All language subtitles for BBC - Pagans - 3 - Band of Brothers

I'm Richard Rudgley.

I've made it my business to delve into
our past to try to find out what makes

who we are today.

And I've explored the Dark Ages and
found that our barbarian ancestors were

mindless savages.

Now I want to fill in one more critical
piece of the puzzle.

We think that our lives are shaped by 2
,000 years of Roman and Christian

tradition.

But I've never really bought into this.

For generations before the Romans came
along, we all lived in a very different

world. And I believe this world still
plays a major part in who we are today.

This is the world of the pagan.

If I told you that this kind of male
culture, beer -drinking football

on the rampage, had its roots in our
pagan past, you probably wouldn't be too

surprised.

But what about the media frenzy that
surrounds our soccer heroes?

What about their celebrity lifestyle?

And what about the precarious nature of
their careers?

And their here -today, gone -tomorrow
managers?

Well, these too are echoes of our pagan
ancestry.

There's also a direct connection between
the male culture of the pagan world and

the members and leaders of that other
famous men's club, the Houses of

Parliament.

On a journey across northern Europe and
back through nearly 3 ,000 years of

history, I'm going to explore the lives
and aspirations of the pagan men and

their leaders that have helped to make
us what we are today.

It's not going to be easy. Our pagan
ancestors didn't write things down.

But the evidence is there, and sometimes
in the oddest of places.

I'm starting my journey in just such an
unlikely place, at the grave of a man

who, on the face of it, sums up
everything that's chivalrous, knightly

Christian. King Arthur.

He was said to be buried here at
Glastonbury, but this Arthur is an

because the real, original Arthur was a
pagan warrior king.

We know Arthur as a Christian from a
world of holy grails and courtly love.

But actually, Arthur was a pagan leader.

He led a band of warriors that lived and
died for one thing.

Fighting. What you have in the early
sources is this barbarian king, battle

leader. And he's a very, not primitive
in the sense that he isn't developed,

he certainly has these primitive
characteristics of leading a band of

Not refined knights, but warriors.

So what would this original author have
done during peacetime?

Well, the original author during
peacetime would probably have prepared

This was a war economy.

This was not a peaceful world in the
sense that we think of the ideal as an

ideal where a king rules over a peaceful
land. This was a world where you're

constantly testing yourself against your
enemies and sometimes even against your

friends. So there's a very strong code
there, a bond between the king or the

leader and his warriors. It's very, very
strong.

They're almost like foster brothers.

And of course it would have been
reinforced where children would be sent

with others equivalent of their social
status. So that you get this very

network of loyalties and alliances.

And this is really what kept society
going.

And you fought for these people. You
defended them when they were in trouble.

It was a very strong sense of we belong
to a group.

For this King Arthur, there were no
knights of the round table, just a band

men, living together, brought up
together, for the sole purpose of

It's now possible to build up a detailed
picture of daily life in this macho

warrior society.

Home was not some mythical castle.

Iron Age hill forts like this one.

are scattered across southern England,
and they are the blueprints for the real

Camelot.

300 years before the birth of Christ,
this was what the local band of brothers

called home.

A gated enclosure, a collection of small
houses dwarfed by a number of massive

halls.

The hall was the focus of this society,
the place where the warriors would meet

for lavish feasts and heavy drinking.

The archaeological finds from this time
include pottery bowls and dishes,

decorative brooches alongside weapons of
war.

A lifetime of studying Danebury Hillport
has given Barry Cunliffe a vivid

picture of life amongst these pagan men.

One of the classical writers says they
drink lots of wine, which is marvellous

for us because our traders provide it
for them. They'll give us a slave for an

amphora of wine, he says.

Marvellous deal for a Roman.

He says that they're so barbaric that
they drink their wine actually

We self -respecting Mediterranean dilute
our wine, those barbarians just swin it

down. So it gives you a picture of
really quite a drunken orgy.

Then, as now, if a group of hard
-drinking northern European men got

alcohol -fuelled boasting and eventually
violence was the likely result.

You can imagine a young man wanting to
make a name for himself.

