̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - coins

An early medieval money mystery is solved

ta385 — Tue, 09 Apr 2024 05:00:00 +0000

Byzantine bullion fuelled Europe’s revolutionary adoption of silver coins in the mid-7th century, only to be overtaken by silver from a mine in Charlemagne’s Francia a century later, new tests reveal. ̽��ֱ��findings could transform our understanding of Europe’s economic and political development.

Pop-up mints and coins made from prayers

amb206 — Mon, 04 Dec 2017 09:38:48 +0000

We’re used to the kind of circular coins that jangle in your pocket. But this one is lozenge-shaped and features a crude impression of a castle on its face. Its edges are sharp.

A silver shilling piece, it was made in 1648 during the bloody siege of Pontefract Castle. Today it’s one of 80 examples of currency on display at the Fitzwilliam Museum. ̽��ֱ��temporary exhibition – Currencies of Conflict – is thought to be the first dedicated exclusively to emergency money.

̽��ֱ��focus is on coinage that reflects the turmoil of the English Civil War. But the exhibition also sets these coins within a wider context of 2,500 years of history and features some rarely shown items from the Fitzwilliam’s outstanding collection.

Between 1644 and 1649, the Royalist stronghold of Pontefract Castle was besieged three times by the Parliamentary forces led by Oliver Cromwell. Royalists loyal to King Charles 1 also held out at Carlisle, Newark and Scarborough Castles. All eventually fell to the Parliamentarians.

Examples of siege coinage from all four castles appear in the display. These coins were made by craftsmen working within the fortress walls, using metal obtained from melting down objects requisitioned from the occupants of the castle and town.

People, and especially soldiers, had to be paid to ensure their continued loyalty. “We don’t know how many emergency coins were made during these sieges but a contemporary journal entry from Carlisle suggests that £323 of shilling pieces were struck from requisitioned plate. They show how a micro-economy developed during times of siege,” said curator Richard Kelleher.

Although the quality and weight of the silver, and (rarely) gold, was generally good, the manufacture was often much less sophisticated. In temporary mints, pieces of metal were stamped with ‘dies’ of varied workmanship, from the crude designs at Carlisle to the accomplished work of the Newark engraver.

“In the emergency conditions of a siege, coins were sometimes diamond-shaped or hexagonal as these shapes were easier to cut to specific weights than conventionally minted coins which required the specialist machinery of the mint,” said Kelleher.

In the medieval period, numerous mints operated across England but by 1558 there was only one royal mint and it was in the Tower of London. During the Civil War, Charles I moved his court to Oxford, establishing a mint in the city. A stunning gold ‘triple unite’ (a coin worth £3 – one of the largest value coins ever minted) is an example of the fine workmanship of the Oxford mint.

On its face it shows a finely executed bust of the king holding a sword and olive branch, while the reverse carries the Oxford Declaration: " ̽��ֱ��Protestant religion, the laws of England, and the liberty of Parliament." Another rare coin from Oxford is a silver pound coin weighing more than 120g showing the king riding a horse over the arms of his defeated enemies.

Also displayed is a silver medal, made during the short Protectorate headed by Oliver Cromwell. It commemorates the Battle of Dunbar of 1650 when Cromwell’s forces defeated an army loyal to Charles II. Its face shows the bust of Cromwell with battle scenes in the background, while the reverse shows the interior view of Parliament with the speaker sitting in the centre.

̽��ֱ��earliest piece in the exhibition is an electrum coin dating from the 6th century BC. It originates from the kingdom of Lydia (western Turkey) and depicts a lion and a bull in combat. ̽��ֱ��earliest reference to coinage in the literature records a payment in coin by the Lydian king for a military purpose.

A Hungarian medal, commemorating the recapture of Budapest, provides a snapshot of a famous siege in progress. ̽��ֱ��walls are surrounded by cavalry and infantry complete with the machinery of siege warfare – artillery pieces – which have breached the walls.

This medal was also used as a vehicle for propaganda. ̽��ֱ��reverse carries the image of the Imperial eagle (representing the Habsburg Empire) defending its nest from an attacking dragon which represents the threat of the Ottoman Empire.

