Material Culture and Social History in Early Medieval Western Europe

People live amidst objects, things, articles, items, artefacts, materials, substances, and stuff – described in social sciences and humanities as material culture, which denotes both natural and human-made entities, which form our physical environment. We, humans, relate to this environment by using, depicting, interacting with or thinking about various material objects or their representations. In other words, material culture is never just about things in themselves, it is also about various ideas, representations, experiences, practices and relations. In contemporary theorising about material culture, the watershed between the tangible and intangible has started to disappear as all the objects have multiple meanings. This paper theorises objects mostly in terms of contemporary socio-cultural anthropology and ethnology by first giving an overview of the development of the material culture studies and then focusing upon consumption studies, material agency, practice theory and the methods for studying material culture.
 Both anthropology and ethnology in the beginning of the 20th century were dealing mostly with ‘saving’; that is, collecting the ethnographical objects from various cultures for future preservation as societies modernised. The collecting of the everyday items of rural Estonians, which had begun in the 19th century during the period of national awakening, gained its full momentum after the establishment of the Estonian National Museum in 1909. During the museum’s first ten years, 20,000 objects were collected (Õunapuu 2007). First, the focus was on the identification of the historical-geographical typologies of the collected artefacts. In 1919, the first Estonian with a degree in ethnology, Helmi Reiman-Neggo (2013) stressed the need for ethnographical descriptions of the collected items and the theoretical planning of the museum collections. The resulting vast ethnographical collection of the Estonian National Museum (currently about 140,000 items) has also largely influenced ethnology and anthropology as academic disciplines in Estonia (Pärdi 1993).
 Even though in the first half of the 20th century the focus lay in the systematic collection and comparative analysis of everyday items and folk art, there were studies that centred on meaning already at the end of 19th century. Austrianethnologist Rudolf Meringer suggested in 1891 that a house should be studied as a cultural individual and analysed within the context of its functions and in relation to its inhabitants. Similarly, the 1920s and 1930s saw studies on the roles of artefacts that were not influenced by Anglo-American functionalism: Mathilde Hain (1936) studied how folk costumes contribute to the harmonious functioning of a ‘small community’, and Petr Bogatyrev (1971) published his study on Moravian costumes in 1937. This study, determining the three main functions – instrumental, aesthetic and symbolic – of the folk costume, and translated into English 30 years after first publication, had a substantial influence on the development of material culture studies.
 The 1970s saw the focus of material culture studies in Western and Northern Europe shifting mainly from the examination of (historical) rural artefacts to the topics surrounding contemporary culture, such as consumption. In Soviet Estonian ethnology, however, the focus on the 19th century ethnographic items was prevalent until the 1980s as the topic was also partially perceived as a protest against the direction of Soviet academia (see Annist and Kaaristo 2013 for a thorough overview). There were, of course, exceptions, as for instance Arved Luts’s (1962) studies on everyday life on collective farms. Meanwhile, however, the communicative and semiotic turn of the 1970s turned European ethnology’s focus to the idea of representation and objects as markers of identity as well as means of materialising the otherwise intangible and immaterial relationships and relations. The theory of cultural communication was established in Scandinavian ethnology and numerous studies on clothing, housing and everyday items as material expressions of social structures, hierarchies, values and ideologies emerged (Lönnqvist 1979, Gustavsson 1991). The Scandinavian influences on Estonia are also reflected in Ants Viires’s (1990) suggestion that ethnologists should study clothing (including contemporary clothing) in general and not just folk costumes, by using a semiotic approach.
