Alex Harvey

Dark Age Britain A detailed overview of Britain between the 5th and 8th centuries, traditionally referred to as the ‘Dark Ages’. Discover some of the lesser known aspects, themes, evidence, and figures of this interes...

Here’s something new: medievalstudies.thinkific.com/courses/dark...

I was asked by a colleague if I wanted to follow in the footsteps of some of the most astute scholars I know and throw my hat into the ring of online teaching…

…and I said yes!

The book ‘Guernsey Connections’ laid on black cloth.

Guernsey Connections (1998) edited by Heather Sebire, was a swift victory if we’re measuring both the quality and speed of book-reading collectively

My fav essays w/in:
- Towards A Ceramic Sequence by K.J. Barton
- Celtic Coins by Philip de Jersey
- A Catalogue of Cliffside Forts by Mike Hill

The book ‘Silk For The Vikings’ by Marianne Vedeler

Silk For The Vikings (2014) by Marianne Vedeler

It was a treat to revisit this book after a few years; Vedeler provides a sweeping, engaging overview of silk distribution networks from China to Scandinavia, and the many folk between, and how it was interpreted / used in Europe between 7-11th c.

a man with a beard says " wish me luck " ALT: a man with a beard says " wish me luck "

I’m really excited to build on the foundation of my own books and the billions of words I’ve digested from other scholars before me to enlighten new audiences with a small selection of candles illuminating the not-so-dark ‘Dark Ages’ of Britain

To teach is to learn and this opportunity, provided by my friend and colleague @shieldmaidenpdx.bsky.social, slots well alongside some other career pivots I’ll be undertaking moving into September

In the words of Alcuin of York; ‘read joyfully, son!’

Tyrants, turmoil, trade, peer-polity competition, fictive kinship, identity forming, and traditions of overlordship across the disciplines of (mostly) archaeology and history will be the aim of the game here

5 weeks, 5 x 90 min webinars/workshops with Q&As, + directions to wonderful scholarship

Through my commitment to life-long learning and an acknowledgement of the woes of the heritage/academic sector, this move towards medievalists.net is - like North Sea pirates before me - one born from pragmatism and a desire to navigate the economic routes of our own time of tyrants and turmoil

…I’m now at a stage in my (early) career where I want to test myself, moving beyond single lectures into full-on seminars and week-by-week modules; ‘Dark Age Britain’ will be my first, providing students a not-unchallenging overview of the winding road between the Romans and the Vikings

And so I present, ahead of time, a 5 week course starting on 1/10/25 on ‘Dark Age’ Britain, and the quotation marks there are deliberate!

In a deliberate and thought-out pivot away from hardcore heritage and towards teaching, I’ve been picking up more and more experience lecturing since 2023…

Dark Age Britain A detailed overview of Britain between the 5th and 8th centuries, traditionally referred to as the ‘Dark Ages’. Discover some of the lesser known aspects, themes, evidence, and figures of this interes...

Here’s something new: medievalstudies.thinkific.com/courses/dark...

I was asked by a colleague if I wanted to follow in the footsteps of some of the most astute scholars I know and throw my hat into the ring of online teaching…

…and I said yes!

Northern Routes to Kingship? I’m looking forward to reading it - I’m currently devouring his Avaldsnes publication for the second time

Ultimately it is somewhere between a spangenhelm and Northern Ridged-type but these modern terms impose something of a limit upon the more fluid identifications of the time - was it implicitly ‘Roman’? Perhaps. Such is the riddle of the era (7/7)

The Pioneer Helm

Same goes for the spearhead (but you knew that!)

The Pioneer helm, on the other hand, is a bit different; similar in form and make to the Coppergate Helmet (8th c) possessing a boar crest ala the Benty Grange example (7/8th) (6/7)

Garrisons and dissolved legions of ‘Franks’ (a name dredged from a soup of 3/4th c. Latin monikers) baking a particular weapon into their identity almost like a brand - not a particular rigid one either. A ‘Saxon’ wielding a francisca isn’t automatically a ‘Frank’ (5/7)

It is not however automatically ‘Frankish’; symbols of martial identity like this are ultimately snapshots of a fluid, mutable process of kinship forming, most of it fictive, that took place in the gloom of Late Antiquity (4/7)

….thought to be emblematic of a shift towards smaller war-bands and smaller-scale ‘duel’-like confrontations (a throwing axe is less useful in a shield wall than a 1v1) (3/7)

An ‘angon’ or spearhead

A throwing axe

First up: this 5th/6th c. angon or javelin head discovered near Ely, ascribed a ‘Frankish’ identity alongside the throwing axe (purchased from G. I. Mungeam in 1973). The latter weapon saw a short-lived period of popularity across W. Europe in the 6th c…. (2/7)

The Royal Armouries don’t have a huge early med. collection but it’s ‘quality over quantity’ at the end of the day.

I had a brief look today at their small assortment at the start of the ‘War’ gallery on the first floor (1/7)

To think merely a week ago I had parked my car on this very street to make a trek to see the Govan stones

I could have seen both Spider-Man and @hornesupremacy.bsky.social in the same day, were I so lucky

started playing Elden Ring again (again)

a man in a spiderman costume is hanging from the side of a building ALT: a man in a spiderman costume is hanging from the side of a building

Watch out for Spider-Man!

The book ‘Goodbye To The Vikings?’ by Richard Hodges on a sofa

A section of a book highlighting the sentence ‘Indeed, the thrust of the new evidence tends in part to confirm that the Vikings only became raiders and invaders when the Carolingian political economy collapsed during the civil wars between the grandsons of Charlemagne’, followed by a pencilled remark that says ‘Oh Hodges’

Goodbye To The Vikings? Re-Reading Early Medieval Archaeology (2006) by Richard Hodges

The more I read about the 5-8th centuries and models of continuity/discontinuity, the harder it gets to form a clear picture; here Hodges argues compellingly for the latter using a few well-sifted case studies

"i just use AI for-" say no more, i already think less of you

Rijksmuseum van Oudheden in Leiden is amazing, likewise the Allard Pierson centre in Amsterdam is good too

York — the archaeology of a place-name - SNSBI The place-name York, like the city itself, has a fascinating history reflecting the influence of many different peoples

Our next name story explores the archaeology of the place-name 'York', written by Diana Whaley, Emeritus Professor of Early Medieval Studies @newcastleuni.bsky.social. Explore the name's development reflected in the people/languages + layers of influence shown in buildings/archaeology.

Seen a few folks astonished by my lack of support for ChatGPT and similar. Because AI, right?

Yeah, no. What we have right now is glorified autocorrect. Glorified autocorrect that takes the energy of an entire city to do what it does, plus half of Lake Erie to cool down while it's doing it.

Cheers Sean, glad you liked it!

A fun and sophisticated podcast episode with @alexharvv.bsky.social and @hornesupremacy.bsky.social
You guys rock 🪨

I wonder - i mean it looks like a Mjölnir to us, but so do many T-shaped objects, including tau crosses. Just depends how much credit we give early med. people in also spotting these unintentional similarities, and then working them deliberately into phases of reuse

Bede has an interesting textual relationship with other kingdoms; Lindsey eats up quite a lot of his word count in the middle of the Ecclesiastical History, for example

Otherwise he devotes most of his mentions to (in his terms) tribal groups: the Deiri and Bernicii