A Quibble

[poliphilo]

I'm quite liking Robert Bartlett's series on the Normans, but it does annoy me how he- or his director- is muddying the water with anachronism. William I was religious- cue pictures of a late medieval madonna. The harrying of the north was horrific- I know what, we'll shoot a sequence in a Victorian churchyard. William was crowned in Westminster Abbey- just look how pretty that Renaissance choir loft is. And ooh- look- stained glass- and bugger the fact that it hasn't been invented yet.  If the object of the exercise is to give us some idea not only of Norman politics but also of Norman culture then this continual pointing of the camera at unNorman things is downright misleading.

Comments

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

That does sound annoying! But are you sure that stained glass hadn't been invented? Colour glass had been used in windows, at least - but perhaps "it depends what you mean by..." I've no doubt the examples they showed in the programmed were highly anachronistic.

As for the harrowing of the north, if they'd really wanted a modern equivalent there's plentiful footage of "punitive operations" from the last few decades they could have drawn on. Perhaps some shots of Saddam's exploits against the Kurds might have got the point across?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

You're right. According to wikipedia there were stained glass windows in Britain as early as the late 7th century. Well, I never!

I think I'm right in saying we don't possess any stained glass in Britain from the early Norman period- but of course that doesn't mean there wasn't any.

There are far too many modern parallels for what William did to the north of England. He was a hard man, but no harder than many of our contemporaries.

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

You should've watched the programme on Anglo Saxon treasures - they actually showed some in situ Anglo-Saxon stained glass. It was a good programme, and well worth catching if you get the chance.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Anglo-Saxon glass! In situ! Wow!

Perhaps I can catch it on the BBC i-player

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

They repeated it last night, I think. It must be On Demand by now, which means it must be on i-player...

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

Oh, chill out and get with the Postmodern times! Don't you know that the concept of chronological narrative is dead??? It's THEME that matters, not accuracy!!

I'm quite enjoying it, too, but I found the first episode more rewarding, presumably because it was talking about things I was less familiar with. With regards to the British Isles, I thought Castle by Marc Morris had a better discussion of the Norman invasion and its aftermath.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I think the problems are (a) that the budget is risibly small and (b) the director is trying to express himself.

I'm in it mainly for the art and architecture, but I learned some stuff about the Normans in Ireland and Scotland that I didn't know before.

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

Ditto, with regards to the Irish. I knew about Earl David, who introduced burghs and town planning to Scotland, but I never knew that Margaret was related to Anglo-Saxon royalty!

Must go visit Dunfermline again some time. It's a classy building.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I was in Dunfermline Abbey a couple of years back. It's my favourite building in Scotland.

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

I'd say Linlithgow Palace has the edge - just!! But then I'm biased towards James IV...

Sellars & Yateman wrote a few lines on this problem, didn't they?

[jorrocks-j.livejournal.com]

For what it's worth, we have it here, too:

Re: Sellars & Yateman wrote a few lines on this problem, didn't they?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I love that cartoon!