 Löfgren’s (1997) clarion call to bring more ‘flesh and blood’ to the study of material culture was a certain reaction to the above focus. Researchers had for too long focused exclusively upon the meaning and, as Löfgren brought forth, they still did not have enough understanding of what exactly it was that people were actually and practically doing with their things. Ingold’s (2013) criticism on the studies focusing on symbolism, and the lack of studies on the tangible materiality of the materials and their properties, takes a similar position. In the 1990s, there was a turn toward the examination of material-cultural and those studies that were written within the framework of ‘new materialism’ (Hicks 2010, Coole and Frost 2010) started to pay attention to objects as embodied and agentive (Latour 1999, Tilley et al 2006). Nevertheless, as Olsen (2017) notes, all materialities are not created equal in contemporary academic research: while items like prostheses, Boyle’s air pumps or virtual realities enjoy increased attention, objects such as wooden houses, fireplaces, rakes and simple wooden chairs are still largely unexamined. The traditional material culture therefore needs new studying in the light of these post-humanist theories.
 Where does this leave Estonian ethnology? In the light of the theoretical developments discussed above, we could ask, whether and how has the material Making sense of the material culture turn affected research in Estonia? Here we must first note that for a significant part of the 20th century, Estonian ethnology (or ethnography as the discipline was called before 1990s) has mostly been centred on the material culture (see the overview of the main topics from vehicles to folk costumes in Viires and Vunder 2008). Partly because of this aspect of the discipline’s history, many researchers actually felt the need to somewhat distance themselves from these topics in the 1990s (Pärdi 1998). Compared to topics like religion, identity, memory, oral history and intangible heritage, study of material culture has largely stayed in the background. There are of course notable exceptions such as Vunder’s (1992) study on the history of style, which includes analysis of theirsymbolic aspects. It is also interesting to note that in the 1990s Estonian ethnology, the term ‘material culture’ (‘materiaalne kultuur’) – then seen as incorporating the dualism between material and immaterial – was actually replaced with the Estonian translation of German ‘Sachkultur’ (‘esemekultuur’, literally ‘artefact culture’). Nevertheless, it was soon realised that this was actually a too narrow term (with its exclusion of natural objects and phenomena as well as the intangible and social aspects of culture), slowly fell out of general usage, and was replaced with ‘material culture’ once again. Within the past three decades, studies dealing with material culture have discussed a wide variety of topics from the vernacular interior design (Kannike 2000, 2002, 2012), everyday commodities (Kõresaar 1999b) and spiritual objects (Teidearu 2019), traditional rural architecture (Pärdi 2012, Kask 2012, 2015), museum artefacts (Leete 1996), clothing, textiles and jewellery (Kõresaar 1999a; Järs 2004; Summatavet 2005; Jõeste 2012; Araste and Ventsel 2015), food culture (Piiri 2006; Bardone 2016; Kannike and Bardone 2017), to soviet consumer culture (Ruusmann 2006, Rattus 2013) and its implications in life histories (Kõresaar 1998, Jõesalu and Nugin 2017). All of these these studies deal with how people interpret, remember and use objects.
 The main keywords of the studies of European material culture have been home, identity and consumption (but also museology and tangible heritage, which have not been covered in this article). Material culture studies are an important part of the studies of everyday life and here social and cultural histories are still important (even though they have been criticised for focusing too much on symbols and representation). Therefore, those studies focusing on physical materials and materialites, sensory experiences, embodiment, and material agency have recently become more and more important. This article has given an overview of the three most prevalent thematic and theoretical strands of the study of material culture: objects as symbols especially in the consumer culture, material agency and practice theory as well as discussing some methodological suggestions for the material culture studies.
 To conclude, even though on the one hand we could argue that when it comes to the study of material culture there indeed exists a certain hierarchy of „old“ topics that relate to museums or traditional crafts and „new“ and modern materialities, such as smart phones or genetically modified organisms. However, dichotomies like this are often artificial and do not show the whole picture: contemporary children are often as proficient in playing cat’s cradle as they are with video games (Jackson 2016). Thus, studying various (everyday) material objects and entities is still topical and the various theories discussed in this article can help to build both theoretical and empirical bridge between different approaches. Therefore, there is still a lot to do in this regard and we invite researchers to study objects form all branches of material culture, be they 19th century beer mugs in the collections of the Estonian National Museum that can help us to better give meaning to our past

