Apocalypse – the Trailer

Shaw Worth (MSt. Medieval Studies 2024)

Scripture suggests that the Christian apocalypse will only happen once. OMS, however, has so far seen two in Hilary Term, both in preparation for the Medieval Mystery Plays 2025 on 26 April 2026 (programme here, and more below), with one now available to stream in perpetuity for HistoryHit’s new documentary The Medieval Apocalypse, presented by Dr Eleanor Janega.

A shorter version of the performance for HistoryHit, composed from the outtakes (thanks to Laura McMillen who sent over the edited clip!)

Hopefully the post below can shed some light onto the process of mounting a medieval performance-text, and offer some insight into the dramaturgs hard at work for their performances on the 26th April. We hope if you watch both your appetites for the Plays might be whetted—especially for those hankering for the Judgement-narrative, of which another staging is forthcoming by the MSt English 650–1550 cohort on the 26th!  

Choosing the text

Though Middle English versions of the Last Judgement exist across the gamut of post-Conquest literature (in poetry and prose as well as drama), Henrike Lähnemann chose an excerpt from so-called ‘Towneley’ collection of mystery plays as our performance text since a) there was already a text available from the preparation for the 2019 cycle, b) (more importantly) it starts with the reference to a horn!

our company (Professor Henrike Lähnemann, Dr Andrew Dunning, Timothy Powell, Michael Angerer, Shaw Worth, Monty Powell, and the Revd Andreas Wenzel)

Like most religious medieval English drama, we ultimately know very little about the provenance and assembly of the texts that come together in their unique sixteenth-century witness (San Marino, California, Huntington Library, MS HM 1). Unlike the York and Chester cycles, it’s not clear when, or by whom the plays were commissioned; as I’ll discuss below, they show marks of major internal revision, suggesting their transmission over an extended period. That would fit with our idea of English dramatic cycles taking place around the Feast of Corpus Christi in the summer: on one day, different guilds re-staged episodes from the Bible from Genesis through to Revelation, at least some of the time on mobile wagons in civic centres between which spectators could move.

The cycle takes its name from the prominent Lancashire family in whose library the manuscript containing the plays was held until the nineteenth century; the dialect of the plays themselves, however, suggests a West Yorkshire origin, and has long been associated with Wakefield in the West Riding, though debate around that attribution rages on. The Last Judgement is a particular gem from the Towneley plays insofar as it bears the distinctive nine-line stanza used by one (hypothetically reconstructed) contributor to the cycle usually called the ‘Wakefield Master’, whose naturalism and comedy elevates what are otherwise completely pedestrian reiterations of doctrinal tropes into rich dramas. (For an accessible introduction to the Master’s verbal tricks, check out the London Review of Books’ Medieval LOLs podcast episode on the Second Shepherds’ Play, hosted by Drs Mary Wellesley and Irina Dumitrescu — link here! – and watch the play in the 2019 performance).

The story as we cut it is very simple—and I’ll avoid ‘spoilers’ to keep you entertained—but the play sees two souls, Bonus and Malus (Monty Powell and Michael Angerer), called to attest to their earthly deeds before Christ seated in majesty and accompanied by three (non-speaking, but singing) helper-angels (Henrike Lähnemann, Andrew Dunning, Tim Powell), and Jesus’ (me) replies to them both. By Malus he is less than impressed…

Putting the play together

Then came the issue of how to stage it. To call any contemporary performance of Middle English (religious) plays ‘historical reconstructions’ is hard to justify, though the situation varies from text to text. Almost no information regarding the staging of the four major cycles survives (beyond some rather opaque, and certainly guild-manipulated registers from York), to say nothing of the fact that the (Tudor!) witnesses to Middle English cycle drama postdate their first performances in most cases by almost two centuries. The Towneley manuscript more likely emerges from sixteenth-century antiquarianism, in other words, rather than from active use. As a substitute, with Henrike’s help and direction, we used stage directions from fifteenth-century German dramatic records, like those surrounding the Bordesholm Marienklage, which leaves rich prefatory details in Latin of players, costumes, and props down to individual textile-types. As Christ I wore a paper crown and (real) liturgical vestments, provided by Andreas Wenzel from the St Edmund Hall chapel (including the right preparatory prayers); stigmata were ably provided by Alison Ray of the Bodleian, whose Burt’s Bees tinted lip balm (sponsorship pending) lent a rather septic sheen to Christ’s woundys, smeared on Boots own-brand cotton gloves. Malus and Bonus wore academic gowns over black; the angels wore surplices and wings from the St Edmund Hall costume store, along with—long-term OMS fans can be reassured—Henrike’s bannered horn invoked by Malus in the opening lines.

