The Shield Ring
First edition
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| Author | Rosemary Sutcliff |
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| Illustrator | C. Walter Hodges |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Historical novel |
| Publisher | OUP |
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Publication date
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1956 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback) |
| Pages | 213 |
| Preceded by | Sword Song |
The Shield Ring is a historical novel for children written by Rosemary Sutcliff and published in 1956. It is the last in a sequence of novels, chronologically started with The Eagle of the Ninth, loosely tracing a family of the Roman Empire, then Britain, and finally Norse-Britain, who inherit an emerald seal ring bearing the insignia of a dolphin.
It takes place during the Norman Rule of Britain, and tells the story of resistance against the Norman Conquest in the Lake District and North West England. Like many Sutcliff novels, the story of the characters unfold against a background of multi-cultural conflict and change.
The story revolves around Frytha and Bjorn, a girl and a boy who have both been orphaned by the Norman conquest, and have sought refuge and been taken in by Jarl Buthar in his hidden Lakeland settlement by Buthar's Mere. The group is portrayed as Northmen settlers who have long established themselves in the area, and are resisting Norman advances into their country. They describe themselves as forming their shield ring up in the fells of Lakeland, as a form of Last Stand against the Norman invasion. The theme of this Shield Ring is developed throughout the story, an ultimately portrayed as an ethic of loyalty to one's group, even unto death.
Bjorn is fostered to a Harp player, an old man who originally fought the Normans at Hastings, who refers to being part of that Shield Wall resisting William the Conqueror. The instrument becomes a key feature of the narrative, being a symbolic link to the indigenous Welsh and British peoples with whom the Norse of Lakeland have intermingled. Bjorn is seen as having the musical gift from his maternal Celtic forebears, and learns to play as he grows up. This links him back to the family of the emerald seal ring with the dolphin insignia, which he is given when he comes of age.
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Wikipedia