The material world is often created by gendered power structures and used to express gendered identities. In this paper, I will offer an overview of the historiography of gender and material culture in the modern period. The first half of the paper will focus on studies of modern Britain. I will take a long view of the development of the history of gender, considering its relationship with cultural history, and why the study of material culture is useful to historians working in this area. I will then explore how historians of gender have recently used material culture, focusing on three main areas: gendered responsibility for purchasing goods; the use of material things to shape and create ideas of gender, and in particular new work that focuses on the construction of masculinity through everyday objects and practices; and the way in which historians of the family and emotional life have started to use the material world, especially in work on fatherhood. I will also reflect on recent criticisms of the study of gender and material culture, and how and where the field might usefully develop in the future. The second half of the paper will focus in on the material culture of the home. Narrowing the focus of discussion will allow me to open up the geographical remit of the paper to explore how we might use the study of gender and material culture in a transnational context.

There is surprisingly little early medieval social history being written. In recent years, more specifically economic history has had a remarkable rebirth, thanks to the (largely unconnected) efforts of archaeologists on the one side and Belgian and German historians on the other; but the study of society in general, outside the restricted spheres of the aristocracy and the church, has been neglected. I speak schematically; obviously, there are notable exceptions. But it is significant that noone, in any country, has thought it worthwhile to attempt a synthesis of early medieval European socio-economic history as a whole that could replace those of Alfons Dopsch or, maybe, André Déléage. It would be hard; but people have tried it for the centuries after 900, with interesting (even if inevitably controversial) results. Why not earlier? Richard Sullivan recently lamented the conservatism of most Carolingian scholarship; in the arena of social history, he could easily have extended his complaints back to 500.

The study of material culture belongs to a relatively young discipline that examines artifacts as well as ideas about, and practices related to, artifacts, with artifacts defined as material objects created or modified by people. Aspects of research in material culture overlap with art history, archaeology, and anthropology, but studies in material culture approach the subject from a different perspective, focusing on areas not necessarily emphasized in these disciplines. Unlike traditional art history, material culture studies concentrate on the function of objects, devoting little attention to their aesthetic qualities, with more emphasis, for instance, on miracles associated with icons than on the style or iconography of icons; unlike traditional archaeology, material culture studies do not necessarily focus on extant artifacts, giving as much attention to references to objects in texts as to extant objects; and, unlike traditional anthropology, material culture studies often give great emphasis to historical development, often over vast expanses of time. While the field of material culture studies has flourished for decades, religious studies have been slow to recognize the importance of material things. Many areas of religion in which material culture plays a prominent role remain largely unexplored, including the place of objects in ritual, religious emotion, pilgrimage, and doctrine. Readers interested in the material culture of Buddhism will want to consult entries for Buddhist art, archaeology, and anthropology as well; in the entries below, the focus is on areas of material culture not necessarily emphasized in these disciplines as well as on studies within these disciplines that are especially relevant to the study of material culture. The term visual culture overlaps with much of what is considered material culture, but excludes objects associated with other senses, such as taste, smell, and touch, which are covered by the term material culture. The material culture approach is particularly well suited for exploring the qualities of particular classes of objects. What is it about relics as body parts that accounts for their appeal? Why are miracles so often associated with physical representations of holy figures and how do these differ from textual representations? How do clothing and food differ from language as a medium of communication? To highlight this aspect of research in Buddhist material culture, the scholarship listed below is divided according to type of object. At the same time, material culture studies also offer an opportunity to examine attitudes toward the material world as applied to a wide variety of objects normally separated by discipline. The doctrine of merit inspired the creation of a wide variety of different types of objects, and the monastic ideal of renunciation permeates many different areas of Buddhist material culture.

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Zubin Mistry’s Abortion in the Early Middle Ages, c.500–900 seeks to uncover the cultural significance of abortion in early medieval societies. While evidence about pre-modern attitudes to abortion in early medieval Western Europe is fragmentary, Mistry manages to summon a range of sources, all condemning the practice. In excerpts of canon laws, penitentials, sermons, saints’ lives, and biblical commentaries, he reads deeply into the context that occasioned authoritative statements on abortion. The resulting monograph is the first to comprehensively gather all of the authoritative fragments on abortion in continental Western Europe from the period and to consider their cumulative effects, addressing how they relate to one another to reflect, if not a cohesive discourse on abortion, then at least the “thought-worlds” of their authors. Abortion in the Early Middle Ages firmly establishes that reactions to the practice of abortion were situational, rooted in specific historical circumstances, and unrepresentative of contemporary abstract concerns about fetal “life.”

