Professor of Medieval German Literature and Linguistics at the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages, Fellow at St Edmund Hall, and Co-Director of Oxford Medieval Studies.
Explanation of the result of the inspection of a sheep liver in the Old Library of St Edmund Hall. Dr Selena Wisnom (Leicester) researches ancient Mesopotamian divination, and asks the question: Will Donald Trump win the 2024 US election?
You can watch the inspection in this video:
Inspection of the sheep’s liver in the kitchen of The Queen’s College, Oxford
Explanation of the results in the Old Library of St Edmund Hall, Oxford
and you can watch the alternative Babylonian reading in this video:
Alternative reading of the result
Disclaimer: the extispicy is for entertainment and research purposes only!
Dr Wisnom held a Junior Research Fellowship in Manuscripts and Text Cultures at The Queen’s College, Oxford from 2016-2020 and is currently Lecturer in the Heritage of the Middle East at the University of Leicester.
Call for submissions of short stories about Morgana le Fay on behalf of the publisher Flame Tree who are advertising a newhardcover series with myths and short stories. Deadline for submissions is 22nd September 2024
From their website: Discover the mythology of humankind through its heroes, characters, gods and immortal figures. Myths, Gods & Immortals brings together the new and the ancient, familiar stories with a fresh and imaginative twist. Each book brings back to life a classic mythological or folkloric figure, with completely new stories alongside the original tales. New and emerging writers from open submissions, reveal hidden themes, casting fresh perspectives on well-known stories, alongside specially commissioned text on the origins and the cultural background of the mythology. The first four books in the series are Medusa, Odin, Circe and Anansi. We’re now opening up submissions for the next two books, Achilles and Morgana le Fay.
Morgana le Fay
Morgana le Fay is a mysterious figure of Arthurian legend, found in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight,Le Morte d’Arthur and a number of other accounts. She is often seen in the context of the men in those myths – a half-sister of King Arthur, a jilted lover of Lancelot, a foil of Merlin – and yet is an extremely powerful character herself. She has deep roots in Celtic mythology and offers a fascinating canvas to be explored. Well known for her magical abilities, including shape-shifting, her complex character oscillates between benevolent healer and malevolent sorceress. Her relationship with Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table is marked by both familial loyalty and deep-seated enmity, making her one of the most enigmatic and multifaceted figures in the Arthurian mythos. Stories submitted for consideration need to explore new angles to the character: have her follow alternative paths, present different viewpoints, imagine new futures, or perhaps pursue story lines that are hinted at in the original tales. Submissions to: Morgana@flametreepublishing.com
Terms:
Multiple submissions are fine but must be in separate emails.
Simultaneous submissions are fine but you must have the right to license your story in an anthology.
For accepted stories we pay Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) rates of 8 cents/6 pence per word for original stories, 6 cents/4 pence for reprints.
We will aim to read each story and confirm its status within 4 months of the submission deadline.
Payment for the chosen stories will be made within 30 days of the final advertised publication date (see our website flametreepublishing.com for details), although some may be paid earlier than that.
Submission does not imply the right to publication. Each story will be read and assessed by the selection panel.
Let us know in your submission email whether your story would be a reprint or is currently unpublished.
Important Notice about Submissions and Guidelines
We’re always looking for better ways of working so we’ve tweaked our submission process to allow us to read more stories, and spend more time assessing the balance of our books. So follow these rules to avoid your story getting lost in our system!
Submissions must use the dedicated email address.
The subject line of the email must be the story title.
The file with the story must be attached to the email (.docx, .doc or .rtf format).
The name of the file must match the name in the subject line.
If submitting more than one story, please submit one story per email.
Other useful tips for a more successful submission
The file name of the submission must be the story name only.
Please just use spaces between words in the title (not _ or – ).
If the story name starts with A or The, please use it at the beginning of the file name.
If you’d like to add some details about the story, confirm if it’s new or a reprint, or add a short bio of yourself, please add to the body of the email not as an attachment.
Story length is most likely to be successful at 3,000-4,000 words, but we will still read stories slightly outside this range.
If submitting a story that has recently been submitted to us for consideration to another anthology, please state this in the submission email.
The Humanities Division Interdisciplinary Master’s Programmes are advertising an Academic Mentor & Communications Officer Joint Position for the MSt in Medieval Studiesand Oxford Medieval Studies (OMS). The deadline for applications is 2 September 2024. For an insight into the duties involved, read the blog post by two previous postholders, Dr Luisa Ostacchini: A Medieval Monologium, and Dr Karl Kinsella Heralding Oxford Medieval Studies.
The role of the Academic Mentor is to support the work of the programme convenors by fostering a group identity for the incoming cohort of students. The Academic Mentor will make an important contribution to the experience of students on this course.
The role of Oxford Medieval Studies (OMS) Communication Officer is to prepare the termly Medieval Booklet, send out a weekly news bulletin, and coordinate graduate students working with OMS.
The position will be offered for one year in the first instance. The holder will be expected to work 64 hours during Michaelmas term and 56 hours during each of Hilary and Trinity terms (for a total of 176 hours over the year). The hours should be divided flexibly between the MSt and OMS portions of the job, with a typical split of two-thirds MSt and one-third OMS. The remuneration offered is at point 7.1 of the casual pay spine; in 2023-24 this was £18.98 per hour.
Duties of the joint position
The role of the Academic Mentor is to:
help foster a sense of group identity and cohesion
contribute to the research mentoring and professional development of the students during the course
establish an informal space for group interaction
This will involve:
directing students towards relevant events and activities and helping them to navigate sources of information, including signposting to relevant learning opportunities and skills development provision
providing information and guidance on academic choice, including programme options and further study
discussing with students their future plans (whether professional or academic) and offering appropriate guidance by directing students towards relevant offices in the University
leading group discussions of academic and professional topics as may be relevant, depending on students’ needs
providing appropriate guidance on drafting research proposals for doctoral applications
coaching students in study skills (e.g., writing)
readiness to serve as ‘a helpful ear’ to students’ academic concerns or anxieties, liaising with the convenors where appropriate and/or where the mentor’s own concerns arise about a student. The mentor will not act as a welfare officer; however, they are advised to consult the convenors or the course administration should welfare issues arise so that students may be directed to the proper sources of support
The role will support the more formal work of the programme convenor to whom the Academic Mentor should report regularly and consult for guidance on offering advice to students (e.g., on University procedures)
The above is meant to act as a broad guidance; it is expected that the role will be flexible and responsive to the needs of individual cohorts.
The role of OMS Communications Officer is to:
Prepare the termly Medieval Booklet for publication two weeks before term starts
Write and circulate a weekly OMS email news bulletin
Coordinate graduate students working with OMS as events and social media officers
Help to administer the medieval.ox.ac.uk blog and the mailing list
Encourage graduate participation in blogging, application to OMS small grants, and so on
Work with the Directors of Oxford Medieval Studies to promote medieval studies
We welcome applications either from postdoctoral candidates, or candidates with relevant experience. Depending on availability and expertise, there might be scope for some collaborative teaching (for which additional payment would be made).
How to apply
Please write a letter of application outlining your suitability for the role, and send it, together with a CV, to interdisciplinary@humanities.ox.ac.uk by 2 September. Please ask two referees to send their references to the same address by the same date. Interviews for shortlisted applicants will take place in late August, and successful applicants will be expected to start from the beginning of Michaelmas term 2024.
The new Introduction to Middle High German by Howard Jones and Martin H. Jones (OUP 2024) is a dedicated student edition of The Oxford Guide to Middle High German, designed for taught courses and self-study. It provides an accessible overview of the grammar and lexis of the language suitable for introductory-level students and includes thirty extensively-annotated texts with explanatory notes suitable for use in teaching. It is accompanied by a companion website which gives open access to further online resources for the study of Middle High German.
Introduction to the workshop by Howard Jones and Henrike Lähnemann
The workshop was designed as a test case to show ways of using the ‘Introduction’ within a university setting or for self-study . Participants got access to the online version and worked with it in groups ranging from beginners to experts on aspects of Middle High German. The “Translathon” consisted of a group competition to translate and comment on passages of the Middle High German text ‘Helmbrecht’.
