November 17, 2009, 4:10 pm

Carol Neuman de Vegvar: Dining with Distinction: The Impact of the Norman Conquest on Social Identities and Feasting Practices in the British Isles (Lecture and Discussion)

The feasting scenes in the Bayeuz Tapestry distinguish between Anglo-Saxons who use drinking horns and Normans who hold palm cups. These visualizations reflect projected ethnic and moral distinctions between the two groups. But the post-Conquest association of horns with an ever-more-remote Anglo-Saxon past also led to a reformulation of the drinking horn as a object of display rather than use, with the addition of legs so that the horn could stand autonomously. The earliest evidence of this change is found in the development in Norman Ireland of a new type of horn terminal, long, heavy and flat on the underside, that served as a counterweight for a filled horn standing upright on its feet.

Carol Neuman de Vegvar is Packard Professor of Fine Arts at Ohio Wesleyan University. Her research considers the art of the early medieval British Isles and its European connections. She co-editor of the volume Roma Felix-Formation and Reflections of Medieval Rome, (Ashgate, 2008) as well as author of recent articles on gendered sightlines in Roman churches, Anglo-Saxon stone crosses in the landscape, the imagery and medium of the Franks and Gandersheim Caskets, and architecture and meaning in Insular canon table arcades. Her current long-term project is on drinking horns and the social dynamics of feasting in the British Isles from the Romans to the Norman Conquest

Location: Olin Auditorium

Sponsor: The Mesaros Art Fund and the Art History Department

Email: parsleya@kenyon.edu

Phone: 427.5342