Filming and reperformance

Filming for the HistoryHit documentary took place in January. Following a quick review of the text and a rundown on mid-Yorkshire vowels circa 1450, we set up to film in the extraordinary Romanesque crypt (under the medieval church of St Peter-in-the-East, now in use as the college library; the crypt itself has been largely unaltered since the twelfth century). There we met Eleanor, the HistoryHit camera team, and the English Faculty’s own Professor Laure Ashe, who also features in the documentary as an interviewed expert. Laura, Eleanor, and Alison provided our ‘audience’, providing boos, cheers, and some less-than-pious (and probably more historically accurate) snickers; with some B-roll taken by the team, and coffee enjoyed afterwards, the documentarians vanished away to some of their other treats (if these delights weren’t enough, also see Alison introducing the Douce Apocalypse in the film as well!) 

In Eighth Week we then reperformed the same extract in the Visiting Scholars’ Centre in the Weston for full term’s final Medieval Coffee Morning as a kind of live ‘ad’ for the Mystery Plays.

Performing in the library allowed us the particular treat of presenting one of the Bodleian’s lesser-appreciated treasures, namely the roll containing the pseudo-dramatic Middle English fragment known as the Dux Moraud (Bodleian Library, MS. Eng. poet. f. 2). If it is indeed an ‘actor’s roll’, as some critics have been eager to suggest, then this rather slender piece of parchment is a vanishingly rare gateway into the performance culture that flourished in East Anglia in the mid-late fifteenth century, including plays like WisdomThe Castle of Perseverance, the Digby Mary Magdalene, and the N-Town cycle. Like other extant Anglian plays extant, the Moraud is distinctively racier than other regions of Middle English cycle drama; we won’t tell if you look it up. 

Despite the fact that they feature the same actors using the same text, these two versions of the Towneley Judgementdemonstrate very neatly the huge potential value of experimental reperformance—of music, mime, liturgy, and dance as well as drama—as a means of engaging with medieval media at large. The HistoryHit documentary brings up interesting questions: with the intervention of the camera, the viewer is no longer free to observe different aspects of the performance going on at once; modern English subtitles ‘remediate’ the frequently alliterative Middle English text, dropping another kind of information into the mix; narration, rather like the long German prefaces mentioned above, will set audiences looking to correlate what they’ve previously heard with what they’re seeing. The Weston performance, on the other hand, makes fewer modernization attempts, but prompted a fair few audience questions on what had actually been said! 

All that’s to say that reasons are very few that medievalists shouldn’t find themselves at Teddy Hall on the 26th to watch the Mystery Plays. The day will bring together a huge range of religious drama and promises to alchemize some cross-discipline work as always.

Cast

Jesus (Shaw Worth) – MSt. Medieval Studies
Malus/Evil Soul (Michael Angerer) – DPhil. candidate in Medieval English
Bonus/Good Soul (Monty Powell) – MSt. Modern Languages
Singing Angel (Andrew Dunning) – Curator of Medieval Manuscripts
Trumpet angle (Henrike Lähnemann) – Professor of Medieval German Literature and Linguistics

Text extract from the Towneley Judgement play in the Oxford Text Archive

Malus: Alas I harde that horne / that callys vs to the dome, 3 All that euer were borne / thider behofys theym com. 4 May nathere lande ne se / vs from this dome hide, 5 ffor ferde fayn wold, I fle / bot I must nedys abide; […] 6 Alas, that I was borne! 11 I se now me beforne, 12 That lord with Woundys fyfe; 13 how may I on hym loke, 14 That falsly hym forsoke, 15 When I led synfull lyfe? 16

