Out of Touch

26 Wednesday Jun 2019

Posted by Ollamh in Economics in Middle-earth, J.R.R. Tolkien

Tags

Barliman Butterbur, Bayeux Tapestry, Beacons, call box, Cell Phones, communication, Eagles, Gondor, Great War, messenger dog, messenger pigeon, military post, Moth, motorcycle messenger, Nazgul, Palantir, pay phone, Postal Service, Postmen, runner, semaphore, signal lamp, telegrams, telegraphy, The Lord of the Rings, The Prancing Pony, Tolkien, wireless telegraphy

Welcome, as always, dear readers.

Recently, we were charging our cell/mobile phone and completely forgot it when we walked out of the house.

image1cell

We were down the road when we realized it and the thought came to us: how times have changed! Before people could carry their little, flat phones in their pockets, away from home, if you had an emergency, you looked for a pay phone/call box.

When JRRT was born, in 1893, the main forms of long-distance communication were the post

and the telegram—brought to your house by a specially-uniformed messenger.

The telephone had been invented in 1875, but was still far from common–

London’s first telephone directory, issued in 1880, listed about 300 customers in a city of 5,000,000 and, when the first actual phone book arrived, in 1896, it had 81,000 numbers for the whole of Britain, with a population of perhaps 30,000,000. (To give you a literary example, Bram Stoker’s Dracula was published in 1896 and, although telegrams are common in the book, no one ever mentions or uses a telephone.)

When Second Lieutenant Tolkien

became his battalion’s signals officer in 1916, there were, in fact, a surprising number of forms of communication available, although most of them would not have ever appeared in civilian form.

There was the telephone, which, with its miles of wire, could be extremely vulnerable to enemy shellfire.

image8telephone

There was what would be called “wireless telegraphy”, an early form of radio, but not very dependable.

image9radio

There was actual telegraphy which, again, used miles of wire.

There was the military post—mostly used not to transmit orders, but to maintain contact with home.

image11militarypost

And then there were the more specifically military methods. At the most basic, there was the runner.

image12runner

Then there was the motorcycle messenger,

image13motorcycle

the signal lamp,

image14lamp

and even the semaphore.

image15semaphore

Beyond the human, there were the messenger dog,

and the messenger pigeon.

So, we asked ourselves, what were Tolkien’s Middle-earth equivalents? First of all, we see Bilbo in Chapter One of The Hobbit, reading his morning’s mail when Gandalf appears.

This is expanded upon in the Prologue to The Lord of the Rings, where we hear about the post as being one of the few actual public services in the Shire. (Here’s someone’s wonderful creation of a postal map of the Shire, complete with regional divisions.)

This service clearly doesn’t extend beyond the Shire as Gandalf is forced to leave a letter for Frodo at The Prancing Pony

in Bree, to be given to the first person going westwards. The innkeeper, Butterbur, completely forgets it, with serious consequences.

Because this is a pre-industrial world, none of the electronic means would be available, of course. Gondor used mounted messengers, as two are discovered ambushed by the Rohirrim on the road to the Rammas Echor (The Return of the King, Book Five, Chapter 5,“The Ride of the Rohirrim”).

(This image is, of course, from the Bayeux Tapestry, the caption saying “Nuntii Wilielmi”, “William’s Messengers”, but the only illustrations of Gondorian mounted men we’ve found are all heavily-armored, something you wouldn’t expect a courier to be, so we’re suggesting this possibility, instead.)

A second method is by the chain of beacon fires along the mountains to the west of Gondor.

As for their opponents, we suppose that one might imagine the Nazgul as the airborne equivalent of mounted messengers, since they seem, when not pursuing Frodo and leading attacks on Gondor, to be couriers for Sauron.

Sauron’s main communication device, however, appears to be the palantir, whereby he controls the actions of Saruman and, to a degree, of Denethor, the Steward.

