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IMC 2017: Sessions

Session 1213: Myth and Identity in Medieval Britain, II: Myths of Conquest

Wednesday 5 July 2017, 14.15-15.45

Sponsor:Medieval & Early Modern Research Initiative, Cardiff University
Organiser:Victoria Shirley, School of English, Communication & Philosophy, Cardiff University
Moderator/Chair:Sheri Chriqui, Department of English, Royal Holloway, University of London
Paper 1213-a'From that Union came the Manx people': Ethnogenesis in the Isle of Man in the 10th and 11th Centuries
(Language: English)
Dirk H. Steinforth, Independent Scholar, Göttingen
Index terms: Archaeology - General, Folk Studies
Paper 1213-bRemembering Hereward the Wake and Eustace the Monk
(Language: English)
Katrina Ingram, Department of History, Politics & Philosophy, Manchester Metropolitan University
Index terms: Historiography - Medieval, Language and Literature - Comparative
Paper 1213-c'And now they challenge their own conquerors'’: Myth and National Identity in Britain in Late 12th-Century Battle Rhetoric
(Language: English)
Connor Wilson, Department of History, Royal Holloway, University of London
Index terms: Language and Literature - Latin, Military History, Rhetoric
Abstract

The second session in this strand addresses how medieval myths were used to respond to various national conquests in the British Isles. The first paper considers the impact of the Viking Conquest on the Christian and Celtic inhabitants of the Isle of Man, examining how the insular Viking Godred Crovan became a national hero and 'founding father'. The second paper focuses on the accounts of Hereward the Wake and Eustace the Monk in medieval chronicles, and it considers how they were used as figures of resistance to the Norman Conquest. The final paper examines a selection of late 12th-century pre-battle orations, and analyses how oration authors utilized myth and ideas of national identity as part of the literary construction of warfare in this period.