Totems and banners: Hild’s Elmet
What banners and totems might Hild’s people have carried in the early seventh-century of MENEWOOD? We don’t know. But here are some guesses, with pictures!
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Hæðfeld: Where Edwin lost his head?
Where, exactly, was the battle of Hæðfeld? I have a theory, based on research I’ve done on water courses and roads of 632.
Read more "Hæðfeld: Where Edwin lost his head?"York in Hild’s time
Last week I read in the Guardian about the discovery of what could be indications of a very early Christian church and burial site beneath the current York Minster. If the more excitable members of the team leading the excavation are right, this could be the wooden church built by Edwin, Hild’s uncle: Potentially the […]
Read more "York in Hild’s time"Update on Hild, plus Where do they sleep?
illustration of 10th century (I think) sleeping arrangements I’ve been working on my Hild novel for a year now. She is twelve. I have 75,000 words. (To put that in context, most novels are around 100,000.) If you believe Bede’s suspicious symmetry, she lived to the ripe old age of 66–so this is turning into […]
Read more "Update on Hild, plus Where do they sleep?"Edwin’s banner, Edwin’s family name
According to Bede, Edwin was preceded by a standard bearer, carrying a ‘tufa’. My assumption has always been that this was a Roman-style standard, or perhaps a staff. At some point I’ll need to work out what that looked like. But another assumption I’m making is that he didn’t assume such pretensions until the late […]
Read more "Edwin’s banner, Edwin’s family name"Arbeia/Tinamutha (?)
I’ve got myself into a bit of a muddle, a plot hole involving time and geography: I need to get a warband from Galloway to Bebbanburg lickety-split. If they were only a few people, I’d put them on a boat to Solway Firth, then send them galloping along the Roman road to Arbeia-that-was, then taking […]
Read more "Arbeia/Tinamutha (?)"Word Choice
I’m having a little trouble sorting out some word choices. Specifically, I need to decide whether a certain character would be a gesith, a thegn, or something else (ealdorman?). A gesith, as I understand it, is a warrior companion, a member of the warband. It’s a term used in very early A-S times, i.e. the […]
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Gemæcce 