Humans Red in Tooth and Claw

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Prehistoric people got into fights, some of them rather large in size and scale. They also carried out what appear, for lack of a better term, to be honor killings. They could take very good care of members of the community, and at the same time be brutal to outsiders.

It always surprises me a little when people are terribly upset by this. People are people. The basic hardware and deep-running software have not changed all that much in the past fifteen thousand years or so. Certain Native American groups have gone to great lengths to stop archaeologists from doing research that might show that their ancestors were at times violent people who may (or may not) have eaten parts of other people. Anyone who looks at a place like Hovenweep, or parts of Mesa Verde, or the Hopi mesa-top towns, or reads early European accounts of meeting Native Americans would not be surprised to learn that the ancient pueblos were easily defendable, or that warfare and raiding might have taken place. Ditto in Europe, although cliff dwellings are less common in most of Europe due to geology.

I was thinking about a video I watched about a genetic bottleneck in the male line of a certain population, and what it might signify. It appears that a lot of men were killed off at roughly the same time, leading to evidence of a bottleneck in the male chromosome contribution. A slightly related pattern has been observed in Scotland and Ireland, where Scandinavian genetic traces suddenly became more common in the male lines, reducing the native male contribution to varying degrees.

Prehistoric people were not peaceful. Who knew? [eyeroll or similar gesture here]. I’m neither surprised nor upset by this information, because people are people. But for some cultures and the mental picture they have of the Ancestors, this kind of information is very upsetting, and has to be explained away, or suppressed. Those who came before can’t have been violent killers who ate the losers. Absolutely not. To admit otherwise is to threaten the faith and perhaps even the foundation of community cohesion. Note that some of these same believers argue that to accept a different faith is to cast oneself out of the community for ever. Only pagans may be tribal members, because Reasons. Among the Hopi, ritual and faith keeps the universe in balance, and those who upset the balance must be counseled, or if extreme enough, removed permanently from doing what they are doing to cause trouble.

My ancestors killed other people, beat them up, stole their livestock, and did what was needed to survive. So did yours. That’s why I’m here, why you are here. That this distresses some moderns … I don’t get it. At an academic level I can comprehend the reasons, but I don’t “get” it.

Thoughts on Growing Up in the Nineteenth Century

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Well, some days it feels like it was that long ago. I read Kipling, Mother Goose, Lang’s Coloured Fairy Books, studied McGuffey’s Readers, and learned on the King James Bible (and later RSV), with parents who drank tea instead of coffee, and who gardened, and let us roam. I was told not to fuss about itchy wool mittens, socks, and pants, had school clothes and play clothes, and heaven help Sib and me if I roughed up school clothes.

Today, I dress like a Victorian or Edwardian, minus the enormous hats, read Kipling and folklore, garden, drink tea, shoot, write novels, have a proper spinster’s Day Job, and, feel rather fond of the “distant” past. Or at least fond of some aspects of it that shaped me.

I suspect I’m trying to find a balance point between the modern world with all the cultural and technological novelties and things in it, and the cultural and social world of the late Victorian era, and the time I grew up in. Contrary to what activists declare, Victorian women had a lot of opportunities to do things, work, influence events (not vote, true, and property laws were still not ideal), and see the world. There was also in Britain and much of the US a sense that women who carried themselves a certain way were to be treated as ladies, and left alone, or at least not hindered, or even assisted if they asked. There was no shame for a man to provide service, and women respected that aid and politeness. Yes, it could be hypocritical on both parts. It also greased the rough gears of society and helped smooth out a number of awkward spots. Hints of it lingered in regional culture when I was growing up.

My ideal world, perhaps, would be one with Victorian and Edwardian manners and mutual respect and politeness, with modern technology and amenities. Where people understood basic rules of social interaction and dress (because dressing with respect for yourself shows respect for others), but also had hot running water and flush toilets without the need for servants. Modern extroverts and people who are used to “being authentic” and “letting it all hang out” would not be happy, but those of use who do better with a mental script and have more restrained personalities would thrive, or at least feel more comfortable. And schools would go back to focusing on a common basic coin of culture, giving everyone a unified set of reference points and ideas. With that foundation, things could still bloom in new and unusual ways, but we would have a language of art, literature, and other things . Tossing out the old and “out of date” for the new, “trending,” and “current” does not seem to be aging well.

