england the evolution of a country & its language

England

The evolution of a country & its language

Influences on Early Britain

Celts: the indigenous peoples (ancestors of the Irish, Scots, Welsh, Cornish, and Bretons

The Romans Anglo Saxons The Norse

Celts

Halstatt culture—7-6th century B.C.

La Tiene culture—5th century B.C.

(55 & 54 B.C. = Caeasar’s invasion

AND, there were people there before them!

Migration of the Celts

Celtic Art

VERY ancient Celts (@500 B.C.)

Swirling designs

Heavy signifigance on the number three

Detail of armor implies a warrior aristocracy.

The Celts

Used make-up to look more warlike.

Oral culture

Loose society (many small tribes)

Celts vs. Picts

The original “naked white people”

Often painted themselves with chalk before going into battle

Sometimes fought naked

The original “naked blue people”

Often painted themselves with woad

Sometimes fought naked

Savage people of lower Scotland

The Celts

Loved feasts: mead drinking, lots of meat (esp. pork)—often noisy and sometimes dangerous!

Built forts on strategic high grounds surrounded by ditches (Motte and Bailey castles)

Ancient Celtic Religion

Druids:wise men, healers, teachers, musicians

Keepers of knowledge who memorized all teachings—ORAL CULTURE

Believed that their souls did not die, but passed to another body.

Cultural Note

Some believe that a druidic figure may be the inspiration for MERLIN in the Arthur legends.

Merlin dictating his poems, as illustrated in a French book from the 13th century

Human Sacrifice

Tacitus, the Roman author, writes about burning people alive in man-shaped wicker figures

Cautionary note: Writing horrible things about one’s enemies helps one’s cause.

Stone Circles & Chalk Hills

Found all over Britain

Used in religious ceremonies

Stonehenge—Used but not built by the Celts

Avebury Stone Circle

Silbury Hill

Celtic Art and Music

Motifs of nature, human figures are symbolic and abstract

Heavily laden with circles, squares, and triangles.

Celtic art survives in decorated MSS, metalwork, and stone crosses.

Celtic Language

Survives in Irish, Gaelic, Welsh languages(Where the Saxons did not conquer)

Very few words survive except in place names Others mostly topographic

EX. avon-river, combe=valley, torr=rock outcropping

Ancor=anchorite=hermit

Welsh Language

Roman alphabet with different sound values & consonant doubling (ll, ff, ww, dd)

Gwynnedd = Guyneth

Siobhan = Shevan

Queen Boudicca (Boadicea) c. 61 A. D.

Celtic warrior queen

Led fight against Romans after they flogged & raped her and her daughters

Tacitus & other Romans write about her

A description from the Romans:

Their aspect is terrifying...They are very tall in stature, with rippling muscles under clear white skin. Their hair is blond, but not naturally so: they bleach it, to this day, artificially, washing it in lime and combing it back from their foreheads. They look like wood-demons, their hair thick and shaggy like a horse's mane. . . . [M]ost content themselves with the weapons nature gave them: they go naked into battle...Weird, discordant horns were sounded, [they shouted in chorus with their] deep and harsh voices, they beat their swords rythmically against their shields.

Arturius

Legendary Celtic war chieftain who led his people to a victory over the Saxons at the Battle of Badon Hill (early 500’s A.D.)

May be start of King Arthur legends

Celtic Religion--Pantheism

Pagans who worshiped gods of nature—over 400 different gods! They believed the spirits were everywhere and in everything.

Believed that natural disasters, disease, famine, etc. were caused because the gods were angry.

Celtic Religion--Pantheism

Worshiped in nature—woods, bogs, mouths of rivers, stone circles, chalk mounds.

Main gods: earth mother (fertility), horned gods, tribal father

Annual sacrifice of a human in the stead of the horned god to shed his blood on the land to ensure fertility.

The Romans

The Greek author Pytheas called them the "Pretanic Isles" which derived from the inhabitants name for them, Pritani.

RomansCalled the Celts BritonsCalled the island “Brittania”@45 B.C. through 449 A.D.

THIS IS LONGER THAN THE UNITED STATES HAS BEEN SETTLED BY EUROPEANS!

The Romans

The Romans never made it to the Northern part of the island – the Picts and Scots were too fierce.

