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Curs istorie si civilizatie engleza

British Insularity

• Great Britain

Englend: The South, the Middle and the North

ScotlandWales

•  Northen Ireland (Uslter-capitala)

• The Isle of man and Anglesey (in the Irish Sea)

• The Isle of Wight, Jersey and Guernsey (the Channel Island)

• The Scily Islands

Consiquences of British Insularity

Britain`s peculiar geographical position has influenced:

• Its climate – the worm Atlantic Current, mild winters and warm summers

•Its people- they are reserved, the consider theirselves as being superior.

• In history- a protection barrier or facilitator of invasions?

Invasions and Patterns of Settlement in British Isles

• Ancient Britain- Stone Age : the megalictic Man; Bronze Age: the Beaker people; Iron

Age: the Celts and the Romans

Stone Age (3 000 BC)

• The first settler probably coming from the Iberian Peninsula, of even from the North

African cost

• This first wave of invaders settled in the west part of Britain and Ireland from Cornwall

• Remains that reveal the huge organisation of labour in prehistoric Britain, the henges as

centres of religious, political, economic power 

e.g. Stonehenge in Salisbury Plain> made of munumental circles of massive vertical stones

tappedwith immense horizontal slabs (megaliths=> the name of the prehistoric people)

Beakes People- Bronze Age (2 400 BC)

•  New groups of people came from Europe (France, the Low Countries) and settled in

south-east Britain

• Caracteristics: round-headed, strongly, taller 

Iron Age- Celts (700 BC)1. Galic Celts/ Goidelic: settled in Ireland, whence they spread to Scotland and the Isle of Man ( Galic dialect- it is extinguished now)

2. 2 centuries later, Brythonic Celts/ Britons settled in England and Wales

3. Belgie (100 BC)> settled in the east of Britain

The Celts:

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Skills: they know how to work with iron. They built hell-forts wich remained economic centres

for local groups long after the Romans came to Britain

Religion: polytheistic. Their priests, the Druds, could not read or write but they memories all thereligious teachings the tribal laws, history, medicine and other knowledge necessary in the Celtic

society.

Gender roles> women, especially from upper strata, had more independence, and they wererespected for their courage and strength in battle (e.g. Boadicca, 61 A.D.)

Curs 1 Literatura engleza

6th- 15th century:

• Migration ends

• Universities and professional schools

• Languages and national literatures

• Roman and Gothic style in art

In 1066, the Norman conquest -> they brought their language, their works.

700 BC, The Celts: Goidels/ Gael, Brythons/Britons, Belgae/ Belgic.Similarities with Anglo-Saxons:

• Organised in Different tribes

• Warriors

• Polytheistic

• Sacred tree

• Oral culture, therefore stress on the value of the vow

• Price for bloodshed outside battle

• The importance of druids

55-54 BC Iulius Caesar 43 AD- The Romans: Claudius conquers the south-> begin the process of romanisation of the

Celts

Queen Boudicca of the Scene dies in 61 ADThe wall of Hadrian

407-410 AD Roman legions withdraw

5th century the anglo-saxons: Jates, Angles and Saxons449 AD Hengest and Horsa against the Picts

Odin= the one eyed god> two ravens (thought and memory), two wolves and a horse with eightlegs

Frigga= the wife of Odin and Baldr Thor= god of thunder and protector of making the hammer Mjolnir, a belt and iron gloves.

Loki= god of mischief, father of Hel, the wolf of Fenrir and the serpent JormungandFreya= goddess of love and beauty

Tyr/Tiw= the one-handed god of justice

 Norns= Urdeer (past), Vervandi(present), Skuld (future), the giant Jmir and Yggdrasil, the ash-tree(frasin) with nine worlds (among wich Asgard, Midgrad, Hel)