Note: "The Butser Ancient Farm project was designed 'to study the agricultural and domestic economy of the period c.400BC to 400AD,' according to director Peter Reynold's last overview of the research program (1999). "The period embraces the late Iron Age and early Roman period [in Britain]. The overall objective was and is to create practical working research programmes based directly upon the archaeological evidence as interpreted from excavations."
According to Digital Digging, "The principal house type at Danebury Ring was a circular, one-door structure ranging between 6 and 9m (20 and 30ft) in diameter. About 70 have been excavated. They fall into two basic types: those built with walls of vertical planks bedded in continuous wall slots; and those whose walls were of wattlework."
"In the Old Norse written corpus, berserkers ... were warriors who purportedly fought in a trance-like fury, a characteristic which later gave rise to the modern English word 'berserk' ... Berserkers are attested to in numerous Old Norse sources, with their name literally rendered as 'bear-coats', along with úlfhéðnar ('wolf-coats')." Source: Wikipedia.
"...It is proposed by some authors that the northern warrior tradition originated in hunting magic. Three main animal cults appeared: the bear, the wolf, and the wild boar." The legend of the werewolf may be related to these ancient stories:
"Old Norse had the cognate varúlfur, but because of the high importance of werewolves in Norse mythology, there were alternative terms such as ulfhéðinn ('one in wolf-skin', referring still to the totemistic or cultic adoption of wolf-nature rather than the superstitious belief in actual shape-shifting). In modern Scandinavian also kveldulf ('evening-wolf'), presumably after the name of Kveldulf Bjalfason, a historical berserker of the 9th century who figures in the Icelandic sagas." (Wikipedia)
Berserkers, like Shieldmaidens, may be completely mythological. According to the National Museum of Denmark, there is little to no archaeological evidence that they ever existed. Assuming that they were real, however, and that the stories about their ultraviolent frenzies are accurate, what could account for their deranged behavior?
The Viking berserkers, we are told, went into battle in a trance-like rage and were supposed to be almost uncontrollable killing machines. Dressed in wolf and bear pelts, they would attack friend and foe alike and their homicidal madness sounds a lot like a drug-induced frenzy of some kind:
"This fury, which was called berserkergang, occurred not only in the heat of battle, but also during laborious work. Men who were thus seized performed things which otherwise seemed impossible for human power. This condition is said to have begun with shivering, chattering of the teeth, and chill in the body, and then the face swelled and changed its colour. With this was connected a great hot-headedness, which at last gave over into a great rage, under which they howled as wild animals, bit the edge of their shields, and cut down everything they met without discriminating between friend or foe. When this condition ceased, a great dulling of the mind and feebleness followed, which could last for one or several days." -- Fabing, Howard D. (1956). "On Going Berserk: A Neurochemical Inquiry. (Subscription-access only)
Note: A detailed commentary on berserkers in general and Fabing's paper can be found here.)
The legends suggest that the berserkers might have taken some kind of drug that caused these fits of berserkergang. Whatever it was, it came on with a rush of "shivering, chattering of the teeth and chill in the body," caused a spike in blood-pressure ("the face swelled and changed its color") and body temperature ("a great hot-headedness") and ended with a hangover with could last for days. No one really knows if the berserkers were high on something, but various candidates have been suggested:
"While some researchers believe the Berserkers simply worked themselves up into a self-induced hysteria before fighting, others maintain that it was sorcery, the consumption of drugs or alcohol, or even mental illness, that accounted for their behaviour. Some botanists have claimed that berserker behaviour could have been caused by the ingestion of the plant known as bog myrtle, one of the main spices in Scandinavian alcoholic beverages." Source: Ancient Origins.
The problem with the bog-myrtle theory is that the plant was commonly used to make beer back then and doesn't appear to produce this kind of dramatic effect on people. Maybe I missed something, but I couldn't find any mention of it in The Vaults of Erowid, a site which covers psychotropic plants and herbs in exhaustive detail.