Jesus: The day is commen of catyfnes, 394 all those to care that ar vncleyn, 395 The day of batell and bitternes, 396 ffull long abiden has it beyn; 397 The day of drede to more and les, 398 of Ioy, of tremlyng, and of teyn. 399 Ilka wight that wikyd is 400 may say, alas this day is seyn! 401 here may ye se my Woundys wide 402 that I suffred for youre mysdede, 403 Thrugh harte, hede, fote, hande and syde, 404 not for my gilte bot for youre nede. […] 405 All this suffred I for thi sake. 432 say, man, What suffred, thou for me? 433 Mi blissid barnes on my right hande, 434 youre dome this day thar ye not drede, […] 435 When I was hungre ye me fed, 442 To slek my thrist ye war full fre; 443 When I was clothles ye me cled, 444 ye Wold, no sorowe on me se; […] 445 Therfor in heuen shall be youre rest, 456 In ioy and blys to beld, me by. 457

Bonus: lord, When had thou so mekill nede? 458 hungre or thrusty, how myght it be? 459 When was oure harte fre the to feede? 460 In prison When myght We the se? 461 When was thou seke, or wantyd wede? 462 To harbowre the when helpid we? 463 When had thou nede of oure fordede? 464 when did we all this dede to the? 465

Jesus: Mi blissid barnes, I shall you say 466 what tyme this dede was to me done; […] 467 My blessed bairns, I shall you say What time this deed was to me done; … ye cursid, catyfs of kames kyn, 474 That neuer me comforthid, in my care, 475 Now I and ye for euer shall twyn, 476 In doyll to dwell for euer mare; […] 477 Catyfs, ye chaste me from youre yate; 483 when ye were set as syres on bynke 484 I stode ther oute wery and Wate, 485 yit none of you Wold, on me thynke, 486 To haue pite on my poore astate; 487 Therfor to hell I shall you synke, […]!

Malus: 488 lorde, when had thou, that all has, 504 hunger or thriste, sen thou god is? 505 When was that thou in prison was? 506 When was thou nakyd or harberles? […] 507 Alas, for doyll this day! 512 alas, that euer I it abode! 513 Now am I dampned for ay, 514 this dome may I not avoyde. 515

Jesus: Mi chosyn childer, commes to me! 524 With me to dwell now shall ye weynde, 525 Ther ioy and blys euer shall be, 526 youre life in lykyng for to leynde! 527 Jesus turns to Malus and sends him out howling ye warid Wightys, from me ye fle, 528 In hell to dwell withoutten ende! 529 Ther shall ye noght bot sorow se, 530 And sit bi sathanas the feynde. 531

Bonus: We loue the, lorde, in alkyn thyng, 613 That for thyne awne has ordand thus, 614 That we may haue now oure dwellyng 615 In heuen blis giffen vnto vs. 616 Therfor full boldly may we syng 617 On oure way as we trus; 618 Make we all myrth and louyng 619 With te deum laudamus.

Call for Submissions: Medieval Epic

Medieval Epic. Special Issue of The Explicator

From the Editor-in-Chief: We invite contributions to The Explicator on any work of medieval literature that is conventionally considered (or should be considered) an epic. Eligible works include Beowulf, Waltharius, the Song of Roland, the Nibelungenlied, and other works traditionally associated with them. Less prominent works, such as bridal-quest epics (e.g., König Rother, Salman und Morolf) or epics pertaining to Dietrich von Bern, are likewise eligible for the issue. Contributions on German material are particularly welcome; they need not address whether the work being studied should be considered an epic. Each contribution needs only to put forward an original interpretation of a passage (or passages) in the work under scrutiny. Papers published in The Explicator should contain fewer than 2500 words.

Papers intended for this special issue should be uploaded directly through the Submission Portal on the website of The Explicator prior to 1 October 2025.

