and military efforts to knit his domains in France and the Low Countries into a single kingdom.
But the duke, whose French title "Charles le Temeraire" also translates as Charles the Rash, lost almost everything in his bid to create a new empire in the heart of 15th century Europe. The workaholic duke's efforts to create an effective administration to rule his scattered territories served as a model for other European princes.
But his defeats at the hands of Swiss confederates and their allies cleared the way for the fragmented kingdom of France to coalesce around its monarch in Paris, and secured the power of the Habsburgs in central Europe for centuries to come. And the failure of Charles, whose court was the most magnificent in medieval Europe, was the decisive moment in the long drive by the Swiss cantons for independence.
"The significance of Charles the Bold for European history is that he led a court which set the standard for the European princes of his day," curator Susan Marti told Reuters. "And with his death power relations in Europe were once again completely reorganised, territories were recombined and new cultural traditions emerged."
WORKS OF ART IN CONVERSATION
For Marti, the power of the exhibition, which shows more than 200 pieces from around 40 different museums and collections, is the way it juxtaposes different works of art.
"What you should not miss are the 'conversations' between the individual objects -- the suits of armour in front of the tapestries, the illuminated books by the tapestries," she said. Thus the knights and ladies depicted in the tapestries are wearing similar armour, silks, brocades and jewels to those on show in the exhibition.
The most magnificent tapestry on show is almost abstract, the extraordinary "Tapestry of a Thousand Flowers", made for Charles's father Philip the Good. One of the highpoints of European art, it shows that Burgundy will bloom like paradise under the duke's rule.
From Bruges come some of the masterpieces of Flemish painting, such as Hans Memling's Moreel Triptych, showing St. Christopher and the infant Jesus. On the side panels, the rich donor and his family kneel piously, the wealth of their clothes picked out by Memling.
Among several illuminated manuscripts on show, a highlight is the duke's exquisitely decorated prayerbook, on loan from the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, showing Charles kneeling before his patron St. George.
In a sensational juxtaposition, the next cabinet shows the golden reliquary donated by Charles to Liege cathedral after he captured the city. St. George, bearing a marked facial resemblance to Charles, stands over the duke, in a message to the burghers of Liege that their new master enjoys divine protection.
The show contains several suits of armour, clearly designed more for display than protection, the medieval equivalent of a flashy sports car. One of the prize exhibits is the armour worn by Holy Roman Emperor Friedrich III and his horse when he met Charles in 1473.
LAVISH FESTIVITIES
The armour is part of an installation commemorating their two-month conference in the German city of Trier, one of the most lavish festivals ever put on in Europe. Between July 30 and Aug. 10, Berne's Historisches Museum will recreate the atmosphere with an 11-day tournament.
Charles used wealth and display in an effort to convince Friedrich he should be raised to the rank of king, and even succeed him as emperor, offering his daughter Maria, whose beautiful profile portrait is on show, as a bride for Friedrich's son Maximilian.
But the conference was a failure and Friedrich left without even taking leave of the humiliated Charles. All over Europe cities and principalities made preparations for the inevitable war. Although a knight, Charles was far from chivalrous, with a reputation for cruelty. In the ensuing hostilities, Charles attacked the empire, conquered Nancy in Lorraine, marched into what is now Switzerland, taking the garrison of Grandson and, true to his reputation, hanged or drowned its defenders.
But his later defeat at the hands of Swiss forces on March 2, 1476 marked the start of his downfall. He abandoned a massive pile of treasure, the legendary Burgundian booty, one of the biggest spoils of war in history, to the victorious Swiss confederates. Much of it is on show in the exhibition.
The ambitious Duke of Burgundy was later killed at the battle of Nancy on Jan. 5, 1477 by the Duke of Lorraine and his Swiss allies. His disfigured body, found days later, was identified by a page through its long fingernails. He was 43.
His death paved the way for French King Louis XI to reunite Burgundy with France, the eventual marriage of Charles's daughter Maria to Maximilian and the Habsburgs to spread their empire beyond Austria and Germany.
The exhibition ends with a magnificent Renaissance bust by Leone Leoni of Maria and Maximilian's grandson Charles V, known as the ruler on whose lands the sun never set, as his empire now included Spanish and Portuguese territories in South America.
Charles V, who grew up in the Burgundian Netherlands, had Charles's remains transferred to Bruges, in Belgium, where they rest to the this day, and where the exhibition moves next year from March 23 to July 21.
Full details of the exhibition are at www.charlesthebold.org
3 June 2008
Reuters News
By Jonathan Lynn
A new blockbuster exhibition in the Swiss capital Berne brings together treasures from the Middle Ages to illustrate a turning point in European history.
The show, running until Aug. 24, recreates the times of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, who poured his vast wealth into diplomatic and military efforts to knit his domains in France and the Low Countries into a single kingdom.
But the duke, whose French title "Charles le Temeraire" also translates as Charles the Rash, lost almost everything in his bid to create a new empire in the heart of 15th century Europe. The workaholic duke's efforts to create an effective administration to rule his scattered territories served as a model for other European princes.
But his defeats at the hands of Swiss confederates and their allies cleared the way for the fragmented kingdom of France to coalesce around its monarch in Paris, and secured the power of the Habsburgs in central Europe for centuries to come. And the failure of Charles, whose court was the most magnificent in medieval Europe, was the decisive moment in the long drive by the Swiss cantons for independence.
"The significance of Charles the Bold for European history is that he led a court which set the standard for the European princes of his day," curator Susan Marti told Reuters. "And with his death power relations in Europe were once again completely reorganised, territories were recombined and new cultural traditions emerged."
WORKS OF ART IN CONVERSATION
For Marti, the power of the exhibition, which shows more than 200 pieces from around 40 different museums and collections, is the way it juxtaposes different works of art.
"What you should not miss are the 'conversations' between the individual objects -- the suits of armour in front of the tapestries, the illuminated books by the tapestries," she said. Thus the knights and ladies depicted in the tapestries are wearing similar armour, silks, brocades and jewels to those on show in the exhibition.
The most magnificent tapestry on show is almost abstract, the extraordinary "Tapestry of a Thousand Flowers", made for Charles's father Philip the Good. One of the highpoints of European art, it shows that Burgundy will bloom like paradise under the duke's rule.
From Bruges come some of the masterpieces of Flemish painting, such as Hans Memling's Moreel Triptych, showing St. Christopher and the infant Jesus. On the side panels, the rich donor and his family kneel piously, the wealth of their clothes picked out by Memling.
Among several illuminated manuscripts on show, a highlight is the duke's exquisitely decorated prayerbook, on loan from the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, showing Charles kneeling before his patron St. George.
In a sensational juxtaposition, the next cabinet shows the golden reliquary donated by Charles to Liege cathedral after he captured the city. St. George, bearing a marked facial resemblance to Charles, stands over the duke, in a message to the burghers of Liege that their new master enjoys divine protection.
The show contains several suits of armour, clearly designed more for display than protection, the medieval equivalent of a flashy sports car. One of the prize exhibits is the armour worn by Holy Roman Emperor Friedrich III and his horse when he met Charles in 1473.
LAVISH FESTIVITIES
The armour is part of an installation commemorating their two-month conference in the German city of Trier, one of the most lavish festivals ever put on in Europe. Between July 30 and Aug. 10, Berne's Historisches Museum will recreate the atmosphere with an 11-day tournament.
Charles used wealth and display in an effort to convince Friedrich he should be raised to the rank of king, and even succeed him as emperor, offering his daughter Maria, whose beautiful profile portrait is on show, as a bride for Friedrich's son Maximilian.
But the conference was a failure and Friedrich left without even taking leave of the humiliated Charles. All over Europe cities and principalities made preparations for the inevitable war. Although a knight, Charles was far from chivalrous, with a reputation for cruelty. In the ensuing hostilities, Charles attacked the empire, conquered Nancy in Lorraine, marched into what is now Switzerland, taking the garrison of Grandson and, true to his reputation, hanged or drowned its defenders.
But his later defeat at the hands of Swiss forces on March 2, 1476 marked the start of his downfall. He abandoned a massive pile of treasure, the legendary Burgundian booty, one of the biggest spoils of war in history, to the victorious Swiss confederates. Much of it is on show in the exhibition.
The ambitious Duke of Burgundy was later killed at the battle of Nancy on Jan. 5, 1477 by the Duke of Lorraine and his Swiss allies. His disfigured body, found days later, was identified by a page through its long fingernails. He was 43.
His death paved the way for French King Louis XI to reunite Burgundy with France, the eventual marriage of Charles's daughter Maria to Maximilian and the Habsburgs to spread their empire beyond Austria and Germany.
The exhibition ends with a magnificent Renaissance bust by Leone Leoni of Maria and Maximilian's grandson Charles V, known as the ruler on whose lands the sun never set, as his empire now included Spanish and Portuguese territories in South America.
