Winters in the World: A Journey through the Anglo-Saxon Year

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Now, this is very curious because, as Eleanor Parker points out, autumn is very much not the time for journeying (not even the Anglo-Saxon autumn which began on 7th August!). Spring is the journeying season and, of course, that is when Bilbo sets off at the start of The Hobbit . He leaves in April, a month forever associated with pilgrimage since Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales . But the key date at the start of The Lord of the Rings is not April 28th (when Bilbo first leaves Bag End) but September 22nd, Bilbo’s birthday and Frodo’s too. Rather than leave Bag End in spring, they leave on or about the autumn solstice. In other words, they leave the Shire at precisely the wrong time of year. J.R.R. Tolkien conceived his Middle-Earth sagas as a means of reacquainting his readers with a mythology that would render Christianity more acceptable.

All this combines to make a work of rare value. It will be interesting to the history or literature buff. For me, I found my prayer life took on new focus and depth. As I went my day and the recent liturgical seasons, I thought of those long-ago Catholic Anglo-Saxons doing the same thing, taking it seriously, knowing that prayer matters, that saints will rush to your aid, that God gives us all that is good in life beginning with the riches of the natural world around us.

I have just finished reading Eleanor Parker’s excellent new book, Winters in the World: A Journey through the Anglo-Saxon Year . Rather than write a traditional review, I thought I’d offer an article that is part review and part reflection with a Tolkienian twist. Today it’s become a popular myth that that symbols linked in modern Britain with Easter, especially eggs, hares or rabbits, derive from the worship of Eostre, but there’s no Anglo-Saxon evidence to support that. None of these symbols were linked to Easter in the Anglo-Saxon period; eggs weren’t associated with Easter in Britain until the later Middle Ages, hares and rabbits not until much later still. There’s nothing to suggest any continuity of customs between the pre-conversion festival and the Anglo-Saxon Christian Easter, and the modern observance of Easter owes nothing to Anglo-Saxon paganism, with the sole exception of its English name. I expected this book to be interesting. I didn't expect to fall in love with it. Eleanor Parker weaves a tapestry of poetry, literature, history, religion, and language to go through the seasons and practices of the Anglo-Saxon year. The result is a masterpiece that gave me a real sense of connection with the people of long ago. Hotjar sets this cookie to identify a new user’s first session. It stores a true/false value, indicating whether it was the first time Hotjar saw this user. To tell the truth, he was very reluctant to start, now that it had come to the point. Bag End seemed a more desirable residence than it had for years, and he wanted to savour as much as he could of his last summer in the Shire. When autumn came, he knew that part at least of his heart would think more kindly of journeying, as it always did at that season.

This sense of relationship between nature and humanity is something the Anglo-Saxon poets drew upon. They used it as a metaphor for emotion, and as a way to understand the processes of the world that their Christian god had created. The church calendar, and its method of dating, does, then, determine the course of the book. However, there is some effort to trace festivals, where appropriate, to their pagan past and, equally, to rubbish a few myths that have sprung up in the twentieth century. The line between myth and fact can be a fine one, and the reader can on occasion sense the extent of Parker’s frustration at modern notions, particularly when there is no textual evidence from the era to support various claims. Explore the festivals, customs and traditions linked to the different seasons, and discover how Anglo-Saxons felt about the annual passing of the seasons and the profound relationship they saw between human life and the rhythms of nature. It is, however, literary analysis with aplomb. The selection of texts is as diverse as possible, covering poetry, sermons, scientific texts, and more. The quotations are well chosen, expertly illustrating not just Parker's argument, but the feelings of the Anglo-Saxon writers. In addition, many of these quotations are provided both in translation (usually by Parker herself) and in the original Old English. For the geek, this can provide hours of amusement and a useful way of attempting to learn the language. There can be few better ways of showing the connections between now and then than by showing the similarity in vocabulary. Many of the festivals we celebrate in Britain today have their roots in the Anglo-Saxon period - come along to learn about their surprising history, as well as unearthing traditions now long forgotten.There isn’t space to explore the implications of all this here - though I am attempting to do so more thoroughly in my PhD - but even this brief survey suggests that, in some respects, the action in The Lord of Rings shadows, or fore-shadows, salvation history itself. I found this a fascinating read. Not just for its insight's into how the Anglo-Saxon year ran, but for the literature it introduces you to. I've read Beowulf but there were quotes from many other poems and works that made me want to take a deep dive into Anglo-Saxon literature.* I also was surprised to see how integral the Catholic faith was in the Anglo-Saxon world. I'd expected to read a fair amount about pagan rituals but the author made it clear that this was a Christian world with only a glancing relationship with pagan religions. The way the faith was practiced then was, of course, different than now but there was enough in common to make me feel a connection with those times. In fact, I now am interested in getting my hands on some of Aelfric's homilies, many excerpts of which were featured in this book. So one day, although autumn was now getting far on, and winds were cold, and leaves were falling fast, three large boats left Lake-town, laden with rowers, dwarves, Mr Baggins, and many provisions… The only person thoroughly unhappy was Bilbo.