Much less elaborate are examples of coins made in circumstances when precious metals were in short supply. A 16th-century Dutch token is made from compressed prayer books and a piece from occupied Ghent in the First World War is made of card.

Extremely vulnerable to damp, these coins’ survival is little short of miraculous. During the siege of Leiden the mayor requisitioned all metal, including coins, for the manufacture of weapons and ammunition. In return, citizens were given token coins made from hymnals, prayer books and bibles.

Bringing the narrative of currency and conflict into the 20th century are paper currencies of the Second World War. Britain and its American allies issued currency for liberated areas of Italy and France, and for occupied Germany.

̽��ֱ��temporary exhibition Currencies of Conflict: siege and emergency money from antiquity to WWII continues at the Fitzwilliam Museum until 23 February 2018. Admission is free.

Inset images: England, Charles 1 (1625-49) silver shilling siege piece, 1645, Carlisle; England, Charles 1 (1625-49) gold triple unite, 1643, struck at Oxford; Commonwealth (1649-60), silver medal of 1650 commemorating the Battle of Dunbar; Lydia, Croesus (561-546 BC), Gold stater. Foreparts of bull and lion facing each other; Leopold I (1658-1705) silver medal, 'Budapest defended 1686' by GF Nurnberger; Netherlands, Leiden, paper siege of 5 stuivers, 1574; Germany, Allied Military Currency, 1 mark, 1944.

In the tumultuous upheaval of the English Civil War, Royalist castles under siege used ‘pop-up’ mints to make coins to pay their soldiers. A unique display at the Fitzwilliam Museum tells the centuries-old story of emergency currency made from gold, silver and compressed prayer books.

Emergency coins show how a micro-economy developed during times of siege.

Richard Kelleher

Fitzwilliam Museum

England, Charles I (1625-49) lozenge-shaped silver shilling siege piece, 1648, Pontefract

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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Seventy years of Indian independence celebrated with summer exhibitions at the Fitzwilliam Museum

sjr81 — Tue, 06 Jun 2017 14:53:16 +0000

2017 is the UK-India Year of Culture, a year of events to celebrate UK’s cultural ties with India. ̽��ֱ��two exhibitions are part of the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge Museums’ India Unboxed series, affiliated to the UK/India 2017 programme run by the British Council.

From Kabul to Kolkata: Highlights of Indian painting in the Fitzwilliam Museum, showcases a selection of Indian miniature paintings and drawings from the 16th to 19th centuries. Works produced under the patronage of the Mughal dynasty and other princely rulers are included, as well as several acquired by early British patrons and collectors in India.

Religious epic and myth, history, royal portraiture, natural history, music and architecture are all included in the themes of the paintings and drawings on show. A new catalogue exploring the themes of the exhibition has been written by Marcus Fraser, Honorary Keeper of Islamic and Indian Manuscripts and Miniatures at the Fitzwilliam Museum.

Elephants, Deities and Ashoka’s Pillar: Coins of India from antiquity to the present explores the history of India through coins produced from the 4th century BC until recent times. Cultural, religious, economic and political developments are richly illustrated by the coins on show. They focus on representative periods of India’s history, ending with a display of banknotes and coins produced since India became independent in 1947.

̽��ֱ��exhibitions are accompanied by a full programme of public events, including handling sessions of historic coins, lunchtime talks, art workshops and family events.

̽��ֱ��Director of the Fitzwilliam Museum, Tim Knox, said: “ ̽��ֱ��Fitzwilliam Museum has a significant collection of Indian miniature paintings and drawings, the majority unpublished and little known. Many of these exquisite, finely detailed works are going on display for the first time. Our coin and medal collections are internationally celebrated and we are delighted to join this important year of Indian culture with some of our finest Indian treasures.”

From Kabul to Kolkata: Highlights of Indian painting in the Fitzwilliam Museum is on show until September 3, 2017 in the Shiba Gallery. Elephants, Deities and Ashoka’s Pillar: Coins of India from antiquity to the present is on show until October 1, 2017 in the Octagon Gallery. Entry to the Fitzwilliam Museum is free.

Two exhibitions and a new book have launched the Fitzwilliam Museum's celebration of the 70th anniversary of Indian Independence. ̽��ֱ��displays celebrate Cambridge’s past and present links with Indian culture with examples from the Museum’s world-class holdings of coins and its rarely-seen collection of Indian miniature painting.

