Author: Luisa Ostacchini

Medieval Matters: Summer, and Passing the Torch

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19/08/2024

15:30

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I hope you are all well, and are enjoying a summer that is equal parts restful and productive. I come bearing various summer announcements.

Firstly, a sad announcement: this will be my final email in your inbox! After three years, the time has come for me to pass on the torch (or should that be TORCH?) in my role as Communications Officer and mentor for the MSt Medieval students. I will still be around Oxford, as I take up a new role at Jesus College in September, so I hope to still see many of you at events and seminars – but I pass the Medieval Matters torch into new hands. The role has been advertised by the Humanities Division with an application deadline of 2 September for a start with the new academic year. This is also an early alert for everybody to send entries to the booklet to the generic address medieval@torch.ox.ac.uk, not to my personal email.

I’ve loved doing this work: it’s not only been a great way to meet and engage with Oxford’s medievalists at every level, but also a way to foster the sense of community that makes Oxford so unique and so special. To my knowledge, nowhere has such a large, vibrant, active, and linked community. If you are an early career researcher, I really encourage you to apply for this role straight away! It’s a fantastic opportunity to meet and work alongside medievalists across the university and beyond, and to work alongside our newest medievalists on the MSt. I’ve been so inspired by our recent cohorts of graduate students, and it’s been such an honour to be a part of their development as scholars. If you want to get a feel for what the job involves, you can read about my experience in my post A Medieval Monologium, and the reflection by one of my predecessors, Karl Kinsella, on his time heralding Medieval Studies.

Read on for summer announcements, opportunites and a list of new book publications:

OMS Matters:

  • Medieval Booklet Submissions: As we look towards the new year, please start thinking about your submissions for the Medieval Booklet. This year, all entries must be sent to medieval@torch.ox.ac.uk.
  • New blog post: The TORCH Network Poetry in the Medieval World after Two Terms of Activity. Ugo Mondini reflects on the initial activities of the TORCH Network Poetry in the Medieval World. He shares the network’s journey so far, which has taken participants through the forms, languages, communities, and geographies of medieval poetry and the challenges its comparative study poses. To read all about the first two terms of the network, and to find out how to get involved next year, please click here.
  • New blog post: Discoveries from New College’s Books of Hours. Caitlín Kane, Special Collections Curatorial Assistant New College writes about the showcase of the College’s collection of Books of Hours back in February of this year. To discover this collection, to find our more about Caitlín’s work on these manuscripts, and to read what happened at the workshop, please click here.

Opportunities and Announcements:

  • The Medievalist Coffee Morning is restarting well ahead of term on Friday, 6 September in the Visiting Scholars Centre 10.30-11.30. Follow the link for instructions how to find it and a playlist of previous manuscript showcases. The first autumn coffee morning will be followed by the
  • Medieval MSS Support Group at the Weston Library: We are pleased to trial a new session, once or twice a month, in which readers of medieval manuscripts can pose questions to a mixed group of fellow readers and Bodleian curators in a friendly environment. Come with your own questions, or to see what questions other readers have! If you wish to pose a question, please order the relevant manuscript to the issue desk, and email the details to Matthew Holford, Tolkien Curator of Medieval Manuscripts, the day before, so that he can arrange for it to be transferred across to the Horton Room for the session. The next session will be held on Friday, 6 September (Horton Room) 11.30-12.30. To find out more, click here.
  • Winter School in Digital Humanities: The Institute for Medieval Research of the Austrian Academy of Sciences is organising a Winter School in Digital Humanities in Vienna in November-December 2024. The Winter School will take a hands-on approach to tools for handwritten text recognition in medieval documents. They will have sub-groups for Carolingian Latin, Late Latin, Byzantine Greek, Syriac, Medieval Czech and Medieval German. They have planned three virtual sessions starting in November 2024 and a three-day meeting in Vienna in December. To read more, and to apply, please click here. The deadline for applications is 15 September.
  • CfP: Staging Silence from Antiquity to the Renaissance: 3–4 July 2025 / St John’s College, Cambridge. 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. Please submit a 250-word abstract for a 20-minute paper to John Colley (stagingsilence@gmail.com) by noon on Thursday 9 January 2025. To read the full CfP, please click here.
  • The last of the events organised by Living Stones, St Mary the Virgin, Iffley is coming up on Saturday 8 September, 2.00 – 5.00 Iffley Church Hall OX4 4EG. We explore the explosive influence of communication with the Arab world with Teresa Whitcombe, and the spread of secular music with Ian Pittaway. We hope to continue the theme next year with a focus on the symbolism of the architectural features and carvings around the church. Please get in touch if you are interested in sharing your research! For contact details and this year’s programme see https://livingstonesiffley.org.uk/events. To read more, please see the blogpost here.

New Publications:

  • The Cambridge Anthology of British Medieval Latin by Carolinne White (Cambridge University Press). This anthology presents in two volumes a series of Latin texts (with English translation) produced in Britain during the period AD 450–1500. Excerpts are taken from Bede and other historians, from the letters of women written from their monasteries, from famous documents such as Domesday Book and Magna Carta, and from accounts and legal documents, all revealing the lives of individuals at home and on their travels across Britain and beyond. For more information, and to order with 20% off, click here and enter the code WHITE2023 at the checkout.
  • From Fingal’s Cave to Camelot by Douglas Gray, edited by Jane Bliss (Independent Publishing Network, Oxford). Contact Jane Bliss for further details and/or to buy a copy. The book costs £17.00 plus postage for those outside Oxford, or free delivery via University Messenger Service to those within the University.
  • Introduction to Middle High German by Howard Jones and Martin H. Jones (Oxford University Press). This book 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. There will be a free workshop day with a translatathon on 2 November 2024, introducing the book for anybody interested in Middle High German. Order online at global.oup.com/academic with promotion code AAFLYG6 to save 30%.
  • The Life of Nuns: Love, Politics, and Religion in Medieval German Convents by Henrike Lähnemann and Eva Schlotheuber, trans. by Anne Simon (Open Book Publishers). Henrike Lähnemann and Eva Schlotheuber offer readers a vivid insight into the largely unknown lives and work of religious women in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Using previously inaccessible personal diaries and letters, as well as tapestries, painting, architecture and music, the authors show that the nuns were, in fact, an active, even influential part of medieval society. Watch the launch during the Medieval Coffee Morning here. To read the book open access, click here. To purchase a paper copy with a 20% discount, use the code LONHL_24 at checkout. There will be a Book at Lunchtime event at TORCH on 13 November 2024 at 1pm.
  • Translating Europe in Ælfric’s Lives of Saints by Luisa Ostacchini (Oxford University Press). This book offers the first book-length study of Ælfric’s Lives of Saints as a unified collection, provides new insight into Ælfric’s translation practices and the ways in which Latin materials were adapted for a vernacular audience, and presents important new insights into the role of Europe in the early medieval English imaginary, and into pre-modern insular-continental relations. For more information, and to order with 30% off, click here and enter code AAFLYG6 at the checkout.
  • The Battle of Maldon: A New Critical Edition by Mark Griffith (Liverpool University Press). Mark Griffith’s new critical edition of the surviving Old English poem about the 991 AD Battle of Maldon offers a striking re-analysis of its marriage of old and new features of alliterative poetry. With an introduction, detailed commentary, and full glossary, it responds to the poem’s varied criticisms, and considers the reliability of the sole surviving manuscript. 20% discount when purchased directly from the LUP website: www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk
  • The Age of Alfred: Rethinking English Literary Culture c. 850–950, Edited by Francis Leneghan and Amy Faulkner (Brepols). This volume takes stock of recent developments and debates in the field of Alfredian scholarship and showcases new directions in research. Individual chapters consider how English authors before, during, and after Alfred’s reign translated and adapted Latin works, often in innovative and imaginative ways. Other contributions provide new contexts and connections for Alfredian writing, highlighting the work of Mercian scholars and expanding the corpus beyond the works traditionally attributed to the king himself. Together, these essays force us to rethink what we mean by ‘Alfredian’ and to revise the literary history of the ‘long ninth century’.
  • Beowulf: Poem, Poet and Hero by Heather O’Donoghue (Bloomsbury). The Old English epic poem Beowulf has an established reputation as a canonical text. And yet the original poem has remained inaccessible to all but experienced scholars of Old English. This book aims to present the poem to readers who want to know what makes it such a remarkable work of art, and why it is of such cultural significance. To purchase at 30% off, please click here.

All that’s left is to say a huge thank you: to my immediate colleagues Henrike and Lesley at OMS, but also to all of you for your submissions, emails, and blog posts over the last three years. I really believe in the work we’ve done over the past three years that I’ve been working at OMS, and am sure it will only go from strength to strength in the years to come. I’m so grateful for the time I got to spend heralding all things medieval, and gracing your emails every Monday. I leave you with a customary Medieval Matters quote – this one from Alcuin.

omnibus est locuples, qui rebus abundat amicis
[He who is rich in friends is rich in everything]
Alcuin, Carm. LXXII

[The Communications Officer passes the torch!]
St John’s College MS. 61, f. 15 v. 
By permission of the President and Fellows of St John’s College, Oxford
Viewable in full at Digital Bodleian
 

Medieval Matters: Week 8

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10/06/2024

14:40

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It feels like only yesterday that I was welcoming you all to Oxford for the academic year, and yet here we are at the very end of Trinity Term. It has been such a fantastic and busy year, and it’s hard to believe that it’s almost over. Here is some wisdom on endings, specially for the occasion, taken from the  Epistolae  project:

vespere autem hora diei ultima terminatur.
[The final hour of the day is concluded in the evening.]
A letter (1156-57) from Osbert of Clare to Adelidis of Barking

I take this to mean that though the end of teaching term is in sight, there are still some hours of ‘evening’ left! You will find below a whole range of delights for this last week of full term.

