Alaric Hall | |
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Born | 1979 (age 44–45) |
Nationality | British |
Academic background | |
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Academic work | |
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Institutions | University of Leeds |
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Alaric Hall (born 1979) is a British philologist who is an associate professor of English and director of the Institute for Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds. He has,since 2009,been the editor of the academic journal Leeds Studies in English and its successor Leeds Medieval Studies . [1] [2]
Hall received his B.A. in Anglo-Saxon,Norse and Celtic from the University of Cambridge,his M.Phil. in Medieval Studies from the University of Glasgow,and his Ph.D. in English from the University of Glasgow. His Ph.D. thesis was on elves in Anglo-Saxon England. [3]
He has subsequently become an associate professor of English and director of the Institute for Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds. Hall researches and teaches the languages,cultures and history of Northwest Europe in the Middle Ages. He has written and edited several works on these subjects. Hall has also written on Icelandic language and literature. [4]
His 2007 book Elves in Anglo-Saxon England received positive academic reviews. The medievalist and Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey described the work as an "exceptionally thorough study",while the Tolkien scholar Dimitra Fimi called it a "solidly scholarly work,with meticulous discussion of philological matters,and also an open-minded (although strictly evidence-based) attempt to look at the bigger picture." [5] [6] [7]
Hall is an environmental campaigner,and since 2018 has regularly stood for election to Leeds City Council for the Green Party of England and Wales. [8] [9] [10] For most of the 2010s he was a resident of the Leeds eco-building Greenhouse and was active in community organising in the local area of Beeston and Holbeck. [11] [12] [13] [14] His activities included campaigning in relation to the United Kingdom cladding crisis. [15]
Within academia,Hall supports open-access publishing and has made his own research freely available online. [16] Correspondingly,he edits Wikipedia,and incorporates editing into his teaching and research at the University of Leeds. [17] [18] [19] He is a member of the University and College Union,campaigning during the 2013 and 2018–2020 UK higher education strikes. [20] [21] [22]
An elf is a type of humanoid supernatural being in Germanic folklore. Elves appear especially in North Germanic mythology,being mentioned in the Icelandic Poetic Edda and the Prose Edda.
Álfröðull is a term and common kenning in Norse mythology. It is ambiguous,referring both to the sun-chariot of the sun goddess Sól and to the rider. Álfröðull is pulled by two horses,Árvakr and Alsviðr. The chariot is pursued by the wolf Sköll. According to Norse mythology,prior to Ragnarök,Álfröðull will give birth to a daughter and after she is eaten by the wolf,the daughter will take her place.
In Norse cosmology,svartálfar,also called myrkálfar,are beings who dwell in Svartálfheim. Both the svartálfar and Svartálfaheimr are primarily attested in the Prose Edda,written in the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson. Scholars have noted that the svartálfar appear to be synonymous with the dwarfs and potentially also the dökkálfar. As dwarfs,the home of the svartálfar could possibly be another description for Niðavellir.
"The Man in the Moon Stayed Up Too Late" is J. R. R. Tolkien's imagined original song behind the nursery rhyme "Hey Diddle Diddle ",invented by back-formation. It was first published in Yorkshire Poetry magazine in 1923,and was reused in extended form in the 1954–55 The Lord of the Rings as a song sung by Frodo Baggins in the Prancing Pony inn. The extended version was republished in the 1962 collection The Adventures of Tom Bombadil.
The Lacnunga ('Remedies') is a collection of miscellaneous Anglo-Saxon medical texts and prayers,written mainly in Old English and Latin. The title Lacnunga,an Old English word meaning 'remedies',is not in the manuscript:it was given to the collection by its first editor,Oswald Cockayne,in the nineteenth century. It is found,following other medical texts,in the British Library's Harley MS 585,a codex probably compiled in England in the late tenth or early eleventh century. Many of its herbal remedies are also found,in variant form,in Bald's Leechbook,another Anglo-Saxon medical compendium.
"Wiðfǣrstice" is an Old English medical text surviving in the collection known now as Lacnunga in the British Library. Wiðfǣrstiċe means 'against a sudden/violent stabbing pain';and according to Felix Grendon,whose collection of Anglo-Saxon charms appeared in the Journal of American Folklore in 1908,“the charm is intended to cure a sudden twinge or stitch,possibly rheumatism that can be due to being shot by witches,elves,and other spirits that fly through the air.”Scholars have often sought to identify this as rheumatism,but other possibilities should not be excluded. The remedy describes how to make a salve,but its main interest lies in the unique charm which follows. This describes how the færstice has been caused by the projectiles of 'mighty women',whom the healer will combat. The charm also mentions elves,believed responsible for elfshot,and provides the only attestation outside personal names of the Old English form of the name of the old Germanic gods,known as the Æsir in Norse mythology.
