IMC 2005: Sessions

Session 513: Old (and Young) Norse

Tuesday 12 July 2005, 09.00-10.30

Organiser:	Oren Falk, Department of History, Cornell University
Moderator/Chair:	Renée Michelle Ward, Department of English, University of Alberta, Edmonton
Paper 513-a	Infant Graves in Scandinavian Cemeteries: An Index of Christian Culture in a Period of Conversion (Language: English) Lotta Mejsholm, Institutionen för arkeologi och antik historia, Uppsala Universitet Index terms: Archaeology - General, Demography, Language and Literature - Scandinavian, Pagan Religions
Paper 513-b	Age Concern in Viking-Age Britain (Language: English) Shannon M. Lewis-Simpson, Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York Index terms: Archaeology - Sites, Language and Literature - Scandinavian, Pagan Religions
Paper 513-c	Undoing Conversion: A New Source for Studying Norse Paganism? (Language: English) Oren Falk, Department of History, Cornell University Index terms: Anthropology, Language and Literature - Old English, Language and Literature - Scandinavian, Military History
Abstract	Mejsholm analyses the frequency and spatial distribution of Viking-Age children's graves in conjunction with literary sources, finding evidence for infanticide and for a conception of childhood very different from that of the modern West. Lewis-Simpson likewise studies burials and other forms of material culture, as well as chronicles and skaldic verse, for contemporary social attitudes towards age in Viking-Age Britain. Falk examines the motif of the declining hero in ON and OE literary sources through a sociological lens, finding evidence for a political stabilizing mechanism responsible for the killing off of overly successful leaders.