University of Wisconsin Milwaukee UWM Digital Commons Theses and Dissertations December 2016 Gender Reflections: a Reconsideration of Pictish Mirror and Comb Symbols Traci N. Billings University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Follow this and additional works at: https://dc.uwm.edu/etd Part of the Archaeological Anthropology Commons, European History Commons, and the Medieval History Commons Recommended Citation Billings, Traci N., "Gender Reflections: a Reconsideration of Pictish Mirror and Comb Symbols" (2016). Theses and Dissertations. 1351. https://dc.uwm.edu/etd/1351 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by UWM Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of UWM Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. GENDER REFLECTIONS: A RECONSIDERATION OF PICTISH MIRROR AND COMB SYMBOLS by Traci N. Billings A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Anthropology at The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee December 2016 ABSTRACT GENDER REFLECTIONS: A RECONSIDERATION OF PICTISH MIRROR AND COMB SYMBOLS by Traci N. Billings The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2016 Under the Supervision of Professor Bettina Arnold, PhD. The interpretation of prehistoric iconography is complicated by the tendency to project contemporary male/female gender dichotomies into the past. Pictish monumental stone sculpture in Scotland has been studied over the last 100 years. Traditionally, mirror and comb symbols found on some stones produced in Scotland between AD 400 and AD 900 have been interpreted as being associated exclusively with women and/or the female gender. This thesis re-examines this assumption in light of more recent work to offer a new interpretation of Pictish mirror and comb symbols and to suggest a larger context for their possible meaning. Utilizing the Canmore database, 272 Pictish monumental sculpture were contextually compared with each other in light of archaeological and historical data. Mirrors and combs appear together or the mirror and comb individually appear on 66 (24.3%) stones. Of these, only eight (2.9%) sculptures are depicted with human figures. The results of this analysis suggest that the mirror and comb symbols were not associated exclusively with women but rather represent actual objects imbued with special meaning as well as symbols of particular lineages and their association with specific socio- political roles in Pictish society. Key Words- Picts, iconography, Scotland, inalienable objects, gender, power ii © Copyright by Traci N. Billings, 2016 All Rights Reserved iii To my grandmother, Francis B. Billings iv TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures vi List of Tables viii Acknowledgements x Chapter 1 Introduction 1 Research Questions 4 Research Context 4 Chapter 2 Literature Review 27 Iconography and Gender 27 Mirrors and Meaning 39 Combs and Meaning 53 Pictish Symbols on Monumental Stone Sculpture 59 Past Interpretations of Pictish Mirror and Comb Symbols 69 Mirrors in Archaeological Contexts 77 Combs in Archaeological Contexts 91 Chapter 3 Methods 97 Discussion of Dataset 97 Goals and Description of Data 101 Limitations 109 Chapter 4 Analysis and Discussion 115 Conclusion 153 Future Research 156 References Cited 158 Appendix A Symbols and Key 179 Appendix B Summary of data collected from Canmore 181 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1.1 Map of the distribution of Pictish monumental stone sculptures 2 Figure 1.2 Map of territorial boundaries around AD 800 5 Figure 1.3 Variations of the Pictish mirror symbol 7 Figure 1.4 Variations of the Pictish comb symbol 7 Figure 1.5 Balmaclellan mirror dated between AD 110 and 240 8 Figure 1.6 Examples of comb types found in Scotland in archaeological contexts dated 9 to the early medieval period as identified by Ashby (2011) Figure 1.7 Clynemilton Stone 10 Figure 1.8 Dunrobin Stone 10 Figure 1.9 Symbols occurring most frequently with the mirror and comb symbols 11 Figure 2.1 Peirce’s model of semiotic theory 30 Figure 2.2 Egyptian New Kingdom mirror with a handle in shape of a Hathor Emblem 40 Figure 2.3 One of six Lady and the Unicorn tapestries 45 Figure 2.4 Greek Red Figure vessel showing the Oracle of Delphi sitting on tripod by 47 the Kodros Painter Figure 2.5 Greek bronze mirror from the mid-fifth century BC 49 Figure 2.6 Italian liturgical comb dated to the late 11th-early 12th century 56 Figure 2.7 A liturgical comb made of ivory in St Albans, England AD 1130 57 Figure 2.8 Distribution of stone circles, henges, and other standing stones in Scotland 61 Figure 2.9 Distribution of Class 1 and Class 2 Pictish monumental stone sculpture with 64 Pictish symbols Figure 2.10 Examples of Pictish symbols 68 Figure 2.11 Meigle No. 22 depicts a possible mermaid 74 vi Figure 2.12 Depiction of the mirror case and double disc symbols 75 Figure 3.1 Symbols identified 99 Figure 3.2 Images that may not be symbols 99 Figure 4.1 Hilton of Cadboll, back 116 Figure 4.2 The Triumph of Christ, on horseback, 12th century French fresco in the 118 Cathedral of Auxerre (Didron 1851: 308-309) Figure 4.3 Epona riding side saddle or sideways. 