A United Europe of Things: Similarities and Differences in Small Finds across Later Medieval Europe

Summary

This is an abstract from the "New Work in Medieval Archaeology, Part 2: Crossing Boundaries, Materialities, and Identities" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The idea of “unity of culture” in medieval Latin Europe is well known in historical texts, especially when it concerns the so-called “Europe north of the Alps.” Scholars have often suggested that due to long-distance trade, widespread knowledge of Latin, and shared religious ideas, we can observe cultural similarities throughout late medieval Europe. For the past five years, we have been testing the extent to which this bold statement is true in terms of the “unity” of material culture, especially small finds, by holding sessions at the annual conference of the European Association of Archaeologists. The results led to an overview publication and the creation of the European Medieval Finds Network focused on supporting research on small finds going beyond the usual national and regional limits. In this presentation, I intend to discuss the opportunities and challenges of studying this group of specific medieval artifacts from the pan-European perspective on an example of later medieval dress accessories (thirteenth–sixteenth centuries). This specific group of artifacts illustrates how innovations in production technology correlate with social change and can be traced in archaeological material across the whole continent.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• New Work in Medieval Archaeology, Part 2: Crossing Boundaries, Materialities, and Identities   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 38741.0