Bücher von H. Munro Chadwick

In this 1907 work, H. Munro Chadwick (1870-1947) re-examines the early history of the English nation from a new perspective. By training a philologist, he uses the tools of ethnology, history, tradition, language, customs, religion and archaeology, to understand how the various Germanic tribes established themselves in Britain, founding new kingdoms. Despite an almost total lack of English historical documents from the period, Chadwick uses a range of historical and literary sources, from both sides of the English Channel, which relied on oral traditions. By close linguistic analysis he shows how the Saxon and other invaders retained close cultural ties with their continental kinsmen. He shows that although the Dark Ages may be obscure due to lack of contemporary sources, careful scholarly analysis of later texts can reveal a great deal about the history, culture and society of the earlier period.

First published in 1905, H. Munro Chadwick's Studies on Anglo-Saxon Institutions applied his study of philology to a re-analysis of the historical evidence for early English law and administration. In the first part he examines the development of the monetary and social systems, coming to some controversial interpretations. The second part of the book looks at the administration at national and local levels, land tenure and the origin of the nobility. He shows that there was considerable variation between different Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and their legal and social organisation. Chadwick combined his knowledge of languages, history and archaeology to highlight new areas for further research, and he had considerable influence on the development of the study of Anglo-Saxon and related subjects at Cambridge.

First published between 1932 and 1940, this three-volume book was a pioneering study of the historical development of world literature. Volume 1 analyses a range of medieval British and Icelandic poetry and sagas, drawing analogies with the literature of early Greece and focussing particularly on heroic literature.

Originally published in 1945, this book examines the development of nationalism in Europe, primarily through the connections between language development and the growth of national feeling associated with them. Chadwick also suggests ways in which the British could work to prevent another European war through greater understanding of other cultures and changing Britain's imperialist mindset.

In this book, first published in 1912, Chadwick uses philological and anthropological approaches to compare the heroic literature of the Greek and Teutonic peoples. He finds many similarities in the cultures which produced such works, despite considerable differences in date, from Homeric Greece to Anglo-Saxon England to medieval Serbia.