Charles V, who grew up in the Burgundian Netherlands, had Charles's remains transferred to Bruges, in Belgium, where they rest to the this day, and where the exhibition moves next year from March 23 to July 21.
Full details of the exhibition are at www.charlesthebold.org
Medieval Festival in Eastern Ontario, June 13-15
First ever Medieval Festival moves into Eastern Ontario June 13 to 15
5 June 2008
Canada NewsWire
Step back a thousand years to the majestic and chivalrous middle ages at Upper Canada Village's Medieval Festival, the first event of its kind in Eastern Ontario, running for three days only - Friday to Sunday, June 13 to 15. This spectacular event features a full array of entertainment designed to amaze and dazzle all ages in a recreated medieval encampment encompassing 10 acres in Morrisburg, just an hour south of Ottawa.
Guests can go back to a time when wizards conjured secret spells, falcons hunted for their masters, warfare was conducted with trebuchets, and knights jousted on horseback to win royal favour. Join in the fun and come dressed in medieval garb to blend in with the folk on the shire. Along with the jousting tournaments with knights on horseback and trebuchet demonstrations, five stages will feature continuous entertainment: falconry shows, jugglers, jesters, magicians, musicians, gypsies, comedians, dancers, and even belly dancers. See the Ottawa Sword Guild, our very own Wizard, the Knotty Knickers, Zoltan the Adequate, the Knot Brothers, Pester the Jester, Captain Jack Sparrow. Enjoy medieval guitar, bagpipe, and harp music that will all add to the faire atmosphere. Medieval kids games, story-telling, artisans, a medieval marketplace, and the Bow & Arrow food tent and pub round out the daily activities. Children will even have the chance to be knighted.
A special feature of the Festival is the Knights of Valour, long renowned for their exciting shows of horsemanship, who will perform two action-packed shows per day (one heavy armour joust and one light) in a style worthy of Kings! As well, the Canadian Raptor Conservancy will mount three demonstrations per day of eagles, falcons, hawks, owls, and kestrels. On Saturday evening, a sumptuous King's Banquet will highlight medieval-style fare and the Tartan Terrors, featuring a two-time World Champion Bagpiper and guitar music, the driving tones of drums from around the world, championship calibre Highland Dancers, and internationally recognized comedic performers.
The Festival takes place 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, June 13 and 14 and from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday. Admission is only $15-adults, $12-seniors, $10-teens, $7-youths, and $3-children 2 to 4. The King's Banquet requires a separate ticket and advance reservations are recommended as space is limited.
The Festival takes place at the Upper Canada Village Heritage Park in Morrisburg, along the St. Lawrence River and an easy drive from Ottawa, Cornwall, Montreal and Kingston, as well as close to a number of U.S. bridge crossings. This location in the Upper Canada Region is about 3-1/2 hours east of Toronto. Lots of lodging and camping is nearby. See the Festival website for more information: www.medievalfestival.ca.
Upper Canada Village is operated by the St. Lawrence Parks Commission, an agency of the Government of Ontario. An award-winning 1860s living history museum, the Village is now open daily from 9:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. until October 5, then on Fall weekends in October. It is located at Exit 758 off Highway 401
5 June 2008
Canada NewsWire
Step back a thousand years to the majestic and chivalrous middle ages at Upper Canada Village's Medieval Festival, the first event of its kind in Eastern Ontario, running for three days only - Friday to Sunday, June 13 to 15. This spectacular event features a full array of entertainment designed to amaze and dazzle all ages in a recreated medieval encampment encompassing 10 acres in Morrisburg, just an hour south of Ottawa.
Guests can go back to a time when wizards conjured secret spells, falcons hunted for their masters, warfare was conducted with trebuchets, and knights jousted on horseback to win royal favour. Join in the fun and come dressed in medieval garb to blend in with the folk on the shire. Along with the jousting tournaments with knights on horseback and trebuchet demonstrations, five stages will feature continuous entertainment: falconry shows, jugglers, jesters, magicians, musicians, gypsies, comedians, dancers, and even belly dancers. See the Ottawa Sword Guild, our very own Wizard, the Knotty Knickers, Zoltan the Adequate, the Knot Brothers, Pester the Jester, Captain Jack Sparrow. Enjoy medieval guitar, bagpipe, and harp music that will all add to the faire atmosphere. Medieval kids games, story-telling, artisans, a medieval marketplace, and the Bow & Arrow food tent and pub round out the daily activities. Children will even have the chance to be knighted.
A special feature of the Festival is the Knights of Valour, long renowned for their exciting shows of horsemanship, who will perform two action-packed shows per day (one heavy armour joust and one light) in a style worthy of Kings! As well, the Canadian Raptor Conservancy will mount three demonstrations per day of eagles, falcons, hawks, owls, and kestrels. On Saturday evening, a sumptuous King's Banquet will highlight medieval-style fare and the Tartan Terrors, featuring a two-time World Champion Bagpiper and guitar music, the driving tones of drums from around the world, championship calibre Highland Dancers, and internationally recognized comedic performers.
The Festival takes place 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, June 13 and 14 and from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday. Admission is only $15-adults, $12-seniors, $10-teens, $7-youths, and $3-children 2 to 4. The King's Banquet requires a separate ticket and advance reservations are recommended as space is limited.
The Festival takes place at the Upper Canada Village Heritage Park in Morrisburg, along the St. Lawrence River and an easy drive from Ottawa, Cornwall, Montreal and Kingston, as well as close to a number of U.S. bridge crossings. This location in the Upper Canada Region is about 3-1/2 hours east of Toronto. Lots of lodging and camping is nearby. See the Festival website for more information: www.medievalfestival.ca.
Upper Canada Village is operated by the St. Lawrence Parks Commission, an agency of the Government of Ontario. An award-winning 1860s living history museum, the Village is now open daily from 9:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. until October 5, then on Fall weekends in October. It is located at Exit 758 off Highway 401
Swedish writer Margit Sandemo
Her novels have taken Scandinavia and Eastern Europe by storm with more than 170...
6 June 2008
Eastern Daily Press
Her novels have taken Scandinavia and Eastern Europe by storm with more than 170 to her name but Margit Sandemo is still relatively unknown in the western world. But now the best-selling Swedish author's dreams of breaking into a new audience have come true thanks to the linguistic skills of a Norfolk man.
Spellbound is the first in Ms Sandemo's Legend of the Ice People series, which has already sold 25 million copies in Scandinavia and nine other European countries. But it has only now been translated into English thanks to the hard work and dedication of Norwich City Council surveyor Greg Herring, who has taken on the enormous task of translating the first six books in the multi-volume series in his spare time.
The humble former fire-fighter has put in hours of work, poring over the dictionary and thesaurus from his home near Shipdham, to give an accurate translation of the fantasy saga.
Mr Herring, 58, learned Swedish after moving there in his early 20s. “A friend of mine was emigrating to Australia and I had thought of going with him but I met a Swedish girl and moved to her home country instead,” he said.
He worked as a fire-fighter in the town of Vallentuna, just north of Stockholm, and gradually picked up the language which he found quite straightforward. “Whereas in English there are so many exceptions to the rule, Swedish tends to stick to the rules,” he said. “It is a very different language and there are not the number of words as in English so I tend to sit with a thesaurus to find alternatives.”
The stories focus on the Ice People who are a seemingly accursed clan of strange mountain people who live high above a glacier barrier in the mountains north of Trondheim. The saga chronicles the battle between good and evil from their interactions with lowlanders and eventually with other countries.
Mr Herring said: “It follows a historical thread but I don't know if she made up the ice people or not. Margit says they were there but she is a bit of a mystic and I can accept people have different beliefs. She is an unusual character and I am trying to get that across in the books.”
It is a far cry from the naïve translating he did in Sweden for technical manuals and talking books for the blind but he is revelling in the challenge, having been introduced to Ms Sandemo, now in her 80s, by a mutual friend. “I am by no means an expert but I enjoy doing it,” he said. “It does not have to be too accurate because it is fantasy but it has to be readable. I have to put across how she wrote it. She can speak some English and she has read it and said she likes it.”
Mr Herring hopes that now an English version is available and it can be read by a much wider market, tentative offers to make the stories into films may be realised. He said: “She has had a couple of approaches, one from George Lucas who had heard about it from a German translation but as it was not in English at that time he has just held on to it, but who knows where it might lead now? It is a long way from doing an instruction book on how to work a fire alarm.”
There are a total of 47 books in the Ice People series so Mr Herring would be hard pushed to translate all those in his spare time but he is taking each day as it comes. “I did not realise how long it would take but I'm just a small cog in a big wheel.”
Spellbound is published by Tagman Press on June 11. Margit Sandemo will be in Harrods, in Knightsbridge, for a book signing on June 14.
