Material culture as memory: combs and cremation in early medieval Britain

Abstract

Early Medieval Europe   (  )  - © Blackwell Publishing Ltd  ,  Garsington Road, Oxford OX   DQ, UK and  Main Street, Malden, MA  , USA Material culture as memory: combs and cremation in early medieval Britain H  W  This paper argues that mortuary practices can be understood as 'technologies of remembrance'. The frequent discovery of combs in early medieval cremation burials can be explained by their mnemonic significance in the post-cremation rite. Combs (and other objects used to maintain the body's surface in life) served to articulate the reconstruction of the deceased's personhood in death through strategies of remembering and forgetting. This interpretation suggests new perspectives on the relationships between death, material culture and social memory in early medieval Europe.How was the past perceived and created in early medieval Europe? Recent studies have discussed the dual roles of literacy and orality as ways by which the past was produced, reproduced and sometimes invented. Early medieval memory can be regarded as a social and ideological, rather than psychological, phenomenon. A wide range of studies have explored the roles and interactions between literacy and oral tradition in actively selecting and transforming the past in the light of contemporary socio-political needs. In this way, it is argued that the political structures, world-views and identities of kingdoms and communities were negotiated through the making and remaking of social memory. 1 Yet words (spoken or written) are only one means by which the past can be communicated, negotiated and contested. Social memory can be communicated through commemorative ceremonies and bodily 1 C.

Tressed for Death in Early Anglo-Saxon England

“…Instead they were items that facilitated, enabled and amplified social remembrance. In particular, grooming items might be considered part of a strategy of re-building the corporeality of the dead by providing ashes with a new surface and substance for burial in the cemetery (Williams 2003;.…”

“…In this study, I explore hirsuite hetereogenity: contrasting strategies in the significance of hair and grooming implements in early Anglo-Saxon mortuary practice. First, the article (re)evaluates previous work on this particular theme before investigating new evidence to revise and extend previous discussions of the role of hair management and transformation among the cremation burials of early Anglo-Saxon England (for broader reviews, see Williams 2003;Ashby 2014).…”

Encountering Imagery: Materialities, Perceptions, Relations

“…Like the cinerary urn itself, combs constituted the absent hair and flesh of the deceased and hence articulated and materialised the regeneration and embodiment of the deceased within the grave (Williams 2003; see also Williams 2007). Yet perhaps both pots and combs were not simply concerned with body-building.…”

“…They may have been placed with the cremains because they were inalienable from the deceased and to express loss and mourning by survivors, but perhaps also to rebuild a sense of the body's surface lost during conflagration (e.g. Williams 2003;. Moreover, the provision of an urn was key to the broader emphasis on containment and wrapping of the body found in both early Anglo-Saxon cremation and inhumation graves (Williams 2005b;Nugent 2011a).…”

“…For example, a significant minority of cinerary urns in many cemeteries in eastern England included fragments of bone and antler combs, often showing no signs of burning and some showing evidence of deliberate fragmentation prior to burial. These were not merely items of personal adornment that signified social identity in death but mnemonic catalysts, which facilitated remembering, forgetting and transformation (Williams 2003;; see also Gansum 2003). Not only did urns and antler combs follow a parallel trajectory in their circulation and deployment in the early Anglo-Saxon cremation rite, but cited each other in three ways.…”