Saying I'm a great hero, I can go and
capture dozens of cows and women and

up our neighbours. You know, I'm that
kind of hero. I can do that.

So no great surprises here. The men of
our early society liked to drink, and

violence often followed.

We could write off our ancestors as
antisocial lagalouts, but another look

the aftermath shows this is only half
the story.

You see, there's always a grain of truth
in the most colourful of legends, and

Arthur and his heroic knights are not
complete fantasy.

Behind the posturing and bad behaviour,
this was actually a society for heroes.

Disputes between rival communities were
not settled by two armies fighting to

the death.

Instead, each side chose a champion, a
hero, who would take on the enemy on

behalf of the community at large.

The heroes from each side would come
out, they would fight each other,

would win, someone would die. To the
death?

Fight to the death.

This seems to have been the norm.

And this would go on throughout the day
until everyone had had a thoroughly good

day's entertainment.

And then normally they would go home,
saving most of manhood, which is crucial

for keeping the crops and herds and
society going. You don't want to

lots of people.

Warrior champions would represent their
communities to prevent widespread

bloodshed. This was what the Band of
Brothers trained for, lived for.

They were the cream of their society,
seeking fame and fortune through their

prowess in the field.

They were the sporting heroes of their
day.

And there's a noisy echo of this pagan
idea of controlled aggression every

Saturday afternoon.

Today's football stars are our
champions, fighting our battles for us

pitch.

So our pagan ancestors were not simply
mindless thugs.

They had a controlled approach to
warfare that kept casualties low. But

were essentially local disputes.

What chance did these disparate bands of
warriors have against the greatest war

machine in history, the Roman army?

It's AD 60, and it's the night before a
horde of unruly native Britons take on

the might of Rome at the legionary
fortress of Camulodunum, modern -day

Colchester.

On paper, there should only be one
winner.

The Romans were the greatest military
machine the world had ever seen, and for

its occupying army, Colchester was the
jewel in their crown.

The ancient Brits, although greater in
number, were not a disciplined fighting

unit. They were a collection of warrior
bands more used to fighting amongst

themselves than presenting a united
front to a common enemy.

But their training in the hillforts did
count for something, for when it came to

battle, our pagan ancestors were
completely fearless.

The Britons are war -mad, and both high
-spirited and quick for battle.

They are willing to risk everything they
have, with nothing to rely on other

than their physical strength and
courage.

It's hard to find evidence for something
as intangible as physical courage

across so many centuries.

And very few skeletons have survived
from these times.

But a rare find from Ireland paints a
dramatic picture of the death of one

warrior.

Like a pathologist at a murder scene,
Laureen Buckley has examined the remains

of this pagan warrior in minute detail.

The story that these battle -scarred
bones tell is one of courage, fortitude

extreme strength of will in the face of
certain death.

He was obviously in a fight.

I think it was a battle rather than a
fight between two people.

He must have had a weapon, probably a
sword in his right hand.

He may have had a shield and lost it, or
he may not have had a shield, but he

was using his left hand almost as
another weapon to parry off blows from

sword.

In the lower third of the arm, he's
received a number of sword wounds, and

of them are quite savage and heavy, and
they've almost cut through the two bones

of the wrist.

The sword is cut right through the
radius.

Now, he may have dropped his hand then
when his wrist was hanging off and left

his left side vulnerable.

He's had sword wounds on the left side,
on the vertebrae, going through to the

ribs. Some of the ribs are almost broken
right through.

They're really savage blows.

This ancient warrior, battle -weary,
defenceless, clutching, broken ribs, and

with his left hand hanging off, still
did not succumb.

It seems the reputation for exceptional
courage was hard -earned and genuine.

Courageous they may have been, but they
weren't immortal.

So what was it that finally finished off
this soldier?

What finally finished him off, the
killer blow, was a spear thrust from

the left side, which was probably from
another person in the battlefield.

So the spear would have gone through
into his left side, through muscle,

fight organs, and it caused a lot of
damage and blood loss.

And that exactly matches the profile of
the tip of his spear.

