Monstrum Demonstrare

“I set myself to sing of the madness of the bard of prophecy, an entertaining tale of Merlin. Guide my pen, Robert, glory of the bishops; for we know that Philosophy has filled you with its holy nectar and made you universally learned, so that you might prove yourself the foremost teacher in the world.

Approve, then, my project, and be ready to be more indulgent to this poet than was that other whom you have just succeeded, attaining an honour well-deserved.

Everything conspired to win that honour for you-your principles, your upright way of life, your birth, your fitness for the place: clergy and people alike supported you. That is why lucky Lincoln is now in the seventh heaven.

Indeed, it might well have been yourself whom I would wish to embrace in a noble poem. But I am not the man for it: no, not even if Orpheus and Camerinus and Macer and Marius and Rabirius of the great voice were all to sing through my mouth and the Muses were my accompanists. But, Sisters, you are used to singing with me; so let us to the song before us. Sound the lyre!

Now, many years and many kings had come and gone. Merlin the Briton was famous throughout the world as king and prophet. He was law-giver to the proud South Welsh, and he foretold the future to their leaders.”

http://www.maryjones.us/ctexts/merlini.html

My favorite subject the wild man. This is a universal myth. In Europe the oldest example we have of the tale is from the Scottish borders, which date from the 6th century. The name merlin is a famous one connected of course with Arthur. This construction is realy based on Geofrey of Monmouth who creates the framework for later legends of Arthur and Merlin in his history of Britian, written sometime around 1136 a.d. Geofrey also wrote a seprate book of prophecies and also a later life of Merlin (featured above) which departs from the Arthur Merlin story and returns the wild man much closer to his early British origins.

Gerald of Wales had not been very happy with Geofrey’s book, claiming it was a tissue of lies written under the influence of demons. Gerald also wrote on the subject of the wild man and clearly had knowledge of the Scottish legend contained in the life of Saint Kentigern the Bishop of Glasgow.

This was not a simple literary despute. One of Geralds works that does not survive or was never written was his decleration to have discovered lost prohecies relating to the wild man. Prophecy of course was a very powerfull political weapon. Robert the Bruce had used the prophicies of Lailoken (the scottish name for Merlin) in his wars with the English to strike fear into the hearts of the English armies bowmen (Largly comprised of Welsh bowmen) and as a means of boosting moral in Scotland, preachers carried the tale to the populace. The dispute between Gerald and Geofrey is in part a battle for control of prophecy. Geofrey’s return to more a more traditional version of the legend a means of maintianing credibility in sections of the population where the older story was well known.

It is an extremly popular legend. After Geofries restructuring of the story, the tradition sprang up that their were two Merlins as a means of explaning the discrepency between the two accounts.

Sleepless Thoughts

Does the fact that the Duke of Argyll’s argument is constructed from a range of complex motivating factors make it invalid as a philosophical argument? When it is broken down, the claims, it is based on are not irrational or unreasonable. It has been constructed to address a range of concerns. Identity and belief are only two components but they are significant ones.

But because an idea may be inspired or motivated by a range of issues. The idea is not the same kind of thing. It is drawn from many different kind’s of things. It is the construction of a particular enviroment, but it adapts and transforms.

These are not just claims regarding religion, they are political and concern the perceived ethnos of groups. The pure form of a species in a folk taxonomy. They ask for valid problems to be addressed. Biology in particular still poses a serious question for many peoples identity, it is a threat to the pure soul of  imagined communities; the ethnos. The measure of all other things in such a taxonomy of species or type. These are not irrational responses, the mistake made is that these questions are viewed by both parties as simply a matter of science. If evolution can be defeated then all our problems will be solved. If we simply give a scientifically valid argument then we have answered the question.

This would not appear to be the correct response or the correct answer. These are only one part of a much wider debate.  But the debate in the 1860′s seems to be a very human response to a range of issues.

The questions posed needs a much broader response. It will not remove the biology question that many religious people or post modernist influenced academics hold.  But if questions are understood fully. Responses can be addressed more fully by both parties.

This is not to suggest it is a straight forward matter. But it is one which requires debate and comunication.