118 Figure 4.4 Kingoldrum No. 1, front and back 121 Figure 4.5 Kirriemuir No. 1, back 125 Figure 4.6 Meigle No. 1, back 127 Figure 4.7 The Drosten Stone, back 129 Figure 4.8 The Maiden Stone, back 130 Figure 4.9 Wester Denoon, front and back 132 Figure 4.10 Invergowrie No. 1, back 134 Figure 4.11 Comparison of sculpture depicting mirrors, combs, and mirror and comb 146 combinations Figure 4.12 Distribution of Class 1 and Class 2 sculptures that depict mirrors, combs, 147 and mirror and comb combinations Figure 4.13 Distribution of sculptures depicting either the comb, the mirror, or both in combination with human figures or hybrid human figures 148 vii LIST OF TABLES Table 1.1 Number of mirror and comb symbols found on Pictish stone sculpture 6 Table 1.2 Total number of mirror, comb, crescent v-rod, double disc z-rod, and 10 Pictish beast symbols on Class 1 and Class 2 monuments Table 2.1 ‘Representamen’ and object as defined by Chandler (2014) 31 Table 2.2 Gender concepts as defined by Spector and Whelan (1989: 69-70) 34 Table 2.3 List of selected cross-cultural meanings ascribed to mirrors 53 Table 2.4 Pictish monumental sculpture classification (Allen and Anderson 1903) 62 Table 2.5 Mirrors found in burial contexts in the British Isles 78 Table 2.6 Mirror burial contexts in the UK (Joy 2008: 215; 2010: 470) 80 Table 2.7 Sexed mirror burials (Joy 2010: 75, 2011: 474) 81 Table 2.8 Mirrors in settlement contexts 84 Table 2.9 Mirrors in watery contexts or other votive deposits 85 Table 2.10 Types of mirror handles in the British Isles (Fox 1958; Joy 2010) 87 Table 2.11 Mirrors in Scotland 89 Table 2.12 Early Medieval comb types and trends in Scotland 92 Table 2.13 Common combs in early Medieval Atlantic Scotland (Ashby 2009, 2011) 94 Table 3.1 List of variables used to record data 98 Table 3.2 Sculptures depicting humans in association with mirror and comb symbols 102 Table 3.3 Physical characteristics of sculptures noted in Table 3.2 103 Table 3.4 Contextual data associated to sculpture noted in Table 3.2 104 Table 3.5 Characteristics used to define Pictish symbols 110 viii Table 4.1 Gender categories assigned to figures that appear together with mirror and 134 comb symbols Table 4.2 Mirror and comb placement and with human or human hybrid figures 137 Table 4.3 Sculptures depicting mirror and comb symbols (Class 1 or Class 2) 140 Table 4.4 Class 1 or Class 2 sculptures which depict mirrors without combs 140 Table 4.5 Number of times each symbol appears in sample 141 Table 4.6 Number of times mirrors, combs, and figural representations appear in sample 141 Table 4.7 Other symbols that appear with mirror and comb symbols 142 Table 4.8 Other symbols that appear with the mirror symbol without the comb symbol 143 ix ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my gratitude to all the people who have helped me with this endeavor. Without you this would not have been possible, and I am truly indebted for all of the support and guidance I have received along the way. I would like to especially thank my advisor, Dr. Bettina Arnold, for her unwavering support and guidance but also for her patience with me as I worked through this process. In addition, I would like to thank her for her invaluable comments on my numerous drafts of this work and for helping me grow as a scholar and a writer. I would like to thank my committee members, Dr. Patricia Richards and Dr. Jason Sherman, for their support and guidance as well; Dr. Richards was particularly helpful in developing my initial thesis topic, and Dr. Sherman guided me in my understanding of the ways in which we, as scholars, can study power and ideology in the archaeological record. I would like to thank Dr. Deanna Wesolowski for her advice regarding semiotics and art history. I would like to thank Bruce Precourt for sharing his knowledge of Classical mythology, which provided a number of key examples in this work. I would like to thank Canmore for providing a database in which researchers can find information related to Scotland and its history. This database was the primary source for my data collection.