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The Wyrm That Stole Yule (part 2) - Trowel 34
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It’s part two of Ash and Tilly’s quest to prevent Ragnarok, as they chat with archaeobotanist and fantasy author Genoveva Dimova about the symbolism and archaeology of trees. But how can we see the symbolic significance of trees in the past? What patterns can we see in how people interacted with trees in prehistory? And why is Ash a megalomaniac? Tune in to find out!
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Transcript
Introduction and Fantasy References
00:00:01
Speaker
You're listening to the Archaeology Podcast Network. You have my sword. And you have my boat.
Episode Introduction: Genevieve de Bova on Archaeobotany
00:00:08
Speaker
And my trowel. Hi, you're listening to episode 34 of And My Trowel, where we look at the fantastic side of archaeology and the archaeological side of fantasy. I'm Tilly. And I'm Ash. And we are here with Genevieve de Bova, chatting all about archaeobotany and the symbolism of trees. Maybe we should do a little recap of exactly what we were talking about,
Significance of the World Tree in Mythology
00:00:30
Speaker
Tilly. That's, yes, good idea. So to put it lightly, Ragnarok is imminent because the World Tree has gone missing, but not to worry, we have set up a plan to replace it. And that's not only to stop the impending apocalypse, but also to get the Asgard Yuletide Committee off our backs because they came and chatted to us at the end of last episode and they were not very happy. They want a winter tree to decorate and apparently nothing less will do than a world tree. So we have to look at how to replace said world trees. But what is the history of trees around wintertime?
Historical and Cultural Symbolism of Trees
00:01:02
Speaker
So nowadays, especially in winter, trees are pretty much synonymous with Christmas and Christmas time. So how has that come? And how have humans in history interacted with trees too? And what really can that tell us about our current predicament? Yeah, true. i mean well which Because I guess one of the main things, and we were talking about that before, right? about world tree In the last episode, we were talking about world trees in mythology and everything. So I mean, Jen, you are a folklore expert here as well. Do you know about anything in terms of like the use of trees in in folklore or in kind of more traditional, I guess, yeah storytelling and legends?
00:01:40
Speaker
I can think of a few things. Like first I started thinking about you trees, which we in several different mythologies, because the poisonous tree, it's kind of so symbolic of death and rebirth. I think in even a Christian myth, it was a symbol of renewal for Christmas.
00:01:57
Speaker
And also it's incorporated in Easter traditions. And then you have chaotic culture where it was a sacred tree in Ireland. It was often used for wine barrels, which is how I encountered that. Actually, we had some, a little, what we realized but ah later were used thieves from a barrel. But at first you were like, what are these weird things? And they turned out in Ireland, Dublin, mostly barrels were made
Christmas Traditions and Tree Symbolism
00:02:20
Speaker
from you. And we think that's cultural because they had all sorts of other trees that you could use to make a barrel or like a little.
00:02:26
Speaker
Steve Vesso, but they were using you and apparently you was known as the coffin of the vine because of the wine barrels. Okay, I like that. Which, by the way, is calling a wine barrel the coffin of the wine. It gives a whole new take on like drinking a bottle of wine. But you trees are often found in churches as well, they're in gay guards. Yeah, they're often used for coffees, like associated with death.
00:02:55
Speaker
Yeah. Is the one as well? Isn't there that really famous church somewhere with a tree on the outside of the door that was supposed to be like the inspiration for J.R.R. Tolkien? And isn't that a huge tree, I think, or something? Oh, is it? I didn't know that. I can't remember. This might be me completely making stuff happen. No, that doesn't make sense. I think there are a few like you trees historically known, like I was reading about a tree that Colombo supposedly preach thunder on the Isle of Burnery, which is near Iona. And then we were kind of looking at the pollen analysis and apparently you don't really grow there. So we think they just wrote the story because it sounds nice. Who knows where he preached in real life. now yeah I mean, that's like history in a nutshell, really. like It was done here, but this isn't a very interesting place.