Translatathon with six competing groups, translating lines 984 to 1035, featuring
00:00 Group 1: Nicholas Champness, Nina Cornell, Philip Flacke, Anna Vines 00:38 Group 2: Sharon Baker, Monty Powell, Willa Stonecipher, An Van Camp 01:14 Group 3: Theodore Luketina, Daniel Ruin, Nina Unland, Hestia Jingyan Zhang 02:04 Group 4: Reuben Bignell, Greta Evans, Andreas Groeger 03:01 Group 5: Joshua Booth, Lia Neill, Catriona Robertson 03:49 Group 6: Isabelle Gregory, Wilfred Lamont, William Thurlwell
The workshop took place on Saturday 2 November 2024, 2-6pm, Taylor Institution Library, Room 2, University of Oxford. Participants were students from first-year undergraduate to doctoral level – a range of people, in fact, who wanted to acquire, practise, and improve their knowledge of Middle High German. No previous knowledge of Middle High German was required. Organisers Sarah Bowden, Howard Jones, and Henrike Lähnemann
3–4 July 2025 / St John’s College, Cambridge. Deadline for paper submissions 9 January 2025
This two-day, in-person conference will explore developing traditions of silence in dramatic texts from antiquity to the Renaissance. Papers are sought from scholars across a range of fields, including classical reception, comparative literature, and medieval and/or early modern English literature. Topics may include:
mute characters and/or characters who never appear on stage;
characters who gain or lose the power of speech (welcoming perspectives e.g. from disability studies);
dramatic silence as represented on page and/or stage (e.g. bookhistory approaches and/or performance studies);
the history and/or function of animals on stage;
the relationship of dramatic silence to music and/orinarticulacy;
representations of dramatic silence in contemporary discursivetexts;
dumb shows;
silence in neo-Latin drama.
Speakers will include Elisabeth Dutton (Fribourg), Barbara Ravelhofer (Durham), and Julie Stone Peters (Columbia). Please submit a 250-word abstract for a 20-minute paper to John Colley (stagingsilence@gmail.com) by noon on Thursday 9 January 2025. Preference will be given to papers with an interdisciplinary and/or comparative focus. It’s anticipated that early career speakers will be able to apply for travel bursaries.
During the Medievalist Coffee Morning on Friday, 21 June 2024, Henrike Lähnemann launched her new book The Life of Nuns. Love, Politics, and Religion in Medieval German Convents, Cambridge: Open Book Publishers 2024, open access: https://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0397 To purchase a paper copy with a 20% discount, use the code LONHL_24 at checkout
Medingen O1: Bodleian Library, MS. Lat. liturg. f. 4: Prayer book: Easter (end 15th to early 16th cent.), fol. 174v: the community of nuns; fol. 288r: Music notation
Medingen O2: Bodleian Library, MS. Lat. liturg. e. 18: Manual for the Medingen Provost (1472/1479), fol. 36v/37r: liturgical drawings; fol. 47vb: Harrowing of Hell initial
Medingen O4: Bodleian Library, MS. Don. e. 248: Psalter by Margarete Hopes (early 16th cent.), fol. 173r: Harrowing of Hell; fol. 196r: Resurrection
Rule of St Clare: Bodleian Library, MS. Lyell 68, 1457
Following this, there was a presentation by Stacie Vos (Ann Ball Bodley Visiting Fellow in Women’s History) talk about Women doing medieval studies in the early 20th century. Stacie reflected on the legacies of several early-20th-century women medievalists who pursued academic and extra-academic careers. She started the group ‘Enclosure’ which January 2021 to February 2024 was hosted at the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages under enclosure.mml.ox.ac.uk, now archived at the Bodleian Library Web Archive.
***
It all started with a mistake: ‘Der Spiegel’, a widely read news magazine in Germany, ran a double-spread article on the big research project which Eva Schlotheuber and I direct, the edition of 1.200 letters from the Benedictine convent Lüne in North Germany. In the interview for it, we had talked about how important education by the nuns was for the ‘Lehrkinder’, children educated at the convent. The girls would come into the community, aged 7 to 9, and then get a thorough grounding in a wide range of discipline such as music, as pictured in the scene from a text book from Kloster Ebstorf.
Teaching Music in the Convents (Ebstorf, Klosterarchiv V 3, 15th century, fols 200v–201r)
Der Spiegel’ turned our phrase of ‘Lehrkinder’ into ‘die Kinder der Nonnen’ (the children of the nuns) – hinting at sex and scandal behind convent walls (in 2/2020 ‘So colourful was the life of nuns in the Middle Ages’).
