Papers by Frank Battaglia
Berghahn Books, Dec 31, 2022
The Anglo-Saxons: The World Through Their Eyes, 2014
The votive experience of early Danish farmers incorporated cannibalism. Practices, beliefs and v... more The votive experience of early Danish farmers incorporated cannibalism. Practices, beliefs and vocabulary of this tradition continued beyond the erection of the first Danish kingly hall at Gudme on Funen about 300 C.E. Cannibalism apparently still had a vestigial role in the religion of the popular militia at Illerup which defeated substantial attacks over a several hundred year period overlapping Gudme hall. In fact, traces of ritual cannibalism have been suggested in the very neighborhood of that building.
Mankind Quarterly, 1994
The name Gefion by which early Danes invoked a female chthonic deity may occur in first two monst... more The name Gefion by which early Danes invoked a female chthonic deity may occur in first two monster episodes of the Beowulf poem five times. Understood as a proper noun instead of a word for “sea,” the passages appear to argue against such veneration, that may have been rooted in matrilineal tribal practices descended from the Neolithic period. Avowals of patriliny in the poem, likewise, suggest a shift in kinship systems was underway. The hall itself may symbolize consolidation of a more hierarchical system among the Danes. Among the citations of this article is: Hilda Ellis Davidson, ‘Gefjon, goddess of the Northern seas’, in Patricia Lysaght, Seamus Ó Catháin, Daithi Ó hÓgáin (eds.), Islanders and Water-Dwellers, Proceedings of the Celtic-Nordic-Baltic Folklore Symposium (Dublin: Department of Irish Folklore, University College, Dublin, 1999), 51-9. Excavation of Scandinavia’s earliest great hall at Gudme, Funen, Denmark has brought it, instead of Lejre, Zealand, Denmark into consideration as a model for Heorot – Frank Battaglia, “Not Christianity versus Paganism, but Hall versus Bog: The Great Shift in Early Scandinavian Religion and its Implications for Beowulf,” Anglo-Saxons and the North, Matti Kilpiö, Leena Kahlas-Tarkka, Jane Roberts and Olga Timofeeva, eds. (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2009), 47-67.
Berghahn Books, Dec 31, 2022
Our subject, medieval studies, was named for a "middle age." It came between Antiquity,... more Our subject, medieval studies, was named for a "middle age." It came between Antiquity, specifically the Roman Empire, and the nation states that succeeded it, particu-larly in Europe.An extensive regime was displaced as competing structures of power—operating from various centers but often more elaborate in their controls—struggled into existence.We live in a time when the so-called global economic system, enacted by free-range and state-run capitalisms, is extending its reach over the entire planet, dislocating national networks. International trade agreements dimin-ish the ability of even the U.S. or E.U., let alone less pow-erful entities, to enforce environmental or labor laws. Nation states are giving way to a larger system, difficult to describe, as the interests of the World Economic Forum impel events more effectively than those of the U.N. Gen-eral Assembly.1Meanwhile, from Ecuadorean tribes of the upper Amazon to the adivasi of forest India, virtually no area es...
It has been becoming customary to suggest that in The House of the Seven Gables Hawthorne prostit... more It has been becoming customary to suggest that in The House of the Seven Gables Hawthorne prostituted his talent by producing a novel written to satisfy the taste of the reading public rather than his own artistic sense. Rudolph Von Abele implies this at several points in his commentary on the novel and William Charvat has ensured the perpetuation of the charge by endorsing it in the Introduction to the Centenary Edition of The House of the Seven Gables. Von Abele proposes that one of the reasons why the work "begins to go wrong at the outset" is Hawthorne's "wish to produce something that [would] please many people by its 'sunniness' and 'optimism.' " Von Abele suspects Hawthorne "of being both confused and uncomfortable while he wrote it," perhaps because of a determination "that since people complained of the gloominess of The Scarlet Letter, he is going to make this work funny come hell or high water."1 Charvat's ce...
Mankind Quarterly, 1994
The name Gefion by which early Danes invoked a female chthonic deity may occur in first two monst... more The name Gefion by which early Danes invoked a female chthonic deity may occur in first two monster episodes of the Beowulf poem five times. Understood as a proper noun instead of a word for “sea,” the passages appear to argue against such veneration, that may have been rooted in matrilineal tribal practices descended from the Neolithic period. Avowals of patriliny in the poem, likewise, suggest a shift in kinship systems was underway. The hall itself may symbolize consolidation of a more hierarchical system among the Danes. Among the citations of this article is: Hilda Ellis Davidson, ‘Gefjon, goddess of the Northern seas’, in Patricia Lysaght, Seamus Ó Catháin, Daithi Ó hÓgáin (eds.), Islanders and Water-Dwellers, Proceedings of the Celtic-Nordic-Baltic Folklore Symposium (Dublin: Department of Irish Folklore, University College, Dublin, 1999), 51-9. Excavation of Scandinavia’s earliest great hall at Gudme, Funen, Denmark has brought it, instead of Lejre, Zealand, Denmark into consideration as a model for Heorot – Frank Battaglia, “Not Christianity versus Paganism, but Hall versus Bog: The Great Shift in Early Scandinavian Religion and its Implications for Beowulf,” Anglo-Saxons and the North, Matti Kilpiö, Leena Kahlas-Tarkka, Jane Roberts and Olga Timofeeva, eds. (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2009), 47-67.