The world and society should not fossilize. I don’t want to live in a true Victorian/ Gilded Age world. I like having instant access to books and maps and music, like flushing and showering in warm water. If women want to wear slacks, great. I can’t really feel homesick for a world that ended seventy years or so before I was born. I can look back and wonder if the world would be better if we revived the good parts, the politeness and restraint, the idea of clothing as a sign of respect for others and yourself, a few more social guideposts and maps.

Something’s Wrong …

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when there is dirt blowing past in the air, yet I pay for sacks of same. Four bags, to continue filling where part of a garden is settling after all the work this past November. I don’t mind filling the stuff in, but doing it as NM and CO blow past and make me sneeze …

Something’s wrong with this system. Sort of like buying cat food and mouse traps on the same trip.

Bagpipe vs. Harp

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What musical instrument do we associate with Scotland? Wales? Ireland? Ireland is easy – the harp is on their currency. They also have the uillan pipes, the ones played seated and pumped with the elbow. Scotland is bagpipes, played by a dude in a tartan kilt, sporran, and possibly white spats and a tartan over his shoulder for good measure. Wales … harp again, triple-strung (three wires per note) because they have to be different.

Scotland actually had the harp as well, and there are a number of harp songs that come from Scotland. But who carries a harp to war? OK, besides “The Minstrel Boy” in the song (written in the 1800s, but don’t worry about that.) Harps are relatively quiet instruments compared to trumpets and bagpipes, and are fragile. At any given time, a box harp is trying to pull itself apart because of the differing tensions and twists on the neck and box. Strings and wires snap, especially wires. You pluck a gut-strung folk harp, and brush a wire strung with your finger nails, or pluck with the nails very gently. Harps love to go out of tune when the weather changes, and need to be detuned (tension released from strings) when not in use.

A clarsach. Source: https://artsphere.org/clarsach/

Bagpipes? All jokes aside, they don’t lose tune as easily as do harps. You stand to play the Scottish pipes, rather than sitting. Pipes cut through other sounds because of their harmonics and the volume one can achieve. Harps are indoor instruments most of the time. Pipes indoors … are loud. Very loud. Painfully loud. You can play bagpipes quietly, but quiet is relative.

A piper in semi-formal dress. Source: http://www.scottishpipers.net/wp/photo-gallery/

The harp in Scotland goes back thousands of years. So why do we associate Scotland with the pipes? War. Bagpipes are unusual, distinctive, and were used on the battlefield to announce who was there, to inspire confidence, and to signal in some cases. Nobles had their pipers, and pipers were protected (usually. There were rare and notable exceptions, which is why they are notable.) Harpers sang the praise of the nobles, back in the day, and entertained. Harp players do not stand beside a battlefield commander at the edge of the fighting, playing to inspire the troops. The importance of the harp got overwritten over the course of Scotland’s history, just as the harp of Wales disappeared for the most part, to be revived in the 1700s-1800s and especially the 1900s.

Tuathal is a harp player (clarsach), a wire-strung instrument. He sings songs of praise and satire, inspiring or shaming, passing on information and news, giving advice, occasionally settling disputes because he is a neutral outsider in most places, and knows the law. He is also blessed, or cursed, with awan, the power of inspiration. When that moves through him, his words have true power, even more than most bards’ songs or recitations.

Fire Weather

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It’s easy to make fun of ranchers and other land managers when they look at lush grazing and gloom about needing more rain or it will be a bad fire season. In most parts of the world, fire season is late summer, when the grass and trees get dry, and lightning or other things (or people) start fires. Here, late winter is the scary season.

