Early evidence of women priests in Christian Church in 5th century

Following the recent decision by the Church of England to accept women bishops I was interested to pick up an article from Reuters last year regarding some archaeological evidence that there were women priests in the second to fifth centuries AD. There is certainly evidence for them in Britain in the Celtic Church from the fifth century on but surprisingly this evidence is in Rome and I had not come across it before.

Frescoes in the newly restored Catacombs of Priscilla are claimed to prove there were women priests in early Christianity. The Vatican dismisses such claims as 'fairy tales' but given the elevated position of women in the Celtic Church this might be wishful thinking on the part of a church with a long history of misogyny.

The Catacombs on the Via Salaria reopened after a five-year restoration project.  I have not visited them myself but you can tour them virtually via Google Maps. A Christian burial site between the second and fifth centuries AD they meander underground for 13km (8 miles) over several levels. The Catacombs of Priscilla contain frescoes of women including the 'Cubicularum of the veiled woman's showing a woman with arms outstretched like a priest saying mass. She is wearing a 'rich liturgical garment' (although the word liturgical is for some reason unknown omitted in the English version) and a stole.Another room known as the 'Greek Chapel' shows a group of women sitting around a table, their arms outstretched like those of a priest saying mass.

This interests me because the Celtic Church always believed that it represented a more 'pure' form of Christianity. Women had a more equal role in society in Northern Europe than in Rome and I had assumed this accounted for equality for women within the Christian Druid Church but it seems I may be wrong and they were simply continuing a tradition within the early Christian Church.

2014 Man Booker Prize longlist

That time of year again. The 2014 Man Booker Prize long list has been published. The competition is open to American novelists for the first time but a deluge of transatlantic entries feared by some has not materialised. Of 154 entries only 40 are by US writers.

In the long list only four of the thirteen writers are American. Britain has six authors including the Indian-born Neel Mukherjee, with one novelist each from Ireland and Australia with Irish-American Joseph O'Neill being claimed by both countries.

Paul Kingsworth is the debut novelist up against some previous winners (Howard Jacobson winner in 2010) and shortlisted writers (Ali Smith 2001 and 2005 and David Mitchell 2001 and 2004).

There is a wide range of genres represented  from Kingsworth's account of life in England post 1066 told in an invented language some way between Middle and Modern English, Howard Jacobson's futuristic love story J and David Mitchell's metaphysical thriller The Bone Clocks.

This reminds me my own current novel Death Runs After is no further forward. Must get on.

Viking exhibition at the British museum

I went yesterday to Bloomsbury to the Viking exhibition at the British Museum as this is the last week. A bit later than my period but similar in many ways. The new Sainsbury Gallery is impressively large but nearly entirely taken up by the reconstruction of the ship. Other replicas I have seen were quite small but this one would hold the 300 men you read about. There were also some beautiful gold brooches and I liked the replica rune stone which has been painted to show how it would originally been coloured (which you can't do with the original). It's very eye-catching and would have been visible for miles.

A History of Post-Roman Britain 400-600:The High Kings

For those who have been following my research diary the first part of my study has been published exclusively on Kindle. It went live yesterday. If you don't have a Kindle you can get a free Kindle app for your laptop or pc.

New TV show for internet entrepreneurs

Reuters reports from San Francisco that a new TV show, brainchild of internet entrepreneur Joe Beninato, has made its debut. Internet entrepreneurs have already been featured in a new comedy 'Silicon Valley' first aired last month. The new show's concept is a self-help call-in show in which hi-tech future moguls can get advice from industry experts anonymously.

The new weekly programme called Founderline will discuss topics like raising funding. The show's creator expects most of the show's audience to watch online (of course) with episodes streamed live as well as posted on sites such as YouTube. It will be produced and aired on a local community cable TV channel in Mountain  View California, the Silicon Valley town where Google has its headquarters.

It will at least make a change from the endless run of chefs, estate agents and property developers.

April 2014 Literary Events

The Essex Book Festival 2014 Adventures with words
1 March to 31 March. 2014
Various venues across Essex

Cambridge Literary Festival
1-6 April
Various venues across Cambridge

New Writing South Build your social web presence
2, 9 , 16 April
The Writer's Place, 9 New Street, Brighton BN1 1UT

The Sword in the Stone and the Castle of Glass

In my translation of The Sword in the Stone mentioned in previous blogs I pointed out that the stone in which Arthur finds the sword has a special significance.  The sword is described as thrust into an anvil which is in turn contained within a block of nearly transparent stone.  This indicates that it has come from Caer Bannwg, Castle Foursqaure also known as the Turning Castle or the Castle of Glass which is the home of the Celtic Gods.  I suggested that the writer might have had in mind a block of transparent marble but it seems I was wrong.

Although the action in the Sword book nearly all takes place in the Spirit World the topography throughout is of the physical world of the fifth century or earlier.  I had assumed that the Castle of Glass was a figment of a poetic imagination but it seems I was wrong there too.  Just outside Inverness is the vitrified hillfort of Craig Phadrig built by the Picts around the 4th century BC.  It was built of granite but following a great fire which some archaeologists think might have been deliberate the inner and outer walls have vitrified, that is to say they have turned to glass as a result of immense heat.  Furthermore within the fort is a smal tumulus of earth cobtaining a stone at the centre. (T Wallace 1921) 

By the fifth century the Picts were Druids and in the mid-sixth century St Columba is said to have visited this site where he had a bit of a row with the Pictish Archdruid when he tried to persuade them to join the Celtic Church so this is a site which had meaning both for the Picts and for the Christian Druids.  It is still not really known how the stone became vitrified since it would require an intense heat up to 1300 degrees Centrigrade for the stone to turn to glass.  It is not surprising that 800 years on people might have concluded this could only have been the work of the gods but it seems quite possible that although the Castle of Glass itself exists only in the Spirit World (and can indeed move around) the writers of the book were aware of the existence of this physical castle of glass in Scotland.

I can't wait to go and visit.  Details of the site can be found at http://canmore.rchams.gov.uk/en/site/13486/details/craig+phadrig or just google craig phadrig to find a selection of entries.