Topic description and stories

Over-hunting walruses contributed to the collapse of Norse Greenland

06 Jan 2020

Medieval Greenlanders may have chased dwindling walrus herds ever farther north in an effort to maintain their economy, when the value of walrus...

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Left: Upper jaw bones of a walrus, with tusks removed. Right: an elaborately-carved ecclesiastical walrus ivory plaque.

Lost Norse of Greenland fuelled the medieval ivory trade, ancient walrus DNA suggests

08 Aug 2018

New DNA analysis reveals that, before their mysterious disappearance, the Norse colonies of Greenland had a “near monopoly” on Europe’s walrus ivory...

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Matthew Paris OSB, Chronica maiora 1CCCC, MS 26, f.127v (Parker Library)

"And the girl he immersed in the font he took out as a boy"

02 May 2014

A conference taking place today in the Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic is the first step in an ambitious graduate-led project to create...

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Finds from the mass grave in Dorset.

Viking mass grave linked to elite killers of the medieval world

25 Jan 2012

A mass grave found in Dorset could belong to a crew of Viking mercenaries who terrorised Europe in the 11th century – according to a new documentary...

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Still from Memories of old awake

Cambridge Ideas - Memories Of Old Awake

26 Sep 2011

Cambridge University academic, Dr Emily Lethbridge, is breathing new life and understanding into the centuries-old Sagas of Icelanders (...

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Emily Lethbridge

Journey to the Icelandic 'saga-steads'

20 Jun 2011

Now mid-way through a year-long 21st-century pilgrimage to the settings of Iceland’s famous medieval Íslendingasögur (‘sagas of Icelanders’), Dr...

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The "Embulance" hits the road in Iceland.

Living in the landscape

15 Jun 2011

Six months after she set forth on an epic tour of Iceland in a Land Rover ambulance on the trail of the country’s medieval sagas, Dr. Emily...

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