Personal Santa Claus Stories
00:03:40
Speaker
Let's say it's here. I'm one of this tree here. I want this tree to be with this person right here. It doesn't matter that he never comes here and he's never seen a tree in his life. And also the tree that you were talking about Tilly for Tolkien is Stowe's Tolkien Door. So it's got the two large yew trees next to kind of a kind of neo-gothic door. And it's Stowe on the Wall. That's where it is, Stowe and Edward's Church. Gloucestershire.
00:04:07
Speaker
we We'll put a link in the show notes so that you can see a picture of it because it is yeah gorgeous. like It's very pretty. Very pretty. but I think there' so many people's had their wedding photos. Oh, that would be, oh, that would be amazing.
00:04:22
Speaker
And so, okay, so you has these sort of, a lot of these sort of associations. We've also talked about Ash, like does Ash have particular associations? Cause Ash is also, is it Yggdrasil? I can't say these names. Yeah, Yggdrasil, you're making me do it now. Yggdrasil is also, yeah, he's he's made of just gendered a tree. I don't think that's the thing. What would you call it a tree? Cause that's like she threw away she. We didn't make them. They are they-them. They're never their pronouns. Yeah. I think so. Unless you're an ent.
00:04:52
Speaker
True. In which case, you are he. Because the Entwives have gone missing. Anyway. Not if you watch the the Rings of Power, they're not. I haven't caught up. yet Oh, really? Sorry. I need to watch. I need to catch up. I've only watched the first couple of episodes. I need to keep watching because I just don't have time to watch things these days,
Mythological Associations of Trees
00:05:10
Speaker
but I want to. continue um Cool. so ah But yeah, so Ash, indeed. Sorry. Continue. Ash, talking about Ash.
00:05:20
Speaker
so tot know about but Yeah, so ash trees are kind of associated with and immortality and healing as well. So you tend to find them in Irish folklore a lot around kind of healing wells, places of kind of pilgrimage and stuff like that too. And the kind of British folklore, they're always kind of sacred amongst druids.
00:05:44
Speaker
And they often kind of make their staphs. I think neodruids do the same thing. They make their staphs from ash. But they again, ah protective kind of qualities as well. And in Norse mythology, Yagrassil is the tree of life and the first kind of person is meant to come from Yagrassil. So they're made of ash. So we're all ash.
00:06:04
Speaker
Everyone has a bit of ash. It's like the whole thing. Everyone is ash. You share, what is it, 96% of your DNA with a cabbage or something? It's you know it's the same thing. everyone We all share, so we probably do share like 94% of our DNA with an ash tree. There you go. Yeah. I am 100% ash. You are though.
00:06:27
Speaker
And it was no you talked about you as well before as well because I mean nowadays when we think of for example Christmas and having our Christmas tree it's always sort of pine or spruce or fur like it's the kind of typical Christmas tree. When did that kind of thing start? Does anyone?
00:06:44
Speaker
I know,
Victorian Influences on Modern Christmas
00:06:46
Speaker
kind of. Good thing we have you here. I believe Christmas trees are actually kind of, not necessarily a Victorian invention, but they're brought over when Victoria and Albert marry, so Victoria the first, and her husband, Prince Albert.
00:07:01
Speaker
But it's very much a ah kind of Austrian-German tradition of having a tree, and it also comes from your kind of pagan kind of belief of having a tree in winter. It is meant to bring the kind of spring in.
00:07:16
Speaker
and kind of look after you and it must be also for like fuel like the yule log kind of thing but then basically it becomes popular because he brings one over for victoria and then they send out a christmas card or something like that or they have like a painting done of them with this tree and everyone's like what is that Why do you have a tree in your house? and like you' You'd put like candles on it and things like that and they're like oh my god so it becomes this new like fashion and then this is where like Christmas cards come out as well and you get a really weird Victorian Christmas cards like if you've ever seen them they're very bizarre. They're so creepy. be Like weird like dead frogs dueling each other and stuff really odd.
