Castle Camus, Isle of Skye

2020 ◽  
Vol 149 ◽  
pp. 277-301
Author(s):  
Mark Thacker
Keyword(s):  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Pilot Phase ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Materials Analysis ◽  
Bayesian Techniques ◽  
Socially Constructed ◽  
15Th Century ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Supplementary Material ◽  
Isle Of Skye

A study of Castle Camus is presented from the pilot phase of the Scottish Medieval Castles and Chapels C14 Project (SMCCCP). The study highlights various challenges faced by investigators seeking to interpret medieval sites where contemporary documentary evidence is late and the physical upstanding remains are fragmentary. Informed by a wider programme of buildings and materials analysis, the paper presents the first independent dating evidence relating to the construction of Castle Camus, through radiocarbon analysis of an assemblage of wood-charcoal Mortar-Entrapped Relict Limekiln Fuel (MERLF) fragments. This data is consistent with later traditions, reporting that a MacLeod clan chieftain died at the castle site in the very early 15th century, and suggests Castle Camus was the formal administrative centre of the lordship of Sleat throughout the later medieval period. Bayesian techniques are used to correlate these different types of evidence and generate an estimate for the constructional chronology of the earliest upstanding structure. The study suggests that construction of the south-east range at Castle Camus was completed in 1280–1330 cal AD (74.2% probability) or 1365–1400 cal AD (21.2% probability). Further discussion highlights the landscape context of the castle site; with a focus on woodland resources and socially constructed boundaries. View supplementary material here   Canmore ID 11544

The Nature of Political Thought

1923 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 204-215
Author(s):  
Raymond G. Gettell
Keyword(s):  
Political Thought ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Political Organization ◽  
Present Condition ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Economic Interests ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Philosophy Professor ◽  
Political Conditions ◽  
The Individual

In the introduction to his readings in political philosophy, Professor Coker says, “since the time of Plato there has been, in every philosophic age, some inquiry as to the justification of political organization in general, as to the relative merits of different political forms, and as to the appropriate position and privileges of the individual as master, member, or subject of the political order of society. Why do we have political organization? What in our present condition do we owe to it? What future benefits may we properly expect to derive from it? Are its purposes characteristically manifold and changing, or are they ultimately reducible to a few limited objects or to some single end? What is its best form? Who should control it? What is its proper relation to the ideas and sentiments of the community at its basis? What spheres of individual and social life is it incompetent to enter? Philosophers and publicists of various types have sought to answer these questions in abstract terms.”If an analysis be made of the questions with which political thought has been concerned, it is found that emphasis was placed at various periods upon widely different types of problems. In the medieval period political controversy centered in the contest for supremacy between spiritual and temporal authorities; in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the dominant interest was in the contest between monarchic and democratic theories of political organization; at present, the extent of state activities has come into prominence, and the connection between political and economic interests is especially close. Besides, political conditions have changed so greatly from age to age that the same problem had quite different meanings at different periods.

Kingdoms and regiones: The documentary evidence

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Rippon
Keyword(s):  
Archaeological Record ◽  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
The South ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
East Anglia ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
East Midlands

During the early medieval period eastern England was occupied by two major Anglo-Saxon kingdoms—the East Saxons and East Angles—alongside a region that Bede referred to as ‘Middle Anglia’. There has been a widespread assumption that Essex (‘the East Saxons’) and Suffolk and Norfolk (the ‘South Folk’ and ‘North Folk’ of East Anglia) were direct successors to these Anglo-Saxon kingdoms (e.g. Carver 1989, fig. 10.1; 2005, 498; Yorke 1990, 46, 61; Warner 1996, 4, plate 1; Pestell 2004, 12; Chester-Kadwell 2009, 46; Kemble 2012, 8; Gascoyne and Radford 2013, 176; Reynolds 2013, fig. 4), which would imply a strong degree of territorial continuity from at least the early medieval period through to the present day. There is, however, a recognition in the Regional Research Framework that regional differences within early medieval society across eastern England have seen little investigation (Medlycott 2011b, 58), something that the following chapters hope to address. This chapter will explore the documentary evidence for these early medieval kingdoms and their relationship to later counties, before turning to the archaeological evidence for Anglo- Saxon immigrants and their relationship to the native British population in Chapters 8–10. The clear differences between the Northern Thames Basin, East Anglia, and the South East Midlands that are still evident during the seventh to ninth centuries are outlined in Chapter 11. Finally, Chapter 12 explores the boundaries of the early medieval kingdoms, and in particular the series of dykes constructed in south-eastern Cambridgeshire.Table 7.1 provides a timeline of key historical dates for early medieval England, and key developments within the archaeological record. The earliest list of territorial entities is the Tribal Hidage. The original document has been lost—it only survives in a variety of later forms—but it is thought to have been written between the mid seventh and the ninth centuries (Hart 1970; 1977; Davies and Vierck 1974, 224–7; Yorke 1990, 10; Blair 1991, 8; 1999; Harrington and Welch 2014, 1). The Tribal Hidage lists at least thirteen peoples in and around eastern England, some of whom clearly occupied quite extensive areas, such as the East Angles (assessed as 30,000 hides), East Saxons (7,000 hides), and the Cilternsætna (4,000 hides).

