Morning Medieval Miscellany

Still have guests, but have a little free time to blow through a Miscellany. When I have more time, I'll probably write a more substantive response to Jeff Sypeck's entry in Modern Medieval's Blog Forum.

• Lingwë's word of the day is actually a phrase, obscurum per obscurius.
• Julie K. Rose has an entry on fairy loaves, or fossilized sea urchins.
  Early Medieval Art has had several new entries since last I included her. If you'd like to hear her lovely voice, here 'tis.
• Steven Till has also had several new posts, including one on medieval history magazines (don't neglect the further recommendations in the comment thread), one on George R.R. Martin's Dreamsongs, and the medieval history term of the week, virgate.
• In answer to a post about rhyming at Futility Closet, Scribal Terror explains that some things rhyming in Middle English rhyme no longer.
• The Swain's new series on Medieval Literature I Didn't Know, which has only one entry so far, has already started to bear some fruit, as a discussion has broken out about Worcester Fragment A -- and I'd like to point out that Larry Swain still has yet to name it with a cooler name than "Worcester Fragment A." I'm with Prof. de Breeze on this one -- I assumed the new teachers were the Normans, because it feels like it. Now, a feeling ain't evidence, but neither is it something to be ignored.
• The Swain also has a bleg about a tough question regarding who received Latin composition training in the Middle Ages (and given the context of the question, probably specifically in England).
• The Swain also points us to a 9 minute excerpt of a lecture on the Book of Kells by Timothy Graham. You can also download a fuller version, or an audio version. h/t The Heroic Age.
• Steve Muhlberger has a post about sex slavery and some other not-so-nice elements of the Middle Ages.
• Medieval Material Culture Blog links to a competing claim for ownership of the Bayeux Tapestry, and also Daily Mail Bayeux Tapestry for the 21st Century. I suppose one would have to read British tabloids regularly to find it funny.
• Over at In the Middle, JJ Cohen asks whether medieval people could conceptualize a world without them without them. The discussion in the comment thread is quite good.