They built Hadrian’s wall to keep these warrior tribes out. It still stands today.

Roman Amphitheater--Chester

Roman Lighthouse, Dover Castle

The Romans

The Romans integrated their own culture with Celtic culture.

They often intermarried with the Celts and Celts could become citizens.

Bath

Originally a shrine to Aquae Sulis, a water goddess

Considered a Holy Place by the Celts

Became a popular resort in the 17th & 18th century

Bath

Romano-Celtic Religion

Mithras was the sun god.

On December 25th, the Romanized Celts celebrated Mithras’s victory in the battle against the night.

The Romans

The Romans left to defend the homeland from invading Germanic tribes.

This left the Celts defenseless against the Picts and Scots attacking from the North and West.

Vortigern’s Invitation @449 A.D.

King Vortigern sent for help from the Anglo-Saxon tribes across the sea.

They came to help, liked the climate, and stayed.

The Anglo-Saxons subjugated the native Celts.

The Saxons

Angles

Saxons

Jutes

Anglo-Saxons

Land became known as Angla-land

Which, of course, became England

Anglo-Saxons

½ of all English words have AS origins

Responsible for the British traits of MelancholyNostalgiaLove of RitualStoicism

Anglo-Saxons

Known for—

Feasts

Telling long-heroic tales

Fascination with the sea

The Germania – Cultural Connections

Baritus:

Battle chant to kindle courage by terrifying their foes.

“a unison of valour”

Anglo-Saxon belief system:

Importance of physical and moral courage

Loyalty above all

Power of fate—”wyrd”Believed that you could not control what happened to you. The measure of a man was HOW he responded to his destiny.

Anglo-Saxon Culture

Warrior society

Thane and his followersBond between them was paramountCOMITATUS PRINCIPLE

Consequences of deserting your lord on battlefield—exile.

The Boar-Ferocious fighter

Symbol of hospitality, protective symbol on shields,

charging boar=royalty or extreme military prowess, put on graves of nobles for

strength in the afterlife.

The Germania, Tacitus, A.D. 98

Polemic to raise moral standards of Rome

Idealized Germanic culture

Where modern Germans got their ideas of purity of blood, superiority of their culture

Of course, Tacitus relied entirely on second-hand accounts!

The Germania – Cultural Connections

Baritus:

Battle chant to kindle courage by terrifying their foes.

“a unison of valour”

The Germania

“They bring back the bodies of the fallen even when a battle hangs in the balance.”

“To throw away one’s shield is the supreme disgrace, and the man [who does this] is debarred from attendance at sacrifice or assembly.”

The Germania

Kings chosen for noble birth—power not absolute or arbitrary.

Leaders chosen for valour—lead by example rather than authority of rank.

Followers usually men of one clan—united by blood as well as battle.

The Germania

Retainers expect things in return

“They are always making demands on the generosity of their chief, asking for a coveted war-horse or a spear stained with the blood of a defeated enemy.”

Uncle/Nephew Relationship

“The sons of sisters are as highly honoured by their uncles as by their own fathers. Some tribes even consider the former tie the closer and more sacred of the two.”

Wergild – The “Man price”

“Heirs are under the obligation to take up both the feuds and the friendship of a father or kinsman. But feuds do not continue forever unreconciled. Even homicide can be atoned for by a fixed number of cattle or sheep.”

The price was determined by rank in society.

The Germania

“Traitors and deserters are hanged on trees; cowards, shirkers. . . are pressed down under a wicker hurdle into the slimy mud of a bog.”

Tollund Man

The Germania -- Women

“Close by [the battle] are “their nearest and dearest . . . whose praise he most desires . . . . It is their mothers and wives that they go to have their wounds treated, and the women are not afraid to compare and count the gashes.”

The Germania – Women

“[A]rmies already wavering on the point of collapse have been rallied by the women, pleading heroically with their men, thrusting forward their bared bosoms, and making them realize the imminent prospect of enslavement.”

The Germania -- Women

“[T]here resides in women an element of holiness and a gift of prophecy; and so they do not scorn to ask their advice, or lightly disregard their replies.”

Their reverence is “untainted by servile flattery or any pretence of turning women into goddesses.”

Anglo-Saxon Women

Cupbearers: served at banquets

Could own and inherit property

Women kept the status and wealth they were born with, not just that of husband

Jewelry was valued as a way of showing status.