This sparked further media interest and the Ullstein publishing house approached us because it had piqued their interest. When we explained that the attention-grabbing headline about “the nuns had children” was based on a misunderstanding, they were slightly disappointed – but then offered us the opportunity to set the record straight. And, arguably, what we could offer was much more exciting: the colourful and detailed accounts of lively, intellectual, strategic, argumentative, powerful women, shaping religion and politics of their times, looking after the girls (despite or even because they were their spiritual and not biological daughters!), negotiating business deals, writing, painting, composing and influencing the way we live today through their books, songs, and art.
‘The Life of Nuns’ tries to capture the richness of the life of these medieval nuns by incorporating as much primary source material as possible. Each of the big topics – such as Education, Music, and yes: Love and Friendship – starts with an account taken from the diary of a nun who lived at the end of the 15th century in the convent St Crucis in Braunschweig. The anonymous author covers the high feasts – celebrating the entry of new nuns, welcoming illustrious visitors – and the everyday mundane events – lice, Lebkuchen (gingerbread), laundry. And we end every of our chapters with the presentation of a significant art work from the convents: the impressive wall paintings done in the 14th century by “three nuns all called Gertrud” in Wienhausen, the largest medieval world map in Ebstorf (30 goatskins sewn together), tapestries, statues, stained glass, the oldest spectacles in the world (fallen through the floorboard cracks in the nuns’ choir) – an embarrassment of riches from a world that few people even know existed. That is particularly true for an Anglophone audience since so much of the evidence is lost due mainly to the dissolution of the monasteries but also a repurposing of surviving architecture and treasures. Compare Kloster Wienhausen and Godstow Abbey: in Wienhausen we have got the full set of monastic buildings, cloisters, huge grain stores, cells, corridors, imposing Gothic nuns choir and more – and everything that furnished it: stained glass, wall paintings, sculptures, down to the different set of dresses for the statues.
The Cistercian Convent of Wienhausen from the South: Magazine (left) and Nuns’ Choir. Photograph: Henrike Lähnemann
Filming at the ruins of one Godstow Abbey near Oxford
In Godstow, on the other hand, we can sense the dimensions of its former power by looking at the impressively long surrounding wall of enclosure and glimpse some of its stylish beauty from the ruined chapel at the back – the rest is only possible to reconstruct from scant archival evidence. Looking at the German counterparts, who shapeshifted through the Reformation, transforming into Protestant female communities who still look after the rich tapestry of medieval life, offers the chance to rectify this in part – and encounter the Life of Nuns at their fullest, mystical, worldly, polyphonous and very much relevant still today.
Call for Actors, Directors, Costume Makers, and Musicians!
Would you like to take part in a medieval dramatic experiment? Directors, actors, costume makers and musicians wanted!
The next cycle is going to take place on 26 April 2025 at St Edmund Hall
These plays were a very popular form of drama in the Middle Ages – with different groups performing short plays telling stories from the Bible. To take part in the next performance, contact Antonia Anstatt and Sarah Ware, Co-Heads of Performance, or email Professor Henrike Lähnemann, Fellow at St Edmund Hall Fellow and Professor of Medieval German Literature and Linguistics, and Professor Lesley Smith, Fellow and Tutor in Politics and Senior Tutor at Harris Manchester College, Co-Directors of the Oxford Medieval Studies Programme at TORCH, under the address medieval@torch.ox.ac.uk.
CAT is back! After a successful run in June 2023, artist in residence at the Physics Department Pam Davis has developed a second art-piece ‘Conversations Across Time’. Free tickets for the performances moving from the Ashmolean to a second secret hidden location are available via the website https://www.citizensai.com/
Dates: June 15th (preview at 11am – 1:20pm) | June 15th | June 16th
Schedule: 15:20 Meet on the steps at the Ashmolean Museum 15:30 Prequel 16:00 Departure for Scene Two 16:15 Scene II is in a Quantum Anomaly [hidden location] 17:40 End | Conversation to Follow
Players: Giovanni De Felice, Sirui Ning and, Juliette Imbert, PDK, Costi Levy, Directors:PDK and Costi Levy Composer: Cheryl Frances-Hoad
From the announcement in 2023: What do horses, medievalists, black hole orbits, boardrooms, and quantum computers have in common? Inspired by the Medieval Mystery Plays, artist in residence at the Physics Department Pam Davis has developed an art-piece ‘Conversations Across Time’ which links medieval theatre, women in science, and Quantum future.
