Books by Lars Kjær
The first biography of King Valdemar I 'the Great' of Denmark (r. 1157-1182)
website: https://ga... more The first biography of King Valdemar I 'the Great' of Denmark (r. 1157-1182)
website: https://gad.dk/valdemar-den-store
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This interdisciplinary study explores how classical ideals of generosity influenced the writing a... more This interdisciplinary study explores how classical ideals of generosity influenced the writing and practice of gift giving in medieval Europe. In assuming that medieval gift giving was shaped by oral ‘folk models’, historians have traditionally followed in the footsteps of social anthropologists and sociologists such as Marcel Mauss and Pierre Bourdieu.
This first in-depth investigation into the influence of the classical ideals of generosity and gift giving in medieval Europe reveals to the contrary how historians have underestimated the impact of classical literature and philosophy on medieval ritualised communication. Focusing on the idea of the gift expounded in the classical texts read most widely in the Middle Ages, including Seneca the Younger’s De beneficiis and Cicero’s De officiis, Lars Kjær investigates how these ideas were received, adapted and utilised by medieval writers across a range of genres, and how they influenced the practice of generosity
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Journal Articles by Lars Kjær
Historisk Tidsskrift, 118, pp. 21-55, 2018
Valdemar II, Matthew Paris and the rumours of a Danish invasion, 1240–41
In 1240, the English chr... more Valdemar II, Matthew Paris and the rumours of a Danish invasion, 1240–41
In 1240, the English chronicler Matthew Paris recorded rumours in England that suggested the Danes were preparing to invade the kingdom. In fact, the suspected invasion travelled eastward. Matthew Paris was not, however, put at ease. In 1241 he recorded the death of Valdemar II, whom he alleged had been boasting of his right to the English throne and his plans to conquer England. This article investigates Matthew Paris’ story, and his knowledge of medieval Denmark and attitudes towards England in medieval Denmark. Matthew had not himself been to Denmark, but had access to informants with personal experience of the Danish royal court: three English clerks and artisans who had served under Valdemar II before returning to England c. 1237 and, in the case of the clerk Nicholas of St Albans, finding service in the English royal court. Matthew Paris seems not to have been alone in his anxieties about the intentions of Valdemar II. In 1240, King Henry III of England sent two separate missions to acquire more intelligence about the situation in Denmark. They must have brought back reassuring news, for English sources give no indication of preparations against invasion in the following years.
Both English and Danish sources indicate that it is unlikely that an actual invasion force had been made ready in 1240. Danish sources do, however, show that Matthew’s information about the Danish boasts about their rights to the English crown are likely to have had a factual basis. In the Gesta Danorum, Saxo Grammaticus makes much of the Danish kings’ rights to the English crown. These claims were also incorporated into the hagiographical literature and liturgy for St. Knud IV. Knýtlinga saga, whose author had been part of Valdemar II’s court, also made much of them. The lost overlordship of England continued to play a role in the historical imagination of the Danish elite long into the thirteenth century.
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Journal of Medieval History, 2019
This article investigates the family backgrounds of aristocratic participants in the First Crusad... more This article investigates the family backgrounds of aristocratic participants in the First Crusade. Through an examination of these it explores the ways in which their decision to join the crusade was influenced by the examples of the previous generation of conquerors, the participants in the invasion of Sicily in 1061, the expedition to England in 1066 and the conflicts on the Iberian peninsula. In this way it opens a discussion about the motives and
expectation of the First Crusaders. It argues that dreams of conquest and the desire to match an older generation’s martial and political achievements may have been as important a factor in motivating crusaders as religious ideals.
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Viator 49:1, pp. 25-49, 2018
This article explores how analytical approaches from the study of medieval gift giving and ritual... more This article explores how analytical approaches from the study of medieval gift giving and ritualized communication can enhance our understanding of the cultural clashes between western Crusaders and Byzantium from the eleventh to the thirteenth century. The focus of the article is the historical commemoration of the encounter between the Byzantine Emperor Alexios I and the participants in the First Crusade, with particular emphasis on Alexios’ gifts to the Crusaders. In later histories of the crusade, the intention behind Alexios’ gift-giving was subjected to detailed discussion, much of it strikingly negative. This article places these negative interpretations in the context of eleventh-century anxieties about gift giving and the longstanding literary tradition of suspicion of Greek generosity. Building on this analysis, the influence of the stories of Alexios’ gifts is explored up to the catastrophic clash between Byzantines and Crusaders during the Fourth Crusade.