The Germania--Marriage Code

“both in peace and suffering, she is to share in his sufferings and adventures.”

Woman’s adultury severely punished:“cuts off her hair, strips her naked nad in the presence of her kinsman . . .flogs her all through the village. Neither beauty nor wealth can find her another husband.”

Marriage Code—Other sources

Adultery treated more casually

*½ goods if take children to raise.*Share of goods if husband keeps children.

Why would Tacitus emphasize the most extreme cases?

Structure of Anglo-Saxon Society

Witan—king’s advisor

Scop—professional bard, held in high esteem(Monks later recorded poetry that had been passed down orally)

Moot

Courts on local, district, & regional levels

Rulings based on tradition, past decisions

FYI: a moot point is one that could be argued as before a court, but everybody already knows the answer, so there’s no point in debating.

The Moot Hall, Keswick

Witanagemot or Witan

The king’s council of wise men, including earls, major landholders, and high religious authorities

Spoofed in Harry Potter books as the Wizengamot tribunal

The Germania–Religious Practices

“do not think it in keeping with the divine majesty to confine gods within walls”

“Their holy places are woods and groves”

Gods similar to Norse Gods

Thunor=God of Thunder

Freya=fertility

Tew=war

The Germania–Religious Practices

Seek information from the cries and flights of birds.

Try to obtain omens and warnings from horses.

Anglo-Saxon Funereal Customs

Buried with weapons, wealth for the afterlife

The wealthy got a full set of armor

Sometimes, great thanes were buried with fully equipped boats.

Other times, the boats were burned at sea.

The Sutton Hoo burial

Sutton Hoo Treasure

Sutton HooTreasure

Sutton HooTreasure

Other Germanic values:

Hospitality is paramount—always hospitable to strangers and visitors.

The more family connections and allegiances a man can command, the higher his status.(Epithets: Hygelac’s thane, or Hrothgar’s son)

Better to die in battle than to grow old and weak.

By the end of the 6th Century

Augustine and his followers begin to convert England to Christianity.

King Ethelbert baptized by Augustine c. 597 A.D.

Conversion of the Saxons

Fate and religion are intertwined in the literature as it is written down (often by monks).

Architecture represents the Saxon aesthetic

Blend of Pagan and Christian in AS Literature

Tension “between faith in an omnipotent Christian God and a

trust in blind, inexorable fate.”

Saxon Church at Dover Castle

Two Religious Centers Arose

York—Northern England

Canterbury—Southern England

The Norse

Viking Invasions – Beginning @ 900 A.D.

10th Century defeated English in the Battle of Maldon

Wanted British technology, raw goods

Norse Mythology

Adumla (cow)|

Buri|

Bor—Bestla (frost giant’s daughter)

|(w)odin—----Vili—----Ve

(spirit of life) (wits & heart) (hearing & sight)

Kill all the frost giants but one—all the blood flooded the world

Norse Mythology

Ymir – Frost Giant that survived

1) skull=sky2) flesh=Earth3) bones=Mountains4) blood=Oceans, lakes, rivers

Dwarves: North, South, East, West

Norse Mythology

Midgard (Ymir’s eyebrows)Middle earth, enclosure away from stone giants

Asgard (Settled by Odin, Vili, Ve – Aesir, guardians of men)linked to midgard by the flaming rainbow bridge, Bifrost

Norse Mythology

Ygdrasil –The living tree, the suffering tree, the life-giver--Regenerates itself, eternal (was, and is, and will be)

Odin hung on a tree for nine days to gain boons for mankind – Runes (magical alphabet) and Skaldic Mead (poetic inspiration)

Runes-”FUTHORK”

The Population of Midgard

Heimdall was the guard at the gate of Midgard

Fathered three generations for the three classes of people.

Three classes of people

Jarl (fair, sharp, skilled, strong)Heimdall teaches him the runes of OdinClass of kings (koniger) and warriors

Karl (ruddy, bright-eyed, well formed)farmers, skilled laborers, peasants

Thrall (ugly, twisted, dull)race of unskilled laborersi.e. to “hold in thrall”

The Days of the Week

Sunday Monday Teusday (Tiu—warrior god, symbol=boar) Wednesday (Wodin) Thursday (Thor—thunder god, very

popular) Friday (Freya—fertility god)

Other important influences

Eostre (estrogen, estrus cycles)(--goddess of the dawn, spring, and new life, feast day in Spring--Symbols are the hare and the egg!