When the late summer is wet, the native and other grasses respond with strong, late season growth. They then cure, turning into nutrient-rich forage for grazers. This is very good. However, as time passes and the grass gets drier and drier, if it is not grazed short, or if it is being “held” for late-season use, things can get interesting. Snow and rain help, as does humidity, because those dampen the fuel and also tend to come with lighter winds and cooler temps. However, when it gets dry, and warm, ranchers and others start getting wary. That dry pasture hay is now “fine fuels” meaning they ignite easily and fire spreads very, very quickly if the conditions are right.

Back in the day, fires started from lightening, hot sparks from trains or from train brakes (still happens but very rarely), and at least once, from birds lighting strike-anywhere matches to flush small animals (as attested to by the cowboy John Arnot). Once or twice dew drops seem to have acted as magnifiers and caused grass to ignite. Now, dropped cigarette butts, sparking trailer chains, people with hot exhaust pipes pulling off the road into dry grass, and snapping power lines that are the main causes. Power line failures caused the huge Windy Duce and Smokehouse Creek fires back on January-Feb 2024. The regional power company now does precautionary shut-downs, warning people in advance that power would be out for 5-9 hours, depending on conditions.

Everyone braces for trouble when a strong low pressure system passes north of the region. If it goes south, we get rain or snow. If it goes way far south (like over Aust-onio or Houston) we don’t see any effects at all. If it goes north, not only does all the moisture stay north of the region, but the wind comes racing out of the southwest, sliding down the mountains and getting drier and warmer as it comes. Once it is dry enough and strong enough, it starts picking up dirt (yuck), and sucks more moisture from plants. If something sparks … It is Katy bar the door. Fires have started that run 50-60 miles at a go. They can travel at ten miles an hour, and individual parts of the fire jump, cutting off people trying to escape. The low visibility causes wrecks. High winds and low visibility keep water-bombers on the ground, so it comes down to people with brush trucks, ranchers with tanker trucks (if they have them), and prayer.

I never, ever want to see another day like that one in 2024, when Miami evacuated to Pampa, and then Pampa started evacuating to Amarillo. When the wind shifted, a wall of crimson smoke hit Amarillo, and it looked as if the Windy Duce would enter the city proper. That’s happened before. I know people who would have lost their house except they have a fish pond in the back yard, and the firemen pumped from that to keep the roof and walls wet and save the home. Because of where Day Job is located, we have a grassfire drill plan as well as the usual emergency drills.

It is going to be a long season until we get rain, or at least humidity.

Random Asides and Thoughts

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I’m tired of being sick. I wish my sinuses would just get rid of this gunk, the rest of me likewise, and I could breathe like a normal human again. And stop scaring people when I open my mouth. I sound like a chain smoker, still. Singing is a no-go because the vocal cords are still inflamed.

Going to the gym to flaunt one’s following seems like a strange way to get dates, but perhaps it works for some women. I go to work out. But I’m Odd.

Typical. The plants are leafing out, and it is supposed to be 21 F on Sunday morning. They should know better after this long, but nooooo.

Mulch weighs a lot more than top soil. Especially after two sacks of mulch have been scattered over two flowerbeds, with two sacks still to go. The short-handled shovel is great for the task, but I feel it so much the next day.

How do flower beds go from 0 leaves to thick with leaves overnight? In spring? I know I cleaned them out on Saturday.

A mental workout can be as satisfying as a physical work out. Sometimes. Sometimes I just wonder what I finished reading, and why the tree(s) died for that.

85 minutes is NOT long enough to soften beans at 3600’ of elevation. Seriously. Possibly not at sea-level, either, unless you use a pressure cooker. I really wonder who wrote the instructions on the soup mix, and if they ever made a batch (I started two hours early, for just that reason.)

One of the weathermen on local TV has a garbage-can wind index. Yesterday was “chase cans into next state.” Yup, spring has arrived. Now if rain would arrive, or damp snow (but not too much of the latter.) We are into fire weather season, and I do not like that at all.