Wednesday, 29 May 2024, 5.15-6.45 UK time Memorial Room: The Queen’s College, Oxford
Dr Peter Tóth (Cornelia Stark Curator of Greek Collections at the Bodleian Libraries, Oxford) will speak on “In Quest of a Medieval Best-Seller: The Authorship of the Meditationes Vitae Christi” as term lecture for the Centre for Manuscript and Text Cultures
The Meditationes Vitae Christi, an anonymous medieval retelling of the life of Christ, appended with a number of extra and emotional details, has been described as the single most influential Franciscan text of the Middle Ages. A real best-seller that has come down to us in hundreds of manuscripts and versions in Latin and almost all the vernaculars of Medieval Europe. The text is known to have exercised an immense influence on Western spirituality and devotion and had decisive impact on Renaissance art and played pivotal role in the evolution of medieval Passion Plays and European theatre in general. Despite this enormous significance, the origin, date and authorship of the work has remained obscure and been in the focus of heated scholarly debates. After a brief survey of the problems of the text and the current scholarly consensus about its origins, the present paper will make an attempt to identify the author of the text and reconstruct its adventurous early history to explain its subsequent anonymity.
Image: Meditationes vitae Christi. English translation by Nicholas Love. Bodleian Library MS. Hatton 31, fol. 28v, mid-15th century. On medieval.bodleian.ox.ac.uk
Where: Wolfson College Buttery When: Friday, April 26 2024 at 1.15.
David Wiles (Emeritus Professor of Drama, University of Exeter) is performing the pseudo-Senecan Roman history play Octavia in the exuberant rhetorical language of the 1561 translation by Thomas Nuce with a group of players from Iffley and the University of Oxford.
Octavia, daughter of Claudius, wife of Nero – Imogen Lewis
Agrippina, wife and killer of Claudius, now dead – Laurence Nagy
Nero, son of Agrippina, now Emperor, killed his mother – Abigail Pole
Poppaea, mistress of Nero – Priya Toberman
Octavia’s nurse – Laura Laubeova
Seneca – Alex Marshall
Prefect – Andrew Stilborn
Messenger– Ivana Kuric
Chorus of Roman citizens – members of the company
Violin – Jessica Qiao
Director – David Wiles
Production sponsored by the Ancient World Research Cluster, Wolfson College Oxford.
Performance filmed by Henrike Lähnemann at Iffley Church Hall on April 21st.
The tragedy of Octavia is a unique example of the Roman history play, and survives because it was bound up with the tragedies of Seneca. The chorus, unlike those of Seneca, is engaged in the action as it rises up in rebellion against Nero. We are performing the play in the student translation of c.1561. Elizabeth had recently come to the throne, and in a polarised world the performance of religious plays seemed increasingly problematic. It was logical to turn to the classics, but the question arose, how to render Seneca in an equivalent English. It was not a matter of searching out what the words meant, but rather of forging a language with an equivalent rhetorical force, which in the Erasmus age meant a more copious language. The translator, Thomas Nuce, had an ear for performance, and did not attempt to find any pedantic metrical equivalence for the Latin. We have stripped the text down to a half-hour version, and have relished playing with the rhythms, rhymes and alliteration. Parsing the Latinate grammar was often a challenge.
The story was scarcely a safe choice in 1561. It tells how Nero cast off his first wife, Octavia, whom he had married for domestic reasons, and contracted a love match. Henry VIII had likewise terminated a dynastic marriage, to the great displeasure of his people, and the fruit of that love match had just come to the throne.
We are a mixed cast of students and community players, and on four occasions have worked on mediaeval plays for the festival at St Edmund Hall. The present production was put together for the annual conference of the Classical Association in Warwick on 24 March. If you are interested in participating in a production at St Edmund Hall in 2025, please contact David Wiles d.wiles@exeter.ac.uk.
