Ninth Century

Roughly fifteen to eighteen Tárkány toponyms have been documented in the tenth-century Hungarian settlement territory in the Carpathian Basin. Some of these have survived up to the present in the name of a settlement or a field name, some are known from thirteenth-century or later charters. We may assume that these place-names are among the earliest Hungarian toponyms. Although
contemporary sources do not mention the title or the occupation name tarchan or tarkán in relation to the ancient Hungarians, linguistic and historical studies have shown that this designation, preserved in geographic toponyms, was probably contemporaneous with the place-names formed from the names of the seven Hungarian tribes as recorded by Constantine Porphyrogenitus in his "De administrando imperii".
The mention of Avar and Bulgar tarqans in the Tisza region in the ninth century are an indication that this title was known in the area later conquered by the ancient Hungarians: there was a tarqan (tarcan primatibus) in the hring of the Avar khagan at the time of Pepin of Italy’s campaign against the Avars in 796, and we know of a tarqan who was one of the dignitaries of the Bulgar khan Omurtag (814–831) (Onegabon ’/ze/ra-tarkan’). Late Avar settlements and cemeteries had been earlier identified in the broader area of two sites, (Mező-)Tárkány in County Heves and Tárkány in County Komárom, that were investigated archaeologically. A tenth-century grave with an ornate purse plate is known within an area of 10 km of each of these
sites (Besenyőtelek-Szőrhát and Bana, respectively). The toponym Bő, interpreted as designating the leader of a kindred, is known in their vicinity.
In sum, the main argument of this study is that the Tárkány toponyms of the Carpathian Basin preserve the memory of the tarqan’s office of local late Avar and Bulgar origin that was incorporated into the early Hungarian military and regional administrative system. The name of the tarqan organisation, originating from the Avar and Bulgar period, was preserved in the memory and traditions of the local population in these regions for two or three generations, and was revived around the turn of the ninth and tenth century in the Hungarian Principality.

In the ninth century rulers from Denmark like Hrœrekr and Guðröðr got control over the western part of Frisia. Around 850 they were appointed by the Frankish kings to look after their interests in general and to defend the coastal areas in particular. At the end of the ninth century the governance by the Danish rulers was taken over by the West Frisian count Gerulf and his successors. Among the Danish rulers it was Guðröðr who settled in Kennemerland, while Hrœrekr also frequented the area. Especially the location of Egmond must be considered, as is explained in this paper.
The West Frisian counts moved the centre of their power from the area near the mouth of the Oude Rijn to the vicinity of Egmond after the Danish rulers had disappeared. In this paper we try to imagine how the Danish rule passed to the West Frisian counts.

In the ninth century the shores of the North Sea were harassed by Danish pirates. It is understandable that medieval chroniclers were rather more interested in their targets, yet something can be told about the origin of these plunderers. For if we map out the different raids in the North Sea area in the period between 834 and 864 - the period in which most transmarine pirate activity is recorded - then the central position of the former Island of Walcheren in the present Dutch province of Zealand is striking. Is it possible that a nest of pirates could have maintained on this island for some decades?

Besides glosses and other textual annotations, early medieval Latin manuscript commonly feature technical signs, annotation symbols and sigla that reflect readership or provide a framework for interpretation and use. The early medieval Insular book users were particularly keen on using such devices. This article maps the usage of technical signs in a corpus of early medieval Irish manuscripts produced on the Continent or preserved and used there early after the production. In the centre of the inquiry are four manuscripts belonging to an Irish scholarly circle associated with Sedulius Scottus. The article concludes that: • Insular, and specifically Irish, annotators used a specific repertoire of technical signs; • This Insular/Irish repertoire is substantially distinct from the repertoire of technical signs used by Carolingian scribes and therefore allows for discerning books annotated by Insular/Irish users on the Continent; • A noticeable difference exists between various identifiable clusters of manuscripts annotated by Insular/Irish users, suggesting that different annotators and circles drew on different parts of the Insular repertoire; • The manuscripts from the Sedulius group stand out from among other Irish books produced on the Continent on account of the specific mode of annotation, which seems to have been particular to the circle of scholars that produced them; • The Greek Psalter of Sedulius, which contains the subscription of Sedulius Scottus, displays a pattern of sign use distinct from the one found in the manuscripts from the Sedulius group and therefore does not seem related to them; • One or two lightly-annotated manuscripts contain traces of annotation in the manner of the Sedulius circle and therefore may reflect activities of the scholars from this scholarly group.