This of course means that today’s email is the last proper Medieval Matters Newsletter of the academic year. In honour of this occasion, today’s guest blog is not written by a guest at all, but by me. This has been my third year as the OMS Comms Officer, and I was asked to reflect on some of the work that I do in this role and my twinned role as the Academic Mentor for the Interdisciplinary MSt in Medieval Studies. I of course answer pressing questions such as “when do you choose the manuscript images” and “what do Medievalists do in August?”, but in many ways this is less a report on the work that I do and more a celebration of some of the fantastic things Oxford’s medievalists have been up to this year. You can read the post here.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

  • The Medieval Mystery Cycle is coming back! Mark your diaries for 26 April 2025! There will be small grants available for student groups putting on plays.
  • Double thanks are due to St Edmund Hall: the College has agreed to host both the plays (including catering!) AND this blog. This means that – after a time when we had to ration images due to server space problems – we can now illustrate posts to our hearts content. Please do consider writing a blog post for us – on your research, an upcoming event or a new publication. Write to Luisa or Henrike to be set up as an author on the blog.
  • Living Stones has two events coming up very soon: On Saturday 29 June artists Sally Levell and Phil Whiting are leading a day-school in drawing at Iffley Church. This is a very popular annual event and spaces are limited. See https://livingstonesiffley.org.uk/events for details and tickets. Tickets are only available online, and the closing date for bookings is 17 June. On Saturday 13 July the second of our three ’12th-Century’ days includes a participatory workshop on manuscript illumination along with a talk about how the builders of Iffley Church saw themselves as inheritors of Rome. Tickets can be booked online and at the door. An appetite-whetter can be found on https://livingstonesiffley.org.uk/past-events/f/oxford-in-1160-scholars-and-pilgrims-at-st-frideswide%E2%80%99s-priory where you can listen to the thrilling talks given by Andrew Dunning and Anne Bailey on Oxford in 1160: Scholars and Pilgrims at St Frideswide’s Priory.

EVENTS THIS WEEK:

Monday 10th June:

  • The Tolkien 50th Anniversary Seminar Series meets at 5pm in the Summer Common Room, Magdalen College. This week’s speaker will be John Holmes (University of Birmingham), Riddles in the Grass: the characterisation and narrative value of landscape over the fields of Rohan. For more information, please see https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/.
  • The Medieval History Seminar meets at 5pm in the Old Library, All Souls College and on Teams. The Teams session can be accessed by logging in to Teams with your .ox.ac.uk account and joining the group “Medieval History Research Seminar” (team code rmppucs). Alternatively, you can use this link. If you have any difficulties please email: medhistsem@history.ox.ac.uk. This week’s speaker will be Katherine Jansen (Catholic University of America) ‘The Relics of Rome’.

Tuesday 11th June:

  • The Medieval Church and Culture Seminar meets at 5.15pm in the Wellbeloved Room, Harris Manchester College. This week’s speakers will be A Book Launch:  New Zealand Medievalism:  reframing the medieval, edited by Anna Czarnowus and Janet Wilson (Routledge). Everyone is welcome at this informal and friendly graduate seminar.

Wednesday 12th June:

  • The Medieval German Graduate Seminar meets at 11.15am in Oriel College King Edward Street 7 (Annette Volfing’s office; press the intercom buzzer to be let in). This week will be a project presentation by Mary Boyle.
  • The Medieval Latin Document Reading Group meets at 4-5pm on Teams. A document is sent out in advance but homework is not expected. Please contact Michael Stansfield for further details and the Teams link.

Thursday 13th June:

  • The All Souls Seminar in Medieval and Early Modern Science meets at 2-3.30pm in the Hovenden Room, All Souls College. This week’s speaker will be Zoe Screti (Harris Manchester College, Oxford), Alchemy during the English Reformation: The Troubled Times of Thomas Charnock.
  • The Germanic Reading Group meets at 4pm online. Please contact Howard Jones Howard.Jones@sbs.ox.ac.uk to request the handouts and to be added to the list. This week will be on the Old Saxon Hêliand (Bradley leading).
  • The Oxford Centre for Byzantine Research Annual lecture will take place at 5pm at  Danson Room, Trinity College. This year’s speaker will be Peter Sarris (University of Cambridge) – ‘Justinian: Between East and West’.
  • At 9.30pm, the St Edmund Consort sings Latin Compline at candlelight in the Crypt of St-Peter-in-the-East (the library church of St Edmund Hall, Queen’s Lane). No registration is needed but please be advised that the space is only accessible via uneven steps and dimly lit, and only a limited number of people can be accommodated on a first-come-first-served basis.

Friday 14th June:

  • The Medieval Coffee Morning meets as usual 10:30am in the Visiting Scholars Centre of the Weston Library (instructions how to find it) with presentation of items from the special collections, coffee and the chance to see the view from the 5th floor terrace.

OPPORTUNITIES:

  • CAT – Conversations Across Time. Preview 11am, Premiere 3:20pm, second performance Saturday 16 June 3:20pm. After a successful run in June 2023, artist in residence at the Physics Department Pam Davis has developed a second art-piece which links medieval theatre, women in science, and Quantum future. Free tickets for the performances moving from the Ashmolean to a second secret hidden location are available via the website https://www.citizensai.com/
  • Waddesdon Internship Scheme: In 2023 Waddesdon launched Waddesdon Pathways, a brand-new, year-long internship programme. They are now looking for our second cohort to start in September 2024. Please find out more information about this, including how to apply here. 

There will be a brief final email next week with some events and opportunities to look forward to over the summer, and some guidance on how to stay in contact if you are leaving. Please do send me anything you would like disseminated! But for now, I give you some fitting words from the Epistolae project, for those who hate goodbyes and endings as much as I do:

quin immo vere dilectionis ligatura reliquum nodetur in aevum
[May the bond of our true affection be knit ever more closely for all time.] 
A letter (c. 732) from Lioba, abbess of Tauberbischofsheim

In other words: stay in touch! Whether you are leaving Oxford for the summer or for the long-term, the community is always here to welcome you back with open arms.

It is an honour and a priveledge to have been your herald for yet another year, and to guide you through the busy schedule of the Oxford academic term. Thank you so much for everything you have done this year: to everyone who has organised an event or seminar; given a paper; attended any number of reading groups or events; brought opportunities and CFPs to my attention; or turned up at the coffee mornings. Oxford’s medieval community is unbelievably special, and it is always such a joy to be a part of it. Long may it prosper!

[The busy, bustling, flourishing world of Medieval Studies at Oxford!]
St John’s College MS. 61, f. 59 v. 
By permission of the President and Fellows of St John’s College, Oxford
Viewable in full at Digital Bodleian
 

A Medievalist Menologium

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10/06/2024

14:03

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A Year in the Life of the OMS Communications Officer and MSt Academic Mentor

As we come to the end of the teaching year and Medieval Matters shuts down for the summer, I was asked to reflect on the year’s happenings, and on some of the work that I do in my role as Communications Officer and my twinned role as the Academic Mentor for the Interdisciplinary MSt in Medieval Studies. As such, I’ve compiled a “menologium” of sorts, highlighting the goings on that have happened across the year. This has been my third year in post since I joined the team in 2021, and it’s been such a delight to see Oxford’s medieval community go from strength to strength during that time. In some ways, then, this report is less about my own work, and more about the strength of the community: which I have been honoured and privileged to witness first hand as your medieval herald and mentor!

JULY

July is the month of beginnings! This might seem odd: Trinity Term is traditionally an end-point for the academic year! But July is the point at which we at OMS are planning forward for the year ahead, and so marks the beginning of the OMS calendar. This is the time of year when we begin planning the Medieval Mystery Plays, thinking about which speakers we will invite and which events we want to host in the year ahead. It’s a very exciting time of year! In 2023, we were planning our OMS lectures and also asking for submissions for the Impact Report.

AUGUST

August is a time for harvesting… submissions for the Impact Report, that is! We had such a lot to celebrate, from book launches to new seminars and reading groups. I am always struck by the phenomenal range of our medieval offerings at Oxford, but collecting all of the information together really emphasised the wealth of languages, approaches and disciplines that we have here.

I was also busy ‘harvesting’ CFPs for a special summer CFP booklet. We had 20 pages of CFPs for Leeds IMC, New Chaucer Society, and Kalamazoo panels hosted by Oxford Medievalists: such an astounding range of submissions that they barely fit in a pdf! We had everything from Alfredian Voices to Medievalisms in Times of Crisis: Reception, Adaptation, and Remediation; from “Authentic” Translation?’ to Medieval Onomastics: Crisis or Stasis?

SEPTEMBER

September is the month of preparation! This is the month when I am busy assembling the Medieval Booklet for the term ahead. Of extreme importance, of course, is selecting which manuscript will illuminate the weekly newsletter. This year I opted to highlight one of the offerings at St John’s College, where I am currently appointed. The newly digitised MS 61 bestiary is both delightful to look at and a real testament to the ongoing work of our library and collections staff in making medieval resources more easily available. Special thanks to Sophie Bacchus-Waterman for giving as a sneak peek behind the curtain of archival work in her blog post for us! When choosing images for the emails, I am looking both for entertaining pictures and for those that might be particularly suited to points in the year, and collecting a folder of them for later use. Some of the images are chosen far in advance (like this week 1 image of a Medievalist with their copy of the booklet), whilst others take my fancy on a weekly basis.

