![]() ![]() The team’s newest insight into early medieval religion, art and culture in the East Midlands, includes a major find at Stowe IX Churches in Northamptonshire, where restoration work by MOLA on the 10th-century church tower has uncovered a large piece of a tall cross shaft previously hidden under the render. “It’s a great example of how cultures can accommodate difference through storytelling.” “The combination of the crucifixion of Christ and the Old Norse legend of Ragnarok might be a way of explaining to people whose traditions came from different areas about Christianity and how their own stories might be understood. The 10th-century stone Gosforth Cross, in Cumbria, tells tales of Christianity as well as the Viking legends of Ragnarok and the Day of Judgement. Professor Story is also part of the Corpus of Anglo Saxon Stone Sculpture team which identifies, records and publishes early English sculpture made before the Norman Conquest, which is of crucial importance in helping identify settlements, religious practices and artistic achievements. ![]() Studying sculpture helps to uncover cultural heritage that was not recorded with pen and parchment. ![]() These books are preserved in 17 European countries as well as the USA and Russia, and this modern network of libraries provides a wonderful opportunity for investigating the networks of knowledge that connected the islands of Britain and Ireland to neighbouring European kingdoms in the age of Charlemagne. The next phase of Professor Story’s work will investigate the production and distribution of these manuscripts in the ‘long 8th century' and the networks of scribes, artists, scholars and patrons who lie behind them. These represent about 620 original ‘Insular Manuscripts’. The Insular Manuscripts pilot project has identified 845 books or fragments of books preserved in modern libraries that were made before about AD 850 using distinctive insular scripts. These reflect the travels of English and Irish clerics in the eighth century and the creation of ‘insular’ monasteries in Frankish lands.” Professor Joanna Story says, “Many other manuscripts show mobility in the other direction, with hundreds of fragments of books written by scribes trained to write in insular style surviving in Charlemagne’s Frankish empire, especially in modern day Germany, France and Italy. ![]()
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