Writing to eerie, dark music is great for the story but not great for the mental state of the writer. I had to go outside and remind myself that it is spring, not October, and that a standing stone had not appeared in my yard.

Did anyone else see the Third Eye series “Happy Day?” Photos of the Avebury Henge in England still give me the creeps after watching that subseries. I don’t know if it would be as effective today as it was when I was 13 or so, but wow. (A town is cursed, and the residents slowly turn into standing stones, much like Avebury Henge, until only two outsiders flee to an older monument and survive. Except when they return after sunrise, the people are people again, as the cycle repeats over, and over, and over and …)

Signs of growing older – you get excited when a family pet has all systems return to normal-for-the-pet after three months. The changed output didn’t bother Jase, but it sure bothered the rest of us (especially our noses.)

Tuesday Tidbit: A Tale of Two Halls

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Some learn the hard way.

Tuathal reached the large building just before dark. Clouds had begun to fill the sky, thin as fine linen or the tail and mane of Rhiannon’s mare. He approached the gateway of the proud farmyard. “Greetings to the hall,” he called.

“Who be ye?” came the reply. A stripling carrying a boar spear and a scowl blocked the gateway. 

“Tuathal Brida’s son, word weaver.” 

The young man’s lip curled in a sneer. “We’ve one of ourn, better than all in the land. ‘Lessen ye can turn yer hand to service, yer not needed here.”

Tuathal inhaled to speak. Awan, word power, pushed into him before he could make a sound. His voice chanted, “Indeed, great are the tales of Fyon the Black, greater still his hospitality. Even the smallest of creatures receives full measure of garment and food in his hall. No harper has been heard of the kind of that of Fyon the Black, even the crows fall silent in shame to be compared to the croaking of his voice. Far spreads the name of Fyon the Black.” 

As the awan flowed through his words, Tuathal felt himself beginning to move, to turn. The stripling smiled. Once the words finished, the youth sneered, “Ye’ve the right of it, now be gone, ye fatherless beggar.” 

Tuathal turned back, snatched a rounded stone from off the small pile beside the gate, and hurled it at the brat. It struck him full in the face, and he cried, dropping the spear to clutch his nose. Dark blood dripped, then gushed. “Bryri Flat-Nose I name you,” the harper called to all who might hear. “I spend no time where no welcome awaits.” He returned to the road, ignoring the commotion behind him. 

Full dark had fallen when a hesitant voice called, “Traveler, need ye shelter?”

Tuathal hesitated, then turned toward the words. “Perhaps, if it is offered freely.”

A young woman, not comely but tidily dressed, gestured toward a tiny farm cot. “Please, be welcome. Me ma’ asked that I keep watch for any who passed. She was helped in time of need, and seeks to repay the gift.”

Was she gesh-bound? If so, he dared not refuse. “Then I cannot but welcome such a gift from an open hand and giving heart.” He followed her to the small place. Oh, it reeked of smoke and sour cheese. He swallowed his pride as he ducked into the low doorway. 

A thin woman, teeth half gone, hair gray-white with the snow of age, said, “Welcome, traveler, in the name of the Lady of the Land. What we have we share.”

“Most generous are you, mistress. May your work prosper in your hands, and your land wax fat in this season of harvest.” Based on the thickness of the wool on her distaff and the fine thread on her spindle, she had skill to spare. 

He ate a bit of coarse bread, sipped water heated with blackberries, and rested. When the awan moved in him, it drew away his strength. 

After he’d eaten and drank, the old woman asked, “Know ye aught of news, Traveler?”

“The land prospers, mistress, the land I’ve seen. Most harvest seems to be finishing, and the grain cut. A farmstead was destroyed in kin strife and the beasts taken, although more I do not know.”

The younger woman shook her head and sighed. “Cao could not forget his sister marrying out. He spoke of it every time we worked his fields or spun for him, counted it a dishonor even though her man paid a high bride price and took no land from the family.” 