Many of these exquisite, finely detailed works are going on display for the first time.

Tim Knox

̽��ֱ��Fitzwilliam Museum

Rama returns in victory to Ayodhya, Pahari (Punjab Hills), Kangra, c.1780-1790

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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Æthelred the Unready, King of the English: 1,000 years of bad press

amb206 — Thu, 21 Apr 2016 09:30:00 +0000

A silver penny struck more than ten centuries ago (on display in the Fitzwilliam Museum) shows Æthelred, King of the English. ̽��ֱ��obverse shows the king in profile and the reverse a Christian cross. Thousands of similar coins have survived. Many are in collections in Copenhagen, Oslo and Stockholm. This coinage is material evidence of ‘Dane-geld’, money paid to England’s enemies in attempts to forestall Viking invasions of England.

Inevitably remembered as ‘the Unready’, Æthelred died exactly 1,000 years ago on 23 April 1016 – 50 years before the Norman Conquest. ̽��ֱ��same date in April is recorded as the day of the death of William Shakespeare (in 1616) and also celebrated each year as St George’s Day.

Born around 968, son of King Edgar and Queen Ælfthryth, Æthelred died in London, a place that had recently been established as political and commercial centre of England. He was the first monarch to be buried in the old cathedral of St Paul which much later became one of the most notable casualties of the great fire of London.

Æthelred’s nickname is a pun that may date from as early the 11th century. Æthelred means ‘noble-counsel’ while the noun unræd means ‘an ill-considered or treacherous plan. “ ̽��ֱ��nickname degenerated from ‘Æthelred unræd’ into ‘Æthelred the Unready’, and ‘Æthelred no-counsel’, giving rise to further stories about him,” says Professor Simon Keynes.

Keynes, a historian in the Department of Anglo-Saxon Norse and Celtic, has worked extensively on the Anglo-Saxon period – especially the charters and coinage that offer new windows into a time of turmoil. He was the organiser and keynote speaker at a conference last week.

Æthelred was just a boy aged around 12 years when he became King of the English, and his long rule was marred by repeated incursions from the Danes. Far from keeping English shores safe from attack, the vast amounts of money paid to the Danes (estimated at £250,000 – a huge sum at the time) simply whetted their appetite for English riches. They took the money and continued their raids. In 1016 England became, for some 50 years, part of an empire of the North Sea.

From the 6th century onwards, England had converted to Christianity while the Danes continued to worship Norse deities. Æthelred believed that this placed God on his side – but prayer proved useless. So did reprisals on Danish settlers. Fruitless attempts to bribe or defeat the Vikings sealed Æthelred’s reputation as a disastrous king who deserved to fail. Sellar and Yeatman’s 1930s classic 1066 and All That echoes this sentiment: the “Wave of Danes” who overran the country were “undoubtedly a Good Thing”.

“Throughout history, Æthelred’s payment of Dane-geld has been used as a short hand for drastic mismanagement and poor decision making,” says Keynes. “But there is another, more complex, picture to be painted of Æthelred’s reign, and the ways that he and his councillors tackled the considerable challenges that they faced as they sought to administer a kingdom and protect their respective interests.”

Much of what we know about Æthelred’s reign comes from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle - an account by an anonymous chronicler of each year’s notable events. ̽��ֱ��Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is far from impartial: its verses were composed by court poets, or skalds, who celebrated the deeds of the leaders of the Viking armies. “ ̽��ֱ��story told in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and retold many times thereafter, is very superficial. But there is plenty of other evidence for the period, and the deeper one looks, the more complex and interesting it all becomes,” says Keynes.

Keynes says that no single body of evidence is richer than the 130 charters that survive Æthelred’s reign. More properly called ‘royal diplomas’, these charters are documents that record agreements made at assemblies held four or five times a year. Such meetings, which took place at major festivals, such as Easter and Pentecost, were an opportunity for both ceremony and business. ̽��ֱ��charters, written in Latin, were witnessed by prominent members of the church and key land-owners.