Bog Myrtle (Myrica Gale) is a natural insect repellent, among other things. It was used (along with other herbs) to flavor beer in the middle ages until "hops supplanted gruit herbs for political and economic reasons." (Wikipedia). Bog Myrtle itself isn't psychedelic, as far as I can tell, but various mixtures of gruit herbs could act as euphorics and some of them had hallucinogenic or deliriant properties, so the idea that the Berserkers were stoned on some kind of herbal drink when they went into battle isn't all that outlandish.
"Helpful for enhancing lucid dreaming and astral work generally, bog myrtle was a flavoring for a type of European beer known as gruit up until the introduction of hops. The other components of gruit (1) were yarrow and wild rosemary. Some say this brew was behind the Berserkers [sic]. In northern Europe, bog myrtle and yarrow have been ingredients in fermented drinks made from grain, honey, or fruit since the Iron Age, and it is still used in Scandinavia to make a liqueur called 'snaps.'" Source: Alchemy Works.
(1) Medieval brewers used a wide variety of gruit herbs in their beer.
If the berserkers were high on something, the most likely candidate is gruit beer, but if they were that drunk it's hard to see how they could function very effectively. Some sources I've found speculate that they were tripping on the psychedelic amanita muscaria mushroom, but the psychoactive ingredient in the mushroom is muscimol, which is described as a "sedative-hypnotic," i.e., a tranquilizer -- just the opposite of what you would expect. Also, I've never heard of a psychedelic that consistently produces outbursts of violent rage. If the berserkers were taking a drug, it sounds like it was a medieval form of PCP.
Were the berserkers mentally ill? Again, it doesn't sound like it. Their furies seem to have been situation-specific, only occurring during battles or perhaps when they were working in their villages. If they were crazy they would've been prone to go berserk for no reason at all, but none of the sources I've found describe them flipping out at random. So, unless they were elite warriors who ate some plant that drove them into a homicidal rage the most plausible explanation for their reported behavior is that the berserkers are simply characters from Old Norse mythology. In other words, maybe they never actually existed.
"The [St. Cuthbert's Gospel], which is a manuscript copy of the Gospel of St John, is the earliest intact European book and is intimately associated with Cuthbert, one of Britain's foremost saints. It was created in the late 7th century in the north-east of England and placed in St Cuthbert's coffin, apparently in 698. It was discovered when the coffin was opened in Durham Cathedral in 1104 on the occasion of the removal of Cuthbert's body to a new shrine. The Gospel has a beautifully-worked, original, red leather binding in excellent condition, and is the only surviving high-status manuscript from this crucial period in British history to retain its original appearance, both inside and out." Source: British Library Medieval Manuscripts Blog.
Note: "With a page size of only 138 by 92 millimetres (5.4 in × 3.6 in), the St Cuthbert Gospel is one of the smallest surviving Anglo-Saxon manuscripts. The essentially undecorated text is the Gospel of John in Latin, written in a script that has been regarded as a model of elegant simplicity." (Wikipedia)
Comment: This fantastic book is over 1300 years old, but it's still perfectly clear and legible. Compare that to the average lifespan of digital documents, which can probably be measured in a few decades at most.
Preserving digital files is a labor-intensive process. According to the Digital Preservation Coalition, the longevity of these documents can be extended with periodic refreshing (moving a file from one physical storage medium to another), migration (changing them from one format to another) and emulation (creating software that can read a variety of formats), but only a small percentage of the digital material being produced today will ever get this kind of archival treatment.
