One of the best films that I remember from my childhood and that thrilled me
on a Saturday night was 'the Vikings' with Kirk Douglas and we also share a facial
characteristic! I'm here today at the Ancient Technology Centre to find out
more about the Vikings and the Dark Ages.
Here I am in a Grubenhaus with a Saxon man his name is Cana but for today
is gonna be known as Mark, so Mark can you tell us what you're doing here?
I'm just preparing my tools ready to do a little bit of leather work, I've got
some goat hide here which I'm going to make into a small pouch as a leather
worker I'd have been responsible for all sorts of things from shoes, tonging parts
of clothing pouches. And shields? Shields of course, sword scabbards. Leather was
a very important material back then and probably very expensive more so than
today. Okay so tell me about the social implications of being a leather worker
would you have been able to move up the ranks and become an important
person? Would you have ever become rich? Probably highly unlikely to have become rich,
but you would have made a living, you would have been an important craftsman,
almost certainly a free person not a slave. Okay so it's interesting you've
just mentioned slaves there ,were slaves still prevalent in the Saxon period then?
Yes yes they were, you had slaves you had various layers of society, so you'd have slaves at
the bottom, then free men working their way up to what we'd call lords and royalty.
How do you feel about the fact that now it's considered that the Dark
Ages describes a period in time post the Roman age where we regressed as a society?
I suppose I'd use something physical. Okay. I'd bring out something which as a leather
worker I could make belts and pouches like this and on the leather work could
be a buckle like this and this is an actual replica of one that was found in
Wiltshire not too far from here, this is early Saxon and this buckle is bronze,
all of this work for a belt buckle. Yeah. Is that dark age? Is that regressive? I
mean it's it's intricate it's absolutely stunning stunning isn't it really. So
yeah so so you're saying that no that's not something that you'd agree with then,
but it was a regressive period. I think they were amazing craftsmen in their
own rights and Dark Ages maybe something you say nowadays.
today we'll be cooking some honey flatbreads actually it's quite seasonal
because I'd be using a bit of cream bit of eggs bit of milk, everything that is
really summery let's say. That sounds quite rich is this the sort of thing that they
would have eaten the dark ages then? You certainly had it, you can make it you
have so many different recipes but since since you have basically wheat flour,
eggs, honey bit of water, or bit of milk and anything you'd like on it, you can
even make a sort of jam with some plums or apples that you stew or berries
actually. First thing, you have a nice wooden trough and you put some flour in,
that's really the basics, after that you break I'd say two eggs, I'm not very very
good at proportions but you add a bit of flour if you need more extra, pinch of
salt somebody told me that it actually makes the egg yolks work separate better
I have no idea I could use my whisk you actually have still traditionally in
Sweden whisks made with silver birch twigs or things like that,
they are absolutely fantastic, you see it works really well and after that Hayley
I'm not certain if you yourself want to take part in it, would you like to put
some.. really? Well I'll add some honey and maybe use the spatula first and after
that I promise you you can get your hands dirty not to worry, just stirring
it a bit. Even I can do this Caroline. Ah brilliant, white flour like that
especially pure wheat white flour was really expensive so I consider them in
this form as a treat, very expensive flour quite a lot of honey even if it's
not that expensive it's still taking from another recipe from that you will,
making Mead definitely, so that's quite all right and if you want to make
it richer or a bit more expensive you use the cream, you use the milk,
these products are seasonal so you are meant to keep them and really use them
to make salted butter and hard cheese to have dairy food throughout the winter. We
always have the idea for example for the Vikings that they are travelling long
distances, well if you are a merchant or traveling distances you have to have
food, you have to cook it yourself, there's a lot of men cooking their
dinners over the open fire in the wild. This is looking a bit sticky, yes, I might
add a bit of flour, bear with me Hayley, actually that's really good
notions of baking and making bread. Okay that is really good, okay yeah that's a
lovely consistency and as you said it's not sticky anymore, you mix it really
well look at that, oh I'm impressed. So what I do is I take a bit of it you
turn it into a little ball, and you flatten it with the palm of your hand, yeah
now you can stop there but I want them to cook fairly quickly,
yeah so instead you can use your fingers to elongate it, really make it thinner,
and bigger, something like that, so feel free to have a go now your hands
are full of flour anyway, and if it gets sticky you add a bit of flour on your
hands that's it. So now we can put them on the skillet,
which is just over the fire and I put a bit of butter on it you go see it's not
very very hot so once they will be on, I'll just put them right over the embers
and I can see the butter bubble, this will be a bit of a thicker one but there's cheese
in it so nobody will find really. This is what I love about cooking is the fact
you get satisfaction out of seeing your friends and family eat afterwards don't
you? Yes definitely. They're looking ready then Caroline? Well actually yes they do.
It's really it's really hot
fire, so you can have, I use a skillet like
that because of practicality you would use a skillet is quite it's just a
frying pan with a long handle these are my favourite but my blacksmith is
laid for the moment, here you go so instead of having the door he go you
can you can even take the knife and cut them to see they're ready, and so these
are definitely looking like mine if I'm honest. Yeah do I try my own? do I risk it?
Yes, okay look and there's always something
good with it. Yeah that looks done, you can add some
honey or honey cream, oh yes even on the on the cakes themselves, honey makes
everything better, they might be hot won't they probably really hot actually.
Let's see if the cheese one worked. Oh that looks okay, that would go with
cheese as well wouldn't it? Yes oh and yeah that's really really tasty thank
you so much you've got a few volunteers I think they might want to have a taste.
Okay well here you goods is cheese one so if you ever want to have a taste
she's one that's really hot though but you see just that the cheese melted in the
middle but uh that's my favourite really. Oh that is my favourite that's lovely,
thank you all right thank you so much you're very welcome.
Well, I had another wonderful day here at the Ancient Technology Centre and I think
I've made some friends.... Oh ey up!
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