Rome and the Cosmopolitan Language of Power in Early Medieval Inscriptions in the British Isles

Abstract

This paper investigates some of the ways in which the idea of Rome was exploited in inscriptions in the British Isles during the early Middle Ages in order to evoke the Rome of the Empire or that of the Church and St Peter. In Wales and Western Britain, inscriptions can suggest a political identification with 'Roman' traditions. For the recently converted Anglo-Saxons, inscriptions were a means of identifying with the Rome of St Peter. Various devices are considered, including the re-use of Roman inscribed stones. The honorific use of the centre of an inscription for a key name and the symmetrical balancing of elements around the centre in an eleventh-century inscription at Deerhurst are shown to derive from prestigious inscriptions in Rome.