Physical books, on the other hand, will last for centuries, if not millennia, if they're kept in relatively dry, shaded and -- as in the case of the St. Cuthbert Gospel -- airtight spaces. And they frequently don't need any specialized handling at all to survive for thousands of years. For instance, look at all the ancient papyri scrolls that have been discovered which are still readable even though they were just stuffed into amphorae and buried in the sand. When it comes to longevity, the old technologies are still the best and this includes things like photographs recorded on film rather than digital media:
"We know that photographic negatives, transparencies and prints last a long time. They are reliable forms of storing data. Recently the Royal Geographic Society reprinted Frank Hurley's pictures from the 1913 Antarctic Exhibition - from his original glass negatives, nearly 100 years old. An example of how robust the storage medium was - remember these negatives had been in sub-zero conditions and transported across an ocean in a tiny lifeboat!" (Digital Preservation Coalition)
The digital revolution which was supposed to make us all smarter has not only shortened the lifespan of written material but has actually caused a general decline in reading and writing. The number of people who read for pleasure has been going down for decades now. The deterioration in writing skills is obvious all over the western world, and cursive handwriting is no longer being taught in many schools. One of the consequences of this is that "toddler's’ excessive use of touchscreens is leaving the muscles in their hands so weak they cannot grip a pencil," according to the Sunday Express.
What does this have to do with the Cuthbert Gospel? Nothing directly, I guess, but look at what the Gospel represents. What we have here is an approximately 1,300-year-old book which has survived into an age when print is dying in favor of digital media with an average lifespan of less than 20 years. The Cuthbert Gospel was written by hand -- a skill that most people don't learn or use anymore -- in a language that most people can't understand -- that came down to us from a period that most people don't know anything about (they don't know the most basic facts about their own history, never mind the Middle Ages).
I wouldn't call this progress. The Cuthbert Gospel, among other things, is a reminder of how much the West has deteriorated.
Note: The entire Cuthbert Gospel can be viewed online in the British Museum's digitized manuscripts collection. Scanning the book makes it available to people who can't visit the museum, but I have to wonder if the digitized version will last anywhere near as long as the original.
"Researchers have replicated five medieval inks using 15th and 16th century recipes," according to Science Daily.
"The fact that historical archives, libraries, museums, writing workshops and even monasteries, currently conserve medieval manuscripts is not only a question of heroes or ordinary people who went through the trouble to save them, passing them down from one generation to the next, or who hid them so they would not be destroyed. The materials used to write and draw upon paper were crucial so that surviving written texts can be read, translated and interpreted nowadays."
Comment: Nothing's perfect, but paper is still the best medium for long-term conservation. Books and documents written centuries, even thousands of years ago are still readable, but modern archivists are facing an almost insurmountable problem when it comes to preserving digital data created only a few decades ago. If these medieval manuscripts had been written on computers, they would be lost forever.
Note: "Iron gall ink (also known as common ink, oak gall ink or iron gall nut ink) is a purple-black or brown-black ink made from iron salts and tannic acids from vegetable sources. It was the standard ink formulation used in Europe for the fourteen-hundred year period between the 5th and 19th centuries, remained in widespread use well into the 20th century, and is still sold today. " Source: Wikipedia.
Related:New Research on Iron Gall Ink. (A two-and-a-half hour scientific assessment of IGI and ways of preserving manuscripts written with this ink)
"There are a fair number of medieval recipes for making ink. There were two completely different types of ink. The first is carbon ink, made of charcoal or lamp-black mixed with a gum. The second is metal-gall ink, usually iron gall, made by mixing a solution of tannic acids [found in bark, leaves, oak galls, etc] with ferrous sulphate (copperas)[1]; it too requires added gum, but as a thickener rather than as an adhesive. The blackness is the result of a chemical reaction. Both types of ink were employed in medieval manuscripts." Source: Medieval Manuscript Manual, Central European University, Budapest.
[1] "Ferrous sulfate was used in the manufacture of inks, most notably iron gall ink, which was used from the middle ages until the end of the eighteenth century. Chemical tests made on the Lachish letters (c.588–586 BCE) showed the possible presence of iron. It is thought that oak galls and copperas may have been used in making the ink on those letters." (Wikipedia)
The Lachish Letters. Ancient Hebrew on clay ostraca (pieces of pottery).