Material Culture and Fashion in Tang China and Beyond Rebecca Doran Empire of Style: Silk and Fashion in Tang China by BuYun Chen. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2019. Pp. xiv + 257. $70.00 cloth, $70.00 e-book. Silk, Slaves, and Stupas: Material Culture of the Silk Road by by Susan Whitfield. Oakland: University of California Press, 2018. Pp. xi + 339. $29.95 cloth, $29.95 e-book. Discussions of the Tang period almost inevitably address, or at least refer to, the dynasty's cosmopolitanism. A complex set of interconnections between the Tang and other kingdoms made it culturally rich and open to a variety of influences. The interstate relationships that contributed to the development of Tang culture and society can be approached from numerous perspectives. These relationships include but are by no means limited to tributary and trade systems, military expansion and foreign policy, and religiously motivated movement into and out of the Tang borders by clergy and laypeople alike. One way to understand and trace the connections between the Tang empire and kingdoms across Eurasia is through the lens of materiality. This material culture encompasses a wide range of articles of clothing, jewelry, decorative objects, items of daily use, and other artistic products, as well as the attendant attitudes toward them and practices surrounding their use. The networks comprising the famed Silk Road, referring to a system of routes across Central Asia and the Middle East, linking Chang'an in the east with Antioch in the west, were crucial to forging [End Page 165] and maintaining ties between the Tang and other kingdoms. They fueled the wealth and lush material culture of the Tang, especially during its first century and a half. This rich materiality is attested in textual, visual, and archaeological sources and remains fundamental to the historical memory of the dynasty. Recent monographs by BuYun Chen and Susan Whitfield adopt groundbreaking, multidisciplinary approaches to material culture in China and beyond. They emphasize the importance of materiality—clothes, textiles, jewelry, bowls, and stupas, among other artifacts—to understanding economic, political, and ideological realities. Chen's Empire of Style: Silk and Fashion in Tang China analyzes the multifaceted Tang fashion system, powered by weavers, artisans, traders, and consumers. Focusing in particular on the significance of silk textiles, Chen utilizes archaeological and textual sources, first, to reconstruct the changing modes of production that drove the creation of these fabrics and, second, to demonstrate the existence of a dynamic fashion culture and consciousness during the Tang. Whitfield's Silk, Slaves, and Stupas: Material Culture of the Silk Road adopts an object-centered approach to the cultural interactions enabled by the Silk Road. It explores the relationships between material items and broader systems of politics, trade, and religion. The monograph traces the creation and movement of ten different objects along the Silk Road and, through this analysis, maps networks of interconnection among artisans, traders, worshippers, and consumers across vast geographic and cultural boundaries. The issues raised and methodologies utilized by both books contribute to ongoing scholarly dialogues and open new directions in the study of material culture, fashion, art, and economic and social history in the Tang and beyond. Empire of Style is divided into two main sections, which unfold progressively to address the ideological and political forces, consumer demand, and logistics of production shaping the development of the Tang fashion system. The monograph begins with an insightful introduction that challenges traditional theories of the genesis of fashion, which have tended to view the emergence of modern fashion culture as inextricably tied to the advent of a capitalist system and commodity culture in nineteenth-century western Europe. Chen debunks the "myth of a static Chinese costume" by introducing what she terms the "tactile and playful world of Tang fashion," a world marked by the [End Page 166] desire for change and "aesthetic play," wherein consumers and wearers used fashion to experiment with social role, image, and perception (pp. 5, 7, 9). Turning to the main body of the book, part 1 comprises two chapters, which explore, respectively, the political and economic developments that enabled the emergence of a cosmopolitan fashion culture during the Tang ("History") and the discursive frameworks through...

The word “material” in material culture refers to a broad range of objects classified as “artifacts”—that is, those objects made or used by humans. The inclusion of the word “culture” is rather misleading, however, as material culture is not strictly culture itself but rather its product; as cultural constructs inform the production of artifacts, the study of material culture is a way of revealing beliefs, assumptions, and social fears within the society that produced and consumed any given artifact. Material culture therefore properly means the physical manifestations of culture, and covers those aspects of human behavior, learning, and knowledge that provide a person with the reasoning for producing and using artifacts. Until relatively recently, there was little serious interest in the study of the material cultures of children and childhood (children being biologically immature individuals, with the associated childhood referring to the social and cultural construction of the lives, development, and meaning of these children). Children’s experiences vary enormously over time, space, and culture, and the material environment of the child is an important part of their experience of the world. Conversely, the study of such material culture makes children visible, particularly in the archaeological record where such materials evidence children’s presence and activities. While the origins of material culture study can be traced back to the late 19th century, texts on childhood objects did not start appearing until much later on, and even then it was largely confined to collectors’ guides and histories (mostly concerning toys, dolls, and children’s costume; items that may be thought of as icons of childhood) rather than studies considering the relationship between children and their material world. Such material cultures may therefore be thought of (after Brookshaw 2009, cited under Material Culture of Children) as being either the material culture of children (items made, adapted, or repurposed by children themselves such as homemade—sometimes termed “makeshift” toys) or the material culture of childhood (items made by or bought for children by adults).

