Unearthing Scotland's Nordic Troves

Carolingian lidded vessel, part of the trove. - ITV.com

"Found in the Galloway area, of the Dumfries and Galloway region in south-west Scotland in September 2014, the assemblage is believed to be of ninth or tenth century Viking culture. The principal finds in the Viking treasure comprise of a decorative gold bird pin, a silver Carolingian pot, a solid gold ring, and a solid silver cross with gold inlay and enamel decorations, over twenty solid gold and silver ingots and dozens of solid silver arm bands decorated with saltire*-type designs."

Read the full article at Coin Week.

Sutton Hoo on Google

"Sutton Hoo: Anglo-Saxon Ship Burial" is a virtual exhibit now on display at the Google Cultural Institute. It may be viewed at this link.

UK experts find 7th-century teen buried in her bed

Via Yahoo! News and the Associated Press:

"Archaeologists excavating near Cambridge have stumbled upon a rare and mysterious find: The skeleton of a 7th-century teenager buried in an ornamental bed along with a gold-and-garnet cross, an iron knife and a purse full of glass beads.
Experts say the grave is an example of an unusual Anglo-Saxon funerary practice of which very little is known. Just over a dozen of these "bed burials" have been found in Britain, and it's one of only two in which a pectoral cross — meant to be worn over the chest — has been discovered."

The full article may be read here.

Wynbeam, Old English Vocabulary

A blog on Tumblr I've recently discovered:

“Hwæt!”
So I just started this blog so I would have a place to be a “nerd.” I have a passionate interest in all things Medieval, ranging from the Early Middle Ages through the Renaissance, and even as far back as Late Antiquity and the Hellenistic Age. Whether it’s art history, history, literature, culture, language, religion, architecture, or legend, as long as it happened in Western Europe before c.1688 I enjoy learning about it. Occasionally I come across objects in the modern world that draw from Medieval influences and customs, and these are the things which fascinate me. I usually post about them on FaceBook or Twitter, but these sites adhere to strict character limits. I felt a blog might be a better place to share my findings.

Wynbeam: tree of delight.
Yggdrasil is the World Tree in Norse Mythology and is pictured in this page’s background. My blog Wynbeam is a collection or “tree” of things in this world which branch from the cultural influence of the Middle Ages. I hope to post photos, trivia, historical facts, hypotheses, etymologies, and anything else I find in today’s world that conjures the ideals of these fascinating eras.

You can find and read posts on Wynbeam here.

Christmas or Yule? Pagan secrets of the festive season

"Around 730 AD the Venerable Bede recorded a custom of the Anglo-Saxons, from whom many modern Britons and Americans are descended. 'They began the year,” he wrote, “with 25 December, designated by the heathen term módraniht, that is, the mothers' night.'

The Anglo-Saxons had another word for it: Geol from Jol in Old Norse, the language of the Vikings, and the origin of our word Yule.

At this time the Vikings would honor the gods Odin, Niord and Freya, as well as departed friends. As the leader of the Wild Hunt, Odin would fly over the countryside bestowing favors on those who honored him best and food would be left out for him. Think of Santa's elves, sleigh and reindeer."

Read the full article at the Sierra Sun.

Viking hoard provides new clues to 'previously unknown ruler'

"One of the most important hoards of Viking silver ever found in Britain contains valuable coins bearing the identity of a previously unknown ruler, it emerged yesterday.
The “hugely significant” hoard of 1,000-year-old artefacts includes more than 200 coins, ingots and pieces of silver jewellery that was found buried underground in north Lancashire." Read the full article at the Daily Telegraph.

Wassail

A demonstration of the ancient custom of  wassailing, specifically that of the Orchard-Visiting wassail:




Some excerpts from Wikipedia's artcles on wassail and wassailing:

Some scholars prefer a pre-Christian explanation of the old traditional ceremony of wassailing. How far the tradition dates back is unknown but it has undeniable connections with Anglo-Saxon pagan ritual. Of recent times the word Wassail (from the Anglo-Saxon toast Wæs þu hæl, "be thou hale" — i.e., "be in good health") has come to be synonymous with Christmas. The word wassail is old English (OE) and so may predate the Norman conquest in 1066. According to the Oxford English Dictionary "waes hael" is the Middle English spelling parallel to OE "wes hal". The American Heritage Dictionary, fourth edition, gives Old Norse "ves heill" as the source of Middle English "waeshaeil". The correct response to the toast is Drinc hæl.
Christmas was not celebrated anywhere before the third century, and only gradually moved northwards through Europe. It was probably the Normans who brought the celebration to England. Traditionally, the wassail is celebrated on Twelfth Night (mostly regarded as January 6, but more properly the evening of January 5). However most people insist on wassailing on 'Old Twelvey Night' (January 17) as that would have been the correct date before the introduction of the Gregorian Calendar in 1752.



In the cider-producing West of England (primarily the counties of Devon, Somerset, Dorset, Gloucestershire and Herefordshire) wassailing also refers to drinking (and singing) the health of trees in the hopes that they might better thrive.
An old rhyme goes: “Wassaile the trees, that they may beare / You many a Plum and many a Peare: / For more or lesse fruits they will bring, / As you do give them Wassailing.”
The purpose of wassailing is to awake the cider apple trees and to scare away evil spirits to ensure a good harvest of fruit in the Autumn.{"England In Particular", Common Ground 2007} The ceremonies of each wassail vary from village to village but they generally all have the same core elements. A wassail King and Queen lead the song and/or a processional tune to be played/sung from one orchard to the next, the wassail Queen will then be lifted up into the boughs of the tree where she will place toast soaked in Wassail from the Clayen Cup as a gift to the tree spirits (and to show the fruits created the previous year). Then an incantation is usually recited such as

Here's to thee, old apple tree, That blooms well, bears well. Hats full, caps full, Three bushel bags full, An' all under one tree. Hurrah! Hurrah!

Then the assembled crowd will sing and shout and bang drums and pots & pans and generally make a terrible racket until the gunsmen give a great final volley through the branches to make sure the work is done and then off to the next orchard. Perhaps unbeknown to the general public, this ancient English tradition is still very much thriving today. The West Country is the most famous and largest cider producing region of the country and some of the most important wassails are held annually in Carhampton (Somerset) and Whimple (Devon), both on 17 January (old Twelfth Night).

At Carhampton, near Minehead, the Apple Orchard Wassailing is held on the Old Twelfth Night (17 January) as a ritual to ask God for a good apple harvest. The villagers form a circle around the largest apple tree, hang pieces of toast soaked in cider in the branches for the robins, who represent the 'good spirits' of the tree. A shotgun is fired overhead to scare away evil spirits and the group sings, the following being the last verse:

Old Apple tree, old apple tree;

We've come to wassail thee;

To bear and to bow apples enow;

Hats full, caps full, three bushel bags full;

Barn floors full and a little heap under the stairs.

Lamb's wool or lambswool is a variety of wassail made from ale, baked apples, sugar and spices. It is mentioned in Poet's Pub by Eric Linklater.

Next crowne the bowle full

With gentle Lambs wooll,

Adde sugar, nutmeg, and ginger,

With store of ale too,

And thus ye must doe

To make the Wassaile a swinger.

In ancient tradition, the first day of November was dedicated to the angel presiding over fruits, seeds, &c. and was named La Mas Ubhal, that is, the day of the apple fruit, and being pronounced lamasool. The English have corrupted the name to lamb's-wool.

There Are No Dead Languages

"For Tolkien, Anglo-Saxon was not a dead language. Nor was Middle English, the variant born of the Norman Invasion, which he also taught–and could recite beautifully according to other of his students who were not so dour as Amis and Larkin." Read the full article by John Farrell at Forbes Magazine.

Yorkshire Dales National Park reveals Anglo Saxon building

"The stone building, near Selside, North Yorkshire, was uncovered by members of the Ingleborough Archaeology Group. ... Samples of charcoal found in the soil floor were carbon dated. That revealed they date from between 660 and 780 AD." Full story is available at the BBC.

£32,000 to dig up evidence of the past

"A project to unearth Bingham’s past has received £32,000....Mr Peter Allen, the association’s chairman, said the project was designed to look for evidence of the original Anglo-Saxon core village and to show how the village grew and changed, right up to the 20th Century." Full article is available at the Newark Advertiser.

More Saxon treasure unearthed

"A silver clothes buckle dating back to the Saxon era has been discovered by two keen archaeologists. ... This item has gone to Verulamium museum as it may be declared treasure trove. ...David Sewell, 52, of New Road, Northchurch, and Mark Becher, 37, from Uxbridge, are regularly unearthing ancient treasure as the heads of firm The Metal Detectors."  More information can be found at Hemel Today.

Foraging 'weeds' provides ancient Anglo Saxon fare today

Plantago major. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

"You probably didn't know that many of what we consider some of the most pernicious weeds in our gardens were once considered sacred among the ancients....For example, when you're mowing your lawn, you may be shredding some of the Anglo Saxons' nine sacred herbs: mugwort, plantain, chamomile, betony, stinging nettle, chervil, fennel and crab apple."  The complete article by Jim Ewing may be found at the Clarion Ledger.

Leeds lands vital grant to save its golden hoard

"The National Heritage Memorial Fund gives £95,000 to keep Anglo Saxon jewellery in the city where it was found. Good news for Leeds' campaign to raise money for the outstanding Anglo-Saxon jewellery found by a metal detectorist, as the Northerner reported last week." Read the full article at The Guardian.

Anglo-Saxon Recipes

Crustade of Chicken and Pigeon, Lamb and Apricot Stew, Curd Cheese Pastries,  and other recipes for traditional meals for the Anglo-Saxon feast table. Good source of traditional ideas for Saxon and other Germanic Reconstructionists. The full PDF article may be found here.

Staffordshire Hoard goes on display in Washington DC

"A museum in the United States has begun exhibiting the UK's largest find of Anglo-Saxon treasure. ...The exhibition is at the National Geographic Museum in Washington DC. ... The hoard of more than 3,500 gold and silver artefacts was found by a metal detector enthusiast in a farmer's field in Staffordshire in July 2009." Full article at BBC News.

Staffordshire Gold Hoard

"One day, or perhaps one night, in the late seventh century an unknown party traveled along an old Roman road that cut across an uninhabited heath fringed by forest in the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia. Possibly they were soldiers, ..." Read the full article at National Geographic.

Anglo-Saxon brooch goes on display

"An Anglo-Saxon brooch discovered in West Hanney is to go on show for the first time since it was unearthed two years ago." Read more at the Oxford Mail.

“Anglo-Saxon Hoard: Gold From England’s Dark Ages” at the National Geographic Museum, Washington, D.C.

Staffordshire Hoard, the largest Anglo-Saxon treasure trove known to date, goes on display until March 2012. Read the full story at the Business Insider.

Language Oddities: Scots English

"The history of Scots English goes back to the Anglo-Saxon invasions during the fifth and sixth centuries A.D. Impacted by the dominant southern English of England and weakened by several wars and political setbacks, Scottish English still retains its unmistakable voice." Read the full story at Your Houston News.

Craftsmen restore boundary wall

"They have been painstakingly removing a 1950s sand and cement render on the wall – thought to date back to Anglo Saxon times – for the past week." Read the full story at the Oxford Times.