'The Persistence of Welsh Identity: A Reassessment of English Cultural Dominance in a Marcher Lordship during the Twelfth Century', Identities, Communities and ‘Imagined Communities’ Postgraduate Conference, University of Bristol, 14th-15th April 2023. (original) (raw)
Related papers
Brit-art: Celtic Art in Roman Britain and on its Frontiers
In Celtic Art in Europe: Making Connections (eds) C. Gosden, S. Crawford & K. Ulmschneider, 315-324. Oxbow Books, Oxford., 2014
As is amply demonstrated in the Megaw’s extremely useful book Celtic Art, first published in 1989 and reprinted in 2001, designs recognisable as Iron Age or Celtic in character persist in Roman Britain, particularly in the north and the west where flourishing new regional art styles develop. Objects include horse-gear, as well as new varieties of other well-known Iron Age object types such as torcs. Recent surveys reveal that these objects are in fact more numerous than art made before the conquest (Gosden and Hill 2008, 2; Garrow et al. 2009). The influence of Rome can be seen especially in the use of enamels of multiple colours arranged in geometric patterns and brass, a Roman metal. However, although this paper is situated within a wider discourse of Romanisation, it is from the perspective not of how pre-Roman peoples became Roman but rather the role of art in the construction and renegotiation of identity. Building on recent research by Fraser Hunter (2006a; 2006b; 2008a; 2008b; 2010; 2012) and Mary Davis and Adam Gwilt (2008), which highlight regionality and diversity, it is argued that this art is not an historical fossil. Rather, through the making and wearing of these objects, people were actively working out how to live in the Roman world, or on its frontiers.
'Good to think': social constructions of Celtic heritage in Wales
… and Planning D: …, 1999
The adoption of Celtic themes in the presentation of heritage sites in Wales builds upon identifiable features of British history and the belief that *Celtic-ness* has some basic appeal to modern visitors. Whereas such presentations have significant economic impacts, particularly through tourism, they rest more firmly on the bases of myth and nostalgia rather than upon any dynamic vision of a Welsh heritage. Visitors, who are often not Welsh, arc drawn to such places as a means of knowing the past and encounter an experience that engenders interest and may help them relate to their own identity, Visiting heritage places is a meaningful act of consumption which asserts the importance of roots and the attractions of a represcntablc past.
Special Issue of British Art Studies, 2017
Weathered, damaged, and largely forgotten, the thirteenth-century effigies of Walter and Mary Stewart lie amid the evocative ruins of Inchmahome Priory on an island in the Lake of Menteith, Stirlingshire (Scotland). This tomb has been overlooked by art historians, yet it is the earliest surviving example in the British Isles of effigies of husband and wife lying side-by-side on the same tomb, the forerunner of a trend for commemorating marriage which would not become widespread for almost another hundred years. The intimacy of Walter and Mary’s relationship is expressed through a complex exchange of gestures, unparalleled in medieval funerary sculpture: both figures stretch out an arm to embrace one another around the shoulder, while Walter reaches across with his other hand to pull the folds of Mary’s cloak over her body. The following article considers the possible connection between this remarkable instance of artistic innovation and Walter and Mary’s involvement in a long-running dispute over their possession of the earldom of Menteith. Examining the gestures of the figures, the decision to place the monument at Inchmahome, and the probable identity of Walter as patron, I argue that the effigies were intended as an enduring witness to the legitimacy of Walter and Mary’s possession of their title and lands. Open access: https://doi.org/10.17658/issn.2058-5462/issue-06/jbarker
Style over substance: architectural fashion and identity building in medieval Ireland
The March in the Islands of the Medieval West, 2012
This article re-examines the art and architecture of twelfth-century Ireland to argue that the style term 'Romanesque' is aptly applied to such works. Cormac's Chapel at Cashel is placed within the context of literary references to the Holy Roman Emperors, and the significance of its twin towered plan is therefore highlighted. Toirdelbach Ua Conchobair's patronage of crosses, both stone and metal, and his enshrining of a fragment of the True Cross in the Cross of Cong, may also have been intended to bear imperial symbolism. Finally, two capitals from the church of Sts Peter and Paul at Armagh show direct stylistic reference to Rome. Thus twelfth-century Irish art can be shown to look both to Rome, and, in some senses, to the Holy Roman Empire; this makes it at one culturally, if not aesthetically, with other Romanesque artwork across western Europe.
In J. Farley & F. Hunter (eds), Celts: art and identity, pp. 36-51. London: British Museum Press. To our eyes Celtic art can look strange, unnatural, yet entrancing. Its meanings are mostly lost to us, but we can appreciate its power and complexity, even if it seems to come from a different world. In fact there is no single Celtic art. Instead a range of different 'Celtic arts' may be observed over a period of around 1,500 years through the Iron Age, Roman and early medieval periods, their influence continuing to the present day.