Slaves and Warriors in Medieval Britain and Ireland, 800 -1200


Book Description

Modern sensibilities have clouded historical views of slavery, perhaps more so than any other medieval social institution. Anachronistic economic rationales and notions about the progression of European civilisation have immeasurably distorted our view of slavery in the medieval context. As a result historians have focussed their efforts upon explaining the disappearance of this medieval institution rather than seeking to understand it. This book highlights the extreme cultural/social significance of slavery for the societies of medieval Britain and Ireland c. 800-1200. Concentrating upon the lifestyle, attitudes and motivations of the slave-holders and slave-raiders, it explores the violent activities and behavioural codes of Britain and Ireland’s warrior-centred societies, illustrating the extreme significance of the institution of slavery for constructions of power, ethnic identity and gender.




Slaves and Warriors in Medieval Britain and Ireland


Book Description

Modern sensibilities have clouded historical views of slavery, perhaps more so than any other medieval social institution. Anachronistic economic rationales and notions about the progression of European civilisation have immeasurably distorted our view of slavery in the medieval context. As a result historians have focussed their efforts upon explaining the disappearance of this medieval institution rather than seeking to understand it. This book highlights the extreme cultural/social significance of slavery for the societies of medieval Britain and Ireland c. 800-1200. Concentrating upon the lifestyle, attitudes and motivations of the slave-holders and slave-raiders, it explores the violent activities and behavioural codes of Britain and Ireland s warrior-centred societies, illustrating the extreme significance of the institution of slavery for constructions of power, ethnic identity and gender.




The Origin Legends of Early Medieval Britain and Ireland


Book Description

The inhabitants of early medieval Britain and Ireland shared the knowledge that the region held four peoples and the awareness that they must have originally come from 'elsewhere'. The Origin Legends of Early Medieval Britain and Ireland studies these peoples' origin stories, an important genre that has shaped national identity and collective history from the early medieval period to the present day. These multilingual texts share many common features that repay their study as a genre, but have previously been isolated as four disparate traditions and used to argue for the long roots of current nationalisms. Yet they were not written or read in isolation during the medieval period. Individual narratives were in constant development, written and rewritten to respond to other texts. This book argues that insular origin legends developed together to flesh out the history of the insular region as a whole.




Multilingualism in Early Medieval Britain


Book Description

This Element offers a comprehensive synthesis of the evidence from the pre-Norman period that situates Old English as one of several living languages that together formed the basis of a vibrant oral and written literary culture in early medieval Britain.




Castration and Culture in the Middle Ages


Book Description

Essays exploring medieval castration, as reflected in archaeology, law, historical record, and literary motifs. Castration and castrati have always been facets of western culture, from myth and legend to law and theology, from eunuchs guarding harems to the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century castrati singers. Metaphoric castration pervadesa number of medieval literary genres, particularly the Old French fabliaux - exchanges of power predicated upon the exchange or absence of sexual desire signified by genitalia - but the plain, literal act of castration and its implications are often overlooked. This collection explores this often taboo subject and its implications for cultural mores and custom in Western Europe, seeking to demystify and demythologize castration. Its subjects includearchaeological studies of eunuchs; historical accounts of castration in trials of combat; the mutilation of political rivals in medieval Wales; Anglo-Saxon and Frisian legal and literary examples of castration as punishment; castration as comedy in the Old French fabliaux; the prohibition against genital mutilation in hagiography; and early-modern anxieties about punitive castration enacted on the Elizabethan stage. The introduction reflects on these topics in the context of arguably the most well-known victim of castration in the middle ages, Abelard. LARISSA TRACY is Associate Professor of Medieval Literature at Longwood University. Contributors: Larissa Tracy, Kathryn Reusch, Shaun Tougher, Jack Collins, Rolf H. Bremmer Jr, Jay Paul Gates, Charlene M. Eska, Mary A. Valante, Anthony Adams, Mary E. Leech, Jed Chandler, Ellen Lorraine Friedrich, Robert L.A. Clark, Karin Sellberg, LenaWånggren







The Cambridge World History of Slavery: Volume 2, AD 500–AD 1420


Book Description

Medieval slavery has received little attention relative to slavery in ancient Greece and Rome and in the early modern Atlantic world. This imbalance in the scholarship has led many to assume that slavery was of minor importance in the Middle Ages. In fact, the practice of slavery continued unabated across the globe throughout the medieval millennium. This volume – the final volume in The Cambridge World History of Slavery – covers the period between the fall of Rome and the rise of the transatlantic plantation complexes by assembling twenty-three original essays, written by scholars acknowledged as leaders in their respective fields. The volume demonstrates the continual and central presence of slavery in societies worldwide between 500 CE and 1420 CE. The essays analyze key concepts in the history of slavery, including gender, trade, empire, state formation and diplomacy, labor, childhood, social status and mobility, cultural attitudes, spectrums of dependency and coercion, and life histories of enslaved people.