“In comparison to the Anglo Saxon Chronicle, which is a wonderfully vivid narrative in the vernacular, the diplomas are dry and seemingly impenetrable documents – and it’s true that individually they appear to yield little. But considered collectively, they offer an opportunity to reach below the surface of recorded events,” says Keynes.

̽��ֱ��majority of the charters issued during Æthelred’s reign represent grants of land. Others give detailed details of the forfeiture of land into the king’s hands or confirm the entitlement of a religious house to lands and privileges which have been lost.

“Royal diplomas were highly valuable documents in their own right. It was the possession of the charter itself which gave an individual the right to the land described even if the individual in question was not named. Not surprisingly copies and forgeries were made – which, for the historian, makes puzzling them out even harder,” says Keynes.

“ ̽��ֱ��diplomas also have long lists of witnesses which, when tabulated and analysed, enable one to detect interesting changes in the composition of the king’s councillors over the course of Æthelred’s long reign – suggesting perhaps who was gaining in power and who was declining.”

Exeter Cathedral holds one of the most beautiful surviving charters, written in ink on parchment. Æthelred's diploma for Bishop Ealdred of Cornwall (994) confirms Ealdred's status as bishop of Cornwall, at St Germans, and states that he is to have the same rights as the other bishops have in their own dioceses. “This charter was probably the outcome of a determination on the part of Archbishop Sigeric to set things in order,” says Keynes.

“ ̽��ֱ��English were under severe Viking attack, and this was one way of making arrangements more pleasing in the sight of God. ̽��ֱ��diploma was issued at a royal assembly, and was witnessed by a number of bishops, ealdormen, abbots, and thegns - in other words by the great and good of the land.”

Coinage offers another window into Aethelred’s reign and management of money is likely to have been on the agenda at royal assemblies. In a collaboration with the late Mark Blackburn, Keeper of Coins and Medals at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Keynes took a keen interest in the coinage of Æthelred’s reign. “Coinage was struck at as many as 80 minting places across England. It was produced in huge quantities for export as part of the tribute money paid to Viking armies and the army tax paid to a standing mercenary force,” he says.

“Variations in coin designs over time suggest that Æthelred and those working with him developed and maintained a system of staggering complexity. To control the economy, the authorities recalled coins of one type from circulation and exchanged them for coins of a new type. ̽��ֱ��designs tell their own stories. ̽��ֱ��earliest types feature the hand of God issuing from a cloud, perhaps to signify divine approval. Later the emphasis shifted to the king’s portrait and he is shown initially bare-headed and later wearing a helmet.”

̽��ֱ��rarest of the coins struck in Æthelred’s time is a short-lived Agnus Dei (Lamb of God) type. Worldwide, just 24 survive, one of which is in the collection of the Fitzwilliam Museum and displayed in the Rothschild Gallery. What makes this coin so remarkable is the absence of king’s portrait: the obverse features the Lamb of God and the reverse a dove, symbol of the Holy Spirit. “ ̽��ֱ��design represents a desperate appeal for peace, in perilous times,” says Keynes.

In portraying Æthelred’s reign as a time of turmoil, historians have drawn on a sermon given by one of the king’s most powerful advisors. Archbishop Wulfstan’s message to the English people is full of gloom: “For it is clear and manifest in us all that we have previously transgressed more than we have amended, and therefore much is assailing this people. Things have not gone well now for a long time at home or abroad, but there have been devastation and famine, burning and bloodshed in every district again and again.”

̽��ֱ��forces ranged against Æthelred were impressive and implacable. In 994 a Viking fleet of more than 90 ships came up the Thames to London. In 1009 the Vikings came again. Almost ten centuries later, in the 1920s, a group of battle axes and spearheads, dating from around 1000, was found in the river close to old London Bridge. Vivid reminders of the raiders who sailed up the estuary to strike at the heart of England, they are on display at the Museum of London.

̽��ֱ��eight battle axes, with their fearsome curving edges, also pose a question: how could the king and his councillors overcome a threat of such a kind?

In September 1666 the great fire of London destroyed St Paul’s cathedral, taking Æthelred’s tomb with it. Today Æthelred is remembered in the cathedral coffee shop where a stone commemorates all the tombs known to be lost. “It’s quite touching to see Æthelred’s name close to the place where he was buried in 1016 and where he lay for the next 650 years,” says Keynes. “It’s highly unlikely that he will never shake off the damage done to him by his soubriquet – but it’s well worth continuing to challenge the accepted versions of the history of a fascinating period.”

