Month: October 2018

Widukind, Saxon thorn

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Widukind is one of those odd characters from history whose historical personae is much larger than his own achievements probably merited. Regular readers may remember mentions of him here and here, when he led various rebellions against the Franks during their decades-long conquest and Christianization of the Saxon people. He was a fearsomely effective military leader, as we shall see, and must have been a powerful force in Saxon society. In the end, however, even he submitted to Charlemagne, and then faded from view. More than a thousand years later, in a bizarre twist of fate, he became a hero to the nascent Nazi regime. A tangled path indeed.

Widukind first appears in history in 777, at the fateful spring assembly at Paderborn that launched King Charles on his path to Roncevalles. “All the Franks gathered there and, from every part of Saxony whatsover, the Saxons too, with the exception of Widukind, who, with a few others, was in rebellion and took refuge in Nordmannia with his companions.”1.Royal Annals, year 777, King, p. 79. “For they all came to him with the exception of Widukind, one of the primores of the Westphalians, who, conscious of his numerous crimes, had fled to Sigfred, king of the Danes.”2.Revised Royal Annals, year 777, King, p. 113.

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Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 Royal Annals, year 777, King, p. 79.
↑2 Revised Royal Annals, year 777, King, p. 113.

Free course on the Book of Kells

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You may have heard of that amazing manuscript known as the Book of Kells. I’ve talked about it here and here. If you want more Kells (and who doesn’t?), Trinity College Dublin, where the manuscript is housed, is offering a free, four-week, online course. You can get all the details at their site:

Should be fun!

What should I wear?

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Clothing is perhaps the most perishable item of all material culture. Even in our modern age clothing is quick to deteriorate – what do you think the odds of your socks surviving to be marveled over a thousand years from now? Without archaeological evidence we have to turn to the sources for information about how people dressed in the eighth century. We are fortunate to have a detailed description of Charlemagne’s everyday clothing, courtesy of his biographer Einhard. Fortunately for us Charles was a man of the people, and so his choices reflect, to some extent, everyday styles.

He wore ancestral, that is, Frankish, clothing. Next to his body, he wore a linen shirt and linen drawers, then a tunic ringed with silk fringe, and stockings. Then he wrapped his lower legs in cloth bands and put shoes on his feet. In winter he covered his chest and shoulders with a jacket 1.The Dutton translation says vest. made from otter or ermine skins, put on a blue cloak, and always girded himself with a sword, whose hilt and belt were either gold or silver. Sometimes he used a jeweled sword, but only on important feast days or when the envoys of foreign peoples arrived. He rejected foreign clothing, even if very beautiful, and never put up with wearing it except at Rome, when once on the plea of Pope Hadrian, and again on the request of his successor, Leo, he wore a long tunic and chlamys2.A short mantle fastened at the shoulders, worn by men in the Greek East since ancient times., and shoes made in the Roman fashion. On feast days he walked around wearing clothes woven with gold thread, bejeweled shoes, a cloak fastened with a gold pin, and a golden crown with jewels. The rest of the time, his dress was hardly different from that of the common people.3.Einhard, Life, ch. 23, p. 41.

Charles in the center, from a mid-9th century manuscript

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Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 The Dutton translation says vest.
↑2 A short mantle fastened at the shoulders, worn by men in the Greek East since ancient times.
↑3 Einhard, Life, ch. 23, p. 41.