Evolving Thoughts; At the Close of the Week

1860′s Britain; Identity in Crisis

Questions

Looking at attitudes to race in Britain in the 1860′s one major question is to what extent the publication of origin of the species fueled this debate? What motivated the Duke of Argyle’s response to Darwin’s views? It seems possible to say that it was not simply a matter of faith. Identity may also have been a key component. From looking at the ‘racial map’ that was perceived to exist at the time in the U.K. it poses the question, how did Victorian society hold together? Was evolution seen as a threat to Gaelic identity along with the views endorsed by people like Robert Knox or institutions like the anthropological society. Was the response to re-draw Gaelic identity, to associated closely with a Germanic culture? Was the philosophical argument constructed by the duke in part motivated by ethnicity and the need to protect an identity.

Gaelic society has long been under great social pressure, the language itself faces serious problems in the contemporary world. Just as it faced a threat to survival from views on race in the 1860′s. The duke as head of the clan had responsibilities for his people and his culture and this was a role he clearly took seriously as he should. In 1860′s Britain no one was able to press the stop button on the race merry-go-round. How central was ethnicity to politics and political influence in the 1860′s?

Clearly one mechanism to ensure order are the Victorian civic responses, not just the town hall and symbols of empire but the clubs and societies from science to sport we see forming Europe wide at this period.It should also be remembered that a sporting club or any other of these institutions could form the focus to discuss any number of issues. In urban centres like Glasgow where Catholic and protestant was not just a religious but a cultural and political division, such groups were set up according to ethnic division as well as those of class. I wonder if the anthropological society of London had a football team?

But these are urban institutions to a large degree. A rural society would require different measures.

One notable similarity in the drawing of Gaelic society as a Germanic using culture, is that it places them in the same ethnic group as the Royal family. We see at this time Queen Victoria and Albert taking great interest and delighting in highland culture. This clearly must have sent out a political message to those with any one of a number of views on Celtic culture. Given the complex maps drawn, they could also be perceived as simply taking an interest in there own cultural heritage it would seem.

The ethnology of 1860′s Scotland is a measure which is partly protecting and preserving  Gaelic culture and seeking to police the boundaries it has drawn? A rational and reasonable political response the problems of the day? Their are clearly no single neat and tidy answers here when we look at this ethnological response or the philosophy which builds on it.

As always these thoughts will have moved on by the end of week 4. The cultural map of Britain at this period is a complex thing. A fast paced merry-go-round of belief and counter belief. Subject to a range of issues form politics, science, philosophy and cultural and social pressure. Yet the fact that these positions could and were debated in the clubs and societies throughout the land, on the soap box of politicians and the houses of Lord’s and Common’s. Britain’s Empire still ran. Wealth flowed into the nation and a civic structure was constructed.

Further ensuring stability.

The Love Sickness of Science?

Love sickness was viewed as a sexual transmitted illness caught by sight. The eye and how it views species is a fascinating subject and seems central to answering many questions of particular interest to me. Just how dependant is logic on what can be seen? What species of image form from words, both written and spoken? It was suggested in one late 17th century Scottish text that this should become a new academic subject.

The study of second sight and the vision of the seer.

I seem to have suffered from love at first sight glancing thorough the pages of this book (link below), which came as a recommendation to read on the subject. The five sense’s seem central to answering a number of outstanding questions I have concerning, magic, words and images and the evolution of ethnology in Scotland from Martin Martin in the late 17th century to the Duke of Argyll and J.F Campbell in the 19th century.

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=EEN4zYEI_nkC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Vanities+of+the+Eye:+Vision+in+Early+Modern+European+Culture&source=bl&ots=EKOioHzG2G&sig=0oMBOI9loTqALi_lJHoDp2Frp8E&hl=en&ei=7kWUS9veNoPw0gSBpYDjDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CAYQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=&f=false

The Five Sense’s

Oral narrative often came under the gaze of official culture. The pulpit was heavily monitored and policed. But oral culture, also provided a gossip system, through which non-officialy sanctioned views could also move. In Scotland traditional culture in the 18th century was perceived as a moral threat.

This was particularly felt by the Gaelic speaking community. English was the language of the schoolroom. Gaelic was viewed as a backward, uneducated language. The attitudes with regard to race (already discussed) and the sheer poverty and hardship of life, endured by many in highlands must have all fed into creating this attitude towards  Gaelic speakers and the Scots in general. I would also serve to reinforce this natural order of things. A Celt would after all still behave as a Celt no matter what culture he found himself born in as Robert Knox suggested. The African slave was discussed in an identical manner by others. Yet the word of mouth and the tongue had long been matters of discussion.

The latin lingua means both word and tongue. It carries with it the sense of the word made flesh and posed questions with regard to sense and logic.