Coins from Æthelred’s reign are displayed at the Fitzwilliam Museum in the Rothschild Gallery. Æthelred's charter for Bishop Ealdred of Cornwall (994) is available for consultation at Exeter Cathedral on request.

Inset image: Æthelred's diploma for Bishop Ealdred of Cornwall (994) (Exeter Cathedral Archive).

He was just a boy when he became King of the English and his reign was marked by repeated attacks by the Danes. Æthelred, who died 1,000 years ago on 23 April 1016, is remembered as ‘the Unready’. But his nickname masks a more complex picture.

Throughout history, Æthelred’s payment of Dane-geld has been used as a short hand for drastic mismanagement. But there is another, more complex, picture to be painted of Æthelred’s reign.

Simon Keynes

Fitzwilliam Museum Aethelred II, Helmet type, Cambridge, Cnit CM.33-1935

Silver penny from the reign of King Æthelred

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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Naughty money: clippers and coiners in 16th-century England

amb206 — Sat, 12 Apr 2014 07:00:00 +0000

̽��ֱ��Royal Mint announced last month that in 2017 it will introduce a new £1 coin, said to be the "most secure coin in the world". ̽��ֱ��reason behind the decision, which could cost businesses as much as £20 million, is the surge in counterfeiting. It is estimated that around 3% of £1 coins are fakes with an estimated 45 million forgeries in circulation.

Four and a half centuries ago, Elizabeth I made the reform of currency one of her government’s top priorities. Invested as queen in 1558, she inherited a coinage which was fraught with problems. Elizabeth’s father, Henry VIII, had authorised a series of debasements which meant that in the space of just seven years the silver content of English coins was reduced by more than 80%. Counterfeiting was rife, with contemporary reports claiming that a great multitude of "noythy [naughty] money" was in circulation.

Research by Jennifer Bishop, a PhD candidate in Cambridge ̽��ֱ��’s History Faculty, looks at 16th-century perceptions of coinage on an everyday level: on the street and in the market place where the bulk of transactions took place at a time when prices were rising and good monies were scarce.

Bishop’s exploration of the Elizabethan coinage is part of a wider study of metallurgical and monetary matters in mid-16th century England. She explained: “What interests me is how these topics were understood and discussed by ordinary people. My sources range from the official texts of royal proclamations and legislation to the uncontrolled circulation of rumours and gossip. Together, these sources show how popular perceptions of the coinage affected government policy and vice versa.”

A good coinage was important because it provided the basic standard on which most transactions and reckonings were calculated in 16th century England. Over and above that, the status of the country’s coinage reflected its reputation on the international stage and the authority and competence of its government. Debasement of the coins in circulation wreaked havoc in the marketplace: at one time the shilling, the original value of which was 12d, was worth half its value at 6d and at its lowest point traded for just 2¼d.

For ordinary people, fluctuating values had serious consequences. Prices rose because sellers anticipated a drop in value and adjusted their prices accordingly. ̽��ֱ��reputation of English coins was so badly damaged that on occasion they were refused as currency and coins of lower denomination – such as base shillings and groats – were increasingly shunned.

“Many contemporary commentators identified the debasement of the coinage as a root cause of England’s economic problems, and they also went much further linking it to widespread social disorder, disruption and popular unrest – and the corruption of English towns and local government – with coinage being deeply symbolic of the health and prosperity of the nation,” said Bishop.

Asked to comment about debasement, the Lord and Council of Ireland wrote to the Privy Council in January 1552: “We do consider that the baseness [of the coinage] cawseth ynyuersall darthe, encreaseth ydlenes, decayeth nobylitie (one of the pryncypall kayes of a common welthe) and bryngeth magistrates in contempt and hatred of the people, whereof muste nedes growe disobedience.”

̽��ֱ��restoration of “good monies” was seen as a panacea for the country’s ills, and recoinage became one of the chief aims of Elizabeth I’s regime. As well as putting an end to debasement, the government set out to tackle counterfeiting. Royal proclamations warned that “counterfeit and false moneys” were being produced “in great and notable sums” and circulated throughout the realm by “divers evil people”. Currency crimes ranged from counterfeiting to clipping, melting, washing and trafficking in coin. Collectively these illicit practices were known as coining.

