Blog

Term draws near. Please send all entries for next term’s OMS booklet to medieval@torch.ox.ac.uk, by Wednesday of -1 week at the latest (1st October). Until then, please see below a number of upcoming deadlines and opportunities:

The Cambridge Medieval History Graduate Workshop is inviting paper submissionsfor Michaelmas term 2025. We host presentations on the cultures, economies, literature, material cultures, politics,thought, religions, and reception of the medieval world, which we define as broadly aspossible as the global period between c.500 and c.1500. We welcome interdisciplinaryscholarship and encourage submissions which stretch our conception… Read more: CFP: Cambridge Medieval History Graduate Workshop

November (14th-16th) at the University of East Anglia. Deadline: Friday (12th September). The CHASE Medieval and Early Modern Research Network (MEMRN) are delighted to share the details for our second annual in-person Winter Conference. Join us from the 14th – 16th of November at the University of East Anglia and online for three days of panels, social… Read more: CFP reminder: CHASE Medieval and Early Modern Research Network (MEMRN) postgraduate conference

‘In our own tongues’: The Medieval Vernacular Bible and its European Contexts’ is organised jointly by the Oxford and Augsburg research teams of the ‘Medieval Vernacular Bibles as Unity, Diversity and Conflict’. The project is based at the universities of Oxford and Augsburg and is supported by the UK-German Funding Initiative in the Humanities (Arts… Read more: Medieval Vernacular Bibles

Time marches ever on, and the new term is on the horizon. It will soon be time to put the next iteration of the OMS booklet together. If you are organising a seminar series, reading group, or one-off event (conference, medievally-themed social event, workshop etc), please email the details to medieval@torch.ox.ac.uk ASAP. If you are… Read more: MT 25 Booklet: Call for Contribution

This year’s Dorothy Whitelock Lecture will be given by Profesor Jane Roberts (University of London) on ‘Guthlac: What the Early Medieval Records Tell Us’. The lecture will take place on 3 December at 5.15pm at St Peter’s College chapel, New Inn Hall Street, Oxford, OX1 2DL.  To secure your (free) ticket, please use the Eventbrite link here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/dorothy-whitelock-lecture-tickets-1368622870849?aff=ebdssbdestsearch… Read more: The 2025 Dorothy Whitelock Lecture

OXFORD, 8–10 APRIL 2026 Plenary speakers: James Simpson and Carolyne Larrington We welcome proposals for papers at the 2026 Medieval Insular Romance conference. Papers may address any aspect of romance composed in the languages of medieval Britain and Ireland, along with the ways that Insular romances engage with texts and traditions beyond those islands. The… Read more: Medieval Insular Romance Conference

A quick update in the middle of the summer break with a few notices which cannot wait for the start of term. I hope you have a good summer and remember that it is never too early to send seminar or event announcements to Tristan Alphey under the Oxford Medieval Studies email!

We have a new Social Media Officer! Elizabeth Crabtree is a Junior Research Fellow at Blackfriars. Her research interests lie in the Christian interpretation of the Bible in the Middle Ages, and especially in how recourse to Jewish sources shaped a Christian understanding of the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible. Her doctoral project explores the… Read more: Introducing our new Social Media Officer

OSRJL Applications for Michaelmas Term 2025 are now open! As part of the Oxford School of Rare Jewish Languages (OSRJL), applications for language classes beginning in Michaelmas Term 2025 are now open! The deadline to apply is 12 September at 12 noon UK time. Classes beginning in Michaelmas Term 2025 include those on the following languages: For more information… Read more: Rare Jewish Languages at Oxford

September 12, 2025, 10:00am–7:00pm Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and ManuscriptsVan Pelt-Dietrich Library Center, University of Pennsylvania, PhiladephiaAnd online via Zoom On September 12, 2025, the Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts at the University of Pennsylvania will host a day-long symposium commemorating Elizabeth (Peggy) A. R. Brown’s extraordinary legacy in the… Read more: Making the Medieval Archive: Celebrating Elizabeth A. R. Brown at Penn

25–26 September 2025. Ioannou Centre for Classical & Byzantine Studies, 66 St Giles’, Oxford, OX1 3LURegistration is free but compulsory https://www.classics.ox.ac.uk/event/the-latin-hymn-as-scriptural-exegesis-from-late-antiquity-to-the-middle-ages The Latin hymnic tradition is one that spans over a millennium from Late Antiquity through the Middle Ages to the Reformation (and beyond). In that period, there are aspects of it that have remained… Read more: The Latin Hymn as Scriptural Exegesis – from Late Antiquity to the Middle Ages

In April 2025, the Guild of Medievalist Makers was launched, co-founded by Eleanor Baker, Kristen Haas Curtis, and Laura Varnam. The Guild was the grateful recipient of an Oxford Medieval Studies Small Grant in Trinity Term 2025 to support the launch of their website and to assist with publicity materials for their first two conference… Read more: The Guild of Medievalist Makers