In theology in rhetoric and anatomy its ambivilant nature is a source of much discussion.

http://www.jstor.org/pss/3195467

J.F. Campbell; Words From the Heart

J.F. Campbell undertook Scotland’s first great ethnographic collection influenced by scientific methods, he undertook to collect the material as best he could. Using a network of collectors, they often first listen to the tale and then got the performer to repeat again and transcribe. Given the limitations of technology at the period this is a good method. Performing a tale is a somewhat different process, than having to sit and slowly speak while someone writes. As it’s rather different from the manner in which the individual normal performs you have a higher chance of stumbling and losing the plot line. A collector who has listened carefully to the tale beforehand can act as prompt and aid the process. It’s still not uncommon for people to do this using modern recording methods. People get nervous. Telling a tale to a friend is very different to having a story recorded by an ethnographer.

J.F Campbell’s methods are the practical working methods of someone use to recording material in the field.

The problems surrounding ethnology have been discussed in a previous post. So I can discuss briefly the role of J.F. Campbell the ethnologist. I suspect he was rather a shrewd one. But that is very difficult to determine. Very little has been written about J.F Campbell. He has left a wealth of research diaries, that contain a wealth of material and a fine collection of his art work. But they were written by one of his relatives and the hand-writing is problematic. But it is through proper analysis of these diaries that J.F. Campbell’s true contribution to the subject will be understood.

He outlines part of his method in the Introduction to West Highland tales titled “The Fairy Egg and What Came Out of It.” I think with J.F. Campbell the problem may be not what he is saying but how he is saying it. In order to understand what he is saying you have to confront his use of metaphor. This is not a language of science. Three metaphors seem essential in my view to understanding J.F. Campbell, the fairy egg which is a reference to the mullaca bean, the barnacle goose and the great tree.

The mullaca bean and the tree would seem the two central metaphors. Galton discussed his objections to J.F. Campbell and suggested the tree was a symbol intended to stand in opposition to Darwin’s tree. He also takes exception to Campbell’s use of metaphor in his work. Stating that it makes his definitions unclear and somewhat difficult to grasp. It should be noted that Campbell was almost certainly an expert story-teller himself, his use of metaphor is very sophisticated. To suggest that the tree is simply standing in opposition to Darwin, may be a partial truth. An example of Galton playing the same word games.

J.F Campbell’s mullaca bean looks like it may contain some pretty interesting information, particularly if it can be traced to the indian version of the name. As it throws an immediate link between Scottish folk practise and Indian folk practice. Something that we can suspect J.F. Campbell would be extremely familiar with.

But such is the problem with metaphor. It is not clearly what exactly is being said. It certainly fulfills its role, in sparking the imagination, opening a world of possibilities  and demonstrates the skill with language that oral performers have. But it is never certain. It is not a scientific language, it would appear to be related to a philosophical debate of the period.

Again with J.F. Campbell’s tree as a metaphor for the journey that international tales undertake, the trade routes they follow, the great paths of knowledge along which they travel along with other forms if information. It is a beautiful image. But one that also hints at other things. It’s an uncertain language.

To repeat. It is not what he is saying it is how he is saying it. I’ve spent quite a few years studying the barnacle goose. It is an interesting creature in its own right. The bean and the tree should not take so long. The philosophy of the Duke of Argyll need to be looked at in relation to this use of language.

It is a debate that still continues in Post modernism. It seem’s to be making points with regard to language that are not so far removed from the  Duke of Argyll’s discussions with regard to language and indeed his use of metaphor.

The Anthropolgy Of Robert Knox

Robert Knox, was an outstanding and highly popular lecturer of Anatomy, Charles Darwin among others was one of his students. An outspoken man considered both a radical and an atheist.  He is perhaps best remembered for his involvement in Scotland’s, famous body snatching case. It was Knox who purchased the murder victims of Burke and Hare.

Knox also had some views with regard to race which even by the standards of his day were out of step. He complains about the attitude to his views, a number of times in the text. His perspective on race are not popular but  not utterly out of step with his time.  He was disgraced for his involvement with Burke and Hare, not for his perspective on Anthropology and Ethnology.

He also discusses some of the problems faced by the inquirer into the races of man and his view that a Celt was a Celt in whatever culture he would be found is not uncommon.

