Blog

This week’s session of the History of the Book seminar at the Taylor Institution delved into the intersection of traditional manuscript study and digital encoding. Building on the introduction by Emma Huber, the session opened with an engaging overview of how XML’s TEI (Text Encoding Initiative) standard provides a framework for scholars to represent texts… Read more: XML: A Hands-On Dive into Digital Humanities

An extra large offering of medieval events for sixth week, and a particularly busy Monday! As always, you can find a complete copy of the Oxford Medieval Studies Booklet here.  Any last-minuted changes will be updated in the weekly blogpost and in the calendar, both accessible via https://medieval.ox.ac.uk/. Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Opportunities

Please see below the details for the History of Liturgy Seminar taking place this coming Monday (17th Nov) at 17.30, both in person at Balliol College and online.

Oxford Medieval Studies is saddened to hear of the death last week of Tony Hunt (1944-2025), Faculty Lecturer in Medieval French and Fellow of St Peter’s College (1990-2009). Tony’s contributions to Anglo-Norman and Medieval French research were prolific and ground-breaking, recognised by Fellowship of the British Academy in 1999; he was decorated Officier dans l’Ordre… Read more: Tony Hunt Obituary

A medieval event a day keeps the blues away – meet week 5 head-on with another set of seminars and events! As always, you can find a complete copy of the Oxford Medieval Studies Booklet here.  Any last-minuted changes will be updated in the weekly blogpost and in the calendar, both accessible via https://medieval.ox.ac.uk/. This week, on the… Read more: Medieval Matter MT 25, Week 5

Friday 28 November 2025 The Old Library, All Souls College, Oxford On the 100th birthday of Review of English Studies, this colloquium will reflect on the role of it and other journals in literary studies in the past and today. All are welcome. To help with catering, please register your intention to attend with Professor… Read more: Colloquium: Journals, Past, Present and Future

The aim of the MHS Essay Prize is to promote and encourage scholarly research and popular interest in the history of the medieval Mortimer family of Wigmore and its cadet branches, including those of Chirk and Chelmarsh, and the family’s impact on the history and culture of the British Isles. Or the history, geopolitics, topography,… Read more: Mortimer History Society Essay Prize Prize

As part of the Italian Research Seminar, Ryan Pepin will speak on ‘Dietro la memoria non può ire’: Copyists’ Slips in the Textual Tradition of the Commedia. Time and Place: Monday, November 10th (5th week), Taylorian, Room 2, 1-2:30 PM Abstract: The enormous textual tradition of Dante’s Commedia – over 600 complete manuscripts – is a mine of… Read more: Copyists’ Slip in Dante

Saturday 15 November 2-7pm. An immersive afternoon of Renaissance music-making with ensemble In spiritu humilitatis, period instruments and the Choir of St Edmund Hall, ending in a performance of Vespers for St Edmund

Weeks 1-4, 7-8 Thursdays 10:00-11:00 am  Catherine Lewis Lecture Theatre, Clarendon Institute, Walton Street, Oxford OX1 2HG and online via Zoom: see link below.  Convenors: Judith Olszowy-Schlanger and Joseph O’Hara This reading group is an opportunity to practise reading directly from images of medieval Hebrew manuscripts in an informal setting. No advance preparation is required… Read more: Medieval Hebrew Reading Group

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Opportunities

Durham University, 2–5 July 2026 In the second half of the first millennium, the Christian scriptures were produced,circulated, and put to use in a diverse range of forms and contexts. A manuscript mayaccommodate a single biblical text (the psalter, a gospel, the Apocalypse), a collectionof texts (the Hexateuch, the fourfold gospel), or, rarely, a complete… Read more: CfP: Shaping the Word- the Form and Use of Biblical Manuscripts inthe Early Medieval West

“OH, I’ve had such a curious dream!” said Alice […] – Alice in Wonderland (Lewis Carroll) Going back to Germany after my two-week adventure in Oxford, I, just like Alice, felt as if waking up from a magical dream. It is not an overstatement to say that the city has bewitched me and, trust me,… Read more: Two Weeks in Wonderland