"It is not known when the first quills appeared, but it is known that some parts of the Dead Sea Scrolls were written with quill in 2nd century BC. St. Isidore of Seville mentions them in the 7th century in his writings, and it is believed that quills then began to spread as a popular method of writing as better than reed pens. With quills, it was easy to write on parchment and vellum. They were also used with fine brushes to illustrate manuscripts with figures, decorations, and images and become more and more popular from the 15th century on, when writing and flourished writing started to spread through the western world." Source: History of Pencils.
This is calligraphy, which is closer to drawing than actual writing.
"What does the quill pen have that the reed pen doesn’t? For starters, the quill is as light as a feather (Literally). The aerodynamics that the feather provides helps with the swiftness that occurs when you write. The quill is definitely thinner than the reed pen and therefore, easier to handle. The quill and reed pen both share the ability to store ink due to capillarity but the quill is more versatile in writing miniscule scripts and perfecting strokes. There may be a correlation between the size/appearance of the scripts during this period and the switch to the quill." Source: Dartmouth Ancient Books Lab.
Note: Feathered quill pens are apparently just a Hollywood invention.
Comment: Quill pens may seem primitive, but the writers who used them could be very productive despite the fact that the pens had to be re-inked constantly and wore out quickly. Just to take one relatively modern example, Charles Dickens used quill pens to write "well over a dozen major novels and novellas, a large number of short stories, including a number of Christmas-themed stories, a handful of plays, and several non-fiction books." (Wikipedia) He was just as productive, if not more so, than writers working with word processors today, so it's obvious that your productivity as a writer has nothing to do with the tools you use.
"A scroll, or rotulus, or roll, is a length of papyrus, leather, parchment, or paper, on which writing is preserved and which is stored in a rolled form. It is most often made by fastening several pieces together, with glue, thread, or thongs. Rolls are often, but not always, written on one side only, for reasons of convenience. An opisthographic roll is one written on both sides, either originally or in the process of re-using the blank outer side of an older scroll." Source: Medieval Scrolls Digital Archive.
The scroll displayed in the video is from the 17th century, I believe. "...There are approximately 23 copies of the Ripley Scroll in existence. The scrolls range in size, colour, and detail but are all variations on a lost 15th century original. Although they are named after George Ripley, there is no evidence that Ripley designed the scrolls himself. They are called Ripley scrolls because some of them include poetry associated with the alchemist. The scrolls' images are symbolic references to the philosopher's stone."
Note: The Romans originally built a settlement and fort on this site. According to Wikipedia, "The suffix of the Anglo-Saxon name Tadcaster is derived from the borrowed Latin word castra meaning 'fort', although the Angles and Saxons used the term for any walled Roman settlement. Tadcaster is first mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, where it appears as Táda, referring to the place where King Harold assembled his army and fleet before entering York and proceeding onwards to the Battle of Stamford Bridge in 1066."
"A motte-and-bailey castle is a fortification with a wooden or stone keep situated on a raised earthwork called a motte, accompanied by an enclosed courtyard, or bailey, surrounded by a protective ditch and palisade. Relatively easy to build with unskilled, often forced, labour, but still militarily formidable, these castles were built across northern Europe from the 10th century onwards, spreading from Normandy and Anjou in France, into the Holy Roman Empire in the 11th century. The Normans introduced the design into England and Wales following their invasion in 1066. Motte-and-bailey castles were adopted in Scotland, Ireland, the Low Countries and Denmark in the 12th and 13th centuries. By the end of the 13th century, the design was largely superseded by alternative forms of fortification, but the earthworks remain a prominent feature in many countries." (Wikipedia)
"A motte is an enditched mound, usually artificial, which supported the strongpoint of the motte-and-bailey castle, overshadowing the bailey or enclosed courtyard below. It is predominantly rounded in plan, but square or rectangular mottes are known, especially in Scotland. The height of mottes varies greatly, the majority being under 5m, although a few of the sites built in the years immediately following the Norman Conquest are well known for having some of the largest castle mounds in the country." Source: Castles of Wales.