It’s rather surprising, we suppose, that Gandalf, who is powerful enough to deal with a palantir (although it’s Aragorn who is its rightful owner), can be so easily trapped by Saruman and left on top of Orthanc, completely isolated when he is so needed in the north.

In P. Jackson’s film, he uses what looks like a fancy moth to call for help,

which appears in the form of one of those eagles, so conveniently available when someone really gets into trouble (Bilbo, Gandalf, and the dwarves in The Hobbit, as well as dwarves, elves, and men vs goblins and Wargs, Frodo and Sam on the edge of Mt Doom in The Return of the King). Suppose, instead, if Gandalf had reached into this robe and pulled out his cell phone–

which he would never have left behind after charging it…

Thanks for reading and

MTCIDC

A Tale of Two Swords

19 Wednesday Jun 2019

Posted by Ollamh in Fairy Tales and Myths, Imaginary History, Military History

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Tags

Charles X, Crusades, Excalibur, French Revolution, Gesta Henrici II et Gesta Regis Ricardi, Glastonbury, King Arthur, King Tancred, Lady of the Lake, Lecce, Lionheart, Louis IX, Louis Philipe, Louis XIV, Louis XV, Louis XVI, Louis XVIII, Medieval, mosaic, Napoleon, Norman, Otranto, Rex Arturus, Richard I of England, Roger of Howden, swords, Third Crusade

So we were reading this really interesting book, Christopher Tyerman’sngcce How to Plan a Crusade, when, on pages 244-5, we came across this: “While Louis prayed to the relics of the Passion, Richard had carried the sword Excalibur.” And we said, “What? Excalibur?”

Welcome, as always, dear readers. In this post, we want to talk a bit about two historic—or mythical– swords, inspired, as we were, by that reference and by two kings involved with them.

The “Louis” in the passage above is Louis IX (1214-1270) of France,

aka St Louis, a saint of both the Catholic and Anglican churches, who led several crusades in the mid-13^th century, but not very successfully, being taken prisoner during the first (1250) and dying of a fever during the second (1270).

The “Richard” is Richard I of England (1157-1199), also called “Lionheart”.

He was also a crusader, having been one of the dominant figures in the earlier Third Crusade (1189-1192).

But how do we know that Richard had “Excalibur”? And how did he acquire it?

We begin with the passage from a contemporary of Richard’s, Roger of Howden (?-1201?), who has left us a history known as Gesta Henrici II et Gesta Regis Ricardi, “The Deeds/Acts of Henry II and the Deeds/Acts of King Richard”. This begins in the 8^th century and covers the period up to 1201, which is presumed to be the year of Roger’s death. Roger went on the Third Crusade with Richard, although he left it early. He either observed or heard about this event, which took place in 1191:

“Et contra rex Angliae dedit regi Tancredo gladium illum optimum quem Britones Caliburne[m?] vocant qui fuerat gladius Arthuri quondam nobilis regis Angliae.”

“And, in return, the King of England gave to King Tancred that best of swords, which the Britons call ‘Calibern’, which had been the sword of Arthur, the one-time noble king of England.”

(The Latin text comes from page 392 of a collection of earlier English historians, entitled “Rerum Anglicarum Scriptores Post Bedam Praecipui”,–something like, “Writers of/on English Affairs in Particular After Bede”–which was published in London in 1596).

“King Tancred” (1138-1194) was the Norman ruler of Sicily from 1189-1194, just when Richard and his fellow Crusaders had reached that part of the world on their way eastward.

Tancred gave Richard a number of ships to help with transport and we might suppose that this was part of a reciprocal process. Remarkably for this early time, we have what appears to be concrete evidence not only that King Arthur was a well-known figure in southern Italy, but perhaps known to Tancred himself.

Tancred had been born in 1138 in Lecce (on the right-hand side of the map, just inland)

and just a few miles south is Otranto, with its cathedral (below Lecce on the map).

The main floor of that cathedral is covered by an enormous mosaic, installed between 1163 and 1165.

In that mosaic is a figure labeled “Rex Arturus”.