Who is Margit Sandemo?
She was born Margit Underdal on April 2, 1924 in Valdres, Norway, the daughter of a Swedish countess and a Norwegian poet. She was the second of five children but her parents divorced in 1930 and her mother took them all to Sweden. She read the works of Shakespeare at the age of eight. She has only been writing since 1964.
Her books weave supernatural themes with historical facts and events mainly take place in Europe in the Middle Ages. Settings include medieval knight castles, bewitched forests and idyllic manor houses.
She has been the best-selling author in Scandinavia since the 1980s and has sold more than 35 million books
6 June 2008
Eastern Daily Press
Her novels have taken Scandinavia and Eastern Europe by storm with more than 170 to her name but Margit Sandemo is still relatively unknown in the western world. But now the best-selling Swedish author's dreams of breaking into a new audience have come true thanks to the linguistic skills of a Norfolk man.
Spellbound is the first in Ms Sandemo's Legend of the Ice People series, which has already sold 25 million copies in Scandinavia and nine other European countries. But it has only now been translated into English thanks to the hard work and dedication of Norwich City Council surveyor Greg Herring, who has taken on the enormous task of translating the first six books in the multi-volume series in his spare time.
The humble former fire-fighter has put in hours of work, poring over the dictionary and thesaurus from his home near Shipdham, to give an accurate translation of the fantasy saga.
Mr Herring, 58, learned Swedish after moving there in his early 20s. “A friend of mine was emigrating to Australia and I had thought of going with him but I met a Swedish girl and moved to her home country instead,” he said.
He worked as a fire-fighter in the town of Vallentuna, just north of Stockholm, and gradually picked up the language which he found quite straightforward. “Whereas in English there are so many exceptions to the rule, Swedish tends to stick to the rules,” he said. “It is a very different language and there are not the number of words as in English so I tend to sit with a thesaurus to find alternatives.”
The stories focus on the Ice People who are a seemingly accursed clan of strange mountain people who live high above a glacier barrier in the mountains north of Trondheim. The saga chronicles the battle between good and evil from their interactions with lowlanders and eventually with other countries.
Mr Herring said: “It follows a historical thread but I don't know if she made up the ice people or not. Margit says they were there but she is a bit of a mystic and I can accept people have different beliefs. She is an unusual character and I am trying to get that across in the books.”
It is a far cry from the naïve translating he did in Sweden for technical manuals and talking books for the blind but he is revelling in the challenge, having been introduced to Ms Sandemo, now in her 80s, by a mutual friend. “I am by no means an expert but I enjoy doing it,” he said. “It does not have to be too accurate because it is fantasy but it has to be readable. I have to put across how she wrote it. She can speak some English and she has read it and said she likes it.”
Mr Herring hopes that now an English version is available and it can be read by a much wider market, tentative offers to make the stories into films may be realised. He said: “She has had a couple of approaches, one from George Lucas who had heard about it from a German translation but as it was not in English at that time he has just held on to it, but who knows where it might lead now? It is a long way from doing an instruction book on how to work a fire alarm.”
There are a total of 47 books in the Ice People series so Mr Herring would be hard pushed to translate all those in his spare time but he is taking each day as it comes. “I did not realise how long it would take but I'm just a small cog in a big wheel.”
Spellbound is published by Tagman Press on June 11. Margit Sandemo will be in Harrods, in Knightsbridge, for a book signing on June 14.
Who is Margit Sandemo?
She was born Margit Underdal on April 2, 1924 in Valdres, Norway, the daughter of a Swedish countess and a Norwegian poet. She was the second of five children but her parents divorced in 1930 and her mother took them all to Sweden. She read the works of Shakespeare at the age of eight. She has only been writing since 1964.
Her books weave supernatural themes with historical facts and events mainly take place in Europe in the Middle Ages. Settings include medieval knight castles, bewitched forests and idyllic manor houses.
She has been the best-selling author in Scandinavia since the 1980s and has sold more than 35 million books
Archaeological finds in Looe
Rich pickings in Looe sees time team uncover medieval history
4 June 2008
Cornish Guardian
Local archaeologists have joined the nation's favourite specialist film crew in Looe to uncover the history of two derelict chapels. Channel 4's Time Team came to the town last week and dug trenches in the fields at Hannafore, West Looe and on Looe Island to delve into the history of the chapel ruins.
The two religious sites, one on the island which dates back to 1139, and the other opposite on the mainland at Hannafore, were the focus of the dig and the team wanted to find out if they were linked or had pilgrim connections. Tony Robinson and Mick Aston, along with other regulars from the show, spent last Wednesday, Thursday and Friday filming different scenes for the programme which is due to be aired next year.
The experts discovered a lot more than they expected including human bones on the island and a standing stone in the gardens. On the mainland at the ruins on top of the hill they also found human bones, a post hole, and pieces of pottery which may date back to the 13th century. Another trench was also set up at the opening of the field at Hannafore and a wall was discovered which was believed to be part of a monk's house.
The Royal Navy also helped in the project and dived off the island to find a wreck and different artefacts. Tony Robinson, the show's presenter, said: "The dig has gone fantastically well. It's such a romantic notion and the sites are lovely. They date back way into prehistoric times and add another layer to Looe's history."
So much new information was discovered that a local historian, who previously wrote a book on the two chapels, is preparing to rewrite it. Tom Scott, the programme's researcher, said: "The dig has been a real challenge because one site is on an island and the other on the mainland. It'll definitely make for an exciting programme."
The team decided to come to Looe after they received many letters suggesting the site. Tom added: "We came down to have a look and fell in love with the gorgeous island and the exciting site. We have found much more than we expected including lots of things from different periods, and have really managed to rewrite history books."
There are many theories now as to how the chapels are linked. One is that pilgrims from medieval times who used to travel to the chapel on the island across a causeway, built a replica on the mainland because the crossing became too dangerous. Another theory is that the chapels acted as lighthouses to warn boats of the dangerous rocks. The archaeologists were also looking into whether the whole field at Hannafore was once an entire pilgrim village.
A report will be written up about the sites now and the artefacts found in the dig will be placed in the Royal Cornwall Museum in Truro. The dig in Looe is episode five of the new series and will be aired between January and March next year.
4 June 2008
Cornish Guardian
Local archaeologists have joined the nation's favourite specialist film crew in Looe to uncover the history of two derelict chapels. Channel 4's Time Team came to the town last week and dug trenches in the fields at Hannafore, West Looe and on Looe Island to delve into the history of the chapel ruins.
The two religious sites, one on the island which dates back to 1139, and the other opposite on the mainland at Hannafore, were the focus of the dig and the team wanted to find out if they were linked or had pilgrim connections. Tony Robinson and Mick Aston, along with other regulars from the show, spent last Wednesday, Thursday and Friday filming different scenes for the programme which is due to be aired next year.
The experts discovered a lot more than they expected including human bones on the island and a standing stone in the gardens. On the mainland at the ruins on top of the hill they also found human bones, a post hole, and pieces of pottery which may date back to the 13th century. Another trench was also set up at the opening of the field at Hannafore and a wall was discovered which was believed to be part of a monk's house.
The Royal Navy also helped in the project and dived off the island to find a wreck and different artefacts. Tony Robinson, the show's presenter, said: "The dig has gone fantastically well. It's such a romantic notion and the sites are lovely. They date back way into prehistoric times and add another layer to Looe's history."
So much new information was discovered that a local historian, who previously wrote a book on the two chapels, is preparing to rewrite it. Tom Scott, the programme's researcher, said: "The dig has been a real challenge because one site is on an island and the other on the mainland. It'll definitely make for an exciting programme."
The team decided to come to Looe after they received many letters suggesting the site. Tom added: "We came down to have a look and fell in love with the gorgeous island and the exciting site. We have found much more than we expected including lots of things from different periods, and have really managed to rewrite history books."
There are many theories now as to how the chapels are linked. One is that pilgrims from medieval times who used to travel to the chapel on the island across a causeway, built a replica on the mainland because the crossing became too dangerous. Another theory is that the chapels acted as lighthouses to warn boats of the dangerous rocks. The archaeologists were also looking into whether the whole field at Hannafore was once an entire pilgrim village.
A report will be written up about the sites now and the artefacts found in the dig will be placed in the Royal Cornwall Museum in Truro. The dig in Looe is episode five of the new series and will be aired between January and March next year.
Sunday, June 01, 2008
Another view of the International Congress on Medieval Studies (not a positive one)
A Dark Age for Medievalists
By Charlotte Allen
2 June 2008
Weekly Standard
Standing before an audience of about 25 academics, all professors and graduate students specializing in the Middle Ages, in a chilly classroom on the vast campus of Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Jeff Persels, a lanky associate professor of French and director of European studies at the University of South Carolina, was reading aloud a scholarly paper at the 43rd International Congress on Medieval Studies. The paper's title was "The Wine in the Urine: Managing Human Waste in French Farce." The paper was about, well, the wine in the urine, or perhaps the urine in the wine. Its topic is a 15th-century farce, or lowlife comic drama, about an adulterous wife who uses a wine bottle as an impromptu chamber pot, with predictably gross results involving her husband and her lover.
