- Here’s a new journal paper by myself and Magnus Green about a lovely yet obscure category of Regency era metalwork from Sweden and Norway. It’s my first contribution to post-1789 archaeology.
- In the first Brother Cadfael mystery by Ellis Peters (1977), a Welsh serf describes a Norman lord as being “feudal”. Welsh inequality is idealised. Otherwise a fine depiction of the 12th century.
- My new art project is to organise a conference on transhumance livestock rearing in the same venue and at the same time as a conference on transhumanism.
- Looking forward to the Stockholm Film Festival. Most of all to watching Saloum: “Propulsively lurching with infectious glee from crime drama to modern-day Western to horror suffused with supernatural elements, this may turn out to be the rare African film that enters the international mainstream, or, at the very least, achieves cult movie status.”
- Here’s my new paper about where and why certain types of gold torc and arm ring also occur in silver and bronze during the Roman Period.
- I learned something sad about a friend who died a few years back. He was convinced that Swedish society was falling apart, and that it was the Muslims’ fault. He was so anxious about this that it kept him from sleeping. Must have been reading alt-right web sites and forums. I can report that the many Muslims in my area are in fact quite keen to keep society from falling apart.
- Cycling shock this morning. I overtook a pedestrian, rang my bell, swerved out to leave space between us when I passed her — and she gave off a loud, shrill, horror-movie steamwhistle scream. Maybe she was wearing earbuds?
- “To survive in this fascist police state, he thought, you gotta always be able to come up with a name, your name. At all times. That’s the first sign they look for that you’re wired, not being able to figure out who the hell you are.” P.K. Dick 1977, A Scanner Darkly, ch. 1
- We’ve let loose 25-30 detectorists at three sites in Glanshammar parish selected for completely different archaeological reasons. All have proved to be thinly sprinkled with 9/10th century dirham coins from the Caliphate, which was not among the reasons that we chose the sites. I’m starting to wonder if all of agricultural Sweden is covered by a single cloud of thinly sprinkled dirham coins, which is only visible if you have either 25 detectorists or extreme patience.
Aardvarchaeology - by Dr. Martin Rundkvist 
It just occurred to me that “glans” reads very differently in Swedish and English. For the latter, the hammer association sounds… painful.
As for the coins, it vaguely feels (to me) that they should be denser in areas that tended to have more trade south/east than west? But, I am definitely a layman here.
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Its just the Classical Latin word for “acorn” or “sling bullet”! Next you are going to tell me that the Latin word for “ring” means something naughty.
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And in Swedish, it is a word that means (roughly) the same as “gloss / glossy”.
As for latin rings, I will just point out that “millennium” and “millenium” mean very very different things.
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A company selling hemorrhoid medicine wanted to use Johnny Cash’s “Ring of Fire” for a television commercial, but his estate refused.
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There’s a Tabasco sauce analogue with that brand name!
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There is a Western Australian hot sauce with the brand name Shit The Bed, which has become a huge best seller in the USA. A local woman in a rural town literally started making the stuff in small batches in her own kitchen, and now she is very wealthy.
There really is no accounting for taste. If the prospect of consuming something will result in you shitting in bed is a big selling point, I give up trying to understand a large sector of humans.
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Australian culinary names are great, such as Two Dogs.
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