ANST - Paganism after 600 A.D.

[Kendall Johnson]

-----Original Message-----
From: Tim McDaniel <tmcd at crl.com>
To: ansteorra at Ansteorra.ORG <ansteorra at Ansteorra.ORG>
Date: Monday, January 19, 1998 12:58 AM
Subject: Re: ANST - About me - Rowan


>On Fri, 16 Jan 1998, Kendall Johnson <avalon at netjava.com>
>wrote:
>> [Daniel de Lincolia wrote:]
>> >All I'm saying is that, if you want to be an authentically
>> >historical person of a Celtic race after 600 AD or so, you'd
>> >say you were Christian.  Before that, it depends where,
>> >when, and how.
>>
>> This is a very argueable date because Charlemagne didn't
>> start forcing christianity upon the Northwestern parts of
>> europe until the early 800's
>
>Um, I wrote "Celtic race".  The only people we'd call Celts
>that Charlemagne may have ruled was Brittany,

Let me say it this way. While Charlemagne was "converting" the northwestern
part of Europe in the 800's the Brittish Isles were developing seperately.
The point I was trying to make is that it isn't before 600 A.D. that would
deside when and where a Celt would live, but after.

In the majority of cases a person claiming a "celtic" persona would hale
from the western or  northern parts of the Brittish Isles. Although a person
claiming a "pagan" persona could hale from anywhere in the Brittish Isles
after the Angles, Saxons, and others came over in roughly 450 A.D. with them
they brought their religions
 and until well after the conquest of William there was no single religion
on the Brittish Isles. Though after King Oswy of Northumbria converts to
Roman Christianity in 664 Christianity was dominate. However It is recorded
that King Edwin was killed shortly after converting to Christianity in the
early 600's by King Penda of Mercia who was pagan. I have no idea how long
Penda reigned and if he later converted or not, but this shows that after
600 A.D. there were pagans on the Brittish Isles.

>
>
>I have the book _William the Conqueror_ (that's the name on
>the spine; you may call him what you will), David C. Douglas
>(Univ. of California Press, Berkeley, 1964).  I don't have
>time to re-read it, but Chapter 13 starts with "William, as
>king, showed himself resolute not only to retain his royal
>rights in the Church, but also to discharge what he
>conceived to be his ecclesiatical duties. ... [he] and all
>his subjects both Norman and English, lived in a world in
>which the Church was recognized as an all-embracing unit
>..."  The monastaries of Normandy were famous, and they
>spread the revival to England (not by founding many more,
>but by reforming the ones there).  William moved
>ecclesiastical pleas from the hundred courts to the bishops'
>courts.  He had many ecclesiastical councils held to reform
>the church.  There is dispute reported there about whether
>the English Church needed outside reform, but measures were
>taken against married priests and bishops.

I agree that paganism on the Brittish Isles was on the decline, but for
several more centuries there were outcrops of paganism such as the invading
Norse (though they were not celtic).

>I would therefore like to ask how you know "the christian
>religion was not strictly enforced on all parts of the
>isle".

You said yourself that William didn't conquer all of Brittan.

>I suspect it wasn't strictly enforced because well-nigh
>everyone was Christian or thought themselves so;
>you don't have to enforce a universal.

A seperate point, but why were laws being made by the monarchs in England
until the 1700's requiring people to go to church or face a fine.


 >I have seen no mention of paganism in
>England post-Conquest, and I've mentioned some pre-Conquest
>analysis above.

Post-conquest England, Scotland,etc. would not have been seriously bothered
by internal paganism, but would have seen small uprisings via invasion from
outside sources. ie Vikings

To summarize the Brittish Isles could have been home to Pagans after 600
A.D. and continental Europe definetly was.

For more sources Check:

The Emergence of Catholic Tradition 100 - 600 A.D. by Jaroslav Pelikan publ.
University of Chicago Press

The Medieval Church by Joseph H. Lynch  publ. by Longmand Group

The Age of Reform 1250 -1550: An intellectual and Religious History of Late
Medieval and Reformation Europe by Steven Ozment publ. by Yale University

The Face of Europe by Peter n Stearns publ. Forum Press

Rufus Guthrie

============================================================================
Go to http://www.ansteorra.org/lists.html to perform mailing list tasks.