37 studies of the adoption of Christianity across northern Europe over 1000 years, and the diverse reasons that drove the process.

37 studies of the adoption of Christianity across northern Europe over 1000 years, and the diverse reasons that drove the process.

In Europe, the cross went north and east as the centuries unrolled: from the Dingle Peninsula to Estonia, and from the Alps to Lapland, ranging in time from Roman Britain and Gaul in the third and fourth centuries to the conversion of peoples in the Baltic area a thousand years later. These episodes of conversion form the basic narrative here. History encourages the belief that the adoption of Christianity was somehow irresistible, but specialists show theunderside of the process by turning the spotlight from the missionaries, who recorded their triumphs, to the converted, exploring their local situations and motives. What were the reactions of the northern peoples to the Christian message? Why would they wish to adopt it for the sake of its alliances? In what way did they adapt the Christian ethos and infrastructure to suit their own community? How did conversion affect the status of farmers, of smiths, of princes and of women? Was society wholly changed, or only in marginal matters of devotion and superstition? These are the issues discussed here by thirty-eight experts from across northern Europe; some answers come from astute re-readings of the texts alone, but most are owed to a combination of history, art history and archaeology working together.
MARTIN CARVER is Professor of Archaeology, University of York.

Introduction: Northern Europeans negotiate their future - and
The Politics of Conversion in North Central Europe - Przemyslaw Urbanczyk
'How do you pray to God?' Fragmentation and Variety in early Medieval Christianity [with Philippa Patrick]
'How do you pray to God?' Fragmentation and Variety in early Medieval Christianity [with Aleks Pluskowski] - Philippa Patrick
Processes of Conversion in north-west Roman Gaul - Susan Pearce
Where are the Christians? Late Roman Cemeteries in Britain - Christopher Sparey-Green
Votive Hoards in Late Roman Britain: Pagan or Christian? - David Petts
Basilicas and Barrows: Christian origins in Wales and Western Britain - Jeremy Knight
Archaeology and early church organisation on Iveragh and Dingle, Ireland - Tomas O'Carragain
Romanitas and Realpolitik in Cogitosus' description of the Church of St Brigit, Kildare - Carol Neuman de Vegvar
Making a Christian Landscape: Early Medieval Cornwall - Sam Turner
Early medieval Parish formation in Dumfries and Galloway (Scotland) - Chris Crowe
Christian and Pagan Practice during the Conversion of Viking Age Orkney and Shetland - James Barrett
Pagan and Christian Anglo-Saxon attitudes to the dead - Audrey Meaney
The acceptance of Christianity at the Anglo-Saxon Royal courts - Barbara Yorke
The control of Burial Practice in Ango-Saxon England - Helen Geake
The straight and narrow way: Fenland causeways and the conversion of the landscape in the Witham Valley, Lincolnshire [with Paul Everson]Everson] - David Stocker
The straight and narrow way: Fenland causeways and the conversion of the landscape in the Witham Valley, Lincolnshire [with David Stocker]Stocker] - Paul Everson
Three Ages of Conversion at Kirkdale, Yorkshire [with Lorna Watts] - Philip Rahtz
Three Ages of Conversion at Kirkdale, Yorkshire [with Philip Rahtz] - Lorna Watts
Streanaeshalch, Strensall and Whitby: locating a pivotal council [with L A S Butler and C J Dunn] - Paul S Barnwell
Streanaeshalch, Strensall and Whitby: locating a pivotal council [with P S Barnwell and C J Dunn] - Lawrence Butler
Design and Meaning in Early Medieval Inscriptions in Britain and Ireland - John Higgitt
Spaces between words: word separation in Anglo-Saxon inscriptions - Elisabeth Okasha
Sacraments in Stone: the mysteries of Christ in Anglo-Saxon Sculpture - Jane Hawkes
Alcuin's Narratives of Evangelism: the life of St Willibrord and the Northumbrian hagiographical tradition - Kate Rambridge
Pagans and Christians at a frontier: Viking burial in the Danelaw - Julian Richards
The body of St Aethelthryth: desire, conversion and reform in Anglo-Saxon England - Catherine E. Karkov
From a late Roman Cemetery to the basilica sanctorum Cassii et Florentii in Bonn, Germany - Christoph Keller
The Cross goes north: from Late Antiquity to Merovingian times south and north of the Alps - Volker Bierbrauer
The Cross goes North: Carolingian times between Rhine and Elbe - Michael Muller-Wille
The Cross goes North: Christian symbols and Scandinavian women - Jorn Staecker
The role of Scandinavian women in Christianisation - the neglected evidence - Anne-Sofie Graslund
Runestones and the Conversion of Sweden - Linn Lager
Christianity as Power, economy and ethnicity in early Medieval Jamtland, mid Sweden - Stig Welinder
The Scandinavian Animal Styles in Response to Mediterranean and Christian Narrative Art - Nancy L. Wicker
The role of secular rulers in the conversion of Sweden - Alexandra Sanmark
Byzantine influence in the Baltic Region? - Per Beskow
St Botulph in Scandinavia - John Toy
Christianisation of Estonia: a process of double-faith and synchretism - Heiki Valk