Online Archive of University of Virginia Scholarship
"Prepared with great craftiness": St. Magnus Cathedral, Rǫgnvaldr Kali Kolsson, and Orkney’s Autonomy in the Medieval North Sea World1060 views
Author
Grayburn, Jennifer, History of Art and Architecture - Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, University of Virginia
Advisors
Reilly, Lisa, Department of Architectural History, University of Virginia
Abstract
This project reevaluates the political position of the Earldom of Orkney within the medieval North Sea world by tracing aesthetic and cultural links between St. Magnus Cathedral and churches in England, Scotland, and Norway. The cathedral does not represent national subjugation and cultural dependency as previously assumed; rather, the cathedral and its iconography in Orkneyinga saga embed the Norse earls within patronage and narrative trends of foreign and Biblical kings to make a final, if ultimately unsuccessful, claim for Orcadian autonomy.
Degree
PHD (Doctor of Philosophy)
Keywords
architecture; medieval; Orkney; Icelandic sagas
Language
English
Rights
All rights reserved (no additional license for public reuse)
Grayburn, Jennifer. "Prepared with great craftiness": St. Magnus Cathedral, Rǫgnvaldr Kali Kolsson, and Orkney’s Autonomy in the Medieval North Sea World. University of Virginia, History of Art and Architecture - Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, PHD (Doctor of Philosophy), 2016-04-26, https://doi.org/10.18130/V3RW03.
