Great Expectations No. 10 The Origin Myth with 1000 faces: for Hengist and Horsa (455 AD?)
Lime
19.5cm x 19cm x 6cm
2024
£1000
Carved by Brigid Vidler
Hengist and Horsa are Germanic brothers said to have led the Angles, Saxons and Jutes in their invasion of Britain in the 5th century. Hengist is thought to be the first of the Jutish kings of Kent.
According to early sources, Hengist and Horsa arrived in Britain at Ebbsfleet on the Isle of Thanet. For a time, they served as mercenaries for Vortigern, King of the Britons, but later they turned against him (British accounts have them betraying him in the Treachery of the Long Knives). Horsa was killed fighting the Britons at Aylesford, but Hengist successfully conquered Kent, becoming the forefather of its kings. Later with the Angles and Saxons they created the idea of “England”
On farmhouses in Lower Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein, horse-head gables were referred to as "Hengst und Hors" (Low German for "stallion and mare") as late as around 1875. Some believe that Hengist and Horsa were originally considered mythological, horse-shaped beings. Martin Litchfield West comments that the horse heads may have been remnants of pagan religious practices in the area.
This “Minument” combines visual prompts from Smallfilms “Noggin the Nog” by Oliver Postgate and Peter Firmin, The Lewis Chessmen from the British Museum and the knights of the Chess set we grew up with; which was my Mum’s Grandfather’s.
King and Queen from the Lewis Chessmen (British Museum)