We’ve answered our first question, sort of: “How do we know that Richard had Excalibur?” But, again, how did he acquire it? Unfortunately, the only reference to Richard and the sword is the one we’ve quoted.

One thought, however. About 1191, the monks of Glastonbury Abbey

excavated a grave which

supposedly included a lead cross which read:

“Hic jacet sepultus inclytus rex Arthurius in insula avallonia cum Wennevereia uxore sua secunda”

“Here lies buried the renowned king Arthurius on the Avalonian island with Guinevere his second wife”

(Latin text from Giraldus Cambrensis, Speculum Ecclesiae, Chapter IX.)

Giraldus himself had been shown this cross by the Abbot, as he tells us. (For a more complete version of this story, in an English translation, please see this LINK.)

Modern research suggests that this was a fake, intended to boost the fortunes of a fading religious site, badly damaged by fire in 1184, but suppose that, to increase their patronage, the monks had added another level to their sham and “found” a sword, which they had then sent to Richard, who carried it off on his journey to the East.

(For more on the fakery, see, for example, this LINK.)

Louis IX, as we mentioned, died on campaign in 1270. His son, Philip, was with him at the time, but sailed back to France after his father’s death and was crowned Philip III in 1271. Our sources are vague here (they don’t always get the year right, for example), but all report that, for the first time, a special sword was used in the coronation ceremony. This was the so-called “sword of Charlemagne”, named “Joyeuse” (the “happy one”), which is mentioned in the 11^th-century Chanson de Roland:

“Si ad vestut sun blanc osberc sasfret,
Laciet sun elme, ki est a or gemmet,
Ceinte Joiuse, unches ne fut sa per,
Ki cascun jur muet.XXX. clartez.”

“[Charlemagne] was wearing his fine white coat of mail and his helmet with gold-studded stones; by his side hung Joyeuse, and never was there a sword to match it; its colour changed thirty times a day.”

(The translator for this was not identified at the site and we would make one small change—“clartez” might be better as “sheen/brightness” instead of “colour”.)

This, one of the few remaining pieces of the royal regalia, is, in fact, a mixture of a number of different periods, all the way up to Charles X (reigned 1824-1830), and experts argue over whether it is actually possible to date any part of it as early as Charlemagne’s time (see this LINK for more).

What isn’t questioned is that some version of this sword, at least, was used as part of the crowning ritual of French kings for centuries and its association with Charlemagne was as important for French history as linking something to King Arthur for English.

We haven’t managed to locate any medieval manuscript illustration which depicts a French coronation with the sword in place, but, when it comes to “The Sun King”, that is, Louis XIV, you can see that’s its hanging from his left side.

The same is true for Louis XV

and for that most unwarlike monarch, Louis XVI.

The French Revolution brought the crowning of kings to a halt, of course,

but Napoleon, all too aware both of the past and of his need to establish himself as the legitimate heir to the previous kings, brought it back, as you can see in this really over the top portrait.

When the younger brothers of the executed Louis XVI, Louis XVIII (1755-1824)

and Charles X (1757-1836)

became king successively in 1814 and 1824, one can still see the sword—although apparently Napoleon’s craftsmen had fiddled with it, as did those of Charles. His successor, Louis Philipe (1773-1850), who belonged to a cousin branch of the royal family, broke the tradition for good and the sword disappeared into history—and the Louvre, where it’s now on display.

And this brings us back to Excalibur. The tradition is a little murky, but the medieval sources are pretty clear that Excalibur had come from “The Lady of the Lake” and, as Arthur lay, gravely, perhaps fatally wounded, he commanded one of his knights, Griflet or Bedivere, according to the tradition, to return it to the Lady, which he finally, and very reluctantly, did.

With this, Excalibur disappears from the story—until Richard is reported giving it to the king of Sicily and our story—briefly—begins again.

Thanks, as always, for reading and

MTCIDC

Water Which?

