Tim Clarkson, Scotland's Merlin: A Medieval Legend and Its Dark Age Origins, John Donald, 2016. Amazon US $22 PB, $8 Kindle. Tim Clarkson's new book, Scotland's Merlin, was a lovely break from my usual plague reading. Merlin is one of the few Arthurian characters who can stand alone from the Arthurian corpus as the Welsh figure... Continue Reading →
King Offa’s tomb
How does one leave a legacy? All leaders care about their legacy. Modern politicians seem preoccupied by both leaving a legacy and what it will be. Medieval kings did not count on historians to keep their legacy or even memory alive. Most early medieval kings are known only as a name in a list, a... Continue Reading →
Heavenfield Round-up 7: June Links
I'm not sure where June went. I wish I had been more productive, but luckily some of my fellow bloggers have been much busier. Bamburgh Research Project has been out in the field for most of June. Various updates have been posted on their blog. Curt Emanuel, the Medieval History Geek, has posts on late... Continue Reading →
The Death of King Diarmait
I've been browsing through the Fragmentary Annals of Ireland for you know what, plague, and I came across an interesting entry. 665 Kl. The death by plague of the son of Áed Sláine, i.e. Blathmac [...], i.e. in Calatruim. Diarmait died in the same place, standing, stretched against a cross, watching the Laigin army approaching... Continue Reading →
St Oswald Hagiography & Literature
This post is a run down of existing hagiography and literature on St Oswald. I'm really concerned here more with literature than history. The works listed on the indented bullet under each work lists the known sources or influences in that work. I may also list a few key translations or secondary works on these... Continue Reading →
LKM: The Realm of Rheged
Finally getting back to my lost kingdoms series of posts, I've been putting off Rheged for some time now. Looking for Rheged is always risky. It is the epitome of the lost kingdoms. It appears just as it is about to be blotted out by a growing regional power, Bernicia. Not unlike Beowulf being the... Continue Reading →
Heavenfield 