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=MeoqAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=robert+knox+the+races+of+man&source=bl&ots=MJcEHgnVh9&sig=N-P99MWWGQnBnQBh6L4P9jXXQr0&hl=en&ei=0-qSS5PSKJf80wT-8cDuDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CA4Q6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=&f=false

Ethnology

Ethnology (from the Greek ἔθνος, ethnos meaning “people, nation, race”) is the branch of anthropology that compares and analyzes the origins, distribution, technology, religion, language, and social structure of the ethnic, racial, and/or national divisions of humanity

Compared to ethnography, the study of single groups through direct contact with the culture, ethnology takes the research that ethnographers have compiled and then compares and contrasts different cultures.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnology

As an undergraduate I read load’s about ethnology, traditionally it has worked in non-historic cultures but its aims are as above defined. It is a study of ethnicity, a comparative subject. What the department of ethnology does in Scotland for the most part is more strictly termed ethnography. The study of a single group. Both ethnology and ethnography have traditionally studied non-historical  oral cultures. The ethnography of my former department keeps to that tradition and focuses on the oral tradition of a rural peasant society, oral, urban ethnology or the ethnography of religious groups.

Orality is a crucial and understated aspect of any culture but when dealing with historical societies that also have a written tradition, there is a relationship between orality and text.

This was the basis of my research, but I also wanted to study the history of my subject, its foundations and the collectors. After four years in the department I felt I still knew little about the subject. It has no written history or indeed much in the way of methodology. I wanted to understand my subject.

I do not think an ethnology or ethnography of a historic culture can be understood if it only focuses on a particular class and excludes the middle classes; in the Victorian period the middle classes  had a particular and distinct form of oral story telling in Scotland. But they were also the consumers and users of written collections of folktales. These were being used for entertainment, religious, moral instruction and in the creation of an ethnic identity.

The relationship between the collector of tales and the construction of national identity is part of the story. The collector does not stand outside and apart of the subject.

Some material was not recorded empirically it was either written and tidied up so it was presentable for a middle class book buying public or it was written by the collector, a part of his ethnicity he wanted to share.

But the term Fakelore is I think wrongly used to discusses these matters. That suggests that ethnology is only of the folk. The pure voice of an oral peasant culture that dates far back in time. That may be true of some stories and myths but there is a relationship with text, other groups use such markers as well, it is to be suggested.

It is still a pure voice but it is the voice of all the folk and not just one group. I don’t think fakelore exists.

I was always tought to understand that J.F. Campbell was the first proper empirical ethnologists. He was the first to collect a mass of material using collectors to write down tales from performers, as they were spoken and in full. But from spending a few weeks on the subject it would seem that J.F. Campbell is the first ethnographer and the Duke of Argyll may be the first ethnologist in Scotland using the material. The subject is not taught in this manner. I only became aware of the Dukes discussions a few weeks ago.

Both the Duke and J.F. Campbell had a deep belief in religion, this is to be expected in Gaelic culture. Indeed most oral tales come from very religious communities and that is reflected in the tales. They are beautiful things.

What does need to be questioned is not the Dukes and J.F. Campbell’s religious beliefs but their methods of enquiry. They are typical of the time. J.F. Campbell certainly views the tales as a tool to understand the races of man. Each race has its own separate culture. Gaelic tales are distinct form Lowland Scottish tales as they are part of a separate race with their own culture.

Race is understood to reflect biological difference. The Gaelic people are related to Scandinavia and thence the germanic people. This forms the cultural complex and allows this race to be traced back through time.

Lowland scot stems from one other branch of the celts, a dark-skinned race, whose name seems to derive from the term melancholia. As do the Welsh. But as there is also Anglo-Saxon settlement this forms one more biologically distinct people. Then there are the Norman’s the french settlers, mostly members of the aristocracy. Robert Knox (who will be breifly disscused in the next post) the Scottish surgeon who wrote a book on the Races of Man considered the house of parliament to be a Norman French institution. perhaps surprisingly given his nationality he considered the Celts to be a lower race (he thought he was Germanic).

Race is a complex thing in 1860′s Britain.

if we look down south at the Anthropological society, the despised the Celtic people considering them a lower from of life. This would appear to be the problem, it is not just that they perceive a difference in ethnicity, it’s the moral value they attach to it. J.F Campbell mentions the existence of an anti Celtic society in London. He probably as the duke certainly appears to have done that men should be treated as equals.

