Early Medieval Europe

What did it actually take to fish in early medieval Britain? In this episode, Michaela Selway talks to Tom Pickles about his new Early Medieval Europe article, which explores what textual and material evidence can tell us about fishing weirs and boats, and the people who built, maintained and used them.

From sourcing timber and constructing weirs or boats to selling fish at market and regulating waterways, fishing involved a surprising range of labour. Tom also discusses how modern fishing techniques can help us understand the past, drawing on conversations with people he met during his research to explore the practical realities of fishing, from construction and maintenance to the catch itself.

Tom’s article, “The Labour of Fishing in Early Medieval Britain”, will be available at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/14680254

Image: Penny Hedge Planting, 1950: A medieval fish weir part of which is still erected annually on Ascension Eve at Whitby, North Yorkshire, as a tenurial obligation, but whose original purpose is forgotten and which is now connected with an invented tradition about its origins. Whitby Museum Photo Archive, PS 0541–05. Copyright Whitby Museum. Reproduced by permission of Whitby Museum and Whitby Literary and Philosophical Society.

Everyone knows the importance of relics for early medieval Christianity. But a relic is only valuable if it's identifiable, otherwise it's just a fragment of bone, cloth or stone. In other words, every relic needs a relic label!

In this episode, Michaela Selway talks to Ana de Oliveira Dias about her new EME article on the remarkable early medieval relic labels from the convent at Chelles, and the nuns who carefully wrote them out in the late eighth century. What insights can the close study of these labels reveal?

Ana's article, "Relics, writing, and devotion in early medieval Chelles", is available open access at https://doi.org/10.1111/emed.70050

How could you be a Carolingian king in a post-Carolingian world?

In this episode, our podcast host, Sam Ottewill-Soulsby, talks to Jon Dell Isola about his new article in Early Medieval Europe, on what charters can tell us about how Arnulf of Carinthia, king and emperor (d. 899), navigated a new world after the Carolingian empire.

You can read the article itself, 'Shaping dynastic history in the charters of Arnulf of Carinthia': https://doi.org/10.1111/emed.70037

You can also read Jon's blog: https://among-the-ruins.ghost.io/

In our latest podcast, Sam talks to Holly Miller and Christina Lee, joint authors of 'Animals and multi-species considerations of well-being 500–1100', about the intersection between animals and medicine in the early Middle Ages, and about the joys of interdisciplinarity.

Holly and Christina's Early Medieval Europe article is available here: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/emed.70024

Welcome to the very first EME podcast, brought to you by Sam Ottewill-Soulsby, our inaugural Podcast Editor. In this podcast, Sam talks to Marco Panato, about Marco's latest article, 'Mills and society in early medieval northern Italy'.

Marco's article is available, open access, here: https://doi.org/10.1111/emed.70003