12 Wednesday Jun 2019

Posted by Ollamh in Artists and Illustrators, Fairy Tales and Myths, Heroes, Literary History, Narrative Methods, Poetry, Theatre and Performance

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Alaric Hall, Alberich, Antonin Dvorak, Apollonius, Argonautica, Arthur Rackham, Elves, ETA Hoffmann, Friedrich de la Motte Fouque, Hans Christian Andersen, Heinemann, Heracles, Hylas, Jason and the Golden Fleece, John William Waterhouse, Judy Collins, mermaids, naiads, Nemean Lion, Old English Poems, Rhine Maidens, Richard Wagner, Rusalka, selkies, silkies, sirens, swan-maidens, The Great Silkie of Sul Skerry, The Little Mermaid, Tommy Makem, Undine, waeteraelfadl, Water Elf Sickness

Welcome, as ever, dear readers.

Just today, our English friend, Michael, sent us an interesting CD set, “Old English Poems, Prose & Lessons”. We turned the jewel box over and our eye was immediately caught by #12 of the listings on the back, “Charm Against Waterelf Sickness”.

In Old English, “waterelf sickness” is a compound which can be read two ways: “waeteraelf-adl” (“water-elf sickness”) or “waeter-aelfadl” (something like “watery elf-sickness”). Alaric Hall, in his extremely informative dissertation, “The Meaning of Elf, and Elves, in Medieval England” (2005), 116, leans towards the second possibility, but, with our western classical background, we immediately imagined a “water elf” and, from there, we thought of naiads—female water spirits–in fresh water, like streams and pools. (If you would like a comprehensive listing of all the subvarieties of such spirits, here’s a LINK to an article on the subject.)

Probably the most famous story about such creatures appears in Apollonius of Rhodes’ 3^rd-c. BC, Argonautica, the story of Jason’s quest for the Golden Fleece.

Two of Jason’s crew on the Argo are Heracles (seen here dealing with the Nemean Lion)

image2herc

and his companion, Hylas (seen here about to get into trouble).

Ancient travel in the Mediterranean often meant coasting, with frequent stops for water, and, in Apollonius’ story, Hylas had gone ashore and found a pool, but was ambushed by a group of naiads, who pulled him under.

(This is John William Waterhouse’s famous 1896 painting of the scene.)

We meet woman waterfolk in much of western folk tradition—and this is excluding those on salt water, including mermaids,

selkies/silkies (who are shape-changers, between seals and humans),

and even sirens.

For fresh water, we had those naiads, but also swan-maidens, often enchanted into water bird forms.

(Here’s a LINK to a whole little collection of stories about such creatures.)

As well, we have the Rhine Maidens,

who, in Wagner’s “Ring” cycle, guard the Rhine gold, deep under the river, but who lose it to the craftsman dwarf, Alberich, with whom they flirted—with evil consequences.

We mentioned mermaids as salt water creatures and, in Hans Christian Andersen’s (1805-1875)

“The Little Mermaid” (1837), we have the story of the mermaid who falls in love with a handsome prince and trades her voice for human form.

(This is the first page of Andersen’s original manuscript.)

There had been an earlier Romantic version of the water spirit and the human (in this case, a knight) in Friedrich de la Motte Fouque’s (1777-1843) novella, Undine (1811).

This, in turn, became an early Romantic opera, Undine (1816), the text by the author, the music by another famous Romantic author, E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776-1822).

The theme which runs through all of these meetings of water spirit and human is the uneasy relationship which seems the only possibility for them, virtually always leading to unhappiness, and this is true of our last water spirit, Rusalka, the subject of an opera, Rusalka, (1901) by the Czech composer, Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904)

Like Andersen’s Little Mermaid, the water spirit (“rusalka” can mean “water spirit” in Czech) falls in love with a prince, trading her immortality for human love.

(This is an image of the original Rusalka, Ruzena Maturova.)

If we said “leading to unhappiness” is the usual conclusion to such romances, Rusalka is even worse. When she is betrayed by the prince, Rusalka becomes a water demon, luring people to their deaths in her pool—a far cry from the happy ending of the Disney movie!