Regular recipients of Medieval Matters will know that another important collection is the wisdom quotations. This year I decided to highlight the work of the Epistolae project, based at Columbia University, which catalogues letters to and from medieval women. Featuring quotations from these letters was intended not only to link Oxford’s medievalists to an exciting resource outside of Oxford, but also to provide an inspirational and aspirational model for interdisciplinary, boundary-pushing, open-access and digital humanities work.

September is also the time when we look ahead to our incoming MSt cohort, so we were putting together welcome events and looking ahead to the start of term! An important September task is updating our mailing list: making sure that incoming students and academics are included, and that those leaving us for pastures new have passed on their new details.

OCTOBER

October is the month of welcomes. For the MSt this year this took the shape of the traditional introductory tea, co-run with Prof. Elena Lombardi, the convener of the MSt. It’s so exciting to get to meet all of Oxford’s newest Medieval researchers, and I am always struck by the fantastic range of interests and the sheer passion for the medieval that our MSt students have. On the OMS side, we had a Medievalists’ welcome party co-run with the Medieval Church and Culture graduate seminar: it was lovely to see lots of you there, both old colleagues and new ones! This is also a time of year when my email inbox is particularly busy, as I am fielding questions from both the OMS and MSt side of things in order to make sure that everyone can find their way around the Oxford system. I’m so honoured to be many peoples’ first port of call for discovering the amazing range of medieval happenings at Oxford, and to be able to welcome everyone in our Week 1 Medieval Matters email!

A big part of my October job is making and distributing the term’s medieval booklet, and preparing the newsletter templates This is a big job, and I’ve been extremely grateful for the support of our Graduate Assistant, Eugenia Vorobeva, who has taken on the huge and important task of adding all of the upcoming events to our Google Calendar, to keep everyone informed and up to date.

NOVEMBER

November is a month of social activity. A big part of what we do at OMS is sharing Oxford’s research and community with the wider world. In this I’ve been ably assisted by Ashley Castelino, our Social Media Officer, who has done stellar work on our socials. Some stats for you: our social media following is steadily growing as always, with (at last count) 6396 followers on Twitter/X, 1531 on Facebook, 858 on Instagram, 577 on Mastodon, 202 on Threads, 320 on TikTok, and 80 on our new LinkedIn page. Our most popular video on TikTok so far has been a primer on medieval heralds by Emma-Catherine Wilson with over 2800 views. We also had some very pleasing numbers on the youtube channel. In particular the two live presentations of books / manuscripts from the study day on Homer and the Nibelungenlied have each drawn over 1,500 views by now! The subscriber base also has grown considerably to 427 subscribers. with 17.383 viewings between them.

There is so much going on at Oxford socially that it’s hard to keep up: any medievalist is spoilt for choice! Having reviewed the booklets from the last year, I count regular events working on at least nine languages:

  • English
  • German
  • French
  • Latin
  • Anglo-Norman
  • Norse
  • Celtic
  • Old Occitan
  • Medieval Hebrew

And a huge range of approaches, including:

  • Queer and Trans Medievalisms
  • Visual Culture
  • Environmental History
  • Digital Editions
  • Music
  • Women’s Writing

The fact that I am guaranteed to have overlooked at least two or three regular languages and could only provide a selection of our range of approaches is testament to the richness of our medieval community. But with so much going on, it’s very hard to keep track!

This is where my job as herald comes in. I usually prepare the outlines for each week’s newsletter at the beginning of term, but there are last minute additions, changes, or cancellations every week. So my Monday morning task every week is to sort through my emails to find anything that needs to be added or altered in the draft blog. I am often alerted for example, to new opportunities, or events that have been newly organised; to seminars changing their paper titles or rooms; or just to a good old fashioned cancellation! When I have made all of the changes, the post then passes to my colleague Henrike Lähnemann for review before finally making its way to your inbox. Any medievalist knows that no text would be complete without a set of errata, addenda or corrigenda, so of course I monitor my emails throughout Monday afternoon in order to send out any last minute changes in as few additional emails as possible. It’s busy work, but after three years in post it has become more streamlined, and it’s lovely to come into my office on Monday mornings and know exactly what I’m working on first!

DECEMBER

December is the month of holidays: a time of celebrating and community. Though the days were dark and cold, luckily we had lots to keep our spirits high! In particular we benefited from the medievalists coffee mornings and from the fantastic opening of the Chaucer: Here and Now exhibition!

This is also a time when many of our MSt students are looking at PhD / DPhil programmes. One of my main roles in December as an Academic Mentor is to support students in preparing doctoral applications. I was delighted to host a number of our students for tea at my college to discuss their progress and their career plans – the future of our field looks very bright indeed!

JANUARY

January is the month of new things. In 2023-24, we saw the establishment of several new and exciting additions to OMS. In particular we welcomed the new Dante Reading group, which successfully secured OMS small-grants funding, and convened by one of our very own MSt students, Charlie West. We were also exciting to welcome a new research group, The Oxford Medieval Manuscripts Group (OMMG), a collective of eight of our postgraduate students and early-career researchers who bonded in Oxford over their passion for medieval manuscripts. We also welcomed a new TORCH funded network, Poetry in the Medieval World, lead by Ugo Mondini, Jennifer Guest, Dirk Meyer, Jim Mallinson and Ida Toth. All of these new groups show that even though we often work with dead languages or the distant past, the study of the middle ages is very much alive at Oxford, with new voices and approaches joining the conversation every year!

January is also, of course, the month of our Hilary Term Medieval Booklet, so I am busy assembling that – making sure that everyone’s submissions are received and that they are formatted with our standard font size, layout etc. and are passed on to Eugenia and Ashley to disseminate across our socials and our Google calendar.

FEBRUARY

February is the month of busy research, when the new academic year is in full swing. At OMS, I was excited to be able to highlight a number of our exciting research outputs this year through a series of blog posts, featured prominently in the weekly newsletter. We had submissions on creative-critical approaches to Beowulf; medieval piggy-banks; and a medieval governance workshop – to name just three! I have so enjoyed reading all of our blog post submissions, and sharing them with a wider network at Oxford and beyond. We have also had a number of exciting new monograph publications, including How to Read Middle English Poetry, by Daniel Sawyer; The Old Testament in Medieval Icelandic Texts: Translation, Exegesis and Storytelling, by Siân Grønlie; and Emperor John II Komnenos: Rebuilding New Rome 1118-1143 by Maximilian Lau, amongst many others!

MARCH

March is the month of the OMS Hilary Term lecture! This year we were thrilled to host the distinguished historian of medicine, Peregrine Horden for a talk on ‘Healthy Crusading in the Age of Frederick II: The Puzzle of Adam of Cremona’. We were very fortunate to host this in the Chapel of Harris Manchester – a perfect medievalism space! Thank you so much to everyone who came along, and to Peregrine for such a fantastic talk.

This is also the month when we at OMS try to have a steering group meeting to work out plans for the future: in particular on connections outside of Oxford, and thinking about new events we can run. We were also making plans for our Trinity Term provision.

APRIL

April (with his shoures soote) is the month of new life and of piercing ‘the droghte of March … to the roote’, so a perfect time to celebrate our newest medievalists!

In April all of our MSt students are hard at work producing their dissertations, and every year those on the Medieval Studies MSt present their work at the Medieval Church and Culture Seminar. This year we had a fantastic range of papers, from ‘The Old English and Old Norse ‘Joshua’: translation and readership in context’ to ‘Envisioning Division: marginal medallions in medieval Judaic and Islamic manuscripts’ to ‘Cruising Hell: seeing and writing Dante’s sodomites’. I am always so inspired by the range of approaches and the interdisciplinarity coming out of this MSt programme.

April also marks the Oxford Medieval Graduate Conference, which this year took the theme of Signs and Scripts. For a write-up of the conference and its goings-on, and to be inspired by the newest generation of medievalists, do read Ashley Castelino’s review blog post.

This year we also saw the much-awaited return of the Cambridge, Oxford, and London Symposium on Old Norse, Old English, and Latin (COLSONOEL), sponsored by Oxford Medieval Studies and TORCH. In 2024 a new committee at the University of Oxford, headed by Natasha Bradley, and comprising of Ashley Castelino, Simon Heller, and Mary Catherine O’Connor, took up the reins to bring this symposium back to life.

April is the month of the Trinity Term Medieval Booklet, so at this time of year I am once again collecting submissions, formatting them, and getting ready to share them with our community across all channels!

MAY

May is the month of plotting, and the OMS team were hard at work making plans for the triumphant return of the Medieval Mystery Cycle!

This year we were also busy plotting ways to improve our blog and newsletter, resulting in the move of our WordPress server on May 16th to enable us to host plenty more medieval blog posts and images. Behind the scenes OMS was struggling with server space, meaning a rationing of images and reduction in the number of blog posts we could host. Luckily we have been saved by St Edmund Hall, who have so kindly agreed to host this blog and allow it to continue in all of its manuscript-illuminated glory. Floreat Aula!

JUNE

June heralds the end of a busy medievalist year! As seminars and reading groups start to wind down for the summer, the Medieval Matters Newsletter starts to look shorter and shorter. Our MSt students are all busy finalising their dissertations, so I rarely get to see them, but it’s always a delight to hear how they are getting on. As the end of the academic year, June is a time for goodbyes, as visiting academics and graduate students depart. Thus, my final work of the year is to remind everyone to stay in touch: once an Oxford Medievalist, always an Oxford Medievalist!

Books for Medievalists

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03/06/2024

14:36

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Free books for medievalists! Professor Richard Sharpe (1954–2020) was Professor of Diplomatic in the University and one of the country’s foremost medievalists, whose research ranged from the early Irish church to Anglo-Norman royal acts to the transmission of medieval Latin texts and medieval books and libraries. He was also a large presence in the History Faculty and much involved in graduate tuition. Books from Professor Sharpe’s library are now being offered gratis to local medievalists. A great encourager of others, he would have been delighted to know that his books could be helping the next generation. For more information, please contact Elizabeth Champion to reserve books and arrange collection.

