Author: Ronald Hutton
Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
ISBN: 9780631172888
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 397
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Book Description
This is the first survey of religious beliefs in the British Isles from the Stone Age to the coming of Christianity. Hutton draws upon a wealth of new data to reveal some important rethinking about Christianization and the decline of paganism.
Author: Ronald Hutton
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300198582
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 496
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Book Description
Britain's pagan past, with its mysterious monuments, atmospheric sites, enigmatic artifacts, bloodthirsty legends, and cryptic inscriptions, is both enthralling and perplexing to a resident of the twenty-first century. In this ambitious and thoroughly up-to-date book, Ronald Hutton reveals the long development, rapid suppression, and enduring cultural significance of paganism, from the Paleolithic Era to the coming of Christianity. He draws on an array of recently discovered evidence and shows how new findings have radically transformed understandings of belief and ritual in Britain before the arrival of organized religion. Setting forth a chronological narrative, Hutton along the way makes side visits to explore specific locations of ancient pagan activity. He includes the well-known sacred sites—Stonehenge, Avebury, Seahenge, Maiden Castle, Anglesey—as well as more obscure locations across the mainland and coastal islands. In tireless pursuit of the elusive “why” of pagan behavior, Hutton astonishes with the breadth of his understanding of Britain’s deep past and inspires with the originality of his insights.
Author: David Rankine
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781905297108
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 305
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Book Description
"An A-Z of the pagan gods & goddesses worshipped in ancient Britain during the first millennium CE through to the Middle Ages"--Cover.
Author: Prudence Jones
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136141723
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 281
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Book Description
The first comprehensive study of its kind, this fully illustrated book establishes Paganism as a persistent force in European history with a profound influence on modern thinking. From the serpent goddesses of ancient Crete to modern nature-worship and the restoration of the indigenous religions of eastern Europe, this wide-ranging book offers a rewarding new perspective of European history. In this definitive study, Prudence Jones and Nigel Pennick draw together the fragmented sources of Europe's native religions and establish the coherence and continuity of the Pagan world vision. Exploring Paganism as it developed from the ancient world through the Celtic and Germanic periods, the authors finally appraise modern Paganism and its apparent causes as well as addressing feminist spirituality, the heritage movement, nature-worship and `deep' ecology This innovative and comprehensive history of European Paganism will provide a stimulating, reliable guide to this popular dimension of religious culture for the academic and the general reader alike.
Author: Dorothy Watts
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317803108
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 319
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Book Description
In Christians and Pagans in Roman Britain, first published in 1991, Professor Dorothy Watts sets out to distinguish possible Pagan features in Romano-British Christianity in the period leading up to and immediately following the withdrawal of Roman forces in AD 410. Watts argues that British Christianity at the time contained many Pagan influences, suggesting that the former, although it had been present in the British Isles for some two centuries, was not nearly as firmly established as in other parts of the Empire. Building on recent developments in the archaeology of Roman Britain, and utilising a nuanced method for deciphering the significance of objects with ambiguous religious identities, Christians and Pagans in Roman Britain will be of interest to classicists, students of the history of the British Isles, Church historians, and also to those generally interested in the place of Christianity during the twilight of the Western Roman Empire.