Abstract: This article, based on the 2021 WMQ -EMSI workshop, “Material Culture Studies and Early American History,” offers a state-of-the-field report. It considers the scholarly popularity of the “material turn” among historians of early America in the twenty-first century and asks what scholars miss by engaging with material culture primarily as tangible evidence without dwelling on the methodological or theoretical foundations of material culture studies as a field. Understanding material culture studies as a field sheds greater light on why material culture evidence is critically important for studying early American history, especially a field that many of us now conceive of as “vast early America.” Interdisciplinary in its origins and practice, material culture studies, like early America, has a vastness—a vastness that gives us tools to decolonize our study of the past. The vastness of material culture studies equips us to do better justice to the rich history of an early America that is similarly vast. This article uses the work of workshop participants as the basis for a discussion of what material culture studies has done in the past, and can do in the future, for fully inclusive, interdisciplinary history.

Review| November 01 2022 Archaeology and History: A Late Antiquity for Britain Robin Fleming, The Material Fall of Roman Britain, 300–525 CE. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2021. 333 pp. + 22 b/w figs. ISBN: 9780812252446. $45, £36.Mateusz Fafinski, Roman Infrastructure in Early Medieval Britain: The Adaptations of the Past in Text and Stone. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2021. 239 pp. + 2 b/w figs. ISBN 9789463727532. €106. Helena Hamerow Helena Hamerow University of Oxford Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Studies in Late Antiquity (2022) 6 (4): 734–739. https://doi.org/10.1525/sla.2022.6.4.734 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Helena Hamerow; Archaeology and History: A Late Antiquity for Britain. Studies in Late Antiquity 1 November 2022; 6 (4): 734–739. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/sla.2022.6.4.734 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentStudies in Late Antiquity Search Archaeology was, once upon a time, referred to as “the handmaiden of history.” Images of artifacts served primarily to adorn the pages of historical accounts regarded by publishers as needing enlivening. How times have changed. Material culture—uncovered for the most part by archaeological excavation—is increasingly playing a central role in the writings of early medieval historians. Notable examples include Chris Wickham’s Framing the Early Middle Ages (2005) and, more recently, John Blair’s Building Anglo-Saxon England (2018).1 The two volumes under review here—both written by historians—bear witness to this growing engagement with material culture and how it is changing the way we view early medieval Britain. The Material Fall of Roman Britain has the archaeological record at its core and uses it to challenge conventional understandings of the notoriously elusive late Roman to post-Roman transition. Refusing to be constrained by traditional disciplinary and chronological divides, the book spans the period... You do not currently have access to this content.

This book has demonstrated how the study of material culture has come of age. From being the preserve of a few hardy souls working in disconnected island Communities — the social and economic history of consumption, ethnographies of contemporary consumption, the anthropology of goods, such as clothing and pottery, material culture studies in archaeology — it has become the stamping ground of many. The concluding article here demonstrates how the study of material culture has come of age. From being the preserve of a few hardy souls working in disconnected island communities — the social and economic history of consumption, ethnographies of contemporary consumption, the anthropology of goods, such as clothing and pottery, material culture studies in archaeology — it has become the stamping ground of many. Things have now become a key part of worlds. That was always true in the sense that the layout of things has always been a powerful pointer to a culture's propensities and dispositions.