Historical Reflections/Reflexions Historiques, 2016
Early Anglo-Saxon ethnicities are read primarily from jewelry and other metal grave furnishings o... more Early Anglo-Saxon ethnicities are read primarily from jewelry and other metal grave furnishings of women. After a period of funerary observances incorporating other-than-metal signifiers and with differing gender and religious implications, a characteristic suite of accessories, devised on British soil of Scandinavian antecedents, had attained prominence in Anglian areas. The boundary of use of certain sleeve fasteners corresponds to the later southern border of the kingdom of East Anglia. These female cuff-links appear to have marked patrilineal marriages whose high status in an innovative political network consolidated the displacement of long-standing matrilineal traditions among British and Germanic populations. Matrilineal social organizations had characterized the Neolithic Period, when horticulture began and food animals were domesticated. The growth of East Anglian political organization may be traced in a patronymic place-name practice. The kingdom seems to have found in patrilineal social structures a constitutive mechanism.
Keywords: Beowulf, bone-tempered ceramic, D-bracteate, Funnel Beaker culture, horse cremation, matriliny
Studies in the Novel, 1970
Mankind Quarterly, 1991
The name Gefion by which early Danes invoked a female chthonic deity may occur in first two monst... more The name Gefion by which early Danes invoked a female chthonic deity may occur in first two monster episodes of the Beowulf poem five times. Understood as a proper noun instead of a word for “sea,” the passages appear to argue against such veneration, that may have been rooted in matrilineal tribal practices descended from the Neolithic period. Avowals of patriliny in the poem, likewise, suggest a shift in kinship systems was underway. The hall itself may symbolize consolidation of a more hierarchical system among the Danes.
Among the citations of this article is: Hilda Ellis Davidson, ‘Gefjon, goddess of the Northern seas’, in Patricia Lysaght, Seamus Ó Catháin, Daithi Ó hÓgáin (eds.), Islanders and Water-Dwellers, Proceedings of the Celtic-Nordic-Baltic Folklore Symposium (Dublin: Department of Irish Folklore, University College, Dublin, 1999), 51-9.
Excavation of Scandinavia’s earliest great hall at Gudme, Funen, Denmark has brought it, instead of Lejre, Zealand, Denmark into consideration as a model for Heorot – Frank Battaglia, “Not Christianity versus Paganism, but Hall versus Bog: The Great Shift in Early Scandinavian Religion and its Implications for Beowulf,” Anglo-Saxons and the North, Matti Kilpiö, Leena Kahlas-Tarkka, Jane Roberts and Olga Timofeeva, eds. (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2009), 47-67.
from Burn After Reading, Volume 1, Miniature Manifestos for a Post/medieval Studies, ed. Eileen A... more from Burn After Reading, Volume 1, Miniature Manifestos for a Post/medieval Studies, ed. Eileen A. Joy and Myra Seaman (an open source publication of punctum books and Oliphaunt Books, 2014)
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Papers by Frank Battaglia
Keywords: Beowulf, bone-tempered ceramic, D-bracteate, Funnel Beaker culture, horse cremation, matriliny
Among the citations of this article is: Hilda Ellis Davidson, ‘Gefjon, goddess of the Northern seas’, in Patricia Lysaght, Seamus Ó Catháin, Daithi Ó hÓgáin (eds.), Islanders and Water-Dwellers, Proceedings of the Celtic-Nordic-Baltic Folklore Symposium (Dublin: Department of Irish Folklore, University College, Dublin, 1999), 51-9.
Excavation of Scandinavia’s earliest great hall at Gudme, Funen, Denmark has brought it, instead of Lejre, Zealand, Denmark into consideration as a model for Heorot – Frank Battaglia, “Not Christianity versus Paganism, but Hall versus Bog: The Great Shift in Early Scandinavian Religion and its Implications for Beowulf,” Anglo-Saxons and the North, Matti Kilpiö, Leena Kahlas-Tarkka, Jane Roberts and Olga Timofeeva, eds. (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2009), 47-67.
Keywords: Beowulf, bone-tempered ceramic, D-bracteate, Funnel Beaker culture, horse cremation, matriliny
Among the citations of this article is: Hilda Ellis Davidson, ‘Gefjon, goddess of the Northern seas’, in Patricia Lysaght, Seamus Ó Catháin, Daithi Ó hÓgáin (eds.), Islanders and Water-Dwellers, Proceedings of the Celtic-Nordic-Baltic Folklore Symposium (Dublin: Department of Irish Folklore, University College, Dublin, 1999), 51-9.
Excavation of Scandinavia’s earliest great hall at Gudme, Funen, Denmark has brought it, instead of Lejre, Zealand, Denmark into consideration as a model for Heorot – Frank Battaglia, “Not Christianity versus Paganism, but Hall versus Bog: The Great Shift in Early Scandinavian Religion and its Implications for Beowulf,” Anglo-Saxons and the North, Matti Kilpiö, Leena Kahlas-Tarkka, Jane Roberts and Olga Timofeeva, eds. (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2009), 47-67.