Persels's paper didn't discuss the play simply as an example of Rabelaisian-style scatology, however. The perspective he used was the postmodernist discipline of "cultural studies," which means pushing works of literature (or movies or television shows or ad campaigns or whatever) through a Marxist cheesegrater as examples of the way society conditions its members to accept the views of a dominant class. In Persels's view, the wine-bottle farce marked a stage in the development of what he called the "bourgeois fecal habitus." Translated out of postmodern-ese into plain English, that means the tendency of uptight middle-class people not to want to talk in public about matters pertaining to the bathroom and to assume that those who do are kind of crude. "The excretory experience became associated with the proletariat," Persels explained. Although he seemed eager to demonstrate that he personally didn't share those uptight middle-class views, at least one of the academics in his audience remained unconvinced that a secret bourgeois habitus didn't lurk underneath his antinomian veneer. "Excretory?" she whispered to a fellow medievalist sitting next to her. "Why doesn't he just say shit?"
And you thought that the Middle Ages was all about jousting knights and damsels in distress. That's because you have never attended the medievalists' congress, the annual first-weekend-in-May ritual at Western Michigan where Persels read his wine-bottle theorizing and where it is definitely not your grandfather's Middle Ages. Persels's paper was part of a Thursday morning panel titled "Waste Studies: Excrement in the Middle Ages" and devoting a full hour and a half to human effluvia. The other two scholars that morning read papers dealing with excrement in Icelandic sagas and the theology of latrines.
Waste studies is a brand new academic discipline invented by Susan Signe Morrison, a dark-haired, extroverted 49-year-old professor of English at Texas State University's San Marcos campus and mother of two (her husband is also an English professor) who organized the session and admitted with good-humored candor in an email that her new field's disgust-provoking subject matter might be a "challenge" to scholars thinking about specializing in it. Morrison's own specialty as a medievalist used to be women on pilgrimages, but then she got the idea for her latest book, Excrement in the Late Middle Ages: Sacred Filth and Chaucer's Fecopoetics, forthcoming this September. In her email she explained that the idea for the fecal book came to her partly because she noticed that dung and privies played a role in the works of Chaucer, Dante, and other medieval authors, and partly because her "son was potty-training." And so a new scholarly industry was born.
To read the rest of this article go to the Weekly Standard website.
By Charlotte Allen
2 June 2008
Weekly Standard
Standing before an audience of about 25 academics, all professors and graduate students specializing in the Middle Ages, in a chilly classroom on the vast campus of Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Jeff Persels, a lanky associate professor of French and director of European studies at the University of South Carolina, was reading aloud a scholarly paper at the 43rd International Congress on Medieval Studies. The paper's title was "The Wine in the Urine: Managing Human Waste in French Farce." The paper was about, well, the wine in the urine, or perhaps the urine in the wine. Its topic is a 15th-century farce, or lowlife comic drama, about an adulterous wife who uses a wine bottle as an impromptu chamber pot, with predictably gross results involving her husband and her lover.
Persels's paper didn't discuss the play simply as an example of Rabelaisian-style scatology, however. The perspective he used was the postmodernist discipline of "cultural studies," which means pushing works of literature (or movies or television shows or ad campaigns or whatever) through a Marxist cheesegrater as examples of the way society conditions its members to accept the views of a dominant class. In Persels's view, the wine-bottle farce marked a stage in the development of what he called the "bourgeois fecal habitus." Translated out of postmodern-ese into plain English, that means the tendency of uptight middle-class people not to want to talk in public about matters pertaining to the bathroom and to assume that those who do are kind of crude. "The excretory experience became associated with the proletariat," Persels explained. Although he seemed eager to demonstrate that he personally didn't share those uptight middle-class views, at least one of the academics in his audience remained unconvinced that a secret bourgeois habitus didn't lurk underneath his antinomian veneer. "Excretory?" she whispered to a fellow medievalist sitting next to her. "Why doesn't he just say shit?"
And you thought that the Middle Ages was all about jousting knights and damsels in distress. That's because you have never attended the medievalists' congress, the annual first-weekend-in-May ritual at Western Michigan where Persels read his wine-bottle theorizing and where it is definitely not your grandfather's Middle Ages. Persels's paper was part of a Thursday morning panel titled "Waste Studies: Excrement in the Middle Ages" and devoting a full hour and a half to human effluvia. The other two scholars that morning read papers dealing with excrement in Icelandic sagas and the theology of latrines.
Waste studies is a brand new academic discipline invented by Susan Signe Morrison, a dark-haired, extroverted 49-year-old professor of English at Texas State University's San Marcos campus and mother of two (her husband is also an English professor) who organized the session and admitted with good-humored candor in an email that her new field's disgust-provoking subject matter might be a "challenge" to scholars thinking about specializing in it. Morrison's own specialty as a medievalist used to be women on pilgrimages, but then she got the idea for her latest book, Excrement in the Late Middle Ages: Sacred Filth and Chaucer's Fecopoetics, forthcoming this September. In her email she explained that the idea for the fecal book came to her partly because she noticed that dung and privies played a role in the works of Chaucer, Dante, and other medieval authors, and partly because her "son was potty-training." And so a new scholarly industry was born.
To read the rest of this article go to the Weekly Standard website.
Memorial service for Herbert Fowler, professor emeritus
SERVICE SET FOR HERBERT K. FOWLER, PROFESSOR EMERITUS OF ARCHITECTURE
29 May 2008
States News Service
A memorial service for Herbert Keatinge Fowler, a professor emeritus of architecture, will take place at 3 p.m. Saturday, May 31, on what would have been Fowler' 87th birthday. The service will take place in Giffels Auditorium, Old Main. The traffic gate north of Old Main will be open from 2:30 to 3 p.m. to accommodate attendees with mobility challenges.
Fowler died last month after a long illness. "Herb Fowler was a consummate teacher, both a gentle man and a gentleman," said Jeff Shannon, dean of the School of Architecture. "He will be greatly missed."
Fowler came to the University of Arkansas in 1952 to design the Animal Sciences Building, among the first structures on campus designed in the modern International style. Architecture department chair John Williams recognized his talent and hired Fowler, who went on to teach for 37 years at the university.
Murray Smart, a professor emeritus of architecture and former dean of the School of Architecture, praised Fowler' teaching: "Herb was a listener as well as a teacher. He would talk to a student and find out what he wanted to accomplish, then help him reach his goals."
Fowler' research focused on medieval architecture and cities. He retraced pilgrimage routes through France to Santiago de Compostela in Spain, developing an extensive knowledge of the churches and monasteries along these routes.
"He brought a special understanding to students about the role of churches and monasteries in medieval life, and their role as hospitals and hotels to pilgrims as they made a sacred, once-in-a-lifetime journey," Smart said.
Throughout his teaching career, Fowler continued to design buildings in a style shaped by the clean functionality of the International style and the sensitivity to site and materials espoused by Frank Lloyd Wright. Fowler' greatest design achievement was his own residence. Situated on a bluff west of Fayetteville, offering breathtaking views of the Boston Mountains, Deepwood was home to Fowler and his family for 35 years.
Herbert Fowler was born May 31, 1921, in Lewiston, Idaho, to Herbert Eugene Fowler and Mary Keatinge Fowler. He attended Yale University in 1939 but his studies were interrupted by Army service in the Pacific theater during World War II. After the war Fowler completed bachelor of arts and bachelor of architecture degrees at Yale. He subsequently worked at architectural firms in New Haven, Conn., and New York City. He met and married Marie Ellen "Judy" Booth in 1952, shortly before joining the University of Arkansas architecture faculty.
Fowler' professional honors included a Fulbright Scholarship, which supported a year of study in Oslo, Norway, and two Rehmann scholarships. He was a member of the Society of Architectural Historians and the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
Late in his teaching career Fowler developed an advanced course, Design Determinants, that addressed tensions between philosophical and pragmatic considerations in design, and the social and environmental forces that help shape the design process. Fowler retired in 1989 as a professor emeritus, but returned to teach this course by popular demand.
In 2007, Fowler' family established the Herbert K. Fowler Award at the School of Architecture. Each year, an architecture student with exceptional drawing ability is selected to receive the honor.