Reading La Amon's Brut: Approaches and Explorations


Book Description

Preliminary material /Editors Reading La3amon's -- INTRODUCTION /ROSAMUND ALLEN , JANE ROBERTS and CAROLE WEINBERG -- DID LAWMAN NOD, OR IS IT WE THAT YAWN? /ROSAMUND ALLEN -- THE BRUT AS SAXON LITERATURE: THE NEW PHILOLOGISTS READ LAWMAN /HARUKO MOMMA -- “ÞE TIDEN OF ÞISSE LONDE” - FINDING AND LOSING WALES IN LA3AMON'S BRUT /SIMON MEECHAM-JONES -- THE SEVERN: BARRIER OR HIGHWAY? /ANDREW WEHNER -- THE POLITICAL NOTION OF KINGSHIP IN LA3AMON'S BRUT /ERIC STANLEY -- QUEER MASCULINITY IN LAWMAN'S BRUT /JOHN BRENNAN -- LA3AMON'S LEIR: LANGUAGE, SUCCESSION, AND HISTORY /KENNETH J. TILLER -- LOSING THE PAST: CEZAR'S MOMENT OF TIME IN LAWMAN'S BRUT /JOSEPH D. PARRY -- LAWMAN, BEDE, AND THE CONTEXT OF SLAVERY /DANIEL DONOGHUE -- DRINKING OF BLOOD, BURNING OF WOMEN /ANDREW BREEZE -- THE CORONATION OF ARTHUR AND GUENEVERE IN GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH'S HISTORIA REGUM BRITANNIAE, WACE'S ROMAN DE BRUT, AND LAWMAN'S BRUT /CHARLOTTE A.T. WULF -- LA3AMON'S GESTURES: BODY LANGUAGE IN THE BRUT /BARRY WINDEATT -- CONQUEST BY WORD: THE MEETING OF LANGUAGES IN LA3AMON'S BRUT /HANNAH MCKENDRICK BAILEY -- A TALE OF TWO CITIES: LONDON AND WINCHESTER IN LA3AMON'S BRUT /IAN KIRBY -- MAPPING THE NATIONAL NARRATIVE: PLACE-NAME ETYMOLOGY IN LA3AMON'S BRUT AND ITS SOURCES /JOANNA BELLIS -- THE LEXICAL FIELD “WARRIOR” IN LA3AMON'S BRUT - A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE TWO VERSIONS /CHRISTINE ELSWEILER -- THE LANGUAGE OF LAW: LOND AND HOND IN LA3AMON'S BRUT /DEBORAH MARCUM -- FRIÐ AND GRIÐ: LA3AMON AND THE LEGAL LANGUAGE OF WULFSTAN /SCOTT KLEINMAN -- LA3AMON'S PROSODY: CALIGULA AND OTHO - METRES APART /ERIK KOOPER -- GETTING LA3AMON'S BRUT INTO SHARPER FOCUS /JANE ROBERTS -- JULIUS CAESAR AND THE LANGUAGE OF HISTORY IN LA3AMON'S BRUT /CAROLE WEINBERG -- LA3AMON'S URSULA AND THE INFLUENCE OF ROMAN EPIC /NEIL CARTLIDGE -- CONSTRUCTING TONWENNE: A GESTURE AND ITS HISTORY /GAIL IVY BERLIN -- WACE TO LA3AMON VIA WALDEF /JUDITH WEISS -- TRANSLATING ENGLAND IN MEDIEVAL ICELAND: GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH'S HISTORIA REGUM BRITANNIE AND BRETA SQGUR /SARAH BACCIANTI -- LA3AMON'S WELSH /JENNIFER MILLER -- THE WISDOM OF HINDSIGHT IN LA3AMON AND SOME CONTEMPORARIES /M. LEIGH HARRISON -- READING THE LANDSCAPES OF LA3AMON'S ARTHUR: PLACE, MEANING AND INTERTEXTUALITY /GARETH GRIFFITH -- LA3AMON'S BRUT AND THE VERNACULAR TEXT: WIDENING THE CONTEXT /ELIZABETH J. BRYAN -- BIBLIOGRAPHY /Editors Reading La3amon's -- NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS /Editors Reading La3amon's -- Index /Editors Reading La3amon's.




Critical Readings on Global Slavery


Book Description

The study of slavery has grown strongly in recent years, as scholars working in several disciplines have cultivated broader perspectives on enslavement in a wide variety of contexts and settings. Critical Readings on Global Slavery offers students and researchers a rich collection of previously published works by some of the most preeminent scholars in the field. With contributions covering various regions and time periods, this anthology encourages readers to view slave systems across time and space as both ubiquitous and interconnected, and introduces those who are interested in the study of human bondage to some of the most important and widely cited works in slavery studies.




The Oxford Handbook of Women and Gender in Medieval Europe


Book Description

The Oxford Handbook of Women and Gender in Medieval Europe provides a comprehensive overview of the gender rules encountered in Europe in the period between approximately 500 and 1500 C.E. The essays collected in this volume speak to interpretative challenges common to all fields of women's and gender history - that is, how best to uncover the experiences of ordinary people from archives formed mainly by and about elite males, and how to combine social histories of lived experiences with cultural histories of gendered discourses and identities. The collection focuses on Western Europe in the Middle Ages but offers some consideration of medieval Islam and Byzantium. The Handbook is structured into seven sections: Christian, Jewish, and Muslim thought; law in theory and practice; domestic life and material culture; labour, land, and economy; bodies and sexualities; gender and holiness; and the interplay of continuity and change throughout the medieval period. It contains material from some of the foremost scholars in this field, and it not only serves as the major reference text in medieval and gender studies, but also provides an agenda for future new research.