Week 3 is upon us – please find below the weekly offering of events, groups, and opportunities. As always, you can find a complete copy of the Oxford Medieval Studies Booklet here.  Any last-minuted changes will be updated in the weekly blogpost and in the calendar, both accessible via https://medieval.ox.ac.uk/. Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Opportunities

New directions in the study of written artefacts from Antiquity to the late Middle Ages.Organised by the Crafting Documents project (AHRC-DFG) and co-sponsored by the Centre for Manuscripts and Text Cultures, University of Oxford.13-14 NOVEMBER 2025, SHULMAN AUDITORIUM. THE QUEEN’S COLLEGE, UNIVERSITY OF OXFORDRegister for free here 9:30 Arrival and registration (coffee and tea available… Read more: Heritage Science and Manuscripts Conference: Programme

Three reasons to study Palaeography by Hannah Free (MSt. Medieval Studies 2025) It was an exciting time being one of this years MML History of the Book students as we met up for the second time this term to have a three hour introduction to medieval Latin Palaeography. Dr Laure Miolo and Dr Alison Ray… Read more: Between bats, bindings, and hidden unicorns

Welcome to week 2, and the Medieval Matters email – a day early this time to coincide with St Frideswide’s Day! In honour of the occasion, Jesus College has paid for the Pershore Legendary to appear on Digital Bodleian, which includes the most accurate copy of Robert of Cricklade’s Life of St Frideswide. Browse away!… Read more: Medieval Matters MT25, Week 2

Fragmented Worlds, Shared Histories The MEMRN Committee are delighted to announce the return of the Winter Conference after the huge success of last year’s inaugural in-person event in Norwich. The MEMRN Winter Conference 2025 will be held from the 13th to the 16th November 2025 at the University of East Anglia. Please find the provisional… Read more: MEMRN Winter Conference 2025

Welcome to Michaelmas 2025 and to the definite version of the Oxford Medieval Studies Booklet! And greetings from the Stephen A. Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities. Among the many superlatives it boasts, there can probably be added the claim that this is the largest grouping (a madness?) of medievalists in the world, allowing encounters across… Read more: Medieval Matters, MT25 Week 1

There are a number of palaeography offers available for anybody interested in Oxford happening in Michaelmas 2025, coordinated by Dr Laure Miolo, Lyell Career Development Fellow in Latin Palaeography and Dilts Fellow at Lincoln College, historian of late medieval Europe, specialising in manuscript studies and history of early libraries with a special focus on scientific… Read more: Palaeography Offers in Michaelmas 25

6-7 November 2025Nederlands Interuniversitair Kunsthistorisch Instituut (NIKI), Florence, Italy (In Person and Online) How can art historians explore, understand, or even ‘feel’ the material evidence of the past? How can we approach the problem of historical distance, of our anachronistic nostalgia and our intellectual desire for pre-modern periods and artefacts? Can we inhabit the time… Read more: The Challenge of Historical Distance: Historicism and Anachronism in the Study of Art

The Oxford Medieval Graduate Conference (OMGC) is one of the highlights of the graduate academic calendar every year. Over two days, this interdisciplinary conference brings together graduate students from the UK and around the world to present their research on a wide variety of topics from across the Middle Ages. Read a review of the… Read more: Call for Committee Members – Oxford Medieval Graduate Conference

The Society for the Study of Medieval Languages and Literature has awarded the Medium Ævum Essay Prize since 2008. The competition is run annually, with postgraduates and those recently graduated with a higher degree invited to submit an essay on a topic that falls within the range of the interests of Medium Ævum in the medieval period (loosely defined… Read more: Medium Ævum Essay Prize

Dear Oxford Medievalists,  Hello from your new Social Medial officer!  As we prepare for the start of term, I want to encourage anyone and everyone to contribute ideas for content on the Oxford Medieval Studies social media. We are active anywhere and everywhere — Beacons (this platform),  BlueSky, Instagram, and Threads — and eagerly awaiting your suggestions. If you want an event,… Read more: Probatio pennae