But that does not mean they are equals. The abolition of slavery did not mean the slave was equal to his master, it meant his master escaped the shame of holding someone in bondage. Darwin and Huxley appear to have exactly the same views. They all considered that races existed and believed their was a moral hierarchy (I suspect with their own ethnic group considered to be the top of the pile).

The methods are the same but in practice as people belong to different ethnic groups the perspectives are very different. Yet this is the high point of Empire and national identity.

These beliefs with regard to race are not drawn from evolution or from religion. Indeed despite the differences this is one aspect where science and religion do agree. Humanity stems from the same origin. The difference lies in what that origin is.

Both religion and evolution should have allowed such perspectives to be rejected. But they were not. When the theory of evolution became public knowledge. It did not matter what side of the argument you took, the origin of man was a big item of discussion.

Yet still these contradictions to both systems remained in place and were held across the middle classes regardless of political or religious perspective.

The Duke of Argyll may be trying to trace back the races of man in a bid to prove evolution wrong. But his methods are not drawn form his religious perspectives. This was the commonly perceived attitude of society. Of political and academic institutions as well. It was the way the world was thought to be composed, this was believed to be what Ethnology was. The duke also made other philosophical arguments that are still live today and are at the moment a subject of debate in the philosophy of science. The views of the Duke on ethnology (and I have not fulled studied them yet) do not affect his views in other matters of Philosophy.It is to be suspected that his views on this subject were little different from most others of his class, and in comparison to some, by the standards of the day distinctly compassionate

We must judge Victorian society by the standards of the time and not our own.

This was not a correct perspective. Ethnology is not matter of biological difference it is one of culture. ethnology is the study of different ethnic groups and their culture. These cultures also share much material between each other. The lines between them were never a sharply drawn as they were in 1860.

Does the fact that the Duke of Argyll and J.F. Campbell were men of deep Christian faith bring Ethnology to its knees or the fact they seem to have held the standard views on these issues that were held by ethnologists and anthropologists throughout Europe?

No, one thing it suggest’s is that the subject should be a rewarding one for people of faith. They will find the tales rewarding things. That is as it should be. But they are a thing for all people, and hold much value in understanding how culture is formed and interacts. Many of the tales are international legends, known throughout the world.

But our history and the tales  belong to the world and not just to Scotland, the history that surrounds them must be told as accurately as it can. I have only begun to look at this area. Much work needs to be done.

The history of the study of ethnology in Europe is a difficult subject to deal with. The way it was understood in the past must be understood but that does not mean making demons out of those in the past.

It makes history more understandable and separates it from myth.

Ethnology in Mid Victorian Britian.

I won’t be make any further post for a while but I would like to say a couple of things. I study ethnology which is an examination of ethnicity. In Britain in 1860 ethnicity would have been termed race. Many Ethnology books bear the same name or a variation, On the Races of Man. By modern standards many of these texts could be considered racist.

I was quite explicit about the fact that I am just reading these texts for the first time. I am gathering a bibliography. I common and standard academic approach used at the start of any academic project, before research begins. The comments were provisional a first impression. these perspectives on race seem to be held across the social and political perspective. No group is exempt.

They are attitudes that are not acceptable to-day but the culture examined is not a contemporary one.

La Pratique Du Theatre

First Flower of Modernisim

The Dramatic Rules

OF ANTIENT AND MODERN TRAGEDY

“The Gods and Goddesses amongst the Antients brought about every thing that was great and extraordinary upon the Theatre, either by their Hatred or their Friendship; by their Revenge, or by their Protection; and among so many supernatural things, nothing appear’d fabulous to the People, who believ’d there pass’d a familiar correspondence between Gods and Men. Their Gods, generally speaking, acted by human Passions: their men undertook nothing without the Counsel of their Gods; and executed nothing without their Assistance. Thus in this mixture of the Divinity and Humanity, there was nothing which was not credible. But all these wonders are downright Romance to us, at this time of day. The Gods are wanting to us, and we are wanting to the Gods; and if, in imitation of the Antients, an Author would introduce Angels and Saints upon our Stage, the devouter sort of people would be offended at it, and look on him as a profane person; and the Libertines wou’d certainly think him weak. Our Preachers wou’d by no means suffer a confusion of the Pulpit and Theatre; or that the People should go and learn those matters from the mouth of Comedians, which themselves deliver in their Churches, with authority to the whole People.”

Charles de Saint Evremond, 1672

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Of_Antient_and_Modern_Tragedy

Modernisim was far from just a scientific matter it was also a creature of art.