This is the third and final volume in a series examining the history of Rome in the early Middle Ages (700–1000 CE) through the primary lens of the city's material culture. The previous volumes examined the eighth and the ninth centuries respectively. John Osborne uses buildings (both religious and domestic), their decorations, other works of painting and sculpture, inscriptions, manuscripts, ceramics, metalwork, and coins as 'documents' to supplement what can be gleaned from more traditional written sources such as the Liber pontificalis. The overall approach is particularly appropriate for tenth-century Rome, which has traditionally been considered a 'dark age', given recent research on standing monuments and the large amount of new material brought to light in archaeological excavations undertaken over the last four decades. This magnificent and beautifully illustrated volume provides a triumphant conclusion to a series which will be indispensable for all those interested in early medieval Rome.

It’s Hard to Say Elizabeth McKeown (bio) Material Christianity: Religion and Popular Culture in America. By Colleen McDannell. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1995. 312 pages. $35.00. Judgment and Grace in Dixie: Southern Faiths from Faulkner to Elvis. By Charles Reagan Wilson. Athens, Ga.: University of Georgia Press, 1995. 202 pages. $29.95 (cloth). $14.95 (paper). It’s not easy to say what things mean. A good reading of the objects of popular culture requires an eye for objects and a taste for theory. It aims to locate things in a landscape that is simultaneously familiar and fresh. The study of material culture is especially challenging when the materials in question are religious things. In this case, interpreters must address the complex category of “religion” and acquaint themselves with a variety of particular and highly-defined traditions of doctrine and practice. Colleen McDannell and Charles Reagan Wilson engage in this demanding practice and demonstrate that the effort pays notable dividends. Things and their associated rituals anchor interpretations of American “popular religion.” From McDannell and Wilson we learn that ordinary people—Protestants, Catholics, Southerners, women, and men—routinely practice religion outside of church, in the privacy of their bedrooms and parlors, and in the public spaces of football stadiums and fraternal lodges. We also learn that the beliefs and rituals of popular religion are frequently borrowed from traditional sources and edited to express regional, class, ethnic and gender convictions. The gender, economic and racial imprints of the larger culture are expressed in popular religion just as they are in the [End Page 650] traditional churches. But popular religion is more heterodox than the Christian churches, and its mass appeal erodes doctrinal and ritual boundaries. McDannell and Wilson provide affectionate readings of the objects, architecture, and landscapes of popular religion and bring this complex and shape-shifting practice into vivid focus. A specialist in Southern religion and culture, Wilson’s first exploration of popular religion—which he also calls “Southern civil religion”—was an analysis of the apotheosis of the Confederacy after the Civil War. In Baptized in Blood: The Religion of the Lost Cause, 1865–1920, he argued that the myths, rituals, evangelists, and demons of Lost Cause religion provided white Southerners with a cohesive cultural identity in the wake of political defeat. 1 In subsequent essays, Wilson extended his analysis of Southern popular religion into the contemporary period and emphasized the study of material culture. His latest volume, Judgment and Grace in Dixie, is a collection of these essays. He concludes that the South is still “God’s Project.” The civil rights movement has desacralized the memory of the Confederacy and its foundational doctrine of white supremacy, and now black and white Southerners struggle to establish a biracial South. Wilson argues that this vision is rooted evangelical Christianity—under God’s judgment and with God’s grace—and nourished in the icons and landscapes of Southern popular religion. The recent wave of church-burnings in the South offer a graphic reminder of Wilson’s accompanying caution: this biracial project is “still in the making.” Popular and material culture studies is Colleen McDannell’s project. While Wilson promotes the South as a site for biracial renewal, McDannell advances the study of popular and material culture among scholars of religion. 2 In her earlier The Christian Home in Victorian America, McDannell entered Anglo-Protestant and Irish-Catholic middle-class parlors to examine hearth rituals and patterns of domesticity that borrowed from and transformed ecclesiastical practices of the institutional churches. She showed how objects (especially the family bible) and domestic architecture (most memorably the “Christian home” designs of Catharine Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe) infused everyday lives with religious structure and significance. In addition to her conclusions about religion, gender, class, and ethnicity, McDannell discovered an ecumenicity of religious goods among Northern Protestants and Catholics, of which Protestant use of Marian icons and devotions is a notable instance. Now, in Material Christianity: Religion and Popular Culture in America, McDannell extends her material cultural approach in several provocative [End Page 651] directions. In a lavishly-produced volume that will find space on contemporary coffee tables, she showcases the materials of...

