Week 2 begins! Please find included a list of this week’s events and opportunities. As always, a PDF version copy of the booklet can be found here. Read on.
EVENTSTHIS WEEK
Monday
French Palaeography Manuscript Reading Group – 10.30am in the Weston Library. Those interested should email Laure Miolo.
Medieval Archaeology Seminar – 3pm at the Institute of Archaeology. Ragneheiður Traistadóttir and Knut Passche will be speaking on ‘Viking Age Burials and Medieval Settlement from Frörður, Iceland/ Wiking Ships: Gateways to the Past’.
Medieval History Seminar – 5pm at All Souls College. Genevieve Caulfield (UCL) will be speaking on ‘Making Moral Judgements: Theory and Practice in the Thought of Johannes Nider’.
Italian Research Seminar – 5:15pm in Room 2 of the Taylorian Institute. Dr Rhiannon Daniels will present a paper titled ‘Printing Boccaccio’s Lives 1470-1600: The Canonisation of a Vernacular Author’.
Tuesday
Medieval English Research Seminar – 12.15pm at Lecture Theatre 2 of the St Cross Building. Sian Hughes will be speaking on ‘Pearls: A Reading and Conversation’.
The Latin palaeography reading group occurs 2-3.30pm. Please email Laure Miolo for more information.
Medieval Church and Culture – 5pm in the Wellbeloved Room, Harris Machester College. Krisztina Ilko (Queens’, Cambridge) will be speaking in ‘A Chess King From Norman Southern Italy’.
The Centre for Early Medieval Britain and Ireland Lecture – 5.15pm at the Gillis Lecture Theatre, Balliol College. Alex Woolf (St Andrews) will be speaking on ‘Ships, Men, and Land in Dál Riata, England, and Beyond’.
Wednesday
Reading Jews in Late Antiquity – 10am in Room 207 of The Clarendon Institute. The theme for this week is Heresies and Heretical Beliefs.
Medieval German Seminar – 11.15am at Somerville College. To be added to the Teams group for updates, please email Henrike Lähnemann.
Medieval Latin Document Reading Group – 4pm online. To join, please email Michael Stansfield.
Late Antique and Byzantine Seminar – 5pm in the Ioannou Centre. Anne McCabe (Athens) will be speaking on ‘From Temple to Church: New Evidence for the Christianization of the Hephaisteion in Athens’.
Thursday
Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies seminar – 5.15pm online. Please see the booklet, where a wealth of Celtic language lessons can also be found.
Oxford Medieval Society Welcome Drinks and Quiz – 6pm at the King’s Arms.
Pusey House Library Welcome Party – 6.15 pm at Pusey House Library.
Friday
Medievalists Coffee Morning – 10.30am at the Weston Library.
Exploring Medieval Oxford through Lincoln & Magdalen Archives – 2pm in the EPA Centre (Museum Road) Seminar room 1. Please contact Laure Miolo for more information.
Middle English Reading Group – 3pm in the Beckington Room, Lincoln College.
UPCOMING
Tickets are available here for the Society of Medieval Archaeology Student Colloquium.
Tickets are available here for the inaugural lecture of the Gad Rausing Associate Professor of Viking-Age Archaeology, held at St Cross College at 3pm on Friday 8th November. Dr Jane Kershaw will be speaking on ‘The Viking Diaspora: Causes, Networks and Cultural Identity’.
The Central European University are advertising a number of funded PhDs and Masters – see the blog post here.
University College Dublin are advertising a funded PhD in Early medieval political and/or intellectual culture (c.500-c.1000 CE) which will be supervised by Dr Megan Welton. See the blog post here.
Check out this handy guide to how to blog – including a call for authors for the OMS blog – by Miles Pattenden.