00:07:59
Speaker
And, yeah, so the pine tree becomes kind of like a popular thing that people would do in the Victorian period and now we just continue it on now. It's quite interesting how many of these Christmas traditions are actually really recent. Yeah. The whole Santa wearing red thing. Yes, right. That's Coca-Cola. Communism, communism, communism, capitalism.
00:08:19
Speaker
Probably communism as well. but Yeah, because we had, even when I was young, we had a Santa, and kind of like, I don't know, a statue-y thing, and he was in green. He was always in green. Yes, I've heard that he was in green. We had dead morose imported from Russia because obviously Santa is way too Western. and ah yeah going to yeah we took capitalistic for us. So we had dead morose, the other morose who was dressed, I think in blue and had like all sorts of, he was kind of like a more frost spirit. But in but just he was I always remember he used to come to my kindergarten and it was always like an old man with a really wispy, horrible beard. So it was kind of creepy.
00:09:01
Speaker
I mean, to be fair, also the the Santas and like sitting on their knee and being like, what do you want for Christmas? Have you been a good girl? No, I don't like it. Yeah, I think you either have that childhood experience of going to see Santa the first time and just screaming in his face. I think everyone's kid has that picture of like, why am I with this strange man?
00:09:22
Speaker
I can remember my first Santo experience indeed. It was at the, which shows how fancy this was. It was at the Yacht Club in Dubai. gosh. Oh, shut up. While we were living there. Well, because all the expats just used to go to the Yacht Club for like, yeah, everything. Cause it was sort of, yeah, I don't know. It was just where everyone went. And, uh, yeah, we went there and then Santa came and had some Christmas presents. And I remember being a bit weirded out by it all. That was a bit like once. What's going on? Why is that here? Just give me my spaghetti bolognese. I didn't really get spaghetti bolognese with like a bowl of parmesan
Archaeological Insights into Tree Symbolism
00:10:00
Speaker
cheese. I mean, nice. Yeah. Sounds good to be honest, better than the dry turkey. Anyway, sorry. i Again, I've gone. I feel like in the last couple of episodes, I'm starting to go rogue. i'm
00:10:15
Speaker
like off script far too much. Quite literally. We have so many stories to tell. I know, I know. But if we think about, okay, so that's sort of the folkloric side of things, but how about if we come to sort of, which I guess is the kind of same you could, it's sort of ethnographic examples of how people have interacted with trees over time. I can remember during my master's learning about like a particular place where people would go and tie like ribbons to a tree or something and and do that kind of thing. i mean how but How do we see how kind of people interacted with plants in the time? Is that also something that you as an archaeobotanist are involved with in your work and your research? I think it's quite difficult to tell, like usual with archaeology, what is ritual and what is just life. Wait for it. Wait for it.
00:11:06
Speaker
There we go. You said the word. word ah to I to write your time in the conversation. yeah i need To be fair, we're talking about trees. like with It's going to be some rituals coming in at some point. Anyway, sorry, you were saying that.
00:11:21
Speaker
I was saying, yeah, it's difficult to tell. and In some ways, like I don't think in the past there was such a big gulf between what's ritual and what's everyday, so it is difficult to try and ah try and like separate what is ritualistic from what is just... like I was thinking when we talk about the meaning of trees, I was trying to think of burial rituals, because that's kind of the most obvious place where you can tell this is definitely something with a deeper meaning.
00:11:49
Speaker
And then I was thinking something like how obviously coffins are made of wood, but that's very practical. And then you have different tools that have wooden handles. Again, very practical. You're meant to just take your axe and use it in the afterlife. Or like, you know, those and house burials in Russia, in Novgorod, or today's Ukraine, actually, it's like him they were, it's Viking burials where they were buried in essentially what's a room, and they were buried sitting down on a chair.
00:12:16
Speaker
Oh, wow. Which again, very uncomfortable. Yeah, kind of practical, like you're meant to wake up in the afterlife and go here's my a little nice room with my little chair. but Well especially if usually you hope that by the time you die you're sort of quite old so getting up from a lying position is always a bit of a faff. So if you're in like a chair then that makes feel makes getting up a lot easier as well. It actually would be really nice just to wake up in the afterlife like oh look at all my furnishings. Everything's all sorted for me. Brilliant.
00:12:47
Speaker
That would be nice. Also, yeah it would help, like you could get rid of all the clutter. Like you literally just take what you can take with you. You know, it's like when you go on holiday and then you come back home and you're like, oh man, I could just live out of a suitcase really. Like, you know, I don't need all this stuff. But then as soon as you get home, you're like, but I can't throw this out because it's perfect. Whereas if someone's done it for you and just given you what you need in your burial, like that nice chair made of wood, you sold it. You're all done. but Was the chair like decorated in any way or was it just a simple chair?
00:13:14
Speaker
Oh, if you're asking difficult questions, I can't remember to be honest. I imagine it probably had some kind of decoration. I'm picturing like a Louis Tressman style, you know, like that's exactly why i pictures. Yeah. beautifully done But it was probably just like an Ikea stool.
00:13:30
Speaker
<unk> position Which in the future might become like a, you know, a type of fancy ritual object right the ikea still i don't know and i think the billy bootcase world definitely that that's a ritual on its own yeah exactly yeah And I had a question like ah questioned in terms of how people's perception of trees changed. I mean, we talked about that a little bit last episode, but do you see a kind of change when, for example, agriculture starts? like Does that impact the role of trees in kind of human
Impact of Historical Deforestation
00:14:10
Speaker
society? Do you see people becoming closer to like big trees? Do you see them becoming just more everyday and not quite so cared for, or is there no real impact?
00:14:20
Speaker
I think we have, but we do see a difference in like deforestation. We think, I think we see how people often mistreated trees in like agricultural society, like tree clearances. And we're actually, the project I was telling about in the last episode with Heinford, we're trying to figure out if the trees that they used to build houses were actually deliberately like if they were growing them for that specific reason, or if they were just collecting whatever material they could find from the forest. And originally we thought that they what must have been deliberately coppicing them, because we have all these long, very straight branches of hazel and odor and birch. But now we're thinking maybe they weren't, maybe they were just taking advantage of what was there. And that kind of starts to make me think, what if they ran out of material? Like if they weren't preserved, if they weren't trying to deliberately grow it,
00:15:15
Speaker
then you must have ended up in situations where you've used up all your material in a certain place and you're just forced to move because you've mistreated the environment. but That's really interesting. And it's so funny because people always say like, oh, let's go back to our ancestors and like live at one with the environment. like well How far back do you want to go? Because we've got to go back by far before we start to exploit everything. Yeah, the first station is a problem, has been a problem for a long, long time, it turns out.
00:15:43
Speaker
yeah Yeah, and it's also yeah it's in managing that environment as well, and that's why you do get like those kind of agricultural landscapes so popping up, I suppose, in the Neolithic too, because they're trying to like mitigate these problems of resource. Yeah, and I wonder if that's one of the reasons why trees are so present in folklore, and like there's all this amitology around them, if the fact that people realise how important they are.
00:16:08
Speaker
like they're known as the plastic of the prehistoric because they are so useful and so easy to make ah objects out of and then suddenly you realize if you mistreat them, then you can't use them anymore. You run out of your most important material.
00:16:23
Speaker
Absolutely, yeah. that's really that's I think that's cool. If that is like a meaning that's come from the very guts of prehistory all the way through, that's very cool. Let's look after the trees. Sorry, my baking timer just went off. Aww. Tilly,
Archaeobotanical Evidence and Environmental Changes
00:16:40
Speaker
we're on the cusp of Ragnarok. Is this really the time for baking? Ash, there's always time for baking even during an apocalypse. oh Well, you know what? I am kind of hungry, actually. It's honey cake. that Okay guys, we'll be we right back.
00:16:56
Speaker
Oh, gosh, I needed that. Who knew the beginning of Ragnarok would be so delicious? ah Thank you. I'll take that as a compliment for the honey cake. So what about like environmental factors? I mean, for example, I remember in the last episode, like in the Entz episodes we had, that you talked about pollen analysis, Jen, which looks at then kind of environmental factors and how that changes. Do you see also kind of plant remains found at archaeological sites, which can kind of suggest different species used depending on environment, depending on time region or anything like that? Yeah, definitely. So we see, and we can essentially trace how the environment changed through things like charcoal very often. Like I talked about how and we don't often get waterlogged remains, but we get a lot of charcoal because charmed material survives quite easily. So we have a lot of much period sites where we have, for example, in the earlier period, lots of use of oak.
00:17:52
Speaker
And then in later period, there's more, for example, trees that prefer damp environments like alder and birch. And that's something that has but like reflects on difference in environment, but it also reflects in difference in culture. Because for example, you can't really build the same sort of structures that you would build from oak that you would build, that you build from alder and birch because they don't grow so big.
00:18:14
Speaker
So that kind of shows us how people had to change their material culture to correspond to environmental differences. And it also can tell us a bit about class. Like some people could afford to bring oak from elsewhere if the oak got too scarce where they were living. But other people couldn't, so they just had to make do what whatever was available locally.
00:18:36
Speaker
yeah hu which I really like looking at that. That's one of my favorite things to do with experimental archaeology as well is to basically see, okay, why are they choosing this particular kind of material? Is it because they were choosing it because of like,
00:18:52
Speaker
or
00:18:58
Speaker
or a double double Or is it because it's actually just practically the most useful material like to make it from, which I guess, yeah. just yeah Well, they just don't have a choice as well. They're like, well, yeah this is what I have. They've already chopped down all of the new trees and all of the ash trees. And now they're like, well, I guess we're with them.
00:19:18
Speaker
Yeah, we were working on like smelter ones, and I was reading all these experimental archaeology experiments with like what different types of charcoal would have been best to use. And our smelter was full of oak, and then I read about oak, and it's really stinky and really smoky and really horrible, so I was thinking, thinking what was the point of that?
00:19:36
Speaker
yeah yeah well which is a stinky oak But I think I've taught that story on here before, haven't I Ash, about the seaweed in the forge? Yeah, I think so. yeah As well, which that was the perfect example of like, why would you add seaweed to a forge? It's because it gives you a high. so Makes you feel really good. Makes you feel really great about your metalworking. So yeah, I guess there might be some things like that as well, and you know, in terms of plant use in the particular context, but yeah.
00:20:06
Speaker
So is there any kind of maybe material culture that you find like interacting with trees? Okay, so we talked about a bit about ritual.
00:20:22
Speaker
Sorry. I want to say it again, but we've talked a bit about that R word and essentially like and how we can't really know about trees and if they were used in these kind of I don't want to say the word again, but I will. really i work and And so, but I was thinking, is there anything like, you like we talked about that with the Forge, is there any material culture that has like, I don't know, tree resin or nuts and fruits like deposited somewhere that maybe you can identify through archaeological investigation and kind of see, oh, actually, this is being used for this kind of ancient tree based ritual or something like that. Is that like something we can find in the archaeological record?
00:21:04
Speaker
Well, I think we have to look at barriers again, if we want to be certain that it was somehow had some sort of ritualistic use. Like you often find things like hazelnut shells in burial contexts, probably just for like food.
00:21:16
Speaker
Yeah. it' the afterlife Or actually, if you go to Eastern Europe, there we start finding rituals, sorry, that him had to do with making sure that your loved one doesn't come back as a vampire. eyes Where you bring in aspen stakes, for a example, it's always aspen and you have to sometimes pierce their heart with an aspen stake. Sometimes you have to actually plant aspen trees around the grave just to trap them in there. I mean, yeah, you want to make sure they're in there.
00:21:45
Speaker
yeah Along with your yew tree for your coffin, you've got your aspen tree for your vampires. What was it? No, but that was for the wine barrel, wasn't it? Yeah, but you can also get yew trees. Well, yew trees are in church yards, that's what I mean. Oh, I see. and then like you've got your all these different things or you've got your lead coffin which would be be even worse for a vampire imagine how smelly that would get but like you know seaweed coffin no that wouldn't work it'd be like a net oh that would be horrible that'd be really but it's interesting so like those burials we've kind of talked a bit about that because we've had our vampire episodes um but i suppose those burials do you see that any kind of burial like that in prehistory especially with the the hazement hazel nut shells and things that maybe have a connection more to the environment. Outside of uses food, I can't really think of many examples. I can think of a few ah situations where we found pollen, but the problem with pollen is that you don't know if it was deposited there deliberately or if it was brought in by things like insects or wind. I don't know if you remember that Neanderthal burial that we, for a long time, it was believed that it was flowers that were put in that Neanderthal burial. And now there's actually some theories that it was insects that brought the pollen, it wasn't flowers at all.
00:23:03
Speaker
oh That's sad, isn't it? We have so many examples about the prehistoric period where we do think it was actually flowers, but it is quite difficult to tell sometimes. Yeah, because I often think about, was it the swan wing burial in Vidvik? I'm pretty sure there was a... Well, you think a swan just dug its way into the valley. I didn't expect to call it the swan wedding. Yeah, I'll tell you that's exactly where I was going with this. No, was thinking there was a hazelnut woven, not hazelnut, a hazel tree, woven kind of rug underneath them all, I think as well. I find that often. But again, I don't know how to make a difference, and if even if we should make a difference between objects that are placed there for practical reasons, like here's your favorite rug.
00:23:48
Speaker
I showed to the other place there specifically because they had some sort of ritual meaning because we get a lot of hazel woven wicker baskets. We get hazel partitions within houses. You get flooring kind of rugs sort of thing. And it's the same with like source the handles for toast that that are sometimes wooden. Sometimes you have like wooden mallets.
00:24:11
Speaker
and Again, artists, things just placed there because they will be useful in the afterlife or they placed there because they have a specific meaning to that community. Well, you could say though, so we talked about the chair last time, right? Like the, yeah that someone was sitting on a chair and that to us is really weird. Like, why would you be sitting on a chair? Whereas to us lying on a rug is like, yeah, of course you'd lie on a rug. But I guess yeah those are kind of the same thing actually. You know, like you would, you would lie on a rug just as much as you would sit on a chair. So actually what, but the only thing that differentiates our interpretation of it is that one of them is weird to us.
00:24:44
Speaker
Oh, effort as well. I would say it's more annoying to take a chair to a burial than a rug. I like to sit them up on it. Yeah. I get them to sit as well. Unless maybe they died on it and then the rig and mortise has just kind of put them in that position. And they're like, you know what, let's do a
Debate: Best Replacement for the World Tree
00:25:00
Speaker
theme. And you're like, oh, I can't be bothered untangling them from the chair. Let's just carry them on the chair. Yeah, it's a theme now. I was like, you know what, let's do the room. We might as well go with it. Yeah, yeah, exactly. If we're doing the whole vlog.
00:25:14
Speaker
OK, so OK, I think we've talked a bit then about like how trees are seen, how plant materials seen. the In last episode, we talked a little bit about kind of the different mythologies, how trees have evolved kind of world trees through fantasy. So let's think about how we can actually solve our problem. So we need to find a world tree because it turns out that we have now discovered, haven't we, Ash? Why yeah the world tree is missing. Do you want to enlighten our listeners?
00:25:42
Speaker
Yeah, Nihog, which is the tiny little serpent that likes to bite Yagrosil and try and eat his little roots, actually succeeded. and He confessed to us during the break and he he just gobbled it a bit too much. So yeah, he ate the wild tree and it's ruined Christmas and it's ruined Yule. So we need to find a new ash tree. So the job is still the same. Was that a brilliant flip? I wonder. I mean, it just makes sense that Yagrassil would be in, like, the replacement would be an ash tree since Yagrassil was an ash tree. I would argue, I would argue that going back to my previous point where we talked about what world tree should be, an ash tree, sure, all well and good, but does it provide you with, you know, a nice food, a nice snack at the end? Yeah, it provides you with life and magic and healing. So does a big tree. And a fig tree is, you know, symbolizes wisdom and success. So that will help you in the new year. That's what you need. You need to have lots of success going on. I don't know. I think ash trees are just like multi-versal, you know, versatile. You can do many things with them. Yeah, sure. They might burn down quickly, but... Exactly. Exactly. Yes. Where is a fig tree? I think... Oh.
00:27:03
Speaker
Jen, did you just roll for charisma? Maybe.
00:27:10
Speaker
ah okay so you please I'm open, I'm open to persuading, or being persuaded. I just wanted to say that I i think, firstly, an algebra is too quickly and we can't risk that. And secondly, a fake is just not straight enough and not strong enough. And I think we should really go for an oak just because of its strength and it symbolizes longevity, its connection with royalty. I think it's the right choice here.
00:27:36
Speaker
I mean, she makes a good point. Yeah, she does make a good point. Weirdly, I'm drawn to her argument. I don't know why either, but I am. Yeah, it's strange, because I was so for figs. It's just a second ago. I was so for ash. The megalomaniac inside me loves it. Do you mean pyromaniac? No, the megalomaniac. I'm ash. It would be ash, too. Oh, I know. Sorry. That makes more sense. There's also a pyromaniac in there, too, but we want to talk to her.
00:28:06
Speaker
Well, then I think we're decided. We're going to go and find the biggest, strongest oak tree we can possibly locate and we'll decorate that and pass that off to the Asgard committee, Yuletide committee for their Christmas tree, their Yuletide tree. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah. How are we going to locate it?
00:28:25
Speaker
Shall we just go for a walk? I think a walk sounds good. Yeah. Jen, would you like to come for a walk? Yeah, sounds lovely. Great. Before we go, ah maybe do you have anything else you would like to share with those listening? I mean, your book has just come out. Where can people
Conclusion and Guest Promotion
00:28:40
Speaker
find it? How can people find out more about what you're up to? Are there any exciting projects in the work for you at the moment?
00:28:47
Speaker
and My book should be available anywhere books are sold. It's important to say something um so I think it's good. point yeah Waterstones or whatever, are just yeah if they don't have it, ask them to bring it in. him I've got a newsletter that I update once a month and that's on my website, which I'm assuming will have links. We will pop that into the show notes. Yes, indeed.
00:29:16
Speaker
And then you can also find me on Instagram. I don't do Twitter anymore, and i but I do Blue Sky. Okay, there you go. And we'll put those links in as well, although I guess you can also find them through the website. So yeah, perfect. Well, thank you so much, Jen, for joining us today. It was really great to chat with you. Thank you for having me. And we hope that everyone listening enjoyed our quest today.
00:29:39
Speaker
If you did, please leave us a review wherever you listen to us as it really helps to support us and the rest of the Archaeology Podcast Network. If you have any ideas for future episodes or maybe you just wanted to discuss a past episode, please do also contact us through social media or you can join the free APN Discord server. Very exciting. We'd love to hear your feedback, so do get in touch. All contact information for us and for Jen, as well as for further reading and links to the points discussed today can, as ever, be found in the show notes.
00:30:08
Speaker
Can you smell sea water? Uh, yeah, I can. Oh, that's not the Midgard Serpent slithering around again, is it? No, I don't think so, but I do have an idea as to what it might be.
00:30:26
Speaker
The Archaeology Podcast Network is 10 years old this year. Our executive producer is Ashley Airy. Our social media coordinator is Matilda Sebrecht. And our chief editor is Rachel Rodin. The Archaeology Podcast Network was co-founded by Chris Webster and Tristan Boyle in 2014 and is part of CulturoMedia and DigTech LLC. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.archpodnet.com. Contact us at chrisatarchaeologypodcastnetwork.com.