Leonard Neidorf, Editor-in-Chief, The Explicator, Distinguished Professor English Department Shenzhen University, https://leonardneidorf.com. Latest publication: Waltharius: The Latin Epic of Walther of Aquitaine (ed. Leonard Neidorf, trans. Brian Murdoch)

Play: The Enterlude of the Godly Queen Hester

When? 28 March, 18:30–20:15
Where? Research Centre, Thatched Barn, Christ Church Meadow

The anonymous English Enterlude of Godly Queene Hester (c. 1529) is a fascinating play, unperformed since the 16th century. Ostensibly in praise of Esther, heroine of Jewish history, the play is actually a political satire about the demise of Cardinal Wolsey. The fall of Wolsey, who had been the monarch’s right-hand man, was a key moment in the reign of Henry VIII. Assuerus, King of Persia, stands for Henry, while Aman, the model of the evil counsellor, for Wolsey. Henry’s wife, Katherine of Aragon, is idealised in the figure of Hester, who fills a traditional role for virtuous royal women by interceding with her husband, but also boldly argues that queens should exhibit the same virtues as kings and can perfectly well govern kingdoms when their husbands are away fighting wars! She thus anticipates the strong secular heroines of Shakespearean comedy.

Originally, the play would have been performed by a boys’ company so it is appropriate that it will be staged by Edward’s Boys. This company, from King Edward VI School, Stratford-upon-Avon, has, over the last two decades, revolutionised our understanding of the early modern repertoire. Alongside the English Enterlude, they will also present a short purimshpil, a Jewish folk play. The purim plays (still a living tradition in Yiddish) tell the story of Esther in a very different mode, celebrating the rescue of the Jewish people by their heroine in farcical style. The production is part of the WOMARD project, which explores connections between Jewish, Christian and Islamic Theatre and is sponsored by the SNSF.

Book your ticket here

The performance will be preceded by free talks, on Esther in Reformation Europe, and the purimshpil: 

16:00-16:45 Professor Cora Dietl, talk on ‘The Esther tradition and Reformation in medieval and early modern Europe

16:45-17:15 Rabbi Bex introduces the purim tradition, and a Q and A session with Bea Baldwin 

Esther pleads for the Jewish people; from The Queen’s College Library, Sel. d. 81, a Sammelband of Reformation-related pamphlets. Retratos o Tablas de las Historias de testamento (1568)
Retratos o tablas de las historias del Testamento viejo, : hechas y dibuxadas por vn muy primo y sotil artifice. Iuntamente con vna muy breue y clara exposicion … de cada vna dellas en Latin, con las quotas de los lugares de la sagrada scritura de donde se tomaron, y la mesma en lengua Castellana, para que todos gozen delas. Frellon, Jean, -1568 M. D. XLIX. | En Lion de Francia, : [Excudebat Ioannes Frellonius] | [52] leaves : ill. ; 4⁰


 

Job: Professor in Latin Palaeography

The Faculty of History and Wadham College are seeking an outstanding palaeographer to join the team of medieval historians. Medieval History is exceptionally strong in Oxford with a large and lively community of taught graduates, doctoral students and postdoctoral early career researchers.  The collegiate university is home to the largest university-based collection of medieval manuscripts in the world.

This post is an exciting and demanding opportunity for a proven scholar and talented teacher whose research and teaching specialism is in the history of Latin manuscripts (codices, documents, fragments thereof) within the disciplinary context of medieval history.  Beyond a specialism in scripts used for writing medieval Latin, there are no chronological or geographical preferences, and the successful candidate will be responsible for graduate teaching across the entire span of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages including book and documentary traditions. The person appointed will conduct research of the highest quality suitable for submission to REF within the broad parameters of the discipline of medieval history, will seek external grant funding for manuscript-related projects and will participate in the public engagement and knowledge dissemination activities of the Bodleian Libraries and the colleges of the University.

The appointee will be expected to play a full part in the academic life of the Faculty of History and Wadham College and will work closely with colleagues in other faculties within the Humanities Division. The University of Oxford uses the grade of associate professor for most of its senior academic appointments. Associate professors are eligible for consideration through regular recognition of distinction exercises for award of the title of full professor.

We welcome applications from candidates at all post-doctoral career stages, including at professorial level. We are committed to creating a diverse academic workforce and positively encourage applications from under-represented communities. We particularly encourage applications from women (approximately 40% of Faculty posts are held by female academics), people with disabilities and Black, Asian, and minority ethnic candidates.

