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| Harold I |
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| Eric Bloodaxe (c. 910-954), |
King of Norway (c. 933-935) |
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| Eric Bloodaxe (c. 910-954), King of Norway (c. 933-935)
and the last Viking king of York (947-948 and 952-954). He was the
favourite son of Harold I of Norway. Eric seems to have had considerable
authority during the last years of his father, who abdicated in his
favour; his killing of his brothers and rivals won him the nickname
“Bloodaxe”. Dethroned and expelled from Norway in 935 by
his half-brother Håkon I because of his misrule, Eric led a
complicated career as a wandering adventurer that culminated at York,
where he gained power in 947. Defeated by Eadred in 948, he was replaced
in York by Olaf Sihtricson, Viking king of Dublin. In 952 he regained
power at York, but was defeated by the English and, betrayed by his
own associates, he was killed at Stainmore in 954. He left a great
reputation in Scandinavia for both courage and cruelty, and is remembered
as the last independent ruler at York.. |
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| 914. A sharp naval engagement (Ware Antiq.) happened
near the isle of Man between Barred and Reginald Mac-Yvor, two Danes,
(the latter of whom was king of Dublin) Reginald obtained the victory,
and slew Barred, and a great number of his party. |
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| 916. (Carad of Lhancarvan). The Ostmen of Dublin made
an expedition into the island of Anglesey in Wales, and wasted it
from end to end with fire and sword. |
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| 919. Was memorable (Ware.) for a sharp battle fought
between Neill Glundub, king of Ireland, and the Ostmen, near Dublin,
on the 15th of September, in which king Neill and a great number of
the principal officers of his army were slain. Donat Mac-Flan O-Melaghlin
succeeded him, and the year following revenged his predecessor's death
by the greatest slaughter of the Danes that ever before happened in
Ireland insomuch, that scarce one half of their great army escaped
(Mac-Geoghagan's Annals, MS). |
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| Dundalk at its head. The bay was the scene of fighting
between the Irish and the Vikings in the 10th century: in 929 Muirchertach,
King of Aileach, captured a Norse fleet; a few years later, Cellachan,
King of Munster, was rescued from Vikings here after a naval battle |
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| 940 Olaf Godfreyson, a Viking ruler of Dublin,
seized the territory of Northumbria in northern England and extended
his rule as far south as Leicester. |
Olaf's death in 941, |
| A. D. 944. (War. Antiq. c. 24) Congelach Mae-Maelith,
king of Ireland, by the assistance of Brien, king of Leinster, assaulted,
took, plundered and burned Dublin having slain (as it is said) 4,000
Ostmen there, and put the remainder of them, with their king Blacar
to flight |
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| King Harold III Hard Ruler |
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| Olaf III, The Quiet (died 1093) Olaf brought the Norse
fleet to Norway after his father was defeated and killed at the Battle
of Stamford Bridge He ruled jointly with his brother Magnus II Barefoot
from 1066 to 1069, and after the death of his brother he ruled alone.
His reign was noted for peace and for the continued Christianization
of Norway |
King of Norway (1066-1093), |
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article
Abelard, Peter (1079-c. 1142), French philosopher and theologian, whose
fame as a teacher made him one of the most celebrated figures of the 12th
century. Born in Le Pallet, Brittany, Abelard left home to study at Loches
with the French nominalist philosopher Roscelin and later in Paris with
the French realist philosopher William of Champeaux. Critical of his masters,
Abelard began to teach at Melun, at Corbeil, and, in 1108, at Paris. He
soon gained fame throughout Europe as a teacher and as an original thinker.
In 1117 he became tutor to Héloïse, the niece of Fulbert,
a canon of the Cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris.
Héloïse and Abelard fell in love, and she gave birth to a
son whom they named Astrolabe. At Abelard’s insistence they were
married secretly; he persuaded Héloïse to take holy vows at
the Benedictine Abbey of Saint-Argenteuil. Her uncle Fulbert, at first
enraged by the relationship between the two and later somewhat placated
by their marriage, finally decided, however, that Abelard had abandoned
Héloïse at the abbey and had him castrated. The couple then
separated: Héloïse joined an order of nuns, while Abelard
retired to a religious retreat, the Abbey of Saint-Denis-en-France, in
Paris.
Abelard’s first published work, a treatise on the Trinity (1121),
was condemned and ordered to be burnt by a Roman Catholic council that
met at Soissons in the same year. Forced by criticism to leave Saint-Denis-en-France,
Abelard founded a chapel and oratory, called the Paraclete, at Nogent-sur-Seine.
In 1125 he was elected abbot of the monastery at Saint-Gildas-de-Rhuis,
where he wrote his autobiographical Historia Calamitatum (History of Misfortunes,
1132). At this time the famous exchange of letters with Héloïse
began, letters that have become classics of romantic correspondence. In
1140 St Bernard of Clairvaux, an eminent French ecclesiastic who thought
Abelard’s influence dangerous, prevailed upon a Roman Catholic council
in session at Sens, and upon Pope Innocent II, to condemn Abelard for
his sceptical, rationalistic writings and teaching. On his way to Rome
to appeal against the condemnation, Abelard accepted the hospitality of
Peter the Venerable, abbot of the Abbey of Cluny, remaining there for
many months. Abelard died at a Clunist priory near Chalon-sur-Saône.
His body was taken to the Paraclete; when Héloïse died in
1164 she was buried beside him. In 1817 both bodies were moved to a single
tomb in the cemetery of Père Lachaise in Paris.
The romantic appeal of the life of Abelard often overshadows the importance
of his thought. He was, however, one of the leading thinkers of the Middle
Ages. In the emphasis he placed on dialectical discussion, Abelard followed
the 9th-century philosopher and theologian John Scotus Erigena, and he
foreshadowed the Italian Scholastic philosopher Thomas Aquinas. Abelard’s
important dialectical thesis that truth must be attained by carefully
weighing all sides of any issue is presented in Sic et Non (Thus and Otherwise,
c. 1123). He also foreshadowed the later theological reliance on the works
of Aristotle, rather than on those of Plato.
Abelard reacted strongly against the theories of extreme realism, denying
that universals have an independent existence outside the mind. According
to Abelard, “universal” is a functional word expressing the
combined image of that word’s common associations within the mind.
This position is not nominalism, because Abelard adds that the associations
from which the image is formed and to which a universal name is given
have a certain likeness, or common nature. His theory is a definite step
towards the moderate realism of Aquinas, but it lacks an explanation of
how ideas are formed. In the development of ethics, Abelard’s great
contribution was to maintain that an act is to be judged by the intention
of the doer in doing it.
In addition to the writings mentioned, Abelard wrote many works in Latin
on ethics, theology, and dialectics, as well as poetry and hymns.
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