Author: Christopher R. Fee
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780198038788
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 260
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Book Description
The islands of Britain have been a crossroads of gods, heroes, and kings-those of flesh as well as those of myth-for thousands of years. Successive waves of invasion brought distinctive legends, rites, and beliefs. The ancient Celts displaced earlier indigenous peoples, only to find themselves displaced in turn by the Romans, who then abandoned the islands to Germanic tribes, a people themselves nearly overcome in time by an influx of Scandinavians. With each wave of invaders came a battle for the mythic mind of the Isles as the newcomer's belief system met with the existing systems of gods, legends, and myths. In Gods, Heroes, and Kings, medievalist Christopher Fee and veteran myth scholar David Leeming unearth the layers of the British Isles' unique folkloric tradition to discover how this body of seemingly disparate tales developed. The authors find a virtual battlefield of myths in which pagan and Judeo-Christian beliefs fought for dominance, and classical, Anglo-Saxon, Germanic, and Celtic narrative threads became tangled together. The resulting body of legends became a strange but coherent hybrid, so that by the time Chaucer wrote "The Wife of Bath's Tale" in the fourteenth century, a Christian theme of redemption fought for prominence with a tripartite Celtic goddess and the Arthurian legends of Sir Gawain-itself a hybrid mythology. Without a guide, the corpus of British mythology can seem impenetrable. Taking advantage of the latest research, Fee and Leeming employ a unique comparative approach to map the origins and development of one of the richest folkloric traditions. Copiously illustrated with excerpts in translation from the original sources,Gods, Heroes, and Kings provides a fascinating and accessible new perspective on the history of British mythology.
Author: Liz Williams
Publisher: Reaktion Books
ISBN: 1789142601
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 351
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Book Description
A bewitching and authoritative historical overview of magic in the British Isles, from the ancient peoples of Britain to the rich and cosmopolitan landscape of contemporary paganism. “An absolute must for anyone interested in the development of paganism in the modern world. I cannot recommend this book enough.”—Janet Farrar, coauthor of A Witches’ Bible “At last, we have a history of British Paganism written from the inside, by somebody who not only has a good knowledge of the sources, but explicitly understands how Pagans and magicians think.”—Ronald Hutton, author of The Triumph of the Moon and The Witch What do we mean by “paganism”—druids, witches, and occult rituals? Healing charms and forbidden knowledge? Miracles of Our Own Making is a historical overview of pagan magic in the British Isles, from the ancient peoples of Britain to the rich and cosmopolitan landscape of contemporary paganism. Exploring the beliefs of the druids, Anglo-Saxons, and Vikings, as well as Elizabethan Court alchemy and witch trials, we encounter grimoires, ceremonial magic, and the Romantic revival of arcane deities. The influential and well-known—the Golden Dawn, Wicca, and figures such as Aleister Crowley—are considered alongside the everyday “cunning folk” who formed the magical fabric of previous centuries. Ranging widely across literature, art, science, and beyond, Liz Williams debunks many of the prevailing myths surrounding magical practice, past and present, while offering a rigorously researched and highly accessible account of what it means to be a pagan today.
Author: Michael Howard
Publisher: Capall Bann Publishing
ISBN:
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 186
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Book Description
Traces the history & development of Celtic Paganism & Christianity specifically in Wales, but also in relation to the rest of the British Isles including Ireland, from the Iron Age to the present. A study of the transition between the pagan religions & Christianity & how the early Church, in the Celtic countries struggled with & later absorbed the earlier forms of spirituality, clearly seen in the development of Celtic Christianity when pagan & Christian beliefs co-existed, albeit in an uneasy & sometimes violent relationship. Also covers how the Roman Catholic version of Christianity arrived in England at the end of the 6th century & its affect on the Celtic Church; how Celtic Christianity was suppressed & the effect this was to have on the history & theology of the Church in the Middle Ages. The influence of Celtic Christianity on the Arthurian legends & the Grail romances is explored, as is the resurgence of interest in Celtic Christianity today.
Author: Anne Ross
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
Author: David Clarke
Publisher: Blandford Press
ISBN: 9780713725223
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 176
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Book Description
Twilight of the Celtic Gods is a fascinating account of Britain's surviving Celtic tradition. This ground-breaking book - based on the authors' combined research in the field - reveals for the first time clear evidence that many ancient traditions and customs are still kept alive today in the heart of twentieth-century Britain. Combining first-hand accounts with folklore, mythology and archeology, David Clarke and Andy Roberts have uncovered the last traces of a Celtic legacy which is in imminent danger of extinction. Their quest combines beliefs about the natural and supernatural worlds with the awesome forces locked in the landscape and in the mind. Illustrated throughout with colour and black and white photographs, line drawings and maps, this book is an important collection of the last remnants of our ancient past.