Winter feasts (used to served boar’s head), New Year’s resolution

Gotterdammerung & Ragnarok

Unlike Greek gods, gods were not invincible

Living in the Gotterdamerung, or “Twilight of the gods”

Would eventually be defeated at Ragnarok, the “day of doom”

The Wild Hunt

Souls of dead warriors who joined Odin in Valhalla waiting to join against the forces of destruction at Ragnarok

Brought to Valhalla by the Valkyrie

Gotterdammerung & Ragnarok

Winter will reign for three years with no summer. All the earth will be at war, father against son,

brother against brother. Wolves Skoll and Hati Hrodvitnisson will swallow

the sun & moon, plunging the earth into darkness.

Monsters will break free, and the WILD HUNT will begin for real!

Gotterdammerung & Ragnarok

Fenrir/Fenris wolf—at the end of the world, will run loose, consuming the earth and heavens. He will swallow Odin.

Slain by Odin’s son who tears off his jaw

Odin and the Fenris Wolf, 1909, Dorothy Hardy

Gotterdammerung & Ragnarok

Midgard serpent—will flood the world by overflowing the ocean & spew deadly venom.

Killed by Thor before he succumbs to death from the poison.

Gotterdammerung & Ragnarok

Horns of Heimdall will ring to warn other gods of the danger.

By the end, Yggdrasill and all the worlds become a blazing inferno and the gods of the Aesir & Vanir die as well as all the inhabitants of Middle Earth.

The sky falls into a pit of flame and the earth sinks into the sea.

The Vikings & Saxons

Constantly battled for control of England

Languages in England merged to become Old English

Battle of Maldon—recorded in poem

Battle of Maldon, Anglo-Saxon Chronicles c. 991 A.D.

Extant in a fragment (beginning & end missing)

Byrhtnoth (Saxon) fights the Vikings

Byrhtnoth is 6’6” to 6’9” in a world where people are on average 5’ tall.

He is also 65 in a time when people lived to @ 40. Awesome despay of wealth—owned land in Essex

& 8 other counties

Battle of Maldon, Anglo-Saxon Chronicles c. 991 A.D.

When he falls, poet reproaches the cowardice of the thane Godric who gallops away

Aelfwine, in contrast, upholds comitatus

He boasts (beot) that no one can “reproach him with fleeing whil his lord lies dead”

“Heart must be hardier courage the keenerMood must be the bolder as our band lessens.”

Battle of Maldon, Anglo-Saxon Chronicles c. 991 A.D.

Glorious defeat

BUT moral victory, affirmation of comitatus

Lindesfarne Castle

Lindesfarne

Book of Kells

Early Englishtranslation of the Christianbible

Illuminated pages

Monastery kept learning alive inthe “Dark Ages”Of Viking invasion

King Alfred the Great

“Great” because he kept united tribes to repel the Danes

King when Vikings sacked the monastery at Lindesfarne

He kept London & Wessex; Vikings kept the Danelaw(North and East England)

Commissioned the Anglo-Saxon chronicles of Britain from the time of Caesar’s invasion

Alfred Jewel

"AELFRED MEC HEHT GEWYRCAN", "Alfred ordered me to be made"

In the Ashmolean in Oxford

Old English/Anglo-Saxon

The emergence of a written language.

Anglo-Saxon/Old English

Language spoken and written from about the 5th to 11th centuries around the time of the Battle of Hastings (1066).

Standardized in 10th century through influence of dominant kingdom of Wessex.

Based on runic script.

Old English Words & Modern Equivalents

Old English Wicu Cyning (c-k) Scort (sc=sh) Gærs Eorþ (þ & ð= th) deor cniht

Modern English Week King Short Grass Earth Deer (orig. wild beast) Knight (orig. youth)

Book of Kells

Early English bible

Illuminated

Lindesfarne Monastery

The Vikings Win, sort of . . .

Ethelred the Unready-weak king-took throne at age 11

King Canute crowned King of England, 1016

Structure of Anglo-Saxon society

Eorls--noble classes(warriors, kings)

Cheorls--farmers, craftsmen