The Ruler Portraits Of Anglo Saxon England

The author argues that this series of portraits, never before studied as a corpus, creates a visual genealogy equivalent to the textual genealogies and regnal lists that are so much a feature of late Anglo-Saxon culture. As such they are an important part of the way in which the kings and queens of early medieval England created both their history and their kingdom."--BOOK JACKET.

Anglo-Saxon England is the only publication which consistently embraces all the main aspects of study of Anglo-Saxon history and culture - linguistic, literary, textual, palaeographic, religious, intellectual, historical, archaeological and artistic - and which promotes the more unusual interests - in music or medicine or education, for example. Articles in volume 36 include: The tabernacula of Gregory the Great and the conversion of Anglo-Saxon England by Flora Spiegel; The career of Aldhelm by Michael Lapidge; The name 'Merovingian' and the dating of Beowulf by Walter Goffart; An abbot, an archbishop and the Viking raids of 1006-7 and 1009-12 by Simon Keynes; and Demonstrative behaviour and political communication in later Anglo-Saxon England by Julia Barrow.

This engaging study focuses on the role of assemblies in later Anglo-Saxon politics, challenging and nuancing existing models of the late Anglo-Saxon state. Its ten chapters investigate both traditional constitutional aspects of assemblies - who attended these events, where and when they met, and what business they conducted - and the symbolic and representational nature of these gatherings. Levi Roach takes into account important recent work on continental rulership, and argues that assemblies were not a check on kingship in these years, but rather an essential feature of it. In particular, the author highlights the role of symbolic communication at assemblies, arguing that ritual and demonstration were as important in English politics as they were elsewhere in Europe. Far from being exceptional, the methods of rulership employed by English kings look very much like those witnessed elsewhere on the continent, where assemblies and ritual formed an essential part of the political order.

Explores how power is shaped and negotiated in later Anglo-Saxon texts, focusing on how hierarchical, vertical structures are presented alongside patterns of reciprocity and economies of mutual obligation, especially within the context of secular, spiritual, literal or symbolic patronage relationships.

Providing a fresh appraisal of the art of Anglo-Saxon England, this text looks at its influence upon the creation of an identity as a nation.

Works on Anglo-Saxon kingship often take as their starting point the line from Beowulf: ‘that was a good king’. This monograph, however, explores what it means to be a king, and how kings defined their own kingship in opposition to other powers. Kings derived their royal power from a divine source, which led to conflicts between the interpreters of the divine will (the episcopate) and the individual wielding power (the king). Demonstrating how Anglo-Saxon kings were able to manipulate political ideologies to increase their own authority, this book explores the unique way in which Anglo-Saxon kings understood the source and nature of their power, and of their own authority.

This groundbreaking study of coinage in early medieval England is the first to take account of the very significant additions to the corpus of southern English coins discovered in recent years and to situate this evidence within the wider historical context of Anglo-Saxon England and its continental neighbours. Its nine chapters integrate historical and numismatic research to explore who made early medieval coinage, who used it and why. The currency emerges as a significant resource accessible across society and, through analysis of its production, circulation and use, the author shows that control over coinage could be a major asset. This control was guided as much by ideology as by economics and embraced several levels of power, from kings down to individual craftsmen. Thematic in approach, this innovative book offers an engaging, wide-ranging account of Anglo-Saxon coinage as a unique and revealing gauge for the interaction of society, economy and government.

Cruciform brooches were large and decorative items of jewellery, frequently used to pin together women's garments in pre-Christian northwest Europe. Characterised by the strange bestial visages that project from the feet of these dress and cloak fasteners, cruciform brooches were especially common in eastern England during the 5th and 6th centuries AD. This book provides a multifaceted, holistic and contextual analysis of more than 2,000 Anglo-Saxon cruciform brooches. It offers a critical examination of identity in Early Medieval society, suggesting that the idea of being Anglian in post-Roman Britain was not a primordial, tribal identity transplanted from northern Germany, but was at least partly forged through the repeated, prevalent use of dress and material culture.