The appointee will be a member of the Faculty of History and a non-tutorial fellow of Wadham College. The post is tenable from 1 October 2025 or as soon as possible thereafter. The deadline for applications is Wednesday 19th March 2025Presentations and interviews are expected to take place in Oxford late April/Early May.

Queries about the post should be addressed to the Chair of the History Faculty Board, Professor Martin Conway  or the Chichele Professor of Medieval History, Professor Julia Smith. All enquiries will be treated in strict confidence; they will not form part of the selection decision.

Pay Scale : Associate Professor Grade 36S: £55,755 to £74,867 per annum plus additional benefits and allowances as detailed in the job description. Further particulars: AP in Medieval Latin Manuscript Studies FP-FINAL.pdf

Apply Now

Medieval Women’s Writing Group

Talk: Breaking Walls, A Graphic Novel: Reflections on Public History. Medieval Women’s Writing Research Seminar

Friday 28 February 2025, 5pm -7pm

Lower Lecture Room, Lincoln College, Turl St, Oxford OX1 3DR

Medieval Women’s Writing Research Seminar Hilary Term 2025

Lower Lecture Room, Lincoln College

Week 6: Friday, 28 February 2025, 5pm

Speaker: Dr Carolin Gluchowski (University of Hamburg) 

All welcome

The Medieval Women’s Writing Research Group meets to discuss everything to do with women’s writing in the medieval period. We hold a variety of events throughout the term. All welcome! 

 Week 1,  Saturday 25th January   Medieval Women’s Writing Research Group Trip to the British Library’s exhibition “Medieval Women” (London) – The registration period for subsidised tickets has passed but if anyone wants to purchase their own tickets for the same time slot and join our group, please get in contact with Kat Smith: katherine.smith@lincoln.ox.ac.uk  
 Week 3, Wednesday, 5th February    Special Event: Medieval recipe books at the Oxford Bodleian Libraries. A collaboration between Critical Food Studies Network, Medieval Women’s Writing Research Group and the Bodleian Academic Engagement – Horton Room, Weston Library  
 Week 6, Friday, 28th February   Medieval Women’s Writing Research Seminar: Dr. Carolin Gluchowski (University of Hamburg) – Breaking Walls, A Graphic Novel: Reflections on Public History (provisional title) – Time & place tbc  
 Week 7, Friday, 7th March   Medieval Women’s Writing Research Seminar: Ved Prahba Shama (Independent Researcher) – Medieval Indian Women’s Writing (provisional topic) – Online 12.30pm (GMT), registration details tbc  

Please see the individual dates for time and place of the session. 

Stay up to date with events by joining our mailing list or following us on X @MedievalWomenOx

Convenors: Katherine Smith, Marlene Schilling and Santhia Velasco Kittlaus. 

Funded by the “TORCH Critical-Thinking Communities” fund. 

Volunteering at Iffley Church

Invitation to a tea party with LIVING STONES on SATURDAY 15 MARCH 3.00-4.30 in the Church Hall, Church Way, Iffley OX4 4EG.
Come along and find out about LIVING STONES. Meet the Living Stones volunteers. Join in: Living Stones is looking for volunteers of any age, background or beliefs

Living Stones is the heritage and educational arm of St Mary’s, the church at the heart of Iffley village, Rose Hill and Donnington. Volunteers welcome visitors to the church. They also run activities, events and talks on its history and architecture. They will start welcoming visitors to the church on Sunday afternoons on Palm Sunday, 13 April. They also have three events planned:

SATURDAY 10 MAY 10.00-4.30 – Drawing Iffley Church, day-school with artist Micah Hayns.

SATURDAY 17 MAY 11.00-7.15 – Day of chant in celebration of St Dunstan, patron saint of bellringers and music. The day ends with a special service in the church sung to music composed by St Dunstan and first written down in the 12th century.

SUNDAY 7 SEPTEMBER – Patronal Festival for St Mary the Virgin, picnic and family fun.