TitleAuthor/Editor
A Culture of Translation: British and Irish Scholarship in the Gennadius Library (1740-1840): 13Lynda Mulvin
Acts of GivingWendy Davies
Anglo-Norman England 1066-1166Marjorie Chibnall
Annuaire de l’nstitut Michel Villey – 2011 Vol 3Olivier Beaud, Denis Baranger
Antiquaries Journal
Antiquaries Journal Vol. LXIX Part II
Antiquaries Journal Vol. LXX Part I AND ii
Archaeologia 1991
Canon Law, Careers and ConquestJorg Peltzer
Carolingian EssaysAndrew W. Mellon
Charles the BaldJanet Nelson
Concise Dictionary of National Biography
Copistia Bologna (1265-1270)Giovanna Murano
Du Burca Rare Books Catalogues 132, 135, 136, 139, 140, 141, and ‘Irishwomen, Children, Education’
Ducal Brittany 1364-1399Michael Jones
Early Medieval ItalyChris Wickham
Early Medieval Spain, 2nd edRoger Collins
FeudalismFrançois Louis Ganshof
Folia CaesarAugustana I
Gaelic Literature SurveyedAodh de Blacam
Hereditas Monasteriorum Vols. 1-8
Hermanthena No. 194 Summer 2013
Ideal and Reality in Frankish and Anglo-Saxon SocietyPatrick Wormald
Il Libro e il Testo Atti del Convegno
Il registro di Andrea SapitiBarbara Bombi
Im Umkreis von AnselmBernd Goebel
Imperial Lives and Letters of the Eleventh CenturyMommsen and Morrison
Introducing the Old TestamentCoggins
Ireland and the Culture of Early Medieval EuropeL. Bieler
John Aubrey and the Advancement of LearningWilliam Poole
Journal of the British Archaeological Association Vols. 156-172
Journal of the British Archaeological Association Vols. 1990-99
Journal of Theological Studies New Series Vol. 35 Part 1
Journal of Theological Studies New Series Vol. 40 Part 1
Journal of Theological Studies New Series Vol. 41 Part 1
Journal of Theological Studies New Series Vol. 41 Part 2
Journal of Theological Studies New Series Vol. 43 Part 2
Journal of Theological Studies New Series Vol. 44 Part 1
Journal of Theological Studies New Series Vol. 45 Part 2
King David: A BiographySteven L McKenzie
La France CistercienneArmelle Bonis
La Vie Religieuse en France au Moyen AgeB. Merdrignac
Lawfinders and LawmakersHelen Cam
Les Origines de la BretagneLeon Fleuriot
Leviticus as LiteratureMary Douglas
Lexicography: An emerging international professionRobert F. Ilson
Magna Commoditas: A istory of Leiden University Library 1575-2005C. Berkvens-Stevelinck
Medieval French BridgesMarjorie Nice Boyer
Montaillou, Village OccitanLe Roy Ladurie
Nederlandse boekgeschiedenisJaarboek Voor
North Country Bishop; A Biography of William NicholsonFrancis Godwin James
Northern History vols. 1966-1995
Northern History, June 1964 February 1969, June 1969
Oxford University Calendar 1999-2000
Oxford University Calendar 2000-2001
Oxford University Calendar 2005-2006
Parliament and Politics in the Age of Churchill and Attlee: The Headlam diaries 1935-51Stuart Ball
Patrology Vol. IVAngelo di Berardino
Place Names of Northern Ireland, County Antrim I, Vol 4
Place Names of Northern Ireland, County Down I Vol 1
Place Names of Northern Ireland, County Down II Vol 2
Place Names of Northern Ireland, County Down IV, Vol 6
Pope John XXII and his Franciscan CardinalPatrick Nold
Proceedings of the British Academi, Bibiographical Memoirs of Fellows Vols. I-XVIII
Proceedings of the British Academy Lectures & Memoirs 1988-2000
Projets de CroisadeJaques Paviot
Province and EmpireJulia Smith
Religion and PowerDouglas Edwards
Royal Historical Society Centenary Guide 1868-1968
Scaliger’s Oriental Legacy in Leiden 1609-2009
Sean, nua agus síoraíocht : Féilscríbhinn in ómós do Dháithí Ó hÓgáinRíonach Uí Ógáin
Small WorldsWendy Davies
Society of Antiquaries of London Annual Report 1990-91
Studies on the Life and Legend of St PatrickL. Bieler
Sussex Archaelogical Collections Vol. 126
The Antiquaries Journal 1991-2019
The Antiquaries Journal Index 61-70
The Barbarian West 400-1000J. M. Wallace-Hadrill
The Christianisation of Latin MetreSeppo Heikkinen
The Dublin ScuffleJohn Dunton
The End of Ancient ChristianityR. A. Markus
The English Historical Review No. 323
The gate of horn: a study of the religious conceptions of the stone age, and their influence upon European thoughtGertrude Rachel Levy
The Irish Contribution to European Scholastic ThoughMcEvoy and Dunne
The Irish Matryoshka: A History of Irish Monks in Medieval EuropeHarkins/OhEarcain
The Kingship and Landscape of TaraEdel Bhreathnac
The Letters of Pierre de CrosWilliman
The Merovingian Kingdoms 450-751Ian Wood
The Settlement of Disputes in Early Medieval EuropeWendy Davies and Paul Fouracre
The Shorter Cambridge Medieval History Vols I and II
The Spanish Kingdoms 1250-1516: Vol. I 1250-1410
The Spanish Kingdoms 1250-1516: Vol. II 1410-1516
Trinity College Cambridge Annual Record 1995-2019
Wadham College Gazette 2017
Wadham College Gazette 2018
William BlackstoneWilfrid Prest

Medieval Matters: Week 7

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03/06/2024

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I don’t quite understand how it’s come around so quickly, but here we are in Week 7. For those who need a bit of a boost at this late stage in the term, some wisdom on the joys of (medieval) texts, taken from the  Epistolae  project:

In nullis nobis desit doctrina legendi,
Lectio sit nobis et liber omne quod est.
[Let us not miss reading’s lesson in any [languages];
Let everything there is be a book and a text for us.]
A poem from Baudri to Constance of Le Ronceray

As Oxford medievalists we are of course extremely lucky to be surrounded by so many opportunities to read and encounter literatures in various medieval languages. But we are also a highly interdisciplinary community, and this week we have a whole host of delights, including Eclipse prediction, Byzantine dining, 19th century manuscript scrapbooks, and an exhibition on medieval monsters!

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

  • The Medieval Women’s Writing Research Group Conference 2024 will be held on 18th June 2024 with the theme of “Exchanging Words” in Room 2 of the Taylor Institution Library both in person (presenters/attendees) and online (attendees). Free but registration required. All info, including the link to registration, can be found here: https://www.torch.ox.ac.uk/event/medieval-womens-writing-research-group-conference-2024-exchanging-words
  • A workshop on Reconsidering Contrafacts: Practices of Contrafacture in Monophonic Song (1150–1550) will take place on 20th June, 10am-7pm. Looking at different repertories of monophonic song between 1150 and 1550, the aim of this workshop is to explore different approaches to the widespread spectrum of practices and concepts of contrafacture: composing new texts for pre-existing melodies. If you want to attend or if you have questions, please email Philip Wetzler. To read more and see the schedule, please click here.
  • Oxford Translation Day 2024: Saturday, June 15, 2024, St Anne’s College. Every June, St Anne’s College runs Oxford Translation Day, a celebration of literary translation consisting of a vibrant range of workshops and talks. The day culminates in the award of the Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize. The Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize is for book-length literary translations into English from any living European language. It aims to honour the craft of translation, and to recognise its cultural importance. It was founded by Lord Weidenfeld and is funded by New College, The Queen’s College, and St Anne’s College. The full programme is available on the Oxford Comparative Criticism and Translation (OCCT) Research Centre website, here: https://occt.web.ox.ac.uk/oxford-translation-day-2024. All Oxford Translation Day events are free, but require registration. Please register via the Eventbrite links provided on the Oxford Comparative Criticism and Translation (OCCT) Research Centre website. https://occt.web.ox.ac.uk/oxford-translation-day-2024

EVENTS THIS WEEK:

Monday 3rd June:

  • The Tolkien 50th Anniversary Seminar Series meets at 5pm in the T. S. Eliot Theatre, Merton College. This week’s speaker will be Michael G.R. Tolkien (Poet and Critic), “A grandson’s reflections on J.R.R. Tolkien. For more information, please see https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/.
  • The Medieval History Seminar meets at 5pm in the Old Library, All Souls College and on Teams. The Teams session can be accessed by logging in to Teams with your .ox.ac.uk account and joining the group “Medieval History Research Seminar” (team code rmppucs). Alternatively, you can use this link. If you have any difficulties please email: medhistsem@history.ox.ac.uk. This week’s speaker will be Peregrine Horden (All Souls, Oxford) ‘A room with a view: Chichele’s college’.

