Normanising the North: The Evidence of Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Scandinavian Sculpture
Abstract This Study Probes the destruction of material culture to illuminate the introduction of Norman political authority into northern England. A brief overview of Norman destruction of churches provides the background to a review of the potential relationship of Anglo-Saxon monuments with memory and identity, in the context of recent discussions of monument reuse. Durham and York, the Anglo-Saxon monastic sites at Wearmouth/Jarrow, Lindisfarne and Jedburgh, and a selection of local churchyards provide case studies. It argues that some monuments seem to have been deliberately targeted, but a wider range of factors, all ultimately derived from changing political circumstances, can be identified that explain why sculpture was removed and reused. The paper serves as a platform for further debate about the significance of monuments in the Middle Ages, and as a contribution to the broader discourse within archaeology about their social meanings.
The Battle of the Standard (1138): A benchmark of Norman and English assimilation.
ABSTRACT This dissertation will explore the social science construct of assimilation between the Norman English and the English two generations after the conquest of England in 1066. The Normans English shall be identified as the descendants of Continentals that either fought alongside Duke William at the battle of Hastings or followed shortly thereafter. The English shall be identified as the descendants of the subjects of Edward the Confessor. This thesis is about perceptions. Many people can perceive the same man very differently. He may be an uncle, son, or brother. He might be a member of a gens, which has more than one nationality, religion, language or set of mores. This thesis examines the relationship between two gentes that shared a nationality, a government, a language, a religion and the holy relics of indigenous saints. Yet, they were separated by the perception that they were different. This thesis examines this perception of differences with medieval charters and poems and the work of historians: medieval, nineteenth century, and modern. The battle of the Standard (1138) shall be used as a benchmark to assess the degree of assimilation between the Normans and English. Seventy-two years after the Norman Conquest, this battle took place at Northallerton between the forces of the Scottish King David and a disparate coalition of Yorkshire noblemen of Continental descent, Flemish mercenaries, English and Anglo-Scandinavian parish fyrds and a small contingent sent by a distant king occupied in an internecine war of succession. By this time the bilingual Norman English had co-opted an English identity, yet were still proud of their Norman heritage. In the next fifteen years, two of the chroniclers, Henry of Huntingdon and Ailred of Rievaulx, writing about the battle, stripped these Norman Englishmen of their patina of Englishness and extolled their Norman exclusivity and superiority. In recent decades, the idea has been established that chroniclers attempted to create a single gens in England during the 1120s. Historians have theorised that medieval clerics used the term ‘barbarians’ for the Christian Welsh, Scots and Irish to create an ‘otherness’, which fulfilled the assimilation of the Normans and English. This thesis shall refute this argument.
Negotiating the cultural and economic outcomes of sport heritage attractions: the case of the National Baseball Hall of Fame
ABSTRACT Contemporary museums must balance their roles as commercial entities and repositories of various, and often dissonant, heritages and histories. Sports museums in particular often have clear commercial and nostalgic aims, particularly through tourist visitation, though the extent to which they represent more challenging narratives remains unclear. This paper examines how one of the most famous sports museums in the world, the National Baseball Hall of Fame (NBHF) in Cooperstown, New York, balances its dual role as tourist attraction and repository of baseball's sometimes checkered past. It was found that different sections of the museum provide greater or lesser degrees of engagement with more controversial issues, although the commercial outputs and appeal of the museum remains clear throughout. Utlimately, the NBHF demonstrates that balancing veneration and critique in collections can be commercially prosperous, and can provide a template for other sport and popular culture museums who may be wary of incorporating more challenging narratives in their exhibits. Furthermore, the symbiotic relationship between the Hall of Fame and the village of Cooperstown, particularly in creating and maintaining cultural and economic outputs, requires further exploration.