Fowler was preceded in death by his wife Judy in 2005. He is survived by his sisters Mary Elizabeth Fowler and Helen Eugenia "Jean" Parsons, his son Ian Keatinge Fowler and daughter-in-law Olga Luz Arango, his daughter Alison Cope Fowler, and grandson Oliver Luke Fowler. Memorials may be given to the following organizations:
The Humane Society of the Ozarks
The Darcy Fowler Memorial Book Fund, at the Fayetteville Public Library
KUAF (Fayetteville Public Radio)
Friends of Lake Wedington
Fayetteville Natural Heritage Society
29 May 2008
States News Service
A memorial service for Herbert Keatinge Fowler, a professor emeritus of architecture, will take place at 3 p.m. Saturday, May 31, on what would have been Fowler' 87th birthday. The service will take place in Giffels Auditorium, Old Main. The traffic gate north of Old Main will be open from 2:30 to 3 p.m. to accommodate attendees with mobility challenges.
Fowler died last month after a long illness. "Herb Fowler was a consummate teacher, both a gentle man and a gentleman," said Jeff Shannon, dean of the School of Architecture. "He will be greatly missed."
Fowler came to the University of Arkansas in 1952 to design the Animal Sciences Building, among the first structures on campus designed in the modern International style. Architecture department chair John Williams recognized his talent and hired Fowler, who went on to teach for 37 years at the university.
Murray Smart, a professor emeritus of architecture and former dean of the School of Architecture, praised Fowler' teaching: "Herb was a listener as well as a teacher. He would talk to a student and find out what he wanted to accomplish, then help him reach his goals."
Fowler' research focused on medieval architecture and cities. He retraced pilgrimage routes through France to Santiago de Compostela in Spain, developing an extensive knowledge of the churches and monasteries along these routes.
"He brought a special understanding to students about the role of churches and monasteries in medieval life, and their role as hospitals and hotels to pilgrims as they made a sacred, once-in-a-lifetime journey," Smart said.
Throughout his teaching career, Fowler continued to design buildings in a style shaped by the clean functionality of the International style and the sensitivity to site and materials espoused by Frank Lloyd Wright. Fowler' greatest design achievement was his own residence. Situated on a bluff west of Fayetteville, offering breathtaking views of the Boston Mountains, Deepwood was home to Fowler and his family for 35 years.
Herbert Fowler was born May 31, 1921, in Lewiston, Idaho, to Herbert Eugene Fowler and Mary Keatinge Fowler. He attended Yale University in 1939 but his studies were interrupted by Army service in the Pacific theater during World War II. After the war Fowler completed bachelor of arts and bachelor of architecture degrees at Yale. He subsequently worked at architectural firms in New Haven, Conn., and New York City. He met and married Marie Ellen "Judy" Booth in 1952, shortly before joining the University of Arkansas architecture faculty.
Fowler' professional honors included a Fulbright Scholarship, which supported a year of study in Oslo, Norway, and two Rehmann scholarships. He was a member of the Society of Architectural Historians and the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
Late in his teaching career Fowler developed an advanced course, Design Determinants, that addressed tensions between philosophical and pragmatic considerations in design, and the social and environmental forces that help shape the design process. Fowler retired in 1989 as a professor emeritus, but returned to teach this course by popular demand.
In 2007, Fowler' family established the Herbert K. Fowler Award at the School of Architecture. Each year, an architecture student with exceptional drawing ability is selected to receive the honor.
Fowler was preceded in death by his wife Judy in 2005. He is survived by his sisters Mary Elizabeth Fowler and Helen Eugenia "Jean" Parsons, his son Ian Keatinge Fowler and daughter-in-law Olga Luz Arango, his daughter Alison Cope Fowler, and grandson Oliver Luke Fowler. Memorials may be given to the following organizations:
The Humane Society of the Ozarks
The Darcy Fowler Memorial Book Fund, at the Fayetteville Public Library
KUAF (Fayetteville Public Radio)
Friends of Lake Wedington
Fayetteville Natural Heritage Society
Alfred the Great
Alfred The Great Stood Up For Defense And Learning
DONNA HOWELL
29 May 2008
Investor's Business Daily
Danish Viking invasions ripped through ninth-century England. One by one, local Anglo-Saxon tribes -- not yet organized into a nation -- fell to marauders. Villages burned, monasteries crumbled. These were the Dark Ages, and hope shone dim. "All of English-speaking civilization was utterly endangered," said Mercer University medieval historian Eric Klingelhofer.
One man decided to stand and fight the Viking threat no matter what the cost. Alfred, the fifth son of Wessex ruler Aethelwulf, vowed to resist the Danes and lead his people to peace no matter what dismal circumstances confronted him. His courage and strategic approach largely prevented the end of the world as the Anglo-Saxons knew it, historians say. His determination to protect his people from threats and fortify their hearts and minds earned him his name in the annals of history -- Alfred the Great.
Alfred (849-899) was born the youngest son of the West Saxons' ruling couple, King Aethelwulf and wife Osburh. No England existed -- just a shared language among neighboring tribes and a common enemy: invading Vikings. "It was seven kingdoms, but then down to only five," Klingelhofer said. "The last man standing was Alfred, even when his army was crushingly defeated."
Alfred had stood far behind several brothers in line for the throne. He took in every chance to watch and learn. Accounts suggest that young Alfred traveled twice across Europe, once as a youngster and later with his father. "As a child he was taken to Rome, as the most expendable younger son of this king of southern England," said biographer David Sturdy. "(Aethelwulf) sent his son as a token of good will -- this poor child of 4 or 5, with a bodyguard and pack mules of gold or silver."
The money was a donation for rebuilding Saxon interests in battle-ravaged Rome, Sturdy says. This arduous journey no doubt made an impression on Alfred, historians say. It exposed him to grandeur, destruction and the expanse of Europe. The young, devout Alfred sought to learn as much as he could and thought of becoming a monk.
Another story of Alfred's childhood describes his mother showing her sons a book, which was a rarity in those days. She said it would be a gift to the son who could read it first. The challenge beckoned to Alfred. "The littlest one struggled at it and struggled at it, while the others were out horseback riding and so on," said Klingelhofer. "He studied it and he got the book."
Alfred watched as his brothers successively ruled the volatile kingdom. They died of illness and from battle after short reigns, leaving just Alfred to take power in his early 20s. Klingelhofer says the task facing Alfred likely inspired the author of "The Lord of the Rings." "He must have been a model, in the back of the mind of Anglo-Saxon expert J.R.R. Tolkien, of people who go on despite terrible odds, no matter how bad it got," Klingelhofer said. "He learned the hard way -- by failing."
The Vikings sacked Wessex, killing many of Alfred's fighters. Some remaining landowners switched allegiance to save their lives, and Alfred retreated into the tidal marshes of Somerset to devise a strategy. He stayed there a winter. It was no act of cowardice, but perseverance. Other rulers of Alfred's day had simply fled after defeat.
Alfred learned from his brothers' and other local rulers' mistakes. He knew the danger of fighting the superior Viking army in the open -- or in the strongholds it made of old Roman towns in the countryside. He trusted his own observations and abandoned traditional battle practices. He knew he had to learn to fight creatively, says historian Alfred Smyth, author of "King Alfred the Great" and other books on medieval Anglo-Saxons.
While wintering in the marsh, Alfred and loyalists quietly recruited locals who formed a guerrilla force. He had little to offer them beyond the example of his own resolve. So inspiring was Alfred's initiative, and his words of victory, that they joined him. This ragtag group took on the Vikings the following spring. At first light, Alfred's fighters surprised the enemy, camped on his estate at Edington, an area the king knew well. They took back the land and drove the Vikings into retreat. "He didn't actually destroy his enemies," Smyth said. "He forced them into submission."
Knowing that symbols can be powerful tools, Alfred had the Viking leader baptized, and showed him and his men the door. "What they would have done to him was cut his heart out," said Sturdy. "He forgave the Vikings who'd overrun his kingdom and just sent them home in disgrace."
Alfred knew diplomacy would pay off. He later pledged a truce with the Vikings that tempered relations. Then he turned his attentions to home, where he set out to better the lives of his people. Recognizing that education broadened their horizons, Alfred urged his subjects to learn to read. He brought in scholars from afar to help translate important Latin texts into English, and even translated several texts himself. Alfred's scholarly achievement stands out, especially when paired with his prowess in battle. Determination fueled both.
DONNA HOWELL
29 May 2008
Investor's Business Daily
Danish Viking invasions ripped through ninth-century England. One by one, local Anglo-Saxon tribes -- not yet organized into a nation -- fell to marauders. Villages burned, monasteries crumbled. These were the Dark Ages, and hope shone dim. "All of English-speaking civilization was utterly endangered," said Mercer University medieval historian Eric Klingelhofer.
One man decided to stand and fight the Viking threat no matter what the cost. Alfred, the fifth son of Wessex ruler Aethelwulf, vowed to resist the Danes and lead his people to peace no matter what dismal circumstances confronted him. His courage and strategic approach largely prevented the end of the world as the Anglo-Saxons knew it, historians say. His determination to protect his people from threats and fortify their hearts and minds earned him his name in the annals of history -- Alfred the Great.