Krasis: Object-centred symposia at the Ashmolean

Krasis is a unique, museum-based, interdisciplinary teaching and learning programme, which began life at the Ashmolean in 2017, devised by classicist (and historian of ancient Boeotia) Dr Sam Gartland and Teaching Curator Dr Jim Harris. In 2018, the programme won a University of Oxford Humanities Division Teaching Excellence Award. Hilary term 2025 was its 22nd iteration.

Each term Krasis gathers eight early career researchers from the University of Oxford (the Ashmolean Junior Teaching Fellows or AJTFs) and 16 current Oxford undergraduates and taught-postgraduates (the Krasis Scholars) for a series of object-centred symposia, devised and delivered by the Teaching Fellows, who each address a shared theme from the standpoint of their own discipline and their own research.

For the Krasis Scholars, the programme offers first-hand insight into what an academic pathway might look like, and provides a rare opportunity to learn directly from researchers and to contribute to the conversation from within their degree specialism. For the AJTFs, it offers a forum for interdisciplinary dialogue and a ready, able team of students and colleagues to explore creative, imaginative approaches to collaborative, collections-based teaching. For all participants, it offers the chance to engage with the peerless collections of the Ashmolean at first hand.

Over the past seven years, Krasis has seen series on Power, the Body, Absence, Presence, Performance, Devotion, Imitation, Voices in Conflict, Movement/Transition, Play, Danger, Identity, Constraint, Opening, Becoming, Belonging, Re-Use, Work, Dialogue, Container, Wealth, Intersections, and Ruptures. We have used objects ranging from kimonos, musical scores and Tibetan musical instruments to Renaissance bronzes, newspaper advertisements, palaeolithic hand-axes and ancient Egyptian magic wands.

Most recently, we have used images loaned to the Ashmolean by the Terra Foundation for American Art to anchor each symposium, with Teaching Fellows connecting outwards from them to explore, for example, Chinese jade, the anthropology of obesity, economic aspiration in the French Revolution, witchcraft and common wealth in early modern Europe, and gift-giving in pre-Christian Sweden, in symposia involving four thousand years of objects from Egypt, China, Japan, Europe and ancient West Asia.

Krasis Teaching Fellows and Scholars have come from Classics, English, History, Economics, Fine Art, Chemistry, Archaeology, Anthropology, Egyptology, Assyriology, Russian, Japanese Studies, German, Earth Sciences, Engineering, Politics, French, Portuguese, History of Art, Arabic, Physics, Statistics, Islamic Studies, Development Studies, Geography, Music, South Asian Studies, Philosophy, Linguistics, Theology, Women’s Studies, Experimental Psychology and Law, and from almost every college of the University.

The growing number of former Scholars returning as Teaching Fellows testifies to the impact of Krasis on its participants. If you’d like to take part, please fill out the application form and return it to krasis@ashmus.ox.ac.uk by 5pm on Friday of 8th week, 14th March.

Four afternoons to change your way of thinking. Forever.

CMTC presents — “Work in Progress” Colloquium

The Centre for Manuscript and Text Cultures’ Hilary Term ‘Work-in-Progress’ colloquium – Tuesday 18th February (5.15-6.45pm, the Memorial Room at Queen’s) 

The CMTC is delighted to be hosting the following speakers: 

Dr Riccardo Montalto (Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II): From manuscripts to history: The reconstruction of the Greek manuscript library of Achilles Statius (1524-1581)

Achilles Statius was a Portuguese humanist active in Rome in the second half of the sixteenth century. Committed to editorial and propaganda activities and, in particular, in the edition of the texts of the Fathers of the Greek Church, Statius set up one of the largest private libraries in Renaissance Rome, peculiar for its size and intellectual value. Starting from the material data detectable from the manuscripts, compared with the data available from different sources – primarily historical, archival and library science – the research aims to reconstruct a part of Achilles Statius’s library and to identify some methods and working practices of the late Renaissance humanists.