Tuesday 4th June:

  • The Mythical and Monstrous exhibition takes place from 12 noon–4pm, Lecture Room 6, New College, Oxford. Hunt for weird and wonderful beasts in items from our fabulous special collections, from dragons and unicorns, to centaurs, blemmyes, and merpeople. Among the wide variety of items on display will be a beautiful thirteenth-century Psalter, a fantastic fourteenth-century apocalypse manuscript, a famous fifteenth-century chronicle, and a spectacular sixteenth-century astronomical text. The exhibition is free and open to all. Signs will be in place to direct visitors to the exhibition from the Porters’ Lodge, located halfway down Holywell Street. If you have any questions, please email library@new.ox.ac.uk.
  • The Medieval French Seminar meets at 5pm at the Maison Francaise. Drinks will be served from 5pm; the presentations will start at 5:15pm. All are welcome! This week’s speaker will be Jonathan Morton (Tulane University), ‘Integuments, Astral Magic, and Robots: Virgil and Medieval Technologies of Literature‘.
  • The Medieval Church and Culture Seminar meets at 5.15pm in the Wellbeloved Room, Harris Manchester College. This week’s speakers will be Charlie West (Regent’s), Cruising Hell:  seeing and writing Dante’s sodomites and Fergus Bovill (Merton), Cut and Paste: the album of illuminated manuscript cuttings in the 19thc. Everyone is welcome at this informal and friendly graduate seminar.

Wednesday 5th June:

  • The Medieval German Graduate Seminar meets at 11.15am in Oriel College King Edward Street 7 (Annette Volfing’s office; press the intercom buzzer to be let in). The topic for this term is Konrad von Würzburg: ‘Der Schwanritter’; this week we will discuss ‘human-animal interaction’Kampf & Körper’ with Julia Lorenz presenting. Open access edition here. If you are interested to be added to the teams group for updates, please contact Henrike Lähnemann.
  • The Medieval Latin Document Reading Group meets at 4-5pm on Teams. A document is sent out in advance but homework is not expected. Please contact Michael Stansfield for further details and the Teams link.

Thursday 6th June:

  • The All Souls Seminar in Medieval and Early Modern Science meets at 2-3.30pm in the Hovenden Room, All Souls College. This week’s speaker will be Laure Miolo (Lincoln College, University of Oxford), Eclipse Prediction in Late Fifteenth-century England: the Case of Lewis Caerleon.
  • The Medieval Visual Culture Seminar meets at 5pm at St Catherine’s College, Oxford, Arumugam Building. All welcome! This week’s speaker will be Lara Frentrop, University of Heidelberg, ‘Objects of Desire: The Byzantine Art of Dining as Social and Romantic Agents‘.

Friday 7th June:

  • The Medieval Coffee Morning meets as usual 10:30am in the Visiting Scholars Centre of the Weston Library (instructions how to find it) with presentation of items from the special collections, coffee and the chance to see the view from the 5th floor terrace.
  • The Oxford Medieval Manuscripts Group (OMMG) meets at 5pm in the Sir Howard Stringer Room, Merton College. Antonia Della Fratte, University of Padua will speak on Gustav F. Waagen Tours of Britain: Describing Illuminated MSS in Oxford.
  • The Anglo-Norman Reading Group will meets at 5-6.30pm. Please note that this final session of the will be Zoom ONLY, as our convenor is unable to attend for our final meeting of the academic year. We shall continue reading from Mandeville, and will also discuss plans for next term. If you wish to join us and are not already on our mailing-list, please contact Stephanie Hathaway or Jane Bliss to be sent the link.

OPPORTUNITIES:

  • Free books for medievalists! Professor Richard Sharpe (1954–2020) was Professor of Diplomatic in the University and one of the country’s foremost medievalists, whose research ranged from the early Irish church to Anglo-Norman royal acts to the transmission of medieval Latin texts and medieval books and libraries. He was also a large presence in the History Faculty and much involved in graduate tuition. Books from Professor Sharpe’s library are now being offered gratis to local medievalists – please see the list here. A great encourager of others, he would have been delighted to know that his books could be helping the next generation. For more information, please contact Elizabeth Champion to reserve books and arrange collection.
  • CFP: Unlocking the Exeter Book – New Perspectives: Paper proposals are invited for a conference to be held at The University of Oxford, on 16–17 April 2025. The Exeter Book or Exeter Anthology is a cornerstone of Old English poetry. From saints’ lives to wisdom poetry, lyrics and laments to riddles and prayers, this fascinating juxtaposition of genres, styles and themes invites constant re-reading and re-evaluation. The conference will bring together established scholars and new voices to bring fresh insights to this rich and enigmatic manuscript. Please send abstracts of no more than 150 words to Rachel Burns and Francis Leneghan by 1st August 2024

Finally, some more wisdom from the Epistolae Project, and from Baudri, on the joys of reading:

quaevis mundi littera nos doceat
[Every literature of the world teaches us.] 
A poem from Baudri to Constance of Le Ronceray

I of course take this broadly, in the spirit of this week’s first wisdom quotation, to mean that every facet of medieval studies teaches us! I wish you a week of productive reading, teaching and learning.

[A Medievalist who “missed reading’s lesson“ in Latin is now a little puzzled…]
St John’s College MS. 61, f. 10 r. 
By permission of the President and Fellows of St John’s College, Oxford
Viewable in full at Digital Bodleian
 

Medieval Matters: Week 6

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27/05/2024

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As we near the end of the teaching year I am driven to reflect on all of the fantastic things we’ve seen at OMS during the course of the year. I’m always struck by the phenomenal range of our medievalist activities: particularly by the huge number of languages represented! Some wisdom this week, then, on a common medievalist problem: that of translation between languages – taken, as always, from  the  Epistolae  project: :

Scito, filia, quod sententia cujuslibet dicti, si de lingua in linguam translata fuerit, vix in peregrino idiomate, sua ei sapiditas vel compositio remanebit.
[Know, daughter, that the meaning of any saying, if it is translated from one tongue to another, will barely retain its savour or composition in a foreign language.]
A letter from A letter from Adam, abbot of Perseigne to Blanche of Navarre

Luckily for us all, there are ample opportunities to learn new medieval languages or to cement our understanding of existing ones at any number of reading groups! This week we have, for example, opportunities to hear about medieval English, Hebrew, Latin, German, Old Norwegian, and Japanese – and I’m sure, with apologies, that there are further languages that have escaped my immediate notice! Please see below for the weekly roundup, and to take full advantage of this embarrassment of linguistic riches.

As blog posts this week, we have the report and recordings of the workshop on the Reception of the Nibelungenlied and Homer workshop; do go and see the exhibition linked to it in the Voltaire Room of the Taylorian Epic! Homer and the Nibelungenlied in Translation which is only on until Wednesday (continued then for another two weeks on a reduced scale)!

EVENTS THIS WEEK:

Monday 27th May:

  • The Queer and Trans Medievalisms Reading Group meets at 3pm in Univ. This informal reading group will explore queer and trans themes in medieval texts. In Trinity, we’ll be thinking about queerness and transness on trial in the Middle Ages. This week’s theme will be The trial of Katherina Hetzeldorfer (Speyer, 1477). All extremely welcome, both in-person and online! To join the mailing list and get texts in advance, or if you have any questions, email Rowan Wilson (rowan.wilson@univ.ox.ac.uk).
  • The Tolkien 50th Anniversary Seminar Series meets at 5pm in the Summer Common Room, Magdalen College. This week’s speaker will be David Bernabé (University of Oxford/University of the Basque Country), Riddles in the Grass: the characterisation and narrative value of landscape over the fields of Rohan. For more information, please see https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/.
  • The Medieval History Seminar meets at 5pm in the Old Library, All Souls College and on Teams. The Teams session can be accessed by logging in to Teams with your .ox.ac.uk account and joining the group “Medieval History Research Seminar” (team code rmppucs). Alternatively, you can use this link. If you have any difficulties please email: medhistsem@history.ox.ac.uk. This week’s speaker will be Laure Miolo (Lincoln, Oxford) ‘Establishing a school of astronomy and astrology in the fourteenth century? The case of the universities of Paris and Oxford’.

Tuesday 28th May:

  • The Medieval English Research Seminar meets at 12.15pm in Lecture Room 2, English Faculty. This week’s speaker will be Alex Paddock, Keble College, Oxford, Patience, the Middle English Physiologus, and the deep sea of experience. Seminars followed by a sandwich lunch. All welcome!
  • The Medieval Poetry Reading Group meets at 4pm in the Colin Matthew Room, Radcliffe Humanities Building. This week’s theme will be Japanese Poetry This is an activity of the TORCH Network Poetry in the Medieval World. For more information, you can refer to our website https://torch.ox.ac.uk/poetry-in-the-medieval-world; you can also contact Ugo Mondini.
  • The Medieval Church and Culture Seminar meets at 5.15pm in the Wellbeloved Room, Harris Manchester College. This week’s speakers will be Marion Ryley (Wadham), Envisioning Division: marginal medallions in medieval Judaic and Islamic manuscripts and Maya Smith (St Cross), Using Pigment Analysis of Pre-Conquest Manuscripts to Illuminate Trade and Commerce. Everyone is welcome at this informal and friendly graduate seminar.
  • The Oxford Interfaith Forum meets at 6-7pm, online for The Greatest Medieval Masoretic Pentateuch: The Lailashi Codex—the Crown of Georgian Jewry. A Panel of Distinguished Scholars will present the Greatest Medieval Masoretic Pentateuch—The Lailashi Codex: The Crown of Georgian Jewry. To register, please click here: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0vfuyppjMpH9UZ-8i1kakoZh0UoGSVPsTl#/registration.

