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Articles 1 - 6 of 6

Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities

The Emotive Force Of Early Medieval Mortuary Practices, Howard M. R. Williams Jan 2007

The Emotive Force Of Early Medieval Mortuary Practices, Howard M. R. Williams

Howard M. R. Williams

No abstract provided.


Forgetting The Britons In Victorian Anglo-Saxon Archaeology, Howard M. R. Williams Jan 2007

Forgetting The Britons In Victorian Anglo-Saxon Archaeology, Howard M. R. Williams

Howard M. R. Williams

No abstract provided.


Depicting The Dead: Commemoration Through Cists, Cairns And Symbols In Early Medieval Britain, Howard M. R. Williams Jan 2007

Depicting The Dead: Commemoration Through Cists, Cairns And Symbols In Early Medieval Britain, Howard M. R. Williams

Howard M. R. Williams

This article develops recent interpretations of mortuary practices as contexts for producing social memory and personhood to argue that early medieval cairns and mounds served to commemorate concepts of gender and genealogy. Commemorative strategies are identified in the composite character, shape and location of cairns and in their relationship with other commemorative monuments, namely Class I symbol-stones. The argument is developed through a consideration of the excavations of early medieval cists and cairns at Lundin Links in Fife.


Review Article: Rethinking Early Medieval Mortuary Archaeology, Howard M. R. Williams Jan 2005

Review Article: Rethinking Early Medieval Mortuary Archaeology, Howard M. R. Williams

Howard M. R. Williams

No abstract provided.


Potted Histories: Cremation, Ceramics And Social Memory In Early Roman Britain,, Howard M. R. Williams Jan 2004

Potted Histories: Cremation, Ceramics And Social Memory In Early Roman Britain,, Howard M. R. Williams

Howard M. R. Williams

Archaeologists have identified the adoption of new forms of cremation ritual during the early Roman period in south-east Britain. Cremation may have been widely used by communities in the Iron Age, but the distinctive nature of these new rites was their frequent placing of the dead within, and associated with, ceramic vessels. This paper suggests an interpretation for the social meaning of these cremation burial rites that involved the burial of ashes with and within pots as a means of commemoration. In this light, the link between cremation and pottery in early Roman Britain can be seen as a means …


Monuments And The Past In Early Anglo-Saxon England,, Howard M. R. Williams Jan 1998

Monuments And The Past In Early Anglo-Saxon England,, Howard M. R. Williams

Howard M. R. Williams

Recent research on both old and new excavation data from Anglo-Saxon burial sites reveals a widespread and frequent practice of reusing monuments of earlier periods. Both Roman and prehistoric structures provided the focus of cemeteries, burial groups and single graves between the late fifth and early eighth centuries AD. It is argued that this practice was central to the symbolism of Anglo-Saxon mortuary practices, and was important for the construction and negotiation of origin myths, identities and social structures.