The British forces, on the eve of the
battle for Colchester,

knew that a similar fate might befall
them.

They may outnumber the Romans, but they
did not underestimate them.

If these part -hooligan, part -hero
gangs were to defeat the greatest army

earth, they would need more than blind
courage.

According to their enemies, a
surprisingly effective part of the pagan

plan was simply the noise they made.

The reason being that this was no
ordinary noise.

The sound of the landscape reverberating
to an ear -splitting clamour is down to

this strange beast, the carnix.

It's actually a megaphone. On hearing
the sound coming from it, Roman

mercenaries thought the whole landscape
was coming to life.

And because of its size, the carnics
reached over the heads of mounted

charioteers and everybody, those same
mercenaries thought that they were being

attacked by a race of giants.

And if you saw 30 of these marching out
of the morning mist, making a sound to

split your eardrums, well yes, you too
would believe you were about to be mown

down by a tribe of titans.

One thing that reconstructing an
instrument of this sort teaches us is

sophisticated it is.

I can play it extremely loud, louder
than a modern trombone. The modern

is the most powerful instrument we've
got.

It plays at a volume that's dangerous to
the ears.

But this instrument is louder.

Maybe a quick blast.

Sure, great. Maybe a really loud blast.

Yeah, that's loud.

It's loud.

It must have seemed even more dramatic
in those times because, of course, the

world was a much quieter place then.
There were no cars, there were no

No cars, no machines, no films with
special effects.

So, effectively, something like this
that transforms sound and transforms the

person that's playing it is taking on a
truly magical function.

It's changing or heightening the
experience of life.

So we usually hold it here. That's it,
yeah.

That's pretty good, Richard, actually.

Time for tune? Yeah, go.

I don't think we're going to get beyond
that on the first lesson.

Well done.

Outside the Roman garrison of Colchester
in AD 60, the warrior Queen Boudicca

found herself leading the revolt against
the hated Romans.

Charged with making a winning army out
of an assortment of troops at her

disposal, she knew they could terrify
the enemy with their fearlessness and

noise they would make.

But her followers had yet another weapon
that they believed would secure their

victory. Woes.

All Britons paint themselves with woad,
which turns the skin a bluish -green

colour, hence their appearance is all
the more horrific in battle.

Woad is a plant of the mustard family.

Pagan ancestors cultivated it for its
leaves, which, when dried, yield a blue

dye.

The leaves are ground into a powder,
which turns blue when rubbed onto the

Grease or egg yolk was used as a base to
spread the dye over the skin.

Right, well, let's start off with, I
think, some lard here, some beef

You won't see this on The Naked Chef
then, will you? No, you won't, no, no.

So the first thing to do is to rub it
onto the skin here.

until it melts okay and we take just a
few grains of wood because a little bit

goes a very long way and grab that into
the body look you're going blue

yep so you've got quite a nice shade of
blue there the person who i first did

this experiment on used to be a
sandhurst officer and he told me that

the color used in the british army
camouflage palette that would make the

soldier's face appear two -dimensional
or in other words perhaps make the

look almost invisible.

We're told that the Iron Age people went
into battle naked as well. Now, we may

call them naked, the Romans may have
thought of them as naked, but actually

they were covered in this that turned
them invisible, they wouldn't really

been naked, they would have been wearing
some sort of protective, maybe even

magical substance.

Caesar may have thought that woe just
made the ancient Britons look feartham.

But if it actually had made them
invisible or more difficult to see in

terrains and in certain lights, then it
was an incredibly effective weapon.

But Jilly Carr believes that it had even
greater significance for these bands of

warriors. She has identified these
objects as grinders, used to turn the

of the woad plants into powder.

And the designs on the different
ornaments represent the different

agents used to apply the woad to the
body.

Beef fat.

Duck eggs.

And semen.

Semen mixed with the woad and spread
onto the body of the warrior before

into battle would have been of powerful,
symbolic significance.

If you think about the attributes of the
warrior, the warrior has to be a very

brave, courageous person, but also very
manly. So attributes such as fertility

and virility would have been very
important as well.

