Update: This article has ended up on quite a lot of conspiracy websites. Hello! Stay polite and considerate. Conspiracy Theorists are the bane of the academic. After years of research, experimentation and peer-review, some random person on the internet appears and instantly disregards your work, choosing to accept a sinister cover-up instead. I’ve written before […]
Anglo-Saxon Emporia: an Exploration
Updated: May 28, 2021 The Emporia represent an interesting set of archaeological evidence in the ‘Anglo-Saxon’ world, likely representing a return to urbanisation for the first time since the Romans. However, as is often the case with archaeological evidence, must about them is unclear. In the latest deep-dive, we take a brief look at the […]
Apollo 11: A Review
Apollo 11 provides a breath-taking look back at the mission to put a man on the moon. Composed of remastered contemporary footage, there is no way to get closer to the people who made this scientific achievement a reality. It is a master-class in the making of historical documentaries. The world has fallen out of […]
Early Medieval Occupational Bynames
Еще одна характерная черта английской системы именования в раннем средневековье — наличие прозвищ/кличек, отражающих род занятий и род работы. Они не только дают нам интересное представление о жизни и возможностях трудоустройства того периода, но и указывают на социальную роль, которую играли эти люди в своих общинах. Меня здесь интересует не столько четкое выражение ранга или […]
The Best Podcasts for Studying
An Oxford Historian Aug 30, 2021 4 min read If the first year of a PhD ( combined with a global pandemic) has taught me anything, it’s the value of a good podcast. Late nights in the library, walking back and forth from obscure reading rooms, and entering thousands of mind-numbing names into a database […]
Obscene and Offensive Early Medieval Nicknames
ВНИМАНИЕ! Ниже приведены некоторые нецензурные выражения. Одна из примечательных особенностей прозвищ раннего Средневековья — их шокирующий характер. Частота имен, которые современная аудитория считает оскорбительными, поразительна, и мы задаемся вопросом, как эти имена вписывались в обычную жизнь того времени. Важно отметить, что эти имена используются не только в закрытых группах и за закрытыми дверями — мы […]
Tolkien
Hello, my name is Tristan and I’m a first-year history PhD researcher at Oxford. The aim of this blog is to share my research and wider history on the early medieval world, help give any advice on applying to university and explaining about Oxford, and generally expanding engagement with the Humanities. So if you fall […]
The Prittlewell Prince
An Oxford Historian Sep 3, 2021 4 min read Archaeology is about much more than treasure-hunting but, inevitably, popular attention tends to be drawn towards rich and magnificent finds. Within an early medieval context, the ‘Princely’ burials of the Mid Saxon period are particularly notable in this context. The Sutton Hoo Mound 1 ship-burial is […]
Westfield Farm – a high-status 'Anglo-Saxon' female burial
The Westfield Farm (Ely) cemetery represents a crucial yet under-appreciated piece of ‘Anglo-Saxon’ funerary archaeology – a cemetery focused around a single lavish female burial. Move over Sutton Hoo Mound 1 and the Prittlewell Prince, there’s a lot to be learnt here too… We hear an awful lot about the large-scale male ‘Princely’ burial of […]
Vikings in the Americas in AD1021, study finds
An Oxford Historian Oct 20, 2021 2 min read Updated: Oct 21, 2021 The presence of the Vikings in the Americas has always been a long-contested topic. Although Saga and archaeological evidence suggest Leif Erikson beat Columbus to ‘discovering’ (/genociding) the Americas, actual concrete proof has always been incredibly limited, and imprecise. Well, a new […]