Deutsche Mythologie is a treatise on Germanic mythology by Jacob Grimm. First published in Germany in 1835,the work is an exhaustive treatment of the subject,tracing the mythology and beliefs of the ancient Germanic peoples from their earliest attestations to their survivals in modern traditions,folktales and popular expressions.
Elveden is a village and civil parish in the West Suffolk district of Suffolk in eastern England. In 2005 it had a population of 270. The village is bypassed by the A11 between Cambridge and Norwich,which ran through the centre of the village prior to 2014.
In English folklore,elf-arrows,elf-bolts and pixie arrows were names given to discovered arrowheads of flint,used in hunting and war by the Pre-Indo-Europeans of the British Isles and of Europe generally. The name derives from the folklore belief that the arrows fell from the sky,and were used by the elves to kill cattle and inflict elf-shot on human beings.
In J. R. R. Tolkien's writings,Elves are the first fictional race to appear in Middle-earth. Unlike Men and Dwarves,Elves are immortal,though they can be killed in battle. If so,their souls go to the Halls of Mandos in Aman. After a long life in Middle-earth,Elves yearn for the Earthly Paradise of Valinor,and can sail there from the Grey Havens. They feature in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Their history is described in detail in The Silmarillion.
The Cleopatra Glossaries are three Latin-Old English glossaries all found in the manuscript Cotton Cleopatra A.iii. The glossaries constitute important evidence for Old English vocabulary,as well as for learning and scholarship in early medieval England generally. The manuscript was probably written at St Augustine's,Canterbury,and has generally been dated to the mid-tenth century,though recent work suggests the 930s specifically.
The Royal Prayer Book is a collection of prayers believed to have been copied in the late eighth century or the early ninth century. It was written in West Mercia,likely either in or around Worcester.
The "Leiden Riddle" is an Old English riddle. It is noteworthy for being one of the earliest attested pieces of English poetry;one of only a small number of representatives of the Northumbrian dialect of Old English;one of only a relatively small number of Old English poems to survive in multiple manuscripts;and evidence for the translation of the Latin poetry of Aldhelm into Old English.
England and Englishness are represented in multiple forms within J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth writings;it appears,more or less thinly disguised,in the form of the Shire and the lands close to it;in kindly characters such as Treebeard,Faramir,and Théoden;in its industrialised state as Isengard and Mordor;and as Anglo-Saxon England in Rohan. Lastly,and most pervasively,Englishness appears in the words and behaviour of the hobbits,both in The Hobbit and in The Lord of the Rings.
Richard Carroll West was an American librarian and one of the first Tolkien scholars. He is best known for his 1975 essay on the interlace structure of The Lord of the Rings,for which he won the 1976 Mythopoeic Scholarship Award for Inkling Studies.
J. R. R. Tolkien was attracted to medieval literature,and made use of it in his writings,both in his poetry,which contained numerous pastiches of medieval verse,and in his Middle-earth novels where he embodied a wide range of medieval concepts.
Scholars have identified numerous themes in J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth writings,among them paganism. Despite Tolkien's assertion that The Lord of the Rings was a fundamentally Christian work,paganism appears in that book and elsewhere in his fictional world of Middle-earth in multiple ways. These include a pantheon of god-like beings,the Valar,who function like the Norse gods,the Æsir;the person of the wizard Gandalf,who Tolkien stated in a letter is an "Odinic wanderer";Elbereth,the Elves' "Queen of the Stars",associated with Venus;animism,the way that the natural world seems to be alive;and a Beowulf-like "northern courage" which is determined to press on,no matter how bleak the outlook.
Philology,the study of comparative and historical linguistics,especially of the medieval period,had a major influence on J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy world of Middle-earth. He was a professional philologist,and made use of his knowledge of medieval literature and language to create families of Elvish languages and many details of the invented world.
Tolkien,Race,and Cultural History:From Fairies to Hobbits is a 2008 book by Dimitra Fimi about J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth writings. Scholars largely welcomed the book,praising its accessibility and its skilful application of a biographical-historical method which sets the development of Tolkien's legendarium in the context of Tolkien's life and times. Major themes of the book include Tolkien's constructed languages,and the issues of race and racism surrounding his work.
Tolkien has often been supposed to have spoken of wishing to create "a mythology for England". It seems he never used the actual phrase,but various commentators have found his biographer Humphrey Carpenter's phrase appropriate as a description of much of his approach in creating Middle-earth,and the legendarium that lies behind The Silmarillion.