And also, if we think about the cosmetic
grinder itself, the action of grinding

the pestle and mortar, the pestle and
mortar would have been male and female

parts, perhaps. that grinding action as
well would have had quite a bit of

significance and symbolism. So I think
it's not just the finished product of

woad that's important, but the whole
ritual of making woad as well.

The macho bands of brothers could
epitomise the negative side of male

aggression, drunken boasting and
violence.

The seamen symbolise the flip side of
this, virility, fertility, potency.

On the eve of battle, the ritual of
grinding the woad, mixing it with semen

applying it to the body, meant that as
well as potentially making himself

invisible, the warrior felt empowered
and protected.

At Colchester, Boudicca and her warriors
scored an emphatic victory against the

Romans.

So devastating was their victory that it
is imprinted on the archaeological

record. In the basement of a Colchester
pub, the evidence is clear.

We're three metres below ground level in
Colchester, and down here we have

preserved evidence of the destruction of
the town in 1860.

What I want you to look at in
particular...

are these red lumps.

These are the remains of buildings which
were torched by Boudica.

The whole thing was destroyed in what
was really a great act of ethnic

cleansing.

I think it was an outpouring of hatred
for...

an alien civilisation and a desire to
get shot of everything Roman.

Boudicca remains a powerful symbol of
British national identity.

There's something very familiar, too,
about the hatred of foreign influence

she and her followers expressed at
Colchester.

She's admired because of her fierce, no
-holds -barred, back -against -the -wall

stubbornness. Something she shares with
other British heroes, Nelson and

Churchill. Something she shares, too,
with Arthur, with the original pagan

Arthur of the earliest stories.

His greatest opponent is a spectacular
monster, a kind of chaos monster, who's

called Tork Trois, and he's a boar, a
wild boar.

clearly something of the outside world,
which has intruded into Britain.

And its invader has to be resisted by
the best of all heroes.

And Arthur is the best of all heroes.

And Arthur, for all his strength,
doesn't actually kill this monster. He

him into the sea. And the last we see of
Talk Twice is he's swimming away. And

the text says, and from this day to
this, we know not where he is.

These earliest Arthur stories emerge at
a time when England was under threat

when facts and rights had a real ending
in mind.

And our greatest heroes have come to
embody this combative, nationalistic

fervour. But that's not the whole story.

To be a successful leader of men, you
need more than just blind patriotism.

And our pagan forebears were well aware
that other, more subtle skills were

required to qualify for the top job.

Tara, the ancient fleet of power in
Ireland.

142 kings are said to have reigned here
since prehistoric times.

Today, when we think of monarchy, we
think of the crown being handed down

father to son.

But that wasn't what happened at Tara.
Here, the crown wasn't inherited.

It had to be earned.

And early Irish stories give an idea of
the boxes which a successful applicant

needed to tick.

The goodness of his shape and family.

His experience and wisdom.

His discretion and kindness.

Eloquence and bravery in battle.

And the number of his friends.

This was leadership by selection, not
power by inheritance.

And at Tara there still survives a stone
that played a part in how the king was

chosen.

I think possibly the...

Best piece of evidence is this fantastic
stone here, which I think you have to

admit is what one would describe as very
phallic -looking.

It is an erect penis.

This stone symbolises the king -to -be
mating with his tribal goddess.

And according to the legends, if the
true potential king came near, it would

shout out.

Well, it hasn't shouted out to us. No,
no. We're not doing that all here.

So this was not a rigid, static social
structure.

This was a dynamic culture, arguably
even a primitive form of democracy, in

which members of a warrior elite would
compete for the support of their

in arms.

And it wasn't enough just to be elected.

The new leader had to prove his worth on
a daily basis, in battle, in the

community, and with the gods.

If anything went wrong, it was assumed
that the gods were displeased, and this

was seen as the fault of the king.

If the king either was making poor
judgments or was failing in his warrior

then the assumption would be that the
gods had been annoyed, and the best

to do if the gods are annoyed with your
king is then to depose him.

And there were plenty of others willing
to come in and take over the role.