Holly Dempster-Edwards (University of Liverpool): Emotions, Gender and Crusading in Fifteenth-Century Burgundian Prose Epics and Chronicles

This paper will give an overview of my PhD thesis, which examines the social function of emotions at the fifteenth-century court of Duke Philip the Good of Burgundy (r. 1419-1467). My methodology is based on that of the historian Barbara Rosenwein, whose concept of ‘emotional communities’ has been highly influential within Medieval Studies. My study is based on emotion words in three Burgundian mises en prose Les Croniques et Conquestes de Charlemaine by David Aubert, La Belle Hélène de Constantinople by Jehan Wauquelin, and Mabrien (attrib. Aubert). I have built on Rosenwein’s framework by employing quantitative analysis of the gendered and ‘racial-religious’ distribution of emotions within each text, alongside qualitative textual analysis and examination of text-image relations. This paper demonstrates how emotions have a social function within this specific emotional community of Burgundian knights and would-be crusaders in response to the Fall of Constantinople in 1453, and how these texts function as literary propaganda which presents itself as didactic; in so doing they attempt to achieve their more subtle aim of maintaining emotion norms within the context of Burgundian chivalric masculinity, hoping to persuade Philip’s courtiers to go on crusade with him in response to the defeat of Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks.

From the archive

Tuesday the 13th of February 2024, 5.15–6.45pm UK time Centre for Manuscript and Text Cultures

Memorial Room, The Queen’s College    

1. A. D’Angelo (Rome ‘Sapienza’), ‘Catullan marginalia in the 16th century: the books of Piero Vettori’. 

The Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich preserves three printed editions of Catullus’ Liber with marginal notes by Piero Vettori (1499-1585). This important scholar edited dozens of Classical authors, but never published anything on Catullus: thus, these books are the main extant evidence of his work on this poet. The notes contain variant readings, original conjectures and loci similes, and they offer new insights on Vettori’s philological method and his library. Through these marginalia, I will try to point out Vettori’s main interests in Catullus’ poetry and the sources he used for his Catullan studies.

2. Marlene Schilling (Oxford), ‘A special form of devotion – personifications of time in late medieval prayer books from Northern Germany’.  

Addressing liturgical holidays, for example welcoming Mr Easterday, is a particular characteristic of late medieval vernacular prayer-books from North German female convents. They highlight a distinct form of poetics, because describing and interacting with specific points in time – personifying them – allows an intercommunication with the divine that conveys a certain form of agency to the speaker. In this paper, we explore the particular type of prayer-books these personifications are found in, talk about their material indicators within the text, and think about the special role of the prayer-books from the Cistercian convent Medingen within this distinct manuscript landscape.

CfP: SELIM 35

The 35th International Conference of the Spanish Society for Medieval English Language and Literature (SELIM 35) will be hosted by the Department of English at the University of Málaga, 24th-26th September 2025. There is a long-standing link of SELIM to Oxford since offer Bruce Mitchell Award for early-career scholars which honours the memory of Dr Bruce Michell (1920–2010), a distinguished scholar of Old English, his long-enduring contribution to the field of medieval English language and literature and active involvement with the Society’s activities and journal in their early decades.

As in previous SELIM conferences, SELIM 35 will have four thematic panels accepting proposals on any topic related to any aspect of linguistic and literary research on Old and Middle English:

PanelPanel coordinatorContact
Old English Literature and CultureFrancisco Rozano-Garcíafrozg@unileon.es
Old English Language and LinguisticsEsaúl Ruiz Narbonaernarbona@us.es
Middle English Literature and CultureAndoni Cossio Garridoandoni.cossio@ehu.eus 
Middle English Language and LinguisticsMarta Pacheco Francomartapacheco@uma.es

Scholars interested in offering 20-minute presentations (followed by a 10-minute discussion) must send a 300-word abstract (excluding references) in electronic format (please use this MSWord template) to the panel coordinator before 30 March 2025. Acceptance of proposals will be confirmed by 15 April 2025. References should comply with the latest APA format (7th edition). Should you have any doubts regarding panel adscription, please send your proposal to the Organising Committee at selim35@uma.es.

Important dates
Proposal submission: 30 March 2025
Notification of acceptance: 15 April 2025
Registration (early bird): 16 April – 15 June 2025
Registration (regular): 16 June – 12 September 2025
Conference dates: 24 – 26 September 2025

For further information please contact the organizing committee at selim35@uma.es.