Wednesday 29th May:

  • The Medieval German Graduate Seminar meets at 11.15am in Oriel College King Edward Street 7 (Annette Volfing’s office; press the intercom buzzer to be let in). The topic for this term is Konrad von Würzburg: ‘Der Schwanritter’; this week we will discuss human-animal interaction with Philip Flacke presenting. Open access edition here. If you are interested to be added to the teams group for updates, please contact Henrike Lähnemann.
  • The Medieval Latin Document Reading Group meets at 4-5pm on Teams. A document is sent out in advance but homework is not expected. Please contact Michael Stansfield for further details and the Teams link.
  • Dr Peter Tóth (Cornelia Stark Curator of Greek Collections at the Bodleian Libraries, Oxford) will speak on as term lecture for the Centre for Manuscript and Text Cultures “In Quest of a Medieval Best-Seller: The Authorship of the Meditationes Vitae Christi” 5.15-6.45 Memorial Room: The Queen’s College, Oxford

Thursday 30th May:

  • The Environmental History Working Group meets at 12.30-2pm in the Merze Tate Room, History Faculty. This week’s speaker will be Ruka Hussain, “Science, Ecology and Romanticism in George Catlin’s travelling ‘Indian Gallery’”. We try to keep discussions informal, and we encourage anyone at all interested in these kinds of approaches to join our meetings, regardless of research specialism or presumed existing knowledge. For updates on meeting details, refer to the EHWG tab on the Environmental History website. For further information or to join the EHWG mailing list, please email environmentalhistoryworkinggroup-owner@maillist.ox.ac.uk
  • The All Souls Seminar in Medieval and Early Modern Science meets at 2-3.30pm in the Hovenden Room, All Souls College. This week’s speaker will be Lawrence Principe (Johns Hopkins University), Franciscan Spirituality, Transmutation, and the Antichrist: John of Rupescissa’s Alchemical Thought and Practices.
  • The Germanic Reading Group meets at 4pm online. Please contact Howard Jones Howard.Jones@sbs.ox.ac.uk to request the handouts and to be added to the list. This week will be on Old Norwegian (Nelson leading).
  • The Medieval Visual Culture Seminar meets at 5pm at St Catherine’s College, Oxford, Arumugam Building. All welcome! This week’s speaker will be Gervase Rosser, University of Oxford, ‘Irrational, Feminine, Subversive: The Cult of Miraculous Images in Medieval England’.

Friday 31st May:

OPPORTUNITIES:

  • Assistant Professor of Early Medieval History [Temporary Cover]: The University of Cambridge Faculty of History wishes to recruit a Temporary Assistant Professor in Medieval History. This is a 2 year Temporary Assistant Professorship to cover the the absence of Professor Caroline Goodson, while she is seconded to the American Academy in Rome. The role will include teaching and examining at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels across a range of early medieval European topics; expertise relating to the medieval Mediterranean may be an advantage. For full details, please click here.
  • College Lectureship in Medieval History (part-time): St. Peter’s College invites applications for a one-year, 7-hour College Lectureship in Medieval History for one year from 1 October 2024, to provide teaching during Prof Stephen Baxter’s sabbatical leave. The position will be particularly suitable for either a doctoral research student nearing the completion of their thesis, or an early career scholar, seeking experience in college teaching and administration. For full details, please click here.
  • Transcription Opportunity: Katherine Turley requires a transcription of a fairly short item in English, in Oxford, Queens College MS 357 (fols. 83v–88v). If you are interested in undertaking this work (obviously for payment) please contact Katherine directly.

Finally, learning languages is all well and good, but of course the real joy (if I may be so bold to suggest, as a literature scholar…) comes in being able to use them for reading. So here is some wisdom on the joys of reading:

Ille liber mihi gratus erat, gratissima dicta.
Ergo consumpsi saepe legendo diem.
[That book was welcome to me, the words most welcome,
So I spent the day reading them often.] 
A poem to Baudri from Constance of Le Ronceray

I hope that however you are spending this bank holiday Monday, you are able to enjoy welcome words, and to spend a day reading things that bring you delight!

[A Medievalist tries to get to grips with a new language… just because it’s a delight it doesn’t mean that it’s easy!]
St John’s College MS. 61, f. 64 v. 
By permission of the President and Fellows of St John’s College, Oxford
Viewable in full at Digital Bodleian
 

Medieval Matters: Week 5

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20/05/2024

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The end of the teaching year is fast approaching! We’ve had such a busy and exciting year that I’m sure many of us are feeling rather exhausted – especially when it’s so warm outside! But there are still four more weeks of official term, and a medievalist’s work is never truly done – if you need some inspiration, heed this advice from Aldhelm, taken from the  Epistolae project: 

carissimi, si quamlibet parum a vestra bona consuetudine aliquando vel semel sentitis declinare: gravem casum gemendo vos incurrisse iudicate.
[dearest friends, if you ever feel that you are slipping occasionally or even once, from your good habits, however little it may be, consider with groans that you have incurred a serious fall.]
A letter (1102) from Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury to Edith

I take this to mean “no slacking in fifth week”! If you’re feeling weary and in need of perking up as we approach the end of the year, our blog post this week is sure to raise your spirits. The blog post about the first of three 12th Century Study Days at Iffley gives a fantastic insight into local history and sainthood, and a wonderful sense of our Medievalist community’s work outside of the University walls! To watch recordings of the talks by Andrew Dunning and Anne E. Bailey, read about future events from Living Stones, and sign up for the Pilgrimage walk along St Frideswide’s Way (26-29 June 2024), please visit the blog post here.

It’s also easier to keep up your “good habits” when you’re surrounded by such a wonderful community of medievalists – please see below for the week’s opportunities to keep up the good work:

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

  • On 25 May, there will be a workshop on The Reading and Reception of the Homeric Poems and the Nibelungenlied in Germany and Europe from the Eighteenth Century to the Present, at the Taylorian and the Bodleian; papers in the morning, manuscript sessions and an exhibition opening in the afternoon. The workshop is open to all with no attendance fee. The papers will also be livestreamed. Please register your interest before Thursday night by emailing John Butcher; for online attendance, a link will be sent out 24 hours in advance. A selection of the papers and the two guided tours will also later be made available as podcasts. The exhibition Epic! Homer and Nibelungenlied in Translation to coincide with the workshop will be open just for a week, so make sure to catch it between 22 and 29 May and / or download the exhibition catalogue which comes out as an open access publication as part of the ‘Cultural Memory’ series by Taylor Editions.
  • All are welcome to a new Latin palaeography group, organised by William Little and Rebecca Menmuir with the Societas Ovidiana. Our aim is to transcribe previously unedited material from a range of medieval manuscripts, beginning with a 12th-century commentary of Ovid’s Heroides 12 (Medea to Jason). This will be a friendly and informal group open to everyone interested in improving (or maintaining) their Latin and palaeography skills, encountering a range of medieval manuscripts, or learning more about classical reception. We will meet on Zoom every Wednesday, 10am EDT / 3pm BST / 4pm CEST, beginning Wednesday 29th May. Please email Rebecca Menmuir for more information and a joining link.
  • OCHJS: Concert – Blind Far Out at Sea: Eran Tzur in Conversation and Concert: 4th of June 2024, 18:00-20:00, Maison Française d’Oxford, 2 Norham Rd, Oxford. Tzur will reunite with his old friend, Elad Uzan, a member of Oxford’s Faculty of Philosophy. Together, they will explore the connection between the Hebrew language, medieval texts and musical expression, and the art of composing poetry, playing together from different periods of Tzur’s artistic catalogue. Register for Tickets here. The event is free, but space is limited, so book your tickets soon. For further information, please click here.

EVENTS THIS WEEK:

Monday 20th May:

  • The Medieval Latin Manuscript Reading Group meets at 1-2pm on Teams. A friendly venue to practice your Latin and palaeography on a range of texts and scripts. We will read a very entertaining account of the legendary foundation of Cambridge University by the Carmelite friar Nicholas Cantlow. Sign up to the mailing list to receive weekly updates and Teams invites.
  • The Tolkien 50th Anniversary Seminar Series meets at 5pm in the T. S. Eliot Theatre, Merton College. This week’s speaker will be Will Sherwood (University of Glasgow), “I am a link in the chain”: Victorian Transformations of British Romanticism and their Influence on Tolkien. For more information, please see https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/.
  • The Medieval History Seminar meets at 5pm in the Old Library, All Souls College and on Teams. The Teams session can be accessed by logging in to Teams with your .ox.ac.uk account and joining the group “Medieval History Research Seminar” (team code rmppucs). Alternatively, you can use this link. If you have any difficulties please email: medhistsem@history.ox.ac.uk. This week’s speakers will be Charles West (Edinburgh), Helen Gittos (Balliol) and Mirela Ivanova (Sheffield), in discussion:  Inventing Slavonic Cultures of Writing Between Rome and Constantinople. Please note the change of room.

Tuesday 21st May:

  • The Medieval English Research Seminar meets at 12.15pm in Lecture Room 2, English Faculty. This week’s speakers will be Alicia Smith (Corpus Christi College, Cambridge), Negotiating shame through the ‘harlot saint’ Thais and Nancy Jiang (University of Warwick) Medieval Penitential Piety and the Virtues of Debt Suretyship. Seminars followed by a sandwich lunch. All welcome!
  • Francesco Zimei (University of Trento): The Italian Lauda: Origins, Features, Connections (Digital Humanities and Sensory Heritage (DHSH) – Seminar  Series), St Edmund Hall, Old Dining Hall, 4.30pm 
  • CMTC presents — “Work in Progress” Colloquium (Trinity Term 2024) 5.15–6.45pm Memorial Room, The Queen’s College: Carolin Gluchowski (New College, Oxford), ‘Revising Devotion: Exploring Church Reform through Prayerbook MS. Lat. liturg. f. 4’ and Paola Rea (Scuola Superiore Meridionale, Napoli / Universitat de València), ‘Non ti maravigliare che io non mi distenda nelo scrivere: Female Autographs and Kinship in an Early-Modern Italian Epistolary Corpus’. Abstracts on https://cmtc.queens.ox.ac.uk/seminars/
  • The Medieval Church and Culture Seminar meets at 5.15pm in the Wellbeloved Room, Harris Manchester College. This week’s speakers will be Alex Still (BNC), Hrothgar’s horse:  the evidence for an interconnected elite across the North Sea world and Elizabeth Williams (LMH), Heavenly Sensations:  multisensory encounters with the liturgy in medieval Jerusalem’s Holy Sepulchre, c. 1099-1215. Everyone is welcome at this informal and friendly graduate seminar.

Wednesday 22nd May:

  • The Medieval German Graduate Seminar meets at 11.15am in Oriel College King Edward Street 7 (Annette Volfing’s office; press the intercom buzzer to be let in). The topic for this term is Konrad von Würzburg: ‘Der Schwanritter’. Open access edition here. If you are interested to be added to the teams group for updates, please contact Henrike Lähnemann.
  • The Medieval Latin Document Reading Group meets at 4-5pm on Teams. A document is sent out in advance but homework is not expected. Please contact Michael Stansfield for further details and the Teams link.
  • The Late Antique and Byzantine Seminar meets at 5.15pm at Auditorium, Corpus Christi College, and online via Teams. Teams link: https://msteams.link/FW0C. This week’s speakers will be Maximilien Durand (Musée du Louvre) and Jannic Durand (Musée du Louvre)   – ‘Creating the Louvre’s New Department of Byzantine and Eastern Christian Art: Issues and Challenges in a Turbulent World’. Please note the change in venue and start time!
  • The Book launch of Siân E. Grønlie’s The Old Testament in Medieval Icelandic Texts. Translation, Exegesis and Storytelling takes place at 5.30-7pm in Seminar Room 9, St Anne’s College. We celebrate the launch of the book (Boydell and Brewer, 2024), with a panel discussion with Prof Heather O’Donoghue, Prof Henrike Laehnemann, and Dr Rachel Burns, followed by a drinks reception. For further details, please see here.

Thursday 23rd May:

  • The All Souls Seminar in Medieval and Early Modern Science meets at 2– 3pm in the Hovenden Room, All Souls College. This week’s speaker will be Michael Hunter (Birkbeck, University of London), Robert Boyle’s Strange Reports: From the Outlandish to the Supernatural. To be added to our mailing list please email Dan Haywood mailto:daniel.haywood@sjc.ox.ac.uk

Friday 24th May:

  • Recording Oxford’s Medieval Lives. A Mise en Perspective of Lincoln Documents takes place from 10am-7pm at Lincoln College. The conference will include academic papers and presentations by students and participants in the year-long seminar ‘Exploring medieval Oxford through Lincoln Archives’. They will be presenting their work and discoveries at the conference alongside papers by David d’Avray (UL/Jesus College), Philippa Hoskin (CCC, Cambridge), Richard Allen (Magdalene College), Michael Stansfield (New College) and Alison Ray (St Peter’s and All Souls). Anyone with an interest in the history of medieval Oxford and medieval documents more generally is welcome to attend and can register by writing to Laure Miolo and Lindsay McCormack.
  • The Medieval Coffee Morning meets as usual 10:30am in the Visiting Scholars Centre of the Weston Library (instructions how to find it) with presentation of items from the special collections, coffee and the chance to see the view from the 5th floor terrace. This week, Thea Gomelauri will present medieval Hebrew manuscripts.
  • The Anglo-Norman Reading Group will meets at 5-6.30pm at the Julia Mann Room in St Hilda’s College, with the option to join remotely online. Those attending in person please be at the Lodge BY 5.00, where we will meet you and take you to the room in South Building. The texts, together with supplementary material, can be found on TT Padlet Please ensure you print the text (or bring it electronically), as we do not provide paper copies. Wine and soft drinks are available as usual!

Saturday 25th May:

Finally, for further inspiration to keep working hard through this last stretch of the teaching year, here is some further advice from Anselm:

Nullus enim potest vitare defectum, nisi qui se semper extendit ad profectum. 
[For nobody can avoid falling back except one who always strains towards progress.] 
A letter (1094/1095) from Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury to Nun M.

The sun should help to ward off any fifth week blues, and to ensure no “falling back” happens, but if you need further assistance, please do come along to the very friendly medievalists coffee morning. In the meantime, I wish you all a week of research and teaching progress!

[Medievalists diligently striving towards progress together…]
St John’s College MS. 61, f. 2 r. 
By permission of the President and Fellows of St John’s College, Oxford
Viewable in full at Digital Bodleian
 

Medieval Matters: Week 4

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13/05/2024

07:23

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Around Oxford, News

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The sun has finally arrived in Oxford! After such a long winter and such a cold and windy April, I think I speak for us all when I say that seeing Oxford in the sunshine is a real joy! I for one was so overjoyed to see the sun this weekend that I was reminded of this wisdom from the  Epistolae project: 

non sic tempestate iactatus portum nauta desiderat, non sic sitientia imbres arva desiderant, non sic curvo litore anxia filium mater expectat, quam ut ego visibus vestris fruere cupio 
[more than the storm-tossed sailor longs for the harbour, more than the thirsty fields desire rain, or the anxious mother watches by the shore for her son, do I long for the sight of you.] 
A letter from Egburg/Egburga/Ecburg (716-20) 

Our blog post this week is a real delight, as both a celebration of a new book publication and a fantastic insight into medieval verse. Dr Daniel Sawyer writes about his brand new book, out this month with Oxford University Press, on Reading Middle English Verse. This will be such an invaluabe teaching resource for those of us teaching medieval literature, and I for one am hugely excited! To discover how studying Middle English verse can make us rethink our modern day use of English, to read more about the many varieties of Medieval English poetry, and to find a discount code for the book, read Daniel’s blog post here.

For further sights that are sure to bring you joy, feast your eyes on all of the fantastic events taking place this week: 

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

  • Invitation to end of year celebration with OMSBook launch: On Tuesday 11 June 11, 2024. 5.00 p.m. for 5.15, the last meeting of the .Medieval Church and Culture‘ seminar’ In the chapel at Harris Manchester College will be combined with a drinks reception and a book launch of New Zealand medievalism: reframing the medieval, edited by Anna Czarnowus and Janet M. Wilson, Routledge. Speakers: Anna Czarnowus (Katowice), Carolyne Larrington (Oxford), David Matthews (Manchester), and Janet Wilson (Northampton). All welcome but RSVP by Friday 7 June 7 to Janet Wilson

EVENTS THIS WEEK:

Monday 13th May:

  • The Medieval Latin Manuscript Reading Group meets at 1-2pm on Teams. A friendly venue to practice your Latin and palaeography on a range of texts and scripts. We will read a very entertaining account of the legendary foundation of Cambridge University by the Carmelite friar Nicholas Cantlow. Sign up to the mailing list to receive weekly updates and Teams invites. https://web.maillist.ox.ac.uk/ox/info/medieval-latin-ms-reading
  • The Queer and Trans Medievalisms Reading Group meets at 3pm in Univ. This informal reading group will explore queer and trans themes in medieval texts. In Trinity, we’ll be thinking about queerness and transness on trial in the Middle Ages. This week’s theme will be The trial of Rolandina Ronchaia (Venice, 1355). All extremely welcome, both in-person and online! To join the mailing list and get texts in advance, or if you have any questions, email Rowan Wilson (rowan.wilson@univ.ox.ac.uk).
  • The Tolkien 50th Anniversary Seminar Series meets at 5pm in the Summer Common Room, Magdalen College. This week’s speaker will be Dr. Eleanor Parker (Brasenose College, University of Oxford), Tolkien and the Anglo-Saxon Calendar. For more information, please see https://tolkien50.web.ox.ac.uk/.
  • The Medieval History Seminar meets at 5pm in the Wharton Room, All Souls College and on Teams. The Teams session can be accessed by logging in to Teams with your .ox.ac.uk account and joining the group “Medieval History Research Seminar” (team code rmppucs). Alternatively, you can use this link. If you have any difficulties please email: medhistsem@history.ox.ac.uk. This week’s speaker will be Emma Hornby (Bristol): ‘Intertextuality in medieval Spain: liturgy, iconography, architecture and music at San Miguel de Escalada in the tenth century’.

Tuesday 14th May:

  • The Medieval English Research Seminar meets at 12.15pm in Lecture Room 2, English Faculty. This week’s speaker will be Tim Glover (Emmanuel College, Cambridge), Compilatory Form and Authorship in Richard Rolle and in Late-Medieval Religious Literature. Seminars followed by a sandwich lunch. All welcome!
  • The Medieval Poetry Reading Group meets at 4pm in the Colin Matthew Room, Radcliffe Humanities Building. This week’s theme will be The Wakan Rōeishū (Japanese and Chinese-Style Chanting Collection, c. 1000): Sound and Manuscript. This is an activity of the TORCH Network Poetry in the Medieval World. For more information, you can refer to our website https://torch.ox.ac.uk/poetry-in-the-medieval-world; you can also contact Ugo Mondini at ugo.mondini@mod-langs.ox.ac.uk.
  • The 2024 Zernov Lecture meets at 5pm at the Maison française d’Oxford, 2-10 Norham Road, OX2 6SE. This year’s speaker will be Dr Sebastian Brock FBA, (University of Oxford), ‘The Ecumenical Journey of the Writings of St Isaac the Syrian’, introduced by David G.K. Taylor (Associate Professor in Aramaic and Syriac, Wolfson College, Oxford).
  • The Medieval Church and Culture Seminar meets at 5.15pm in the Wellbeloved Room, Harris Manchester College. This week’s speakers will be Elena Vermeer (Trinity), The Old English and Old Norse ‘Joshua’:  translation and readership in context and Vita Dervan (Lincoln), Rewriting Virgil through Dante:  Guido da Pisa’s Fiore d’Italia and medieval translation. Everyone is welcome at this informal and friendly graduate seminar.