So it's a bit like a football manager
being on a losing streak. If his team

doesn't win, or in this case, if he goes
into battle a few times and they lose,

he's not really going to last. It's
exactly that.

It was clearly a slightly dangerous
thing to be an early king.

So, at a time when power was not
hereditary, a time without ruling

kings, what were the skills that a man
needed to demonstrate to take on these

weighty obligations?

Here in Sweden, the home of the Vikings.

It is possible to chart the path which a
young man would have had to follow to

move up through the ranks to the reward
and the responsibilities of leadership.

Unusually for pagan times, the Vikings
wrote down their stories in runes, which

tell us a lot about how they lived.

One particular runestone gives us a
unique insight into how Viking men tried

climb the ladder to power.

and the tragic consequences for one ill
-fated young adventurer.

This is the stone put up by a mother in
memory of her son, and he went eastwards

to find gold and fame, actually, and he
just disappeared.

So they start here with the verse saying
that they fared courageously far

after gold.

And in the east, they gave the eagles,
and that means that they actually let

dead enemies on the battlefield to be
eaten by the eagles.

And then it says, sadly enough, they
died in the south.

But that does not matter.

It's OK to die, as long as you've been
Croatians, isn't it? To die in the right

way. To die in the right way, and most
of them, of course, did. The whole point

is, it is a rite of passage, but also a
selection mechanism.

It's the most horrible ones that come
home, isn't it?

So it's death or glory, really.

It's death or glory, yes.

These bloodthirsty raids were
essentially Viking rites of passage.

Young men trying to prove their courage
and strength, as well as their

adventurous spirit.

Because in the pagan era, these skills
were what a young man needed to take the

first step on the ladder to success.

The warrior characteristics personified
in Norse mythology by the god Thor.

Here on this runestone we can see Thor
and his hammer. Here he's struggling

against the Midgard serpent.

He was strong and he was brave and he
was true, but altogether too simple

-minded for the Viking elite.

Whilst the young adventurers on the
raids needed to start by proving their

as fighters, they would have known that
to move up through the ranks and go on

to lead their fellow men, they would
need to add new skills.

And these were represented by the Norse
god Odin.

Odin was the king of the gods, and a far
more complex character.

Subtle, political, slippery, and very,
very clever.

Birka, a small island near Stockholm, is
the site of Sweden's first Viking town,

a town surrounded by pagan cemeteries,
some 1600 burial mounds in all.

Excavations here have revealed startling
evidence about the cult of Odin.

But one particular grave baffled
archaeologists.

The grave had an earth floor with walls
made of planks, like a room.

Inside, sitting on a chair in the middle
of the room, were the remains of a man

and a woman, surrounded by various
objects.

Neil Price explained to me that this was
a burial dedicated to Odin.

Just before the grave was sealed up,
somebody has stood on the edge of the

grave, about here.

and thrown in a lance, a really long
lance.

And about this much of it has gone into
the wood of the front of that platform.

So in other words, somebody's thrown it
in with really a lot of force. And this

lance has passed over the people in the
chair to go into the wood. And we know

from written sources that the act of
casting a spear or a lance over

is the dedication of that thing to Odin,
to the god.

Odin was the god of the elite, and the
quality of the goods in the grave

indicate that the couple would certainly
have been members of that elite.

But what made them so special?

There are some clues in the things they
chose to be buried with.

The weapons here show that the man was a
Viking warrior and indicate that

fighting was important to him.

But, as a follower of Odin, this was not
enough.

Odin is very definitely a god of the
elite.

He's also one of the gods of war.

But above all, he's the god of the mind,
really, and everything that goes on

with the mind.

So he's not so much a god of physical
fighting, sort of in -your -face

Like Thor.

Exactly. One of the things that we see
huge emphasis on with Odin is the idea

of clear thinking.

Imagine an early medieval battlefield.

It's a huge open space full of people
shouting. There's no uniforms. Everybody

looks more or less the same.

Very difficult to tell who's on your
side and who isn't.

Full of men sort of bashing at each
other with sharp, pointy things.

It's a pretty chaotic place. And the
idea of losing your concentration, of

losing that... And that's where Odin
comes in. He has special kinds of spells

for giving you enhanced concentration,
sort of sharpening you up. And that's

way that Odin interacts in combat.

Coolness, concentration, clear thinking.

These are the qualities needed for
effective leadership.

If Thor represents brawn, then Odin
equals brain.

The Viking leader needed both.

And if Thor represents the macho side of
the warrior chief, then Odin

characterizes the feminine side.

Odin is a god of dubious sexuality.

He often dresses as a woman.

And I think it's no accident that in
this burial dedicated to him, we have

a man and a woman.

This staff found in the grave is the
wand of a sorceress, symbol of a woman's

powerful magic.

There seems to be a kind of male magic
and then there's female magic, which is

quite different. So did men ever sort of
dabble in women's mysteries?

Yeah, there's a lot of taboos around
this kind of magic.

And whenever men perform it, there's a
very clear suggestion of something

improper, something unmanly, a very
strong overturn of homosexuality. In

society, it was fantastically
homophobic.

Why despite that are there quite a few
men in the written sources that do

perform this magic anyway? I think the
answer to that is that it gave these men

a particular kind of power that they
couldn't get any other way.

Something that made them very powerful
and very feared.

Perhaps the warrior here had dabbled in
women's magic. Judging by the elaborate

burial, he was certainly powerful.

And does this mean he was gay?

I don't think so.

In the macho warrior world of the
Vikings, showing your feminine side was

probably as rare as it is among certain
male cultures today.

But a successful leader of these men
would also require qualities we

more with women.

such as compassion, subtlety.

For the wannabe Viking celebrity, Odin
represented all the talents that a man

needed to progress from fighter to
leader.

He needed foresight as well as courage.

He would have to show different sides of
himself in different situations, and he

needed to win the support of his
colleagues, symbolically, at least, to

them.

In these respects, he was very much like
a modern politician, and for a very

good reason.

These are the qualities that are
required to win elections.

In the same way our political masters
need the support of the voters, so pagan

leaders needed to persuade their
followers that they were the right men

job.

This is Gamla Uppsala, the traditional
seat of the pagan rulers of Sweden.

Rulers who had to be elected.

Rulers who went on the campaign trail to
win votes in different parts of the

country. Rulers who had to keep in favor
with the electorate. Sound familiar?

He had to be generous with gifts and
distribute the gifts among his retinue,

among his people.

The more gifts you could bring out, the
better king you were, so to say.

To be a successful leader here, you
needed to court popularity, play the

political game.

You needed friends in the right places,
a bit of spare cash. Oh, and you needed

to be able to talk to the gods.

Another reason the pagan leaders needed
the qualities of Thor and Odin was

because it was their job to communicate
with the gods on behalf of their

community.

And if you had the right communication
with the gods, then you received luck.

So it must have been very stressful
being the king because you've got the

breathing down your neck if the crops
are not going well.

And then the gods also need to be
placated with sacrifices.

And also there's other people trying to
take over from you all the time. It must

have been very stressful because there
were many people.

who had the ability, they had the right
breeding to become a king.

So therefore, it was a constant strife.

When you're in the top job, just like
today, there's only one way to go.

Down.

When your luck runs out, you're out on
your ear.

A solitary warning for leaders
everywhere comes from the story of King

here at Gamla of Sala.

After a bad harvest one year, he
sacrificed animals to the gods.

But the next year, the crops failed
again, and he was forced to make a human

sacrifice.

The following year, in the face of
another poor harvest, the people took

into their own hands.

They sacrificed their king.

Though this was a world in which failing
leaders could be removed, very much

like our own times, though these pagan
kings would go to spend more time with

their gods, rather than their families.

In a world where people power still
counted for something, what could these

pagan leaders do to make sure that they
hung on to their power and to their

lives?

Here at Taplow in Buckinghamshire, is
the burial site of a man who seems to

embody the ultimate in power, fame and
fortune to which our ancient ancestors

could aspire.

Everything about this mound and its
location tells about status, really high

status. The size of the mound itself,
imagine the kind of investment in

resources it takes to get the guys
together to build a mound of this scale.

A symbolic statement of terrific power
and intensity for the people who lived

under its shadow and for the wider world
to see.

But it's what was found inside this
mound that's really interesting, because

sums up everything about men and heroes
in the pagan world.

And strangely enough, at the same time,
it also points the way to how things

will be in the future, in the Christian
world.

Inside there were the remains of a pagan
leader surrounded by the trappings of

leadership.

There's a sword laid across his body,
beautifully crafted ornaments and

collections of weapons and drinking
vessels to represent his loyal band of

brothers.

So even though we can't even be sure
what this man's name was, We can tell

a lot about him, build up a kind of
profile of him from the artefacts that

found with him.

Absolutely. They tell a very interesting
story about the man himself and about

the lifestyle of the warrior class in
the early 7th century.

There are a number of spears, and there
were certainly four seals, which is an

exceptional number for an Anglo -Saxon
grave.

And we suspect that these are not so
much the personal possessions of the

man, but that they symbolise the warrior
troop who depended on him, who were

there as a visible sign of his power,
and, of course, whom he entertained and

looked after and fed and watered for his
part of the bargain. So they're there,

I think, as symbolic offerings within
this grave and a representation of his

status as the commander of a band of
warriors.

The weapons and the echoes of the
feasting and drinking society are

from the early bands of warriors, the
original Knights of the Round Table.

But other finds of Tatlow require more
explanation.

For example, this lyre.

Lyres had long been played in the
warrior halls, but why would a powerful

such as Tatlow Man have one buried with
him?

Liars have been found in several graves
of the poet musicians who sang the

praises of their masters.

But here in Suffolk, the poet burials
are practically next to the large burial

mounds of their masters, an indication
of the importance attached to their

So where exactly are we now?

We're just about here where the tumulus
is marked there. The cemetery stretched

out in this general area around here.

And in the smaller grave was the grave
with the poet -musician buried in it.

He's one of a number of these people who
we found buried across this general

landscape. They're buried with their
large lyre in their arms in the grave.

Their principal role clearly was the
role that's identified by the lyre,

is the role of musician and poet and
recorder of events.

So they'd be a mixture of a war
correspondent and a spin doctor and an

Precisely. He was able to communicate
with people on behalf of the local

aristocracy who were sponsoring him and
carry their message across, and that was

a very powerful position to be in.

So the lyre in the Taplo burial
represents another weapon in the

armoury.

Spin.

Rulers like Taplo Mann employed spin
doctors to talk them up as they

their followers with what sounds
suspiciously like corporate hospitality.

But for all the conspicuous consumption
on show here, it's what's missing that

tells us most about leadership.

at the end of the pagan era.

Taploman's sword, rusted over the
centuries, would have been another

possession, with an elaborate scabbard
and a glamorous bejeweled handle, or

hilt. But the hilt is missing.

Swords are in themselves very high
-status things, of course, and normally

had very elaborate precious metal hilt
mounts.

But, strangely, there's no trace of
those here, and...

A very likely possibility is that they
were removed before burial, so that the

very precious hilt mounts were taken off
to be remounted on a new sword for his

heir or successors or whatever.

They're part of the power that you're
conferring on the next generation.

I think that what was happening at
Taplow was the beginnings of hereditary

and the end of more democratic forms of
leadership.

From now on, kingship would be a
birthright rather than the reward for

excellence.

The world of our pagan ancestors was
coming to a close, but did it disappear

altogether?

21st century hooligans certainly drink,
boast and fight like their pagan

forebears, but it looks like they've
lost the pagan code of honour.

And I'm not sure about their physical
and moral courage either.

Our pagan ancestors knew how to channel
male aggression into a force for good,

for the good of everybody.

It was a society of heroes, and I
suppose we still need heroes today, role

models and champions.

We also need leaders, political or
otherwise, but leaders of our own

So remember, when we build up our
celebrities only to knock them down

that's the pagan in us.

And lest our leaders forget it, we may
not sacrifice them to the gods anymore,

but we still have the power to vote them
out.