Tuathal added her words to his own knowing and nodded. “Honor slighted, even when the slight is only in a man’s heart, is a bitter thing.” He tuned the clarsach and began a brighter tune. “Honor polished brings joy to all, especially to the generous and wise, as Sibhon Golden Hair proved to Fion.” The ladies spun as he sang the tale. 

“Thank ye, master harper,” the old woman said with a glad sigh and smile when he finished. “Your gift sped our work and brightened the night.”

Come the morning, they offered more bread, the last they had. He thanked them, but declined. He gave them his blessing, then departed before true dawn replaced the faint hint of the sun’s waking. Fyon might not be pleased to find him still on his lands, whoever Fyon was. Wealthy and powerful, that Tuathal knew. Wise? His men were not, and men returned the light of their masters. Nor did he want to be near Cao if the dead man’s own kin came seeking his head. 

As he crossed a hill and glanced back at the road, light glinted on metal. Helmets and spears on the road, coming from the south. Fyon’s men seeking to avenge the slights? Others pursuing kin-justice from Cao? Tuathal wasted no time. He hurried on before they saw him. Had Fyon truchaine and horses? He’d not smelled horses, but he’d not gotten inside the gate, either.

It was midday before he stopped and rested. The clouds thickened, softening the light and warning of a change. The season of sun passed, and wet and winter approached. He ate an apple that had fallen onto the road. The sour milk of the women’s cot had not been so sour as the fruit. Were they bond slaves, or hired women? Not his concern. He drank from a well after giving thanks. The water tasted of metal, like the wells north of his mother’s court, near the iron lands. The wind whispered a warning, and he sped his steps. 

(C) 2026 Alma T. C. Boykin All Rights Reserved

An Irish Puzzle: What Happened in the Early Bronze Age (or didn’t)?

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I’m reading Barry Cunliffe’s prehistory and early history of the British Isles, mostly for the prehistory. And something interesting happens on Ireland at one point. The population tanks, or so it appears from the archaeological and pollen records. No, not during the Ice Ages, when all of Britain was abandoned to varying degrees, but Ireland had a depopulation period when England et al are holding steady. Or so the evidence suggests.

If you look at the megalithic sites in Ireland, they start in the western areas, often in places facing the sea and sunset (but I repeat myself). When people moved inland, they are on uplands, often facing west, but some are aligned with other things. A belief change may have been in progress as generations passed, and the culture shifted somewhat from what it had been earlier. Then we get to the enormous communal projects, most famously Newgrange and the associated monuments around it, a landscape set apart for something different from day-to-day life. England has something similar in Salisbury, of which Stonehenge is only the best known feature. The entire landscape has a ritual purpose, or did to the people of the Neolithic.

Newgrange, back in Ireland, underwent several phases of use, and some of the interior stones were reworked from earlier monuments, or “buried” inside the great mound, perhaps as a connection between the people of the past and the people of the present. The site, and similar ones, were used by communities for several hundred years, and then—

Something happened, and the site went into dormant. Did a political development lead to a change in worship, honoring one ancestor instead of those of the entire tribe or lineage? Did worship stop needing trained professionals who had undergone initiation inside the mounds, and instead shifted to being conducted by the head of the family, on a smaller scale? Did different beliefs move in with a new people (like the Tuatha DeDannan replacing the Fir Bolg, who had replaced others?) Human sacrifices and other water offerings start to appear more and more, relatively speaking, as the Bronze Age developed.

One event that might have influenced both worship and population was a weather downturn. The Neolithic in western Europe and the British Isles was relatively warm, good for farming. Then a cold, damp dip, and a few cold, dry, dips shifted things for a few centuries before the old Gulf Stream controlled pattern returned. Farming traces in Ireland fade out in many places, being replaced with forest pollen, and probably by more animal husbandry. Blanket bogs appear, covering fields. People died, or perhaps left for Brittany or other places that still supported farming. Trade faded, other than in a few places where gold and silver and copper continued to be mined (like tin in Cornwall).