Wednesday 15th May:

  • There will be no meeting of the Medieval German Graduate Seminar this week.
  • The Medieval Latin Document Reading Group meets at 4-5pm on Teams. A document is sent out in advance but homework is not expected. Please contact Michael Stansfield for further details and the Teams link.
  • The Late Antique and Byzantine Seminar meets at 5pm at Ioannou Centre for Classical and Byzantine Studies, 66 St. Giles, Oxford, and online via Teams. Teams link: https://msteams.link/FW0C. This week’s speaker will be James Cogbill (University of Oxford) – ‘Fourteenth-Century Byzantine History-Writers and the Problem of Emperors’ Family Ties’.
  • The Oxford Interfaith Forum will meet at 6pm, online via zoom for Sounding the Silence – Contemplation as Poetic Practice; Poetry as Contemplative Practice by Dr Aaron Maniam. To register, please click here.

Thursday 16th May:

  • The Environmental History Working Group meets at 12.30-2pm in the Merze Tate Room, History Faculty. This week’s speaker will be Mim Pomerantz, “Ecological Automatism: Photography and Non-Human Creativity in Minotaure (1933-1939)”. We try to keep discussions informal, and we encourage anyone at all interested in these kinds of approaches to join our meetings, regardless of research specialism or presumed existing knowledge. For updates on meeting details, refer to the EHWG tab on the Environmental History website. For further information or to join the EHWG mailing list, please email environmentalhistoryworkinggroup-owner@maillist.ox.ac.uk
  • The Germanic Reading Group meets at 4pm online. Please contact Howard Jones Howard.Jones@sbs.ox.ac.uk to request the handouts and to be added to the list. This week will be on the Gothic Bible (Ryan leading).
  • The Medieval Women’s Writing Reading Group meets at 5-6.30pm in Lincoln College, Lower Lecture Room. This week’s theme is Arabic and Hebrew Medieval Women’s Writers. Stay up to date with events by joining our mailing list or following us on X @MedievalWomenOx. Texts for the reading group are shared on the mailing list.
  • The Medieval Visual Culture Seminar meets at 5pm at St Catherine’s College, Oxford, Arumugam Building. All welcome! This week’s speaker will be Livia Lupi, University of Warwick, Artistic Practice and the Emergence of the Architect in Italy, c. 1300 – c. 1480.

Friday 17th May:

  • The Medieval Coffee Morning meets as usual 10:30am in the Visiting Scholars Centre of the Weston Library (instructions how to find it) with presentation of items from the special collections, coffee and the chance to see the view from the 5th floor terrace. 
  • The final meeting of the initiative ‘Teaching the Codex’ will take place at Merton College 2-5pm on the topic of ‘hybridity’. Places are limited but if you would like to check whether there is still space, contact Mary Boyle. 
  • The Oxford Medieval Society Chain Maille Workshop takes place at 2-5.30pm, in St John’s College New Seminar Room. Registration is MANDATORY. Don’t miss out, places are limited! Tickets: £15. Refreshments will be provided. To register, click here.
  • The Oxford Medieval Manuscripts Group (OMMG) meets at 3.15pm at the V&A Museum, London. We will look at Illuminated Manuscript Cuttings at the V&A, London in conversation with Catherine Yvard, National Art Library Special Collections Curator. Places are limited: please write to elena.lichmanova@merton.ox.ac.uk by 10/05/2024.

Saturday 18th May:

  • Living Stones meets at 2pm in Iffley Church Hall for talks by Andrew Dunning and Anne Bailey on Oxford in 1160: Scholars and Pilgrims at St Frideswide’s Priory. For more information and Tickets please visit https://livingstonesiffley.org.uk/events.

I wish you a week of research joys and garden joys alike! 

A blue lion with orange and green leaves Description automatically generated with medium confidence[A flock of Medievalists visit the University Parks to find some summer joys] 
St John’s College MS. 61, f. 23 v.  
By permission of the President and Fellows of St John’s College, Oxford 
Viewable in full at Digital Bodleian 

CALL FOR PAPERS: Addressing Difficult Aspects of the Medieval (ADAM)

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12/05/2024

20:13

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23rd–24th September, 2024 | St John’s College, Oxford
KEYNOTE: Professor Corinne Saunders

The inaugural ADAM workshop will bring together medievalists of all disciplines to discuss the research and teaching of ‘difficult’ or ‘taboo’ topics. We welcome applications for scholars working in any field that demands sensitivity and resilience from researchers, such as (but not limited to): gender, sexual violence, mental health, disability, and race.

The workshop exists to foster connection and conversation between researchers, to raise some of the key questions of challenging research and to create a reliable network of support. Paper sessions will be linked by group discussions, addressing topics such as: the problems of establishing new terminologies and reworking those that may be problematic; how best to deal with extant scholarship with outdated views; how to approach sensitive topics rigorously within an academic framework.

Besides these methodological aspects, we are eager to discuss pastoral issues: the potential mental toll of research on these themes; the pedagogical demands that these issues place upon tutors and supervisors; how to undertake sound scholarship when personally affected by these issues.

ADAM’s aims are to provoke academic discussion, provide scholarly resources, and to establish a community that can provide support for those working on such topics. The network will provide both a platform and a safe space for uncomfortable conversations, cultivating a greater understanding of the clear and latent difficulties of this research. It is also our intention to produce an edited collection on this topic, to which the workshop speakers will be warmly invited to contribute.

We invite abstracts for 20-minute papers from Early Career Researchers and postgraduates. Please send
abstracts of 300 words to Grace O’Duffy by 9th June, 2024.

How To Read Middle English Poetry

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12/05/2024

19:54

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blog

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By Daniel Sawyer

[Workers rebuild Troy, in a copy of John Lydgate’s Troy Book: Manchester, John Rylands Library, MS Eng 1, f. 31v. Reproduced under a Creative Commons licence, CC-BY-NC 4.0.]

For most people, poetry in Middle English—roughly 1100 to 1500—is a world unknown. I’d long thought this a shame, but it was only through shaping How to Read Middle English Poetry as an accessible guide for students that I grasped just how innovative and thrilling the period in truth is.

Did you know, for instance, that someone unwittingly wrote a Shakespearean sonnet more than a century before Shakespeare’s birth? Or that the first poem we can attribute to a named woman displays a unique and startlingly intricate form? And while we think of English blank verse—metrically-regular poetry without regular rhyme or alliteration—as the mainstay of things like early-modern drama and Paradise Lost, the idea occurred to poets at least twice, independently, before the third (re)invention that started its sixteenth-century flourishing. Such facts lurk in the Middle English centuries, making these in some ways the most exciting spell in English poetry’s history.

What made this period so experimental?

For centuries after the Norman conquest of England in 1066, French stuck around as another spoken language alongside English—and a spoken language with more cachet. Latin, meanwhile, filled the role of the normative written language, often coming baked-in with literacy: those who learned to read learned to read in Latin, other literacies coming as a kind of by-product. 

Consequently, English lacked the reach of a prestigious tongue, but it also lacked prestige’s pressures. Several poetic traditions coexisted in English, without a clear hierarchy of prestige sorting them: it would, after all, always seem more elevated to write in Latin or French. As a result, this was the great age of experiment in English poetry.

It is in this period that we first see English poetry in alternating metres descended from post-classical Latin and early French. These metres are the ancestors of most regular verse of the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries. This was the metrical family in which Chaucer worked; within it, he invented the five-beat line that would one day propel poetry from Thomas Wyatt to Elizabeth Barrett Browning, not to mention the plays of Shakespeare, Marlowe, and Jonson.

At the same time, Middle English sustained a separate metrical family of poems descended from Old English verse habits: alliterative verse. Though somewhat changed from the Old English model, the verse of Piers Plowman, (most of) Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and of the Alliterative Morte Arthure recognisably sits within English’s original and longest-lasting verse tradition. Such poems have a formal lineage which runs back before English was English. Also in this bucket lurks Layamon or Lawman, whose curious early Middle English Brut provokes expert debate over its classification, and offers the earliest known tales in English of King Arthur and King Lear.

Neither alternating verse nor alliterative verse held a place of straightforward prestige, distinguished from other poetry. The Gawain stanza switches between the two, showing us a poet comfortable shuttling across metrical lineages. Moreover, mixing traditions brought forth a third body of work, alliterative-stanzaic poetry, which married alliterating half-lines in alliterative metre to end-rhyme, often together with a fireworks display of other effects. One example, today known as ‘Three Dead Kings’ and preserved uniquely in the Bodleian, has a claim to the title of the most complex stanza-form in English at any time.

[The start of ‘Three Dead Kings’, Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Douce 302, f. 34r.]

In the sixteenth century and after, rising five-beat alternating lines—‘iambic pentameter’—would ascend to prestige as a standard form for art poetry. Through the same centuries, English slowly took over from Latin and French in the worlds of academia, government, religion, and the law. Today, English is a global language, and is the world’s most frequently learned tongue. For some contexts, it has come to hold the kind of roles that French and Latin once held in England: a prestige language, a source of loanwords and models.

In the twenty-first century, then, we might learn a few things by delving into the middle of English’s history, the language’s time of least social importance: Middle English teaches us to see how English is not a transparent default, but a tongue alongside others; it teaches us to appreciate the quirks in English, and in the other languages we meet. And often it is Middle English poetry that offers this lesson most clearly, while also forming a wildly creative and varied body of work in its own right.

Daniel’s book is due out in May 2024 from Oxford University Press. Readers can use the code AAFLYG6 to get 30% off either the hardback or the paperback when ordering How to Read Middle English Poetry direct from OUP.