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Viking and Medieval Scandinavia, 2017
This article investigates the nature of political life and conflict in medieval Denmark, focussin... more This article investigates the nature of political life and conflict in medieval Denmark, focussing on the case of the rebellion against King Niels between 1131 and 1135. The article engages with previous scholarship that has identified the basis of the rebellion, and the governing feature of political life in the period, as the material interests of the competing kin-networks. Through an investigation of both the documentary and narrative sources for the conflict, the reigns of King Niels and his successor Erik II Emune, the leader of the rebellion, this article argues that in fact political and religious principles were much more important. Building on this it argues that we need to pay much more attention to the stated principles of political actors as found in the contemporary sources and the way these enabled aristocrats and would-be kings to mobilise support.
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Historisk Tidsskrift 113:2, 2013
This paper discuss the hitherto overlooked evidence for the capture of Valdemar II found in the a... more This paper discuss the hitherto overlooked evidence for the capture of Valdemar II found in the annals of Dunstable priory England.
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Journal of Medieval History, Jan 1, 2011
[skip to content]. SOAS Research Online. SOAS Home »; Research »; SOAS Research Online. Login, ...
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Journal of Medieval History, Jan 1, 2011
This article investigates the use of feasts and gifts of food in the household of Eleanor de Mont... more This article investigates the use of feasts and gifts of food in the household of Eleanor de Montfort between February and August 1265. In his influential The dangers of ritual, Philippe Buc argued, through a study of early medieval chronicles, that rituals in medieval Europe were regularly targets for disruption and aggressive manipulation either in practice or in the texts reporting the rituals. This article tests Buc’s thesis against administrative records from thirteenth-century England. The evidence from Eleanor’s household accounts is illuminated through a study of contemporary literary sources and didactic texts. It concludes that the administrative records indicate that rituals in practice were less habitually the subject of manipulation and conflict than the literary evidence indicates.
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Book Chapters by Lars Kjær
This chapter introduces the contributions to the volume Gift-Giving and Materiality in Europe, 13... more This chapter introduces the contributions to the volume Gift-Giving and Materiality in Europe, 1300-1600. It sets out some of the main themes, and places them against the background of recent scholarly developments, and against ideas about gift-giving current in late medieval and early modern Europe.
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‘Cæsar i middelalderen: Cæsars ånd’, in Trine Arlund Hass and Trine Grove Saxkjær (eds.), Cæsar: manden og myten (Aarhus, Aarhus University Press, 2020), 167-84., 2020
Denne artikel diskuterer Juius Cæsars efterliv i middelalderens literatur og historieskrivning
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‘Remembering the Vikings in Thirteenth-Century England and Denmark’, Thirteenth Century England XVII, ed. A.M. Spencer and C. Watkins (Woodbridge, Boydell), 1-21, 2021
This chapter explores and compares the ways in which the vikings were remembered in thirteenth-ce... more This chapter explores and compares the ways in which the vikings were remembered in thirteenth-century England and Denmark.
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‘Glory and Legitimation in the Aristocratic Hall’, in Wojtek Jezierski, Kim Esmark, Hans Jacob Orning, Jón Viðar Sigurðsson (eds.), Nordic Elites in Transformation, c. 1050–1250, Volume III: Legitimacy and Glory (London, Routledge), 154-74, 2020
Timothy Reuter identified the central question in any investigation of the medieval aristocracy a... more Timothy Reuter identified the central question in any investigation of the medieval aristocracy as being: “How did they get away with it?” This paper explores one element in the elite’s strategy for normalising their dominant position, namely the role of conspicuous consumption in the aristocratic hall. Generosity and hospitality served numerous purposes for the medieval elite: it was an opportunity to demonstrate wealth and power in the form of the food and drink consumed, precious tableware and the buildings in which festivities took place. Feasting was an opportunity to reinforce and display political alliances. Besides this, however, it was also an opportunity to demonstrate virtue and class through the correct treatment of the prestige goods assembled. By treating the rich foodstuffs and precious gifts with a studied, courteous indifference, the medieval elite sought to demonstrate to their peers, subjects, themselves and their maker that they were not enthralled to worldly riches and deserved their exalted status.
Published version: https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/glory-legitimation-aristocratic-hall-lars-kj%C3%A6r/e/10.4324/9781003097143-9
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This book chapter investigates the way in which chroniclers in thirteenth-century England underst... more This book chapter investigates the way in which chroniclers in thirteenth-century England understood the political conflicts between Henry III and Simon de Montfort. It focuses on the use of biblical models for interpreting the changing fortunes of the two parties.
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Drinking, Regicide and Royal Authority in Twelfth and Thirteenth-Century Denmark
This book cha... more Drinking, Regicide and Royal Authority in Twelfth and Thirteenth-Century Denmark
This book chapter investigates the way in which drinking parties and feasting developed under the Valdemarian kings of Denmark. It suggests that despite the introduction of western European customs of courtesy the feasts of twelfth and thirteenth-century kings of Denmark continued to have their own particular characteristics. These included a higher acceptance of drunkenness and an aggressive tradition of exchanging taunts and boasts. One result of this can be seen in the fact that stories of fights and murder at feasts are much more frequent in the Danish material than in Western and Central Europe. The anarchy of the feast made it possible to use the feast as a cover for attempts to eliminate political rivals, as happened in the infamous bloodfeast in Roskilde in 1157 when Sven Grathe sought to murder his co-kings Valdemar and Knud Magnusson.
Feasts, and stories of feasts gone wrong, could, however, also be used to bolster royal authority. The Valdemarian kings spent vast amounts on hospitality, seeking to establish and maintain ties of friendship and display the splendor of the royal court. Chronicles and saints’ lives produced by writers associated with the royal house utilised stories of feasts gone wrong to portray the enemies of the crown as rebels and would be breakers of the peace of the table.
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Books by Lars Kjær
website: https://gad.dk/valdemar-den-store
This first in-depth investigation into the influence of the classical ideals of generosity and gift giving in medieval Europe reveals to the contrary how historians have underestimated the impact of classical literature and philosophy on medieval ritualised communication. Focusing on the idea of the gift expounded in the classical texts read most widely in the Middle Ages, including Seneca the Younger’s De beneficiis and Cicero’s De officiis, Lars Kjær investigates how these ideas were received, adapted and utilised by medieval writers across a range of genres, and how they influenced the practice of generosity
Journal Articles by Lars Kjær
In 1240, the English chronicler Matthew Paris recorded rumours in England that suggested the Danes were preparing to invade the kingdom. In fact, the suspected invasion travelled eastward. Matthew Paris was not, however, put at ease. In 1241 he recorded the death of Valdemar II, whom he alleged had been boasting of his right to the English throne and his plans to conquer England. This article investigates Matthew Paris’ story, and his knowledge of medieval Denmark and attitudes towards England in medieval Denmark. Matthew had not himself been to Denmark, but had access to informants with personal experience of the Danish royal court: three English clerks and artisans who had served under Valdemar II before returning to England c. 1237 and, in the case of the clerk Nicholas of St Albans, finding service in the English royal court. Matthew Paris seems not to have been alone in his anxieties about the intentions of Valdemar II. In 1240, King Henry III of England sent two separate missions to acquire more intelligence about the situation in Denmark. They must have brought back reassuring news, for English sources give no indication of preparations against invasion in the following years.
Both English and Danish sources indicate that it is unlikely that an actual invasion force had been made ready in 1240. Danish sources do, however, show that Matthew’s information about the Danish boasts about their rights to the English crown are likely to have had a factual basis. In the Gesta Danorum, Saxo Grammaticus makes much of the Danish kings’ rights to the English crown. These claims were also incorporated into the hagiographical literature and liturgy for St. Knud IV. Knýtlinga saga, whose author had been part of Valdemar II’s court, also made much of them. The lost overlordship of England continued to play a role in the historical imagination of the Danish elite long into the thirteenth century.
expectation of the First Crusaders. It argues that dreams of conquest and the desire to match an older generation’s martial and political achievements may have been as important a factor in motivating crusaders as religious ideals.
Book Chapters by Lars Kjær
Published version: https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/glory-legitimation-aristocratic-hall-lars-kj%C3%A6r/e/10.4324/9781003097143-9
This book chapter investigates the way in which drinking parties and feasting developed under the Valdemarian kings of Denmark. It suggests that despite the introduction of western European customs of courtesy the feasts of twelfth and thirteenth-century kings of Denmark continued to have their own particular characteristics. These included a higher acceptance of drunkenness and an aggressive tradition of exchanging taunts and boasts. One result of this can be seen in the fact that stories of fights and murder at feasts are much more frequent in the Danish material than in Western and Central Europe. The anarchy of the feast made it possible to use the feast as a cover for attempts to eliminate political rivals, as happened in the infamous bloodfeast in Roskilde in 1157 when Sven Grathe sought to murder his co-kings Valdemar and Knud Magnusson.
Feasts, and stories of feasts gone wrong, could, however, also be used to bolster royal authority. The Valdemarian kings spent vast amounts on hospitality, seeking to establish and maintain ties of friendship and display the splendor of the royal court. Chronicles and saints’ lives produced by writers associated with the royal house utilised stories of feasts gone wrong to portray the enemies of the crown as rebels and would be breakers of the peace of the table.
website: https://gad.dk/valdemar-den-store
This first in-depth investigation into the influence of the classical ideals of generosity and gift giving in medieval Europe reveals to the contrary how historians have underestimated the impact of classical literature and philosophy on medieval ritualised communication. Focusing on the idea of the gift expounded in the classical texts read most widely in the Middle Ages, including Seneca the Younger’s De beneficiis and Cicero’s De officiis, Lars Kjær investigates how these ideas were received, adapted and utilised by medieval writers across a range of genres, and how they influenced the practice of generosity
In 1240, the English chronicler Matthew Paris recorded rumours in England that suggested the Danes were preparing to invade the kingdom. In fact, the suspected invasion travelled eastward. Matthew Paris was not, however, put at ease. In 1241 he recorded the death of Valdemar II, whom he alleged had been boasting of his right to the English throne and his plans to conquer England. This article investigates Matthew Paris’ story, and his knowledge of medieval Denmark and attitudes towards England in medieval Denmark. Matthew had not himself been to Denmark, but had access to informants with personal experience of the Danish royal court: three English clerks and artisans who had served under Valdemar II before returning to England c. 1237 and, in the case of the clerk Nicholas of St Albans, finding service in the English royal court. Matthew Paris seems not to have been alone in his anxieties about the intentions of Valdemar II. In 1240, King Henry III of England sent two separate missions to acquire more intelligence about the situation in Denmark. They must have brought back reassuring news, for English sources give no indication of preparations against invasion in the following years.
Both English and Danish sources indicate that it is unlikely that an actual invasion force had been made ready in 1240. Danish sources do, however, show that Matthew’s information about the Danish boasts about their rights to the English crown are likely to have had a factual basis. In the Gesta Danorum, Saxo Grammaticus makes much of the Danish kings’ rights to the English crown. These claims were also incorporated into the hagiographical literature and liturgy for St. Knud IV. Knýtlinga saga, whose author had been part of Valdemar II’s court, also made much of them. The lost overlordship of England continued to play a role in the historical imagination of the Danish elite long into the thirteenth century.
expectation of the First Crusaders. It argues that dreams of conquest and the desire to match an older generation’s martial and political achievements may have been as important a factor in motivating crusaders as religious ideals.
Published version: https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/glory-legitimation-aristocratic-hall-lars-kj%C3%A6r/e/10.4324/9781003097143-9
This book chapter investigates the way in which drinking parties and feasting developed under the Valdemarian kings of Denmark. It suggests that despite the introduction of western European customs of courtesy the feasts of twelfth and thirteenth-century kings of Denmark continued to have their own particular characteristics. These included a higher acceptance of drunkenness and an aggressive tradition of exchanging taunts and boasts. One result of this can be seen in the fact that stories of fights and murder at feasts are much more frequent in the Danish material than in Western and Central Europe. The anarchy of the feast made it possible to use the feast as a cover for attempts to eliminate political rivals, as happened in the infamous bloodfeast in Roskilde in 1157 when Sven Grathe sought to murder his co-kings Valdemar and Knud Magnusson.
Feasts, and stories of feasts gone wrong, could, however, also be used to bolster royal authority. The Valdemarian kings spent vast amounts on hospitality, seeking to establish and maintain ties of friendship and display the splendor of the royal court. Chronicles and saints’ lives produced by writers associated with the royal house utilised stories of feasts gone wrong to portray the enemies of the crown as rebels and would be breakers of the peace of the table.
Drawing on examples from both medieval and early modern Europe, the authors from the UK and across Europe explore the craftsmanship involved in the production of gifts and the use of exotic objects and animals, from elephant bones to polar bears and 'living' holy objects, to communicate power, class and allegiance. Gifts were publicly given, displayed and worn and so the book explores the ways in which, as tangible objects, gifts could help to construct religious and social worlds. But the beauty and material richness of the gift could also provoke anxieties. Classical and Christian authorities agreed that, in gift-giving, it was supposed to be the thought that counted and consequently wealth and grandeur raised worries about greed and corruption: was a valuable ring payment for sexual services or a token of love and a promise of marriage? Over three centuries, Gift-Giving and Materiality in Europe, 1300-1600: Gifts as Objects reflects on the possibilities, practicalities and concerns raised by the material character of gifts.
website: https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/giftgiving-and-materiality-in-europe-13001600-9781350183698/