THE CASTLE OF ACHANDUIN, LISMORE—A POINT OF REFERENCE FOR THE RADIOCARBON ANALYSIS OF MORTAR-ENTRAPPED RELICT LIMEKILN FUELS

Radiocarbon ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
Mark Thacker
Keyword(s):  
Bayesian Models ◽  
Pilot Phase ◽  
Materials Analysis ◽  
Short Program ◽  
Materials Research ◽  
Point Of Reference

ABSTRACT The results of a short program of landscape, buildings and materials analysis undertaken at Achanduin Castle, Lismore, Scotland (NM 8043 3927) are presented from the pilot phase of the Scottish Medieval Castles & Chapels C14 Project (SMCCCP). The study presents the first independent chronological evidence relating to the construction of this important medieval building, by radiocarbon analysis of a limited assemblage of Mortar-Entrapped Relict Limekiln Fuel (MERLF) fragments. Informed by a wider investigation of structural phasing and sample taphonomy, these measurements are constrained within a series of different Bayesian models, to generate a range of comparative estimates for the building’s constructional chronology. The precision with which the construction of this building can now be dated, from other evidence associated with the site, makes the Achanduin Castle study a useful point of reference for wider materials research.

scholarly journals Das Brautinventar der Paola Gonzaga: Hochzeitswagen und Brauttruhen

2020 ◽  
pp. 278
Author(s):  
Wolfgang D. Wanek
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Daily Life ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Political Situation ◽  
Late Medieval Period ◽  
15Th Century ◽  
Shed Light

The Bride Inventory of Paola Gonzaga: Bridal Cart and ChestsThe following paper takes a closer look at the bridal cart and chests of the Mantuan princess Paola Gonzaga, who was sent to marry Leonhard of Gorizia in 1478. With her she brought an adequate dowry, which was listed in an inventory. Based on this document, aspects of the material culture of the time shall be discussed and used to gain insights into the daily life of women and their situation in the 15th century. The analysis will focus on two categories of Paola’s dowry: the partly preserved chests and the luxurious bride cart and its accessories. Those objects also shed light onto the socio-political situation of the late medieval period, and provide insights into the mechanism and imaginaries of medieval dynastic representation, namely of the Gonzaga family.

scholarly journals Documentary evidence of droughts in Sweden between the Middle Ages and c1800

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dag Retsö ◽  
Lotta Leijonhufvud
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Social Impacts ◽  
Weather Data ◽  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Documentary Data ◽  
15Th Century ◽  
Instrumental Period ◽  
The Middle Ages

Abstract. This article explores documentary evidence of droughts in Sweden in the pre-instrumental period (1400–1800). The database has been developed using contemporary sources such as private and official correspondence letters, diaries, almanac notes, manorial accounts, and weather data compilations. The primary purpose is to utilize hitherto unused documentary data as an input for an index that can be useful for comparisons on a larger European scale. The survey shows that eight sub-periods can be considered as particularly struck by summer droughts with concomitant harvest failures and great social impacts in Sweden. That is the case with 1634–1641, 1652–1657, 1665–1670, 1677–1684, 1746–1750, 1757–1767, 1771–1776 and 1780–1783 and 1641–1646. Among these, 1652 and 1657 stand out as particularly troublesome. A number of data for dry summers are also found for the middle decades of the 15th century and the 1550s.

scholarly journals Material evidence? Re-approaching elite women’s seals and charters in late medieval Scotland

2021 ◽  
Vol 150 ◽  
pp. 301-326
Author(s):  
Rachel Meredith Davis
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Word And Image ◽  
15Th Century ◽  
Legal Context ◽  
Different Types ◽  
19Th And 20Th Century ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Material Evidence ◽  
Insight Into

Medieval Scottish women’s seals remain largely unexplored compared to the scholarship on seals and sealing practice elsewhere in medieval Britain. This article has two chief aims. First, it seeks to demonstrate the insufficiencies of the 19th- and 20th-century Scottish seal catalogues as a mediated record of material evidence and the use of them as comprehensive and go-to reference texts within current research on late medieval Scotland. This includes a discussion of the ways in which medieval seals survive as original impressions, casts and illustrations and how these different types of evidence can be used in the construction and reconstruction of the seal’s and charter’s context. Second, this paper will explore the materiality and interconnectedness of seals and the charters to which they are attached. A reading of these two objects together emphasises the legal function of the seal and shows its distinctive purpose as a representational object. While the seal was used in con-texts beyond the basic writ charter, it remained a legally functional and (auto)biographical object, and, as such, the relationship between seal and charter informs meaning in representational identities expressed in both. The article will apply this approach to several examples of seals belonging to 14th- and 15th-century Scottish countesses. Evidence reviewed this way provides new insight into Scottish women’s sealing practice and female use of heraldic device. The deficiencies of assuming women’s design to be formulaic or that their seals can be usefully interpreted in isolation from the charters to which they were attached will be highlighted. The interconnectedness of word and image conveyed personal links and elite ambitions, and promoted noble lineage within the legal context of charter production.

scholarly journals The changing face of industry in west Edinburgh

2019 ◽  
Vol 85 ◽  
pp. 1-26
Author(s):  
Laura Bailey ◽  
Morag Cross
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Cold Storage ◽  
Agricultural Landscape ◽  
Industrial Area ◽  
Technological Innovations ◽  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Modern City ◽  
A Site

Excavations on a site at 19 West Tollcross, Edinburgh, produced evidence of activity in the area from the medieval period to the 20th century. The medieval remains are likely to relate to activity on the periphery of a settlement in the hinterland of Edinburgh, thus confirming the archaeological potential of settlements now subsumed under the modern city. Excavation through the deep stratigraphy, when supplemented with documentary evidence, offered a glimpse into evolution of the area from an ‘agricultural landscape’ to an ‘industrial’ area, constantly being transformed in line with contemporary technological innovations. More recent remains associated with Lochrin Distillery, slaughterhouses, Edinburgh Ice and Cold Storage Company’s unit, an ice rink and a garage were uncovered.

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