If the old gods and their priests couldn’t make things better, or at least stop them from getting worse, perhaps people stopped worshipping them. Perhaps communities scattered, so great central places of worship no longer mattered. If no one remembered the rites after a while, then the places of worship changed focus, or were left standing as monuments to a better time, later repurposed (as in Salisbury, where the Celtic cultures built burial mounds around the rim, looking into the plain and dominating the skyline.)

Eventually, people returned, but with a greater focus on husbandry and less on farming (although farming remained very important). The great kings of Irish legend appear, the high king and lesser monarchs, the bards and druids and law-speakers. First Halstatt, then La Tene styles migrate west and eventually appear in Ireland. From there the modified designs spread back through Britain to the Continent.

When Enthusiasm Meets Opportunity

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I had not throughs of Stift Vorau for quite a while. I was moving some things and found the small organ pipe I was given there, a reward for hard work, interest, and enthusiasm. It was in 2015, on what would prove to be one of the best trips to Europe I have ever arranged and taken. The small metal tube got me thinking about all the amazing things that have happened when my curiosity and interest met someone else’s knowledge and desire to show or teach.

One thing my parents insisted on when I was growing up was doing homework before (and during) travels. This was more than just keeping caught up on school work. This was reading about the place we were going, and the history and culture of that place. Keep in mind, one year, my parents disagreed so vehemently with a textbook that they pulled Sib and I from school and took us to see Revolutionary and Civil War battlefields, as well as the Air and Space Museum, so we’d get the straight scoop on the two wars. Another trip centered on the Mormon Trail. Yet another tracked the routes of the great fur trappers in the US west, and visiting the rendezvous sites. So I saw how important it was to learn a little something in advance, because rangers and others would happily expound on things if asked the right, or just new, questions.

Fast forward to Austria in 2015. Vorau is a beautiful church, built like a fortress because it was on the eastern frontiers of Catholicism, Islam, and Orthodoxy (and Habsburg vs. Ottoman vs. anyone else) when founded in the 1160s by Margrave Ottokar and his wife. It is an active Augustinian monastery, but open for tours. Since I and my fellow tour members were especially interested in old and Baroque* churches, it was a perfect fit. I’d booked an English-language tour, which would be a half-hour highlights visit.

A little Baroque. Just a little. Source: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stift_Vorau

We arrived a little early, in order to stretch legs and look at the exterior and setting of the cloister. The guide appeared and summoned us. When he learned that I was fluent in German, and we were really, really interested in the history and details of the church, well! Not only did we see the church, including the sacristy, but also got an extended tour of the library, got to see more of the gardens, and the tour ended up lasting 90 minutes. It was wonderful! After we finished, the guide presented me with the small organ pipe. They had decommissioned two ranks because the pipes had been worn beyond repair, and replaced them with less modern, more appropriate stops. I now have one of those tiny old pipes, and amazing memories of a wonderful day.

Something similar happened in Gurk, where the guide went into great detail about the altarpiece and statues, and how it fit into the liturgy of the mass at the time, and about the materials and the economy of Gurk, and the miracles attributed to the frontier saint Hemma (now a peacemaking saint as well as rescuer of captives). Other historic places as well, a little knowledge, a few questions, and fountains of knowledge opened. People, I discovered, love talking to interested visitors who have a bit of a clue, and who want to learn.

The one exception was in 2005, in Quedelinburg Abbey. The woman acting as tour guide was former STAZI, and it showed. She refused to answer questions, refused to talk about the art in the church, and deliberately kept the group from being able to see the treasures of the abbey, because “Americans stole them and a Texan hid them until the 1990s.” One of the tour members, a US Army WWII veteran, muttered something about “What would the Soviets have done to them, hmmm?” but under his breath. When I returned to Quedlinburg in 2018, things were quite different. However, the people there are still touchy about a Texan carrying off the medieval book covers and other artifacts, so we did not mention that some of the group came from there.

A little knowledge, and a genuine interest, open doors. Literally, in some cases.