First week is upon us! Welcome back, and a particular welcome to those joining us for the first time. I hope you’ve all had a chance to flick through the booklet of medieval events this term – if not, a PDF version can be found here. I’d like to draw your attention to the OMS Welcome Event this Tuesday at 5pm – I look forward to meeting lots of you there, and hearing more about the events you are running.
And: check out this handy guide to how to blog – including a call for authors for the OMS blog – by Miles Pattenden.
EVENTSTHIS WEEK
Monday
French Palaeography Manuscript Reading Group – 10.30am at the Weston Library.
Medieval History Seminar – 5pm in the Wharton Room, All Souls. Edward Zychowicz-Coghill (KCL) will be speaking on ‘Writing the Conquest of Egypt: A case study in the Formation of Islamic Historical Writing’.
Tuesday
Medieval English Research Seminar – 12.15pm in Lecture Theatre 2, St Cross Building. Amy Appleford (Boston University) will be speaking on ‘Ascetic Theory and the Impaired Christ: Peter Damian, Richard Rolle, Julian of Norwich’.
Latin Palaeography Manuscript Reading Group – 2pm in the Weston Library.
Oxford Medieval Studies Welcome Event – 5pm in the Wellbeloved Room, Harris Manchester College. A welcome event for all medievalists, old and new – all those running a seminar/group are encouraged to come along to pitch their event to the community!
Wednesday
Reading Jews in Late Antiquity – 10am in Room 207, The Clarendon Institute, Walton St. The topic this week will be Jewish Women and Communal Roles.
Medieval German Graduate Seminar – 11.15am at Somerville College. The topic for this term is Konrad von Megenberg: ‘Buch der Natur’. The 1861 edition by Pfeiffer is open access online, 2003 edition by Luff/Steer is accessible via SOLO. This will be a short organisational meeting – contact Henrike Lähnemann for more information.
Medieval Latin Document Reading Group – 4pm on Teams. To join and/or to find out more, please contact Michael Stansfield.
Late Antique and Byzantine Seminar – 5pm in the Ioannou Centre for Classical and Byzantine Studies. Alexander Sherborne (Oxford) will be speaking on ‘The Extraordinary Medieval Monuments of Georgia: A Report by the Oxford University Byzantine Society Research Trip, July 2024’.
Dante Reading Group – 5.30pm in Seminar Room 11, St Anne’s College
Thursday
Medieval Women’s Writing Research Seminar – time TBC, Online. Arnisha Ashraf (Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi) will be speaking on ‘Woman’s Body as ‘Commodity’: Matrimonial Alliances and Political Dynamics in Medieval Assam (c.1600-1800)’.
Greek and Latin Reading Group – 3pm in the Stapeldon Room, Exeter College. The theme this term is ‘Greek and Roman Lives’.
Medieval and Renaissance Music – 5pm on Zoom. Please register here.
‘The Winter Sun in Capricorn: Portal Imagery in Chaucer & Chartres Cathedral’, with the American Friends of Chartres – 7:30, held Online. Tickets here.
Friday
Beowulf Study Day – 10pm in the Study of the Book Room, Faculty of English. Booking required.
Medievalists Coffee Morning10.30-11.30am in the Visiting Scholars Centre of the Weston Library. All welcome.
Middle English Reading Group – 3pm in the Beckington Room, Lincoln College. This term, the group will be reading Troilus and Criseyde – please bring a copy of the Riverside Chaucer if possible.
Oxford Medieval Manuscripts Group – 5pm at the Weston Library. Andrew Honey will be speaking on ‘Cataloguing Medieval Bookbindings at the Bodleian: Manuscripts from Reading Abbey as a case study’. Spaces are limited: please email Elena Lichmanova by 16/10/2024.
Anglo-Norman Reading Group – 5pm in the Farmington Institute in Harris Manchester College.
UPCOMING
Tickets are still available here for the inaugural lecture of the Gad Rausing Associate Professor of Viking-Age Archaeology, held at St Cross College at 3pm on Friday 8th November. Dr Jane Kershaw will be speaