The Angles and Pope Gregory I
From Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angles
Now I believe the Angles and their region, which is called Angeln, are the source of the names England and English. Nevertheless, the Angles supposedly had an unusual appearance which Pope Gregory I thought was angelic. This makes me wonder. What did the Angles look like?
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"You have a responsibility to consider all sides of a problem and a responsibility to make a judgment and a responsibility to care for all involved." --Ian Danskin
According to this, their unusual appearance was due to their blond hair and blue eyes:
http://www.lookandlearn.com/blog/25603/ ... r-heights/
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"You have a responsibility to consider all sides of a problem and a responsibility to make a judgment and a responsibility to care for all involved." --Ian Danskin
The Angles were a Germanic ethnic group who migrated to England with some of the Saxons--hence, "Anglo-Saxon." The migrations seemed to have started around AD 450 or so. Ironically, they became Christianized somewhat later than the Celts in Ireland.
It does seem as if "England" derives from the "Angles."
The Angles probably just looked like modern Brits, and modern Dutch, and modern Germans, and most generic north Europeans.
The Pope Gregory was an Italian Roman used to seeing olive skinned Mediterraneans. Germanic, and Celtic, people from northern europe from beyond the Alps were all exotic specimens to him - with their flaxen hair and blues eyes,and fair skin. So he considered that foreign fair look to be "angelic".
The sport of fishing today is also called "angling". It derives from the Old English word "angle" which meant "hook" (or anything bent) before it morphed into the modern meaning of a geometric type angle.
The north sea coast of modern Germany bends as it forms the peninsula of Jutland. The ancient Germanic tribe who lived at that bend (or Angle) came to be called the "people of the Angle"- or just the "Angles".
When the Roman empire finally retreated from Britain the barbarians tribes of the coast of Germania invaded and drove the Celtic Britons out of most of south east Britain. These invading Germanic tribes being the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes.
Which is why place names in that part of the UK have names like "East Anglia", and "Wessex"(West Saxon). Eventually south east Britain came to known as "la Angleterre" (the land of the Angels), and finnally as "England".
http://www.lookandlearn.com/blog/25603/ ... r-heights/
Perhaps it was more a pun than anything else? According to that article pope Gregory had been to Britain before for missionary work, so he had probably seen people of the northern parts of Europe before.
The Dutch word for England is Engeland, and the word for angel is engel, I always wondered if there was some connection, but it's just based on the Angles.
Anyway, the Angles, Saxons, and Frisians were likely closely related people, they were neighbours speaking very closely related languages (the Anglo-Frisian languages, of which today only English, Scots and Frisian are left as far as I know).
They would likely have looked like the Danes and Germans, Europeans look sort of similar anyway.
This was in ancient times. Late Roman Empire times when slavery was still the norm and slave labor was the foundation of the economy.
But yeah- of that context the story does sound kind of strange to modern ears.
Judging from what I've read lately, it now seems creepy as all hell. That's what we today call "fetishizing" someone for their race or ethnicity.
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"You have a responsibility to consider all sides of a problem and a responsibility to make a judgment and a responsibility to care for all involved." --Ian Danskin
...Thank you . Interesting .
My understanding was that the physical land , what is now England , was Christian early on , as a Roman Empire part - Wales and Ireland followed later .
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angles
Now I believe the Angles and their region, which is called Angeln, are the source of the names England and English. Nevertheless, the Angles supposedly had an unusual appearance which Pope Gregory I thought was angelic. This makes me wonder. What did the Angles look like?
_________________
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