So, what about our charm against waeteraelfadl? Here’s a translation:

“If a man is in the water elf disease [waeter aelfadle], then the nails of his hand are dark and the eyes teary, and he will look down. Give him this as medicine [laecedome]: everthroat, hassock, the lower part of fane, yewberry, lupin, helenium, marshmallow head, fen mint, dill, lily, attorlathe, pulegium, marrubium, dock, elder, fel terre, wormwood, strawberry leaves, consolde. Soak with ale; add holy water to it. Sing this gealdor over it thrice:

I have bound on the wounds the best of war bandages, so the wounds neither burn nor burst, nor go further, nor spread, nor jump, nor the wounds increase [waco sian?], nor sores deepen. But may he himself keep in a healthy way [halewaege?]. May it not ache you more than it aches earth in ear [eare?].

Sing this many times, “May earth bear on you with all her might and main.” These galdor a man may sing over a wound.”

(translation from Karen Louise Jolly, Popular Religion in Late Saxon England: Elf Charms in Context (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996)

Unfortunately, this looks more like a cure for a skin disease than for an ill-fated affair between water spirit and human!

Thanks, as always, for reading and, also as always,

MTCIDC

You can find Alaric Hall’s dissertation (now a book) at: http://www.alarichall.org.uk/phd.php.

pps

Child Ballad 113, “The Great Silkie of Sul Skerry” is about the male version of such a creature. For a haunting performance of this, with a modern tune, sung by Judy Collins (with Tommy Makem on pennywhistle), here’s a LINK.

ppps

The most famous aria from Dvorak’s opera is a song sung to the moon by Rusalka, “Měsíčku na nebi hlubokém“, and we find it one of the most beautiful arias we know. Here’s a LINK so that you can hear it, too.

pppps (we think that this is a record, even for us)

In 1909, the publisher Heinemann released a translation of de la Motte Fouque’s Undine with illustrations by Arthur Rackham. Here’s a LINK so that you can download it and add it to your library.

Tamsin

05 Wednesday Jun 2019

Posted by Ollamh in Literary History, Military History, Narrative Methods

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Tags

Algernon Blackwood, billyblind, boggart, Captain Blood, cat, Catherine of Braganza, Charles I, Charles II, Dorchester, Dorset, Errol Flynn, George Jeffreys, ghost, Glastonbury Abbey, Glastonbury Tor, James, King Arthur, Lucy Walter, M.R. James, Maiden Castle, Monmouth, Nell Gwynn, Peter Beagle, rebellion, Sedgemoor, Somerset, Tamsin, Two Men in a Trench

If you had never seen a ghost and probably didn’t believe in them, what would convince you? How about a ghost cat?

In Peter Beagle’s

Tamsin (1999),

13-year-old Jenny Gluckstein encounters one and it’s only the beginning of a wonderfully rich and, this being a novel by Peter Beagle, a little melancholy, ghost story.

We don’t do spoilers, but what we’d like to do—oh, and, by the way, Welcome, dear readers, as ever!—is, first, to recommend this novel, which begins in New York City, but is mainly set in Dorset,

in the southwest of England. If you’re interested in spooks and spirits of all kinds, England is a wonderful place to explore, and the southwest is especially haunted (if you believe in such things—we’re neutral, ourselves, but love a good ghost story). Just look at this massive Iron Age hill fort near Dorchester, called locally, “Maiden Castle”—what lives there at night?

[And speaking of good ghost stories, some of our favorites are by M.R. James (1862-1936) and Algernon Blackwood (1869-1951). Click on the names to access the links so that you can sample their work for yourself, if you don’t know them already.]

Jenny is transplanted from New York to Dorset because her mother’s second husband is an English agricultural specialist who is hired to rebuild a 350-year-old farm in Dorset. Jenny is, initially, very unhappy with the move—especially when her closest friend, Mr. Cat, must spend 6 months quarantined before being allowed into England. Things slowly begin to change, however, as she makes friends with her two new stepbrothers and finds that the ancient house holds more than her new family, including a boggart, the billyblind, and four ghosts (including that cat).