Il progetto Sicily in Transition è nato dalla collaborazione delle Università di York e di Roma Tor Vergata, con il pieno ap-poggio della Soprintendenza ai BB. CC. AA di Palermo. La finalità della nostra ricerca è quella di analizzare, attraverso il registro archeologico, in quale modo i mutamenti di regime politico hanno influenzato organizzazione, composizione e stili di vita delle popolazioni soggette. L’arco di tempo considerato va dal VI al XIII secolo, periodo nel quale la Sicilia ha visto diverse dominazioni: quella bizantina, islamica, normanna e sveva. Sicily in Transition prevede di analizzare con metodi in parte nuovi, in parte più tradizionali, sia insiemi di reperti (ecofatti e manufatti) prodotti da precedenti scavi, sia di acquisire dati attraverso nuove indagini. In particolare gli scriventi hanno scelto di indagare un’area molto promettente della Sicilia centrale: il territorio di Castronovo di Sicilia. Qui, in due campagne di ricerca durate ciascuna quattro settimane, sono state realizzate indagini magnetometriche, ricognizioni di superficie, di archeologia dell’architettura e sondaggi stratigrafici. La finalità era quella di valutare il potenziale archeologico dei principali siti storici del territorio. I primi risultati sono promettenti in relazione alla varietà tipologica e cronologica dei diversi insediamenti identificati: una fortezza dei secoli VII-IX sul Monte Kassar; un fortilizio con fasi del pieno medioevo e dell’età moderna sul Colle San Vitale; un ampio villaggio non difeso con fasi dall’età tardoantica al medioevo, incluse importanti testimonianze di età islamica, nell’area del Casale San Pietro. Le indagini preliminari hanno quindi confermato le ampie potenzialità informative dell’intero territorio di Castronovo rispetto ai temi della nostra ricerca e stanno quindi consentendo di programmare gli interventi futuri.

The Western Puerco region of east-central Arizona figured prominently in foundational studies of the Early Pueblo period (AD 650-950) yet remains on the periphery of recent research. This article presents new survey and chronometric data from three communities located in a densely occupied portion of the Western Puerco, the Petrified Forest. These data suggest that the Petrified Forest hosted the earliest known aggregated settlement in the region, circa AD 700-800, before residents transitioned to a dispersed settlement pattern that remained in place through the Chaco era. Neighboring portions of the Western Puerco, however, only hosted settlements of a similar size from AD 840 forward. Chaco great houses were founded in these communities during the tenth and eleventh centuries. Unlike better known examples of aggregation that unfolded within only a few generations, similar developments in the Petrified Forest were likely the culmination of hundreds of years of local population growth, increasing sedentism, and use of prominent natural features on the landscape. The lack of fit between the causal factors proposed for village formation in the northern Southwest and eighth century aggregation in the Petrified Forest suggests alternative models are needed to explain the formation of early population aggregates in the Western Puerco and across much of the western portion of the northern Southwest more broadly.

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La región oeste de Puerco, en el centro-este de Arizona, figura de manera prominente en los estudios fundacionales del periodo Pueblo Temprano (650–950 d.C.) pero permanece en la periferia de las investigaciones actuales. Este artículo presenta nuevos resultados de recorridos de superficie y datos cronométricos de tres comunidades localizadas en una porción densamente poblada del oeste de Puerco: el Bosque Petrificado. Dichos datos sugieren que el Bosque Petrificado albergó el asentamiento agregado más temprano de la región, ca. 700–800 d.C., el cual pasó en poco tiempo a un patrón de asentamiento disperso que se mantuvo como tal durante todo el periodo Chaco. Sin embargo, las zonas aledañas al oeste de Puerco albergaron únicamente asentamientos de tamaño similar a partir de 840 d. C. Las “great houses” de Chaco fueron fundadas en estas comunidades durante los siglos diez y once de nuestra era. A diferencia de ejemplos de agregación mejor conocidos, como aquellos observados en el norte de San Juan que ocurrieron en tan solo unas cuantas generaciones, los desarrollos similares vistos en el Bosque Petrificado probablemente fueron la culminación de cientos de años de crecimiento de la población local. Para poder situar el Bosque Petrificado en el contexto regional de una mejor manera, comparamos y contrastamos la arquitectura, la cultura material y los patrones de asentamiento de dicho sitio con aquellos presentes en sitios seminales del oeste de Puerco; asimismo, discutimos las implicaciones que el fenómeno de agregación temprana tuvo en la demografía regional y en las historias de los asentamientos a largo plazo.