Alfred (849-899) was born the youngest son of the West Saxons' ruling couple, King Aethelwulf and wife Osburh. No England existed -- just a shared language among neighboring tribes and a common enemy: invading Vikings. "It was seven kingdoms, but then down to only five," Klingelhofer said. "The last man standing was Alfred, even when his army was crushingly defeated."
Alfred had stood far behind several brothers in line for the throne. He took in every chance to watch and learn. Accounts suggest that young Alfred traveled twice across Europe, once as a youngster and later with his father. "As a child he was taken to Rome, as the most expendable younger son of this king of southern England," said biographer David Sturdy. "(Aethelwulf) sent his son as a token of good will -- this poor child of 4 or 5, with a bodyguard and pack mules of gold or silver."
The money was a donation for rebuilding Saxon interests in battle-ravaged Rome, Sturdy says. This arduous journey no doubt made an impression on Alfred, historians say. It exposed him to grandeur, destruction and the expanse of Europe. The young, devout Alfred sought to learn as much as he could and thought of becoming a monk.
Another story of Alfred's childhood describes his mother showing her sons a book, which was a rarity in those days. She said it would be a gift to the son who could read it first. The challenge beckoned to Alfred. "The littlest one struggled at it and struggled at it, while the others were out horseback riding and so on," said Klingelhofer. "He studied it and he got the book."
Alfred watched as his brothers successively ruled the volatile kingdom. They died of illness and from battle after short reigns, leaving just Alfred to take power in his early 20s. Klingelhofer says the task facing Alfred likely inspired the author of "The Lord of the Rings." "He must have been a model, in the back of the mind of Anglo-Saxon expert J.R.R. Tolkien, of people who go on despite terrible odds, no matter how bad it got," Klingelhofer said. "He learned the hard way -- by failing."
The Vikings sacked Wessex, killing many of Alfred's fighters. Some remaining landowners switched allegiance to save their lives, and Alfred retreated into the tidal marshes of Somerset to devise a strategy. He stayed there a winter. It was no act of cowardice, but perseverance. Other rulers of Alfred's day had simply fled after defeat.
Alfred learned from his brothers' and other local rulers' mistakes. He knew the danger of fighting the superior Viking army in the open -- or in the strongholds it made of old Roman towns in the countryside. He trusted his own observations and abandoned traditional battle practices. He knew he had to learn to fight creatively, says historian Alfred Smyth, author of "King Alfred the Great" and other books on medieval Anglo-Saxons.
While wintering in the marsh, Alfred and loyalists quietly recruited locals who formed a guerrilla force. He had little to offer them beyond the example of his own resolve. So inspiring was Alfred's initiative, and his words of victory, that they joined him. This ragtag group took on the Vikings the following spring. At first light, Alfred's fighters surprised the enemy, camped on his estate at Edington, an area the king knew well. They took back the land and drove the Vikings into retreat. "He didn't actually destroy his enemies," Smyth said. "He forced them into submission."
Knowing that symbols can be powerful tools, Alfred had the Viking leader baptized, and showed him and his men the door. "What they would have done to him was cut his heart out," said Sturdy. "He forgave the Vikings who'd overrun his kingdom and just sent them home in disgrace."
Alfred knew diplomacy would pay off. He later pledged a truce with the Vikings that tempered relations. Then he turned his attentions to home, where he set out to better the lives of his people. Recognizing that education broadened their horizons, Alfred urged his subjects to learn to read. He brought in scholars from afar to help translate important Latin texts into English, and even translated several texts himself. Alfred's scholarly achievement stands out, especially when paired with his prowess in battle. Determination fueled both.
15th century music
Songs in the key of death: Edward Wickham on how modern tastes in funeral music owe it all to a medieval composer who went out in style
Edward Wickham
28 May 2008
The Guardian
Even if it is an urban myth, it deserves retelling. A bereaved family requested Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody for their loved one's funeral service. A CD was duly played, but the organist allowed it to run on to the next track: Another One Bites the Dust. This is up there with another, perhaps mythical, occasion when an organist misinterpreted a couple's request for "the theme tune from Robin Hood" and, instead of playing Bryan Adams's (Everything I Do) I Do It for You from the Kevin Costner film, launched into this bracing lyric from another era: "Robin Hood, Robin Hood, riding through the glen."
Choice of funeral music dates us just as surely as clothes or what children's programmes you remember with affection. One of the UK's current favourites, according to a recent survey, is Monty Python's Always Look on the Bright Side of Life. The well-balanced funeral or memorial service will, of course, provide an opportunity for both celebration and seriousness: there is a place for Monty Python and Monteverdi. And the best composers of funeral music can turn on a sixpence. Purcell's apparently simple Funeral Sentences masterfully moves from melancholy to hope in just a couple of chord changes.
At its simplest level, this shift is between two modes: the major and the minor. The former is uplifting and extrovert; the latter contemplative and introvert. While many examples can be found to contradict these stereotypes, not least from non-western musical traditions, this association still seems so basic one is tempted to assume it is the result of some "deep grammar" of music with which we are born. But in reality, these emotional responses to musical modes are relatively modern, dating back to the 15th century - to November 27 1474, to be precise.
At the end of a distinguished career as a musician, church politician and administrator, Guillaume Dufay lay on his deathbed in France's Cambrai Cathedral, in which he had served as man and boy. Much of his substantial estate was to pass to the cathedral, including money for a mass to be sung on the anniversary of his death, with the stipulation that the choristers be provided with a hearty meal afterwards. The hope was that they might, even fleetingly, spare a thought for the departed Dufay "who was once one of them".
But the most unusual clause in Dufay's will was the provision of money for a group of musicians to sing Dufay's own composition Ave Regina Coelorum over his body as he lay dying. The great man had composed this piece almost 10 years earlier, but presumably had this purpose in mind even then - for he customised the text to include a clause referring specifically to himself: "Miserere supplicanti Dufay sitque in conspectu tuo mors eius speciosa." Or: "Pity your supplicant Dufay and may his death be lovely in your sight."
Dufay's dramatic vision of his own passing is mirrored by his music's rhetorical gestures and an explicit plea for pity that is distinctly humanist. In many other respects, Ave Regina Coelorum seems a disarmingly carefree work to modern ears - but, at the exact moment where his own name appears, Dufay makes a striking change from major to minor - and so the musical rhetoric of mourning was born.
Sadly for Dufay, his wish to have the motet performed over his dying body was not fulfilled. Another canon at Cambrai died just before him on the same day, so Dufay's final hours were spent alone as arrangements for his colleague's funeral were busily made. Ave Regina Coelorum was not performed until Dufay's funeral.
Only three decades later, Josquin des Prez wrote perhaps the finest musical lament of the Renaissance, and the first truly "modern" piece of funeral music. His Nymphes de Bois laments the passing, in 1497, of the venerable French court composer Jean Ockeghem. Here, emotional rhetoric and musical artifice combine perfectly in a way that today's listeners can easily appreciate and understand.
In my experience of programming medieval and Renaissance music with my group the Clerks, when we arrive at Josquin's Lament there is an almost audible sigh of recognition from the audience, even from those who have never heard it. It sounds familiar and modern. Josquin is speaking a language we understand, and the rhetoric of mourning has emerged from the strange and the ritualised into the more personalised, extrovert and humanistic Renaissance. While it is still a long time before we reach Monty Python, this is the language that Palestrina spoke, which Purcell and Bach learned assiduously, and which still - aside from the stuff of urban myth - fills our cathedrals and chapels today
Edward Wickham
28 May 2008
The Guardian
Even if it is an urban myth, it deserves retelling. A bereaved family requested Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody for their loved one's funeral service. A CD was duly played, but the organist allowed it to run on to the next track: Another One Bites the Dust. This is up there with another, perhaps mythical, occasion when an organist misinterpreted a couple's request for "the theme tune from Robin Hood" and, instead of playing Bryan Adams's (Everything I Do) I Do It for You from the Kevin Costner film, launched into this bracing lyric from another era: "Robin Hood, Robin Hood, riding through the glen."
Choice of funeral music dates us just as surely as clothes or what children's programmes you remember with affection. One of the UK's current favourites, according to a recent survey, is Monty Python's Always Look on the Bright Side of Life. The well-balanced funeral or memorial service will, of course, provide an opportunity for both celebration and seriousness: there is a place for Monty Python and Monteverdi. And the best composers of funeral music can turn on a sixpence. Purcell's apparently simple Funeral Sentences masterfully moves from melancholy to hope in just a couple of chord changes.