Today all UK coinage is made by the Royal Mint in Llantrisant, South Wales. In the mid-16th century, there were as many as eight Royal mints licensed to strike coins. Outside the mints, counterfeiting was widespread and practised by all manner of “naughty persons”. Records noting the occupations of arrested counterfeiters (punishment for those found guilty of the most severe crimes was hanging) reveal that the came from a wide range of social groups – from gentlemen to servants.

“Counterfeiters included goldsmiths and metalworkers. Some counterfeit coins were so skilfully made that they were hard to spot, especially when the official coins in circulation were of such poor quality. Records in the State Papers show that one arrested counterfeiter, James Powell was so confident in his coining abilities that he offered to make tools and instruments for use by the royal mint,” said Bishop.

Measures introduced to tackle coining included the directive in 1556 that no one should accept any coins without first weighing them. Coins found to be false were to be defaced or cut into two to render them unusable. Examples of coins cut in this way are held by the Fitzwilliam Museum.

̽��ֱ��coins worst affected by debasement were shillings, otherwise known as testons, which posed the greatest challenge in restoring public faith in the coinage. Because some testons in circulation were baser (containing less silver) than others, it was decided that they would be given two different rates: the “worse” sort of testons valued at half the “better” sort. ̽��ֱ��base testons bore a distinguishing mark – fleur de lis, rose, lion or harp. Just as today the Bank of England offers tips on how to check the validity of the £1 coin in your pocket, and what to look for in forgeries, so the Elizabethan government issued visual aids to help people identify the base coins.

Confusion about which coins were better and which worse led to the regime taking a further measure in 1560. Stamping irons were sent out to the mayors of towns: better testons were to be stamped with a portcullis and worse ones with a greyhound, with the process taking place in public for all to observe. “This show of openness was important because during the debasement period there had been rumours about the dishonesty of mints officials who were suspected of manipulating the coinage for their own benefit,” said Bishop.

It was thought that many of the counterfeit coins had been forged overseas and smuggled into England; several proclamations warned against “conningge” foreign coiners and “strangers dwelling in foreign parts”. On the other hand, overseas craftsmen (from Germany and the Low Countries) were much in demand for their superior metallugical skills. When Elizabeth decided to reform the coinage in 1560, she hired a team of German coiners to come to London and work in the royal mint. Their presence was resented by a number of English mint workers and refiners who complained that “straungers” were being unfairly favoured.

A French-made machine for minting coins, which would replace the old method of manual minting, was resisted by English coiners who feared the loss of their jobs.

Elizabeth I’s efforts to restore the good reputation of English coinage, and lift it clear of associations of decay and corruption, were not altogether successful. But a majestic gloss was put on recoinage as one of the greatest achievements of her reign. In 1563 James Pilkington, Bishop of Durham, declared that Elizabeth had succeeded in “restoringe vs a fine coin from so base”. ̽��ֱ��chronicler Raphael Holinshed wrote that “our most gracious Queene, and souereign Princes did finish the matter wholly, vtterly abolishing the vse of copper Coine, and conuerting the same into fine Syluer.”

A royal proclamation announced that the Queen had achieved the “victory and conquest of this hideous monster of the base moneys.” A commemorative medal was struck to make the recoinage, with a portrait of Elizabeth on the obverse.

Bishop said: “Today the new £1 coins are described as cutting edge and it is claimed that their production represents a giant leap into the future. But the government’s attempts to prevent counterfeiting and boost confidence in the national currency are nothing new. ̽��ֱ��latest coins might be technologically advanced but the problems and discussions surrounding them have their roots firmly in the past."

Inset images: Edward VI teston stamped with a seated greyhound countermark (Spink & Son); a 'bad' teston deliberately cut in two (Fitzwilliam Museum); pictures of the base testons showing their distinguishing marks ( ̽��ֱ��summarie of certaine reasons, 1560).

In 2017 a new £1 coin will appear in our pockets with a design extremely difficult to forge. In the mid-16th century, Elizabeth I’s government came up with a series of measures to deter “divers evil persons” from damaging the reputation of English coinage and, with it, the good name of the nation.

