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IMC 2016: Sessions

Session 1104: Rethinking the Horn: New Readings From Texts, Images, and Archaeology

Wednesday 6 July 2016, 11.15-12.45

Organiser:Carol Neuman de Vegvar, Department of Fine Arts, Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware
Moderator/Chair:Victoria Whitworth, Centre for Nordic Studies, University of the Highlands & Islands, Orkney
Paper 1104-aFanfares and Feasts: Medieval Irish Horns in Text and Image
(Language: English)
Emma Jane Anderson, School of Literatures, Languages & Cultures - Celtic & Scottish Studies, University of Edinburgh
Index terms: Art History - Sculpture, Language and Literature - Celtic
Paper 1104-bThe Horn in the Grave: Burial Practices and Gender in Early Anglo-Saxon England
(Language: English)
Carol Neuman de Vegvar, Department of Fine Arts, Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware
Index terms: Archaeology - Artefacts, Art History - Decorative Arts, Social History, Women's Studies
Abstract

Drawing on linguistics, literature, art and archaeology, this session presents new thinking on the roles of horns in elite feasting and burial. Anderson considers ambiguities in the taxonomy of early medieval horns in both visual imagery and Irish text references to horns at feasts: the semantic range of corn, adarc, and buaball encompasses both drinking vessels and musical instruments. Neuman de Vegvar examines the contexts of two anomalous depositions of drinking horns in Anglo-Saxon women's - rather than men's - graves. Considering the narrative role of women offering drinking horns at feasts in the Norse saga literature, Hofmann asks whether they play the role of peaceweavers or whether the motif has to be interpreted differently in that context.