At its simplest level, this shift is between two modes: the major and the minor. The former is uplifting and extrovert; the latter contemplative and introvert. While many examples can be found to contradict these stereotypes, not least from non-western musical traditions, this association still seems so basic one is tempted to assume it is the result of some "deep grammar" of music with which we are born. But in reality, these emotional responses to musical modes are relatively modern, dating back to the 15th century - to November 27 1474, to be precise.
At the end of a distinguished career as a musician, church politician and administrator, Guillaume Dufay lay on his deathbed in France's Cambrai Cathedral, in which he had served as man and boy. Much of his substantial estate was to pass to the cathedral, including money for a mass to be sung on the anniversary of his death, with the stipulation that the choristers be provided with a hearty meal afterwards. The hope was that they might, even fleetingly, spare a thought for the departed Dufay "who was once one of them".
But the most unusual clause in Dufay's will was the provision of money for a group of musicians to sing Dufay's own composition Ave Regina Coelorum over his body as he lay dying. The great man had composed this piece almost 10 years earlier, but presumably had this purpose in mind even then - for he customised the text to include a clause referring specifically to himself: "Miserere supplicanti Dufay sitque in conspectu tuo mors eius speciosa." Or: "Pity your supplicant Dufay and may his death be lovely in your sight."
Dufay's dramatic vision of his own passing is mirrored by his music's rhetorical gestures and an explicit plea for pity that is distinctly humanist. In many other respects, Ave Regina Coelorum seems a disarmingly carefree work to modern ears - but, at the exact moment where his own name appears, Dufay makes a striking change from major to minor - and so the musical rhetoric of mourning was born.
Sadly for Dufay, his wish to have the motet performed over his dying body was not fulfilled. Another canon at Cambrai died just before him on the same day, so Dufay's final hours were spent alone as arrangements for his colleague's funeral were busily made. Ave Regina Coelorum was not performed until Dufay's funeral.
Only three decades later, Josquin des Prez wrote perhaps the finest musical lament of the Renaissance, and the first truly "modern" piece of funeral music. His Nymphes de Bois laments the passing, in 1497, of the venerable French court composer Jean Ockeghem. Here, emotional rhetoric and musical artifice combine perfectly in a way that today's listeners can easily appreciate and understand.
In my experience of programming medieval and Renaissance music with my group the Clerks, when we arrive at Josquin's Lament there is an almost audible sigh of recognition from the audience, even from those who have never heard it. It sounds familiar and modern. Josquin is speaking a language we understand, and the rhetoric of mourning has emerged from the strange and the ritualised into the more personalised, extrovert and humanistic Renaissance. While it is still a long time before we reach Monty Python, this is the language that Palestrina spoke, which Purcell and Bach learned assiduously, and which still - aside from the stuff of urban myth - fills our cathedrals and chapels today
Archaeologists find medieval feeding bottles in northwest Russia
Archaeologists find medieval feeding bottles in northwest Russia
26 May 2008
RIA Novosti
Archaeologists have made a rare find of a number of medieval baby bottles at excavations in Veliky Novgorod, an ancient city in northwest Russia, a scientist said on Monday.
"Similar bottles are rarely found in excavations, and here we have already discovered... three of them,"
Medieval Slavs made feeding bottles by attaching leather bags to the wider part of cow horns. A baby drank the milk from a hole made on the tip of a horn. Novgorod is one of the most ancient cities of the Eastern Slavs. It was first mentioned in the Sofia First Chronicle in 859, while the city's chronicle says by 862 it was already a major trading route between the Baltics to Byzantium.
26 May 2008
RIA Novosti
Archaeologists have made a rare find of a number of medieval baby bottles at excavations in Veliky Novgorod, an ancient city in northwest Russia, a scientist said on Monday.
"Similar bottles are rarely found in excavations, and here we have already discovered... three of them,"
Medieval Slavs made feeding bottles by attaching leather bags to the wider part of cow horns. A baby drank the milk from a hole made on the tip of a horn. Novgorod is one of the most ancient cities of the Eastern Slavs. It was first mentioned in the Sofia First Chronicle in 859, while the city's chronicle says by 862 it was already a major trading route between the Baltics to Byzantium.
Archaeological investigation in North Tyneside
Unearthing lost village
By SONIA SHARMA
29 May 2008
The Newcastle Chronicle & Journal Ltd
EXCAVATIONS could take place on the site of a former community centre to unearth the remains of a medieval village. Plans have been drawn up to knock down the old Dudley People's Centre in Weetslade Road, Dudley, North Tyneside, and build new homes in its place.
But Tyne & Wear archaeologists want a dig carried out before any work takes place. A planning report says: "The site is of potential archaeological interest. It lies very close to Low Weetslade Farm, which is shown on the Ordnance Survey of 1850. We think this may be the location of North Weetslade medieval village. Weetslade was a member of the Barony of Morpeth. By the 13th Century it was split into two parts. There was a tower at Weetslade in 1415 and a medieval chapel and a well at Thurspottes. There is a possibility that archaeological remains may survive on this site."
Maps also suggest the people's centre building was a former colliery school, as shown on the Ordnance Survey second edition of 1890. The report adds: "The investigation is required to ensure any archaeological remains on the site can be preserved."
After the closure of the people's centre, North Tyneside Council opened another community facility to serve the residents of Dudley. The new John Willie Sams Centre in Market Street opened its doors in March. It has a library service with computers, an ICT suite, community activity spaces, interview rooms, a fitness suite, creche, health clinic, skate park and a youth shelter.
Sunderland-based firm Gladedale Ltd wants to build 20 homes on the site. The council has received three letters of objection from residents. The plan is to be discussed by a committee on June 3.
By SONIA SHARMA
29 May 2008
The Newcastle Chronicle & Journal Ltd
EXCAVATIONS could take place on the site of a former community centre to unearth the remains of a medieval village. Plans have been drawn up to knock down the old Dudley People's Centre in Weetslade Road, Dudley, North Tyneside, and build new homes in its place.
But Tyne & Wear archaeologists want a dig carried out before any work takes place. A planning report says: "The site is of potential archaeological interest. It lies very close to Low Weetslade Farm, which is shown on the Ordnance Survey of 1850. We think this may be the location of North Weetslade medieval village. Weetslade was a member of the Barony of Morpeth. By the 13th Century it was split into two parts. There was a tower at Weetslade in 1415 and a medieval chapel and a well at Thurspottes. There is a possibility that archaeological remains may survive on this site."
Maps also suggest the people's centre building was a former colliery school, as shown on the Ordnance Survey second edition of 1890. The report adds: "The investigation is required to ensure any archaeological remains on the site can be preserved."
After the closure of the people's centre, North Tyneside Council opened another community facility to serve the residents of Dudley. The new John Willie Sams Centre in Market Street opened its doors in March. It has a library service with computers, an ICT suite, community activity spaces, interview rooms, a fitness suite, creche, health clinic, skate park and a youth shelter.
Sunderland-based firm Gladedale Ltd wants to build 20 homes on the site. The council has received three letters of objection from residents. The plan is to be discussed by a committee on June 3.
Mohun Book of Hourrs
`Book of hours' has rare female voice
Rich Barlow
24 May 2008
The Boston Globe
Mary Dockray-Miller has dug in musty libraries from London to Paris - and now Copley Square. The latter has provided her with surprising research material right in her own backyard. Dockray-Miller, who teaches English literature at Lesley University in Cambridge, is publishing a paper that prints, for the first time, three prayers from a 122-page medieval manuscript secreted in the Boston Public Library's rare books collection.
The Mohun Hours is one of many surviving "books of hours"- personalized medieval prayer books that usually were owned by wealthy Catholic women. This particular book was a wedding gift to English aristocrat Eleanor de Mohun, given either by her parents or new in-laws around 1330. The three prayers about which Dockray- Miller writes were added two generations later, probably by a female descendant of Eleanor's. All three, written in Middle English, put a feminine perspective on what could be a harsh, masculine medieval Christianity.
One petitions Jesus to calm the reader's soul as he calmed the River Jordan before being baptized. The second poem, just six lines, prays to Jesus "for the purity of your incarnation, for the merit of your wounds' blood and your passion, for the pledge and meaning of your death and your resurrection." The third asks for a pure life and an afterlife with the angels.
Dockray-Miller commends what she calls the BPL's unusual public access. Her paper is being published by a scholarly journal, Women and Language. Excerpts from a recent interview follow.
Why wouldn't a man have had this?
They weren't all written for women, but a majority of them were female-owned. It was a very female form of private devotion. An aristocratic woman would have ladies in waiting or women who served her, and in the morning, they would all do their devotions together.
Tell me about the Mohun Hours-who wrote it?
The liturgical texts are standard church texts in Latin. They're the same in every book of hours. The more personalized prayers are anonymous. We don't know who wrote them. The prayers that I was working with are a really small part of the entire book. A lot of [the prayers] are prayers to Christ, and they seem almost romantic in a modern sense.
