Hello Mr. Cornwell,
I first discovered your work with "The Archer's Tale" and have recently read "The Last Kingdom." They are both on my short list of best historical fiction I have ever read! Recently though the briefly mentioned sceadugenga in "The Last Kingdom" has captured my interest. I did a little research and found the brief mention in Beowulf, but couldn't find any other sources for them. Outside of a few wiki pages that cite nothing, I couldn't find any reliable ties to Anglo-Saxon mythology outside of Beowulf. I've been meaning to look into more Anglo-Saxon, Celtic, and Germanic mythology anyway, so if you could point me to some more sources on the Sceadugenga in mythology, or just some good sources on what the ancient Britons thought dwelt in the woods and went bump in the night, that would be great. I was very impressed with your ability to weave the mythology of people groups into representing their cultures in a rich way, so I hope you might have some good sources for a look into old European mythology and stories.
Thanks!
Jonathan
I’m fairly sure I found the ‘shadow-walker’ in Beowulf too! And that’s a pretty good source. I don’t know of any other offhand . . . though it was so long ago that I don’t remember exactly where I found it, though I do remember that my old Anglo-Saxon tutor from college days reproved me for getting the tense wrong. As for European mythology, where do you start? There is so much, and so much under the radar, and how far do you go back? The Celtic World, edited by Miranda Green, is useful, but that may be too far back. The sagas, obviously. Much of the magic and superstition lingered far longer than we suppose, which makes a book like Religion and the Decline of Magic by Keith Thomas so useful, but most of the material comes from forty years of reading and jotting notes into a book – literally hundreds of books.