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Scops in Anglo-Saxon Culture
9
Scops
What remains of the scops?
Not much.
Eric Luke
There's some lyres and whistles in museums, but because of the absence of written language, almost nothing remains of what they truly were.
What happened to the scops?
Many experts don't agree on why
scops disappeared. Some believed that the personal tastes of the people were changing,
while some believed that the influence of the 'humility' of Christianity downplayed the
showoff-y tone of the scops.
What role did scops play in war?
What might they have
sounded like?
What instruments did they play?
The scop fulfilled many roles in an Anglo Saxon tribe. Among those functions were:
court singer
tribal historian
genealogist
teacher
composer
critic
warrior
traveler and reporter
Scops were ancient performers.
However, they did not perform for pleasure; they performed to inform and to spread news.
Scops performed in the
mead-halls of great kings
and chieftans. These are not
the mead-halls we know of
today, though- these were filled
with the rich and powerful and were the places where business contracts and marriages took place.
What are scops?
http://youtu.be/QHA5SvmJyJM?t=3m48s
In modern-day America, a scop would be comparable to a librarian/teacher/musician/propagandist with very high status.
What do they do?
When scops sang or
told stories, they spoke
of war and of the
trials and triumphs
of various heroes. These
stories were meant to
inspire and to encourage
those who were listening to go out
and fight new battles and make
their people proud.
photo (cc) Malte Sörensen @ flickr