We do consider that the baseness [of the coinage] cawseth ynyuersall darthe, encreaseth ydlenes, decayeth nobylitie (one of the pryncypall kayes of a common welthe) and bryngeth magistrates in contempt and hatred of the people.

Lord and Council of Ireland, 1552

EEBO

Holinshed's Chronicles 1557

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Explore the scary stories of early cultures

amb206 — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 16:00:31 +0000

̽��ֱ��Festival of Ideas (www.cam.ac.uk/festivalofideas/) is the UK’s largest free festival celebrating the arts, humanities and social sciences. It runs this year from October 24-November 4 with a theme of ‘Dream and Nightmares’.

Narratives built around dreams and nightmares are woven into the early cultures of the British Isles with blood-curdling descriptions of scary beasts – fire-breathing dragons, many-humped sea-monsters, composite creatures mutating before our eyes – whose forms decorate many of the precious manuscripts that survive to bring us gripping tales of heroes and outlaws.

An afternoon of talks and readings this Saturday (3 November) at the Faculty of English will explore the language and literature of early Britain and Ireland – the Anglo-Saxons, the Welsh, and the Irish – with a series of eminent speakers giving an accessible overview of their research for an audience of teenagers upwards. ̽��ֱ��Vikings, whose culture influenced those of Britain and Ireland in this period, will also make an appearance.

̽��ֱ��sessions will start with a talk by Professor Paul Russell about dream narratives in Old Welsh and Old Irish. Professor Russell, head of Cambridge’s Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse, and Celtic, will introduce the audience to tales such as the Old Irish Aislinge Oenguso ( ̽��ֱ��Dream of Oengus) and the medieval Welsh Breudwyt Ronabwy ( ̽��ֱ��Dream of Ronabwy). ̽��ֱ��audience will also meet a Welsh monk who dreams of a beautiful girl. This talk will be followed by readings of Old Welsh and Old Irish given by current undergraduates of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic.

Dr Richard Dance will explore the origins of the words ‘dream’ and ‘nightmare’ with reference to his research into the history of the English language. He will then read an extract of the Old English poem ̽��ֱ��Dream of the Rood, an early Christian poem that describes the Crucifixion from the viewpoint of the Cross. ‘This poem is an example of Old English verse at its most imaginative,’ said Dr Dance. “It brilliantly harnesses the vivid, weird metamorphosis of dreams to explain the inner meaning of this central Christian story.”

Further readings of Old English and Old Norse by students will be followed by a talk on the monsters of Old English coinage by Dr Rory Naismith. He will refer in particular to a coin belonging to the Fitzwilliam Museum that bears the image of a creature that is half-dragon, half-wolf. It illustrates the way in which imagery from the pagan heritage of the English overlapped with Christian imagery as symbols of the power of rulers such as Penda and Offa of Mercia.

̽��ֱ��afternoon will conclude with a talk on dreams in Old Norse by Dr Judy Quinn, who is known for her work on Old Norse poetry and Icelandic sagas. She will explore two different dream sequences recorded in Icelandic sagas, one set in the ancient pagan past (Gísla saga) and another during the politically tumultuous thirteenth century (Íslendinga saga). In both sagas, powerful ‘dream women’ visit saga figures to try to influence their behaviour, creating scenes that are shockingly vivid and rich in detail about the cultural value of dreams.

Dreams and nightmares in early Britain and Ireland will take place at the Judith Wilson Studio, Faculty of English, Sidgwick Site, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge on Saturday 3 November from 2pm to 5pm. No need to book, no charge, suitable for ages 14 and over.

For full details of the sessions and all Festival of Ideas events go to www.cam.ac.uk/festivalofideas/.

Don’t miss the chance to learn about the rich cultures of the early British Isles in a series of free talks and readings at the Faculty of English, taking place this Saturday (3 November) as part of Cambridge ̽��ֱ��’s Festival of Ideas.

Narratives built around dreams and nightmares are woven into the early cultures of the British Isles.

Jóhanna Ólafsdóttir

Illustration from the Saga of St Olaf, Flateyjarbók, Reykjavik, Iceland

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