St. Cuthbert's Gospel, The Digital Dark Age & The Decline In Basic Literacy
Video from 2012.
"The [St. Cuthbert's Gospel], which is a manuscript copy of the Gospel of St John, is the earliest intact European book and is intimately associated with Cuthbert, one of Britain's foremost saints. It was created in the late 7th century in the north-east of England and placed in St Cuthbert's coffin, apparently in 698. It was discovered when the coffin was opened in Durham Cathedral in 1104 on the occasion of the removal of Cuthbert's body to a new shrine. The Gospel has a beautifully-worked, original, red leather binding in excellent condition, and is the only surviving high-status manuscript from this crucial period in British history to retain its original appearance, both inside and out." Source: British Library Medieval Manuscripts Blog.
Note: "With a page size of only 138 by 92 millimetres (5.4 in × 3.6 in), the St Cuthbert Gospel is one of the smallest surviving Anglo-Saxon manuscripts. The essentially undecorated text is the Gospel of John in Latin, written in a script that has been regarded as a model of elegant simplicity." (Wikipedia)
Comment: This fantastic book is over 1300 years old, but it's still perfectly clear and legible. Compare that to the average lifespan of digital documents, which can probably be measured in a few decades at most.
Preserving digital files is a labor-intensive process. According to the Digital Preservation Coalition, the longevity of these documents can be extended with periodic refreshing (moving a file from one physical storage medium to another), migration (changing them from one format to another) and emulation (creating software that can read a variety of formats), but only a small percentage of the digital material being produced today will ever get this kind of archival treatment.
Physical books, on the other hand, will last for centuries, if not millennia, if they're kept in relatively dry, shaded and -- as in the case of the St. Cuthbert Gospel -- airtight spaces. And they frequently don't need any specialized handling at all to survive for thousands of years. For instance, look at all the ancient papyri scrolls that have been discovered which are still readable even though they were just stuffed into amphorae and buried in the sand. When it comes to longevity, the old technologies are still the best and this includes things like photographs recorded on film rather than digital media:
"We know that photographic negatives, transparencies and prints last a long time. They are reliable forms of storing data. Recently the Royal Geographic Society reprinted Frank Hurley's pictures from the 1913 Antarctic Exhibition - from his original glass negatives, nearly 100 years old. An example of how robust the storage medium was - remember these negatives had been in sub-zero conditions and transported across an ocean in a tiny lifeboat!" (Digital Preservation Coalition)
The digital revolution which was supposed to make us all smarter has not only shortened the lifespan of written material but has actually caused a general decline in reading and writing. The number of people who read for pleasure has been going down for decades now. The deterioration in writing skills is obvious all over the western world, and cursive handwriting is no longer being taught in many schools. One of the consequences of this is that "toddler's’ excessive use of touchscreens is leaving the muscles in their hands so weak they cannot grip a pencil," according to the Sunday Express.
What does this have to do with the Cuthbert Gospel? Nothing directly, I guess, but look at what the Gospel represents. What we have here is an approximately 1,300-year-old book which has survived into an age when print is dying in favor of digital media with an average lifespan of less than 20 years. The Cuthbert Gospel was written by hand -- a skill that most people don't learn or use anymore -- in a language that most people can't understand -- that came down to us from a period that most people don't know anything about (they don't know the most basic facts about their own history, never mind the Middle Ages).
I wouldn't call this progress. The Cuthbert Gospel, among other things, is a reminder of how much the West has deteriorated.
Note: The entire Cuthbert Gospel can be viewed online in the British Museum's digitized manuscripts collection. Scanning the book makes it available to people who can't visit the museum, but I have to wonder if the digitized version will last anywhere near as long as the original.
Posted at 07:00 AM in Ancient Britain, Ancient Literature, Ancient Writing, Books, Christianity, Commentary, Culture, Current Affairs, Europe, Medieval, Religion, Videos | Permalink