How did the Boston Public Library get it?
The BPL bought it [in 1954 from a London book dealer.] [Before then], it got passed around, probably after the Reformation, and we're lucky it didn't get burned or destroyed by Henry VIII and his idiots. [Henry famously broke with the church over his multiple wives and replaced papal authority over the Church of England with his own.]
Is there something about the Mohun book that makes it special?
My scholarly interest has to do with women's literacy. I think there's this cartoonish stereotype of medieval women: They got married when they were 12, they had 10 kids by the time they were 25, and then they died. And they were all illiterate and had chastity belts. [By contrast], I'm really interested in the amount of female literacy and engagement with literature that I've found.
Twenty or 30 years ago, there was this assumption that women had no history in the Middle Ages, there weren't any documents associated with them, it was all about bishops and kings. And now, there [is research confirming female literacy.] There are hundreds of manuscripts that were used by women [in the aristocratic class.] I'm interested in what it says about the way women practiced Christianity.
And what do we know?
We know there's this intense devotion to Christ as a personality. The three poems in this manuscript that are in Middle English say, [for example], "The water was wild but the child was good, the child with his right hand blessed the flood." There are no prayers to the Virgin Mary, to other saints. They're all pleas [to] a gentle and forgiving God. They wanted a Christ who was almost like a sweet boyfriend, a very personal Christ. This is at the same time as the Inquisition, mostly Spanish and Italian men who are, in the name of Christ, burning people alive at the stake and putting them on the rack.
Rich Barlow
24 May 2008
The Boston Globe
Mary Dockray-Miller has dug in musty libraries from London to Paris - and now Copley Square. The latter has provided her with surprising research material right in her own backyard. Dockray-Miller, who teaches English literature at Lesley University in Cambridge, is publishing a paper that prints, for the first time, three prayers from a 122-page medieval manuscript secreted in the Boston Public Library's rare books collection.
The Mohun Hours is one of many surviving "books of hours"- personalized medieval prayer books that usually were owned by wealthy Catholic women. This particular book was a wedding gift to English aristocrat Eleanor de Mohun, given either by her parents or new in-laws around 1330. The three prayers about which Dockray- Miller writes were added two generations later, probably by a female descendant of Eleanor's. All three, written in Middle English, put a feminine perspective on what could be a harsh, masculine medieval Christianity.
One petitions Jesus to calm the reader's soul as he calmed the River Jordan before being baptized. The second poem, just six lines, prays to Jesus "for the purity of your incarnation, for the merit of your wounds' blood and your passion, for the pledge and meaning of your death and your resurrection." The third asks for a pure life and an afterlife with the angels.
Dockray-Miller commends what she calls the BPL's unusual public access. Her paper is being published by a scholarly journal, Women and Language. Excerpts from a recent interview follow.
Why wouldn't a man have had this?
They weren't all written for women, but a majority of them were female-owned. It was a very female form of private devotion. An aristocratic woman would have ladies in waiting or women who served her, and in the morning, they would all do their devotions together.
Tell me about the Mohun Hours-who wrote it?
The liturgical texts are standard church texts in Latin. They're the same in every book of hours. The more personalized prayers are anonymous. We don't know who wrote them. The prayers that I was working with are a really small part of the entire book. A lot of [the prayers] are prayers to Christ, and they seem almost romantic in a modern sense.
How did the Boston Public Library get it?
The BPL bought it [in 1954 from a London book dealer.] [Before then], it got passed around, probably after the Reformation, and we're lucky it didn't get burned or destroyed by Henry VIII and his idiots. [Henry famously broke with the church over his multiple wives and replaced papal authority over the Church of England with his own.]
Is there something about the Mohun book that makes it special?
My scholarly interest has to do with women's literacy. I think there's this cartoonish stereotype of medieval women: They got married when they were 12, they had 10 kids by the time they were 25, and then they died. And they were all illiterate and had chastity belts. [By contrast], I'm really interested in the amount of female literacy and engagement with literature that I've found.
Twenty or 30 years ago, there was this assumption that women had no history in the Middle Ages, there weren't any documents associated with them, it was all about bishops and kings. And now, there [is research confirming female literacy.] There are hundreds of manuscripts that were used by women [in the aristocratic class.] I'm interested in what it says about the way women practiced Christianity.
And what do we know?
We know there's this intense devotion to Christ as a personality. The three poems in this manuscript that are in Middle English say, [for example], "The water was wild but the child was good, the child with his right hand blessed the flood." There are no prayers to the Virgin Mary, to other saints. They're all pleas [to] a gentle and forgiving God. They wanted a Christ who was almost like a sweet boyfriend, a very personal Christ. This is at the same time as the Inquisition, mostly Spanish and Italian men who are, in the name of Christ, burning people alive at the stake and putting them on the rack.
Bede manuscripts on the display at Jarrow
Bede still teaches as historic pages turn
Tony Henderson
410 words
24 May 2008
The Journal, Newcastle
PRICELESS manuscripts associated with the Venerable Bede came back to their spiritual home yesterday at the monastery site where he lived and worked. On loan from the British Library, the display at Bede's World in Jarrow in South Tyneside includes a leaf from one of the oldest single-volume Latin Bibles in the world, which was produced at the twin monastery of Wearmouth-Jarrow. Also on show is one of the earliest surviving copies of Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People.
The Jarrow exhibition, which opens today, is part of the Bede & Beijing festival of art, which explores themes common to Anglo-Saxon Northumbria and Chinese culture. The festival will take place at six venues across South Tyneside and Sunderland - Bede's World, Monkwearmouth Station Museum, National Glass Centre, St Paul's Church Jarrow, St Peter's Church Monkwearmouth and Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens. Scot McKendrick, head of manuscripts at the British Library, who set up the Jarrow exhibition, said: "This is wonderful, world-class material. It is top-notch."
Bede's World director Kate Sussams said: "We are really proud to be working in partnership with the British Library and are thrilled to have these important manuscripts on display for our local community. This shows how important our cultural heritage is and especially significant given our forthcoming bid for world heritage site status."
Wearmouth-Jarrow was one of the most important centres of learning and culture in the 7th and 8th Centuries. Its large scriptorium produced many copies of influential texts - surviving copies of which are brought together for the first time for the display at Jarrow. Wearmouth-Jarrow had one of the best libraries of its day, containing more than 600 books, many collected across Europe by the monastery's founder, Benedict Biscop.
The most famous inhabitant of the monastery, Bede, used the extensive library, books borrowed from elsewhere, and his unique abilities to create new works, shaping the learning of the ancient classical world into the textbooks of emerging Christian Europe. His writings on history, theology, geography, mathematics, science, language, astronomy, and music earned him the title "The Teacher of the Whole Middle Ages". His works have been continuously reproduced over 13 centuries and remain in use today. This shows how important our cultural heritage is, given our bid for world heritage site status.
Tony Henderson
410 words
24 May 2008
The Journal, Newcastle
PRICELESS manuscripts associated with the Venerable Bede came back to their spiritual home yesterday at the monastery site where he lived and worked. On loan from the British Library, the display at Bede's World in Jarrow in South Tyneside includes a leaf from one of the oldest single-volume Latin Bibles in the world, which was produced at the twin monastery of Wearmouth-Jarrow. Also on show is one of the earliest surviving copies of Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People.
The Jarrow exhibition, which opens today, is part of the Bede & Beijing festival of art, which explores themes common to Anglo-Saxon Northumbria and Chinese culture. The festival will take place at six venues across South Tyneside and Sunderland - Bede's World, Monkwearmouth Station Museum, National Glass Centre, St Paul's Church Jarrow, St Peter's Church Monkwearmouth and Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens. Scot McKendrick, head of manuscripts at the British Library, who set up the Jarrow exhibition, said: "This is wonderful, world-class material. It is top-notch."
Bede's World director Kate Sussams said: "We are really proud to be working in partnership with the British Library and are thrilled to have these important manuscripts on display for our local community. This shows how important our cultural heritage is and especially significant given our forthcoming bid for world heritage site status."
Wearmouth-Jarrow was one of the most important centres of learning and culture in the 7th and 8th Centuries. Its large scriptorium produced many copies of influential texts - surviving copies of which are brought together for the first time for the display at Jarrow. Wearmouth-Jarrow had one of the best libraries of its day, containing more than 600 books, many collected across Europe by the monastery's founder, Benedict Biscop.
The most famous inhabitant of the monastery, Bede, used the extensive library, books borrowed from elsewhere, and his unique abilities to create new works, shaping the learning of the ancient classical world into the textbooks of emerging Christian Europe. His writings on history, theology, geography, mathematics, science, language, astronomy, and music earned him the title "The Teacher of the Whole Middle Ages". His works have been continuously reproduced over 13 centuries and remain in use today. This shows how important our cultural heritage is, given our bid for world heritage site status.
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