The ghosts are ectoplasmic survivors of a tragic period in the history of southwest England which all begins with Charles II (1630-1685).

After his father, Charles I, had been executed in London in January, 1649,

his son, Charles, had led an exile’s life until, in 1660, he was invited to return to Britain and reign as Charles II.

Unfortunately for the country, although Charles was married to the Portuguese princess, Catherine of Braganza (1638-1705),

they produced no heirs. Charles also had a long string of mistresses, including the most famous, Nell Gwynn (1650-1687),

and one of them, Lucy Walter (c1630-1658)

gave him a son, James (1649-1685),

whom Charles not only acknowledged, but made, among other things, the Duke of Monmouth.

This James had somehow come to believe that his father, Charles, had secretly married his mother, thereby making him the legitimate heir to the throne of England. His uncle, also named James (1633-1701),

asserting that his older brother, Charles, appeared to have no legitimate heir, claimed the throne for himself upon his brother’s death. This did not please the Duke of Monmouth, who, believing that he had support in the southwest of England, raised a rebellion there against his uncle. He had only very limited resources, and much of his little army was armed with improvised weapons, many of them repurposed farm equipment.

Opposing these was a detachment of the Royal Army,

trained professional soldiers. The only battle of this brief campaign occurred not in Dorset, but in the shire to the northwest, Somerset,

which, in itself is a rather spooky place. After all, in the 12^th century, the monks of Glastonbury Abbey claimed that they had happened upon the grave of King Arthur

and they had a lead cross (from the coffin) to prove it.

Even if it’s not spooky, Glastonbury is an impressive place—just look at Glastonbury Tor, with the remains of the 14^th-century church of St Michael atop it.

Monmouth knew that, to have any chance of raising more support, he would have to deal with that detachment of redcoats sent to stop him, but, with his own army’s limitations, the best way to even the odds was to attempt a night attack, one of the most difficult maneuvers possible. Unfortunately, although the Royal Army was initially surprised, the mist which covered the battlefield, along with an uncertain knowledge of the terrain, and the lack of discipline among Monmouth’s troops,

as well as the steadiness of the King’s soldiers,

led to a complete defeat of Monmouth’s army, which immediately disintegrated, while Monmouth and his chief followers fled for their lives.

Monmouth was soon captured and brought before his uncle, James, who was less than avuncular in his reaction

and, very soon afterward, Monmouth was beheaded.

Not content with ending the rebellion, James sent a five-man commission of judges to the region to rout out all opposition to his reign. This commission was headed by the Lord Chief Justice, George Jeffreys, First Baron Jeffreys (1645-1689).

Jeffreys, from the records, was a very thorough man, but a very biased one, as well, and several hundred people across the region were executed after brief trials,

others being shipped as virtual slaves to the Caribbean. (The swashbuckling adventure film, Captain Blood (1935), with Errol Flynn, is about one of the latter—a doctor who helps a wounded escapee from Sedgemoor and suffers for it.)

Jeffreys then becomes the villain of Tamsin, having developed a passion for Tamsin Willoughby, whose family farm is the one which Jenny’s stepfather is hired to restore, during the period now known as the “Bloody Assizes”. Tamsin and Jeffreys and Tamsin’s lover, Edric, are trapped in a kind of terrible time warp and it’s Jenny who—but wait—we said no spoilers, and we mean it!

This is a book to read and reread and now, with a little historical background from us, we hope you enjoy it as much as we have.

MTCIDC

If you would like to know more about the Battle of Sedgemoor, the Two Men in a Trench team of Tony Pollard and Neil Oliver have a fun battlefield archaeology program on it. Here’s the LINK.

doubtfulsea

~ adventure fantasy

Monthly Archives: June 2019

Out of Touch

A Tale of Two Swords

Water Which?

Tamsin