Reviewed by: Settlements and Strongholds in Early Medieval England: Texts, Landscapes, and Material Culture by Michael D. J. Bintley Sybil Jack Bintley, Michael D. J., Settlements and Strongholds in Early Medieval England: Texts, Landscapes, and Material Culture (Studies in the Early Middle Ages, 45), Turnhout, Brepols, 2020; hardback; pp. 231; 13 b/w illustrations; R.R.P €75.00; ISBN 9782503583846. While not all scholars of the early medieval period will accept Michael Bintley's views, this book is an invaluable introduction to some new approaches to interpretation of the period between the departure of the Romans and the coming of the Normans in England, such as those of John Blair and Éamonn Ó Carragáin. In this book Bintley hopes to open further areas for future research. He is primarily interested in changing our understanding of the ways in which the authors of contemporary vernacular literary works presented the links between people and the places in which they lived. [End Page 195] The texts that survive from any period are important, but they have a particular place in any largely non-literate society, such as early medieval England. Before archaeological excavation in England revealed some of the material remains of the period after the departure of Rome, investigation into why and where literature and poetry were composed, and in what language and how they were disseminated, provided almost the sole insight on the ordering of a society both lay and religious where knowledge was spread by oral presentation. Well-known authors such as Gildas and Bede, who set out the myths of the communities' origins and their narratives of events, were the basis for classical historical analysis even when their attribution of the destruction of the communities to religious failure was abandoned. As Bintley shows, in the years since World War II this classical presentation has been modified as archaeologists have uncovered numerous sites of many different types from this period across England. Scholars since extended their vision to examine how space was structured and perceived by people from all parts of society and interdisciplinary studies soon followed, one of the earliest being Audrey Meaney's PhD thesis (University of Cambridge) in 1959 on A Correlation of Literary and Archaeological Evidence for Anglo-Saxon Heathenism. Bintley's study introduces an analysis of the material settlements that interprets the physical remains in the light of widely accepted social practices that are held to bind society together, such as gift exchange, oath swearing, and ritual feasting. The spiritual understanding of landscape at the time is brought into the explanations of how towns were shaped for a strongly ecclesiastical purpose. He examines closely the role of the Church in the form and nature in which particular structures were created and interpreted as critical to their role. That the secular buildings were almost invariably wooden, while religious buildings were normally stone (and often of older, Roman stone reused), is presented as a critical cultural signifier. The apparently disorganized village layouts are seen as relating to different expectations of community interaction and integration from those that had preceded them. Bintley makes clear the different situations at different times such the slow regeneration of towns and the special approach to interurban space immediately after the departure of the Romans and the effect of the Viking invasions and the need for strongholds. Some of his arguments are still heavily dependent on interpretations of more recent texts, such as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, that create an image of a directing elite, starting in the eighth century, and getting more authoritative in the Alfredian ninth century—when pivotal change in the conceptualizing of the function of a town was occurring and the creation or recreation of governing institutions, and the development of philosophical arguments about the definition of the role of a king, the duty of the community, and the creation of bonds across social strata and secular and religious interests began to emerge. Bintley seems concerned to establish the continuities in social and settlement culture throughout the period and to show not only how a familiar legacy was developed, but also how there was a constant return to grief [End Page 196] about intellectual ignorance and the loss...

ABSTRACTThis paper reviews the position of old age in the societies of post-Roman Europe, from the fifth to the 10th centuries. Drawing on both primary and secondary literary and material sources of the period, I suggest that living beyond the age of 60 years was an uncommon experience throughout the early Middle Ages. Not only was achieving old age a minority experience, it seems to have been particularly concentrated among the senior clergy. This, together with the growing importance of the Christian Church as the institution that stabilised post-Roman society, the decline of urban living and its attendant culture of leisure and literacy, and the transformation of kinship into a symbolic ‘family under God’ contributed to a more favourable status for old age, or at least one that was particularly favourable for older men. This was based not so much upon the accumulation with age of wealth and privilege, but upon the moral worth of old age as a stage of life. The early Middle Ages, the so-called ‘Dark Ages’, was in this respect a relatively distinctive period in the history of old age. With all around instability and the future uncertain and often threatening, survival into old age was a rare but frequently revered attainment.