Filling the Gaps: Strathclyde and the Anglo-Saxons

Tim and I have been chatting about Strathclyde for longer than either of us would probably care to admit (even before his name was on the cover of any books!). So I was thrilled to tuck in with his latest book Strathclyde and the Anglo-Saxons in the Viking Age in the days running up to Christmas....

Medieval biological weapons

I picked up a book the other day about ancient biological and chemical weapons. I was a little surprised that it has a chapter on insect weapons. It not that I don't think insects can be a weapon, as we saw in my recent post on the defense of Chester, it's just that I didn't...

Oswine the Anti-Hero

(A post from the archive on the anniversary of King Oswine's death.) King Oswine of Deira (Yorkshire) 20 August 651 Today is the anniversary of the execution of King Oswine of Deira, considered by some to be a saint. All we know of Oswine is included in Bede's History (Book III:14). Bede writes a curious...

The 300 (or 303)

When you think of 'the 300' you probably think of the recent movie on the famous Spartan-Persian battle of antiquity. Considered by historians all around as a pivotal battle in antiquity, the number 300 either spawned a legend that spread all the way to the British Isles or was such a common symbolic number that...

FB: The Mystery of Urbs Iudeu

James Fraser has written an interesting article on a very important seventh century English fortress called Urbs Iudeu. Fraser notes that the Urbs Iudeu is unlikely to be one of the better known named places on the Firth of Forth, this fortress gave its name to the firth itself, or took its name from the...

Urien, Lord of Catraeth

I've been thinking today about the claim that Urien is Lord of Catraeth. Wherever Catraeth is doesn't matter for the moment. What has struck me as strange is that the British attacked Catraeth. The point of the battle of Catraeth was to take it away from its Lord, and the Britons lost. Other references to...