Using Data to find Interesting Manuscripts in the Bodleian’s Medieval Catalogue On Friday 25th July 2025, the Bodleian Coffee Morning presentation was given by Matthew Holford and Sebastian Dows-Miller, who are working on a project on the Bodleian’s western medieval manuscript catalogue data. The purpose of the project, funded by Digital Scholarship @ Oxford, is… Read more: Manuscripts by Numbers

Online / Oxford / Stockholm, 4-7 December 2025 The advent of Large Multimodal Models such as ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini – humanly conversant but also unpredictable assimilations of collective learning and experience – has opened a remarkable new era in pre-modern studies. How will LMMs transform our understanding of the pre-modern as they re-interpret the… Read more: Ars Inquirendi – Querying the Pre-Modern in the Age of Large Multimodal Models

Navigating Oxford as a Medieval Research Student Irene Van Eldere is a PhD candidate within the ERC-project ‘Pages of Prayer’ at Leiden University. As part of her research on early Middle Dutch Books of Hours, she spent two terms at the University of Oxford.   In the first week of my five-month research stay at… Read more: A Case for Cycling in Oxford

Please see below a CfP for an onomastics panel at Leeds IMC in 2026 – all are welcome, from any discipline/medieval period/ geographical focus!

Full-time, fixed-term postdoc position for 6 months to work with Andrew Dunning on redeveloping the Medieval Libraries of Great Britain project as a sustainable, open-access digital resource for manuscript studies. Apply by 14 July 2025 Full job advert and Further Particulars The Bodleian Libraries are seeking to appoint a researcher to join the Medieval Libraries of Great Britain project,… Read more: Medieval Libraries of Great Britain Project Researcher

Dear all, Weekly emails will stop over the long vac, but it is worth drawing to your attention a number of opportunities that take place before term starts up again. It is never too early to send in events for the booklet and / or the calendar – we will keep posting events on the… Read more: Medieval Matters, The Long Vac

20 and 21 April 2026 in Oxford Submission Deadline: 15 September 2025. Borders, Boundaries, and Barriers have become increasingly prominent themes in historical scholarship. Over the last decade, these concepts have been the focus of sustained scholarly interest, drawing especially upon theoretical frameworks and (trans-)national contexts. There is, therefore, a pressing need to examine how… Read more: CfP: Borders, Boundaries and Barriers: Real and Imagined in the Middle Ages

Another academic year draws to a close: welcome, finally, to Week 8. The full Medieval Studies booklet is available here. Next Thursday, 19 June, 4:30-6pm, is the official launch date for the “The Oxford Medieval Mystery Plays – the Film”. This is a wonderful chance to come together to celebrate the end of the year, and watch… Read more: Medieval Matters, TT25 Wk 8

Welcome to Week 7: the full Medieval Studies booklet is available here. First, a number of important reminders. The Centre for Early Medieval Britain and Ireland is hosting an online exhibition of artefacts and manuscripts that explore the lives of early medieval women. To submit an item, or to attend the even, follow this link. The Medieval… Read more: Medieval Matters TT25 Week 7

When: Tuesday 10th, 3:30-5. Where: Massey Room, Balliol College Interested in exploring the lives of medieval women? Recently stumbled upon a text or a bit of material culture that piqued your interest?  The Centre for Early Medieval Britain and Ireland will be launching an online exhibition later this spring, designed to complement the British Library’s recent… Read more: EMBI ‘Early Medieval Women’ Online Exhibition

Friday 13 June 2025, 12 noon–5PMLecture Room 4, New College, Oxford New College Library is pleased to announce our exhibition for Trinity Term! In ‘Art of the Book’, we explore the beauty of all things bibliographical through our wonderful special collections—from the medieval period to the present day. Expect fabulous illumination, exquisite illustrations, beautiful bindings,… Read more: ‘Art of the Book’ Exhibition at New College, Oxford

Welcome to Week 6: the full Medieval Studies booklet is available here. Big News! Join us on Thursday 19th June from 4:30 – 6 at the Farmingdon Institute (Harris Manchester College) for the Film Launch of the Medieval Mystery Plays! We are promised ‘liberal quantities of drinks (including the famous Tiddly Pommes apple juice) and nibbles’; full… Read more: Medieval Matters TT25, Week 6

When? Thursday, 19 June 2025, 4.30-6pm Where? Farmingdon Institute, Harris Manchester College

Welcome to Week 5: the full Medieval Studies booklet is available here. Thank you to those who have submitted their publications for the OMS impact booklet – please continue to send short blurbs to the Oxford Medieval Studies email address ASAP. Pictures also welcome! Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Opportunities (new additions in bold)