This paper demonstrates both in argumentation and terminology, how the cohesion and self-identification of the communities as well as the delineation from others are determined by the understanding of religious belonging. The idea of following the "true religion" was a part of the construction of "us",  at the same time, it was a marker of distinction and differentiation from others (what we are not). Religion was also a major factor in the perception of alterity: resulting in separation and opposition, manifesting on the level of the communities pertaining to them.
Based on the terminological approach, we could see that the concept of otherness as well as a term indicating it, was not present, however, a set of lexical items, terms, and notions were used to refer to perceptions of difference on multiple levels (religious, linguistic, racial, etc.), as well as they were tools for othering. A whole web of ideas could be identified either in case of the constructions of otherness, or in case of those of belonging.
As an outcome of the research, it may be mentioned that this essay addresses the contemporary and increasing debate on the perception of Islam/the Muslim as other. On the one hand, this paper offers data related to an early phase of this perception; on the other, the challenge of the research lies in the geographic area: the Christian authors examined here lived together with Muslims, so the so-called Saidian "oriental other" based on the Western othering is not applicable.

Final copy of article sent to The Heroic Age for publication

Haimo, the master of the monastic school at Saint-Germain (Auxerre) never wrote a treatise on anger. Understanding his thoughts about anger, therefore, requires reconstructing them from the various references scattered throughout his commentaries and homilies. In this essay I perform that reconstruction. Haimo focused not on whether anger was good or bad, or on whether or not one should avoid it. Indeed, Haimo assumed that people would by nature become angry. Instead, he focused on the duration of anger once felt. Haimo’s concern was for emotion as experience, and for the transformation of one emotional experience into another.

Old Norse skaldic poetry is the only major tradition of vernacular praise-poetry of the Germanic Middle Ages. According to the Icelandic medieval sources, the first skalds were active around the end of the ninth century, in a time characterized by the consolidation of Scandinavian presence and intensified cultural contacts within the areas affected by the Viking expansion. As an oral, vernacular genre, skaldic poetry displays highly innovative features within the Germanic poetic tradition, as regards both metre and diction, raising the much debated question of the nature and the extent of foreign influences on the unattested Scandinavian poetical forms. The debate about the ‘origins of dróttkvætt’ has traditionally addressed the possible sources of foreign influence on specific formal traits, namely metrical innovations (syllable counting and cadence) and phonic features (rhyme and assonance patterns), focusing on the evident similarities with the insular Celtic poetical practice. Recently, other formal and thematic features (e.g. tmesis and ekphrasis) have been taken into account to highlight possible connections with more latinized scholarly milieux in the context of increasing political and diplomatic contacts between the Carolingian court and emerging Scandinavian territorial entities. (Poole 2013, 'Scholars and Skalds'). However, the most distinctive innovation characterizing the ‘skaldic revolution’ is probably to be found in diction; the kenning system, as a thematically integrated and internally regulated ‘poetic metalanguage’, appears already established and fully productive in the verses of the first attested skald, Bragi Boddason (late ninth century). When considered in terms of a structured semiotic item, rather than as a hypertrophic rhetorical figure, the kenning-device raises important questions concerning the origins of the genre, not secondary to the ones posed by metre. This paper intends to address the problem of the emergence and development of skaldic diction as a structural feature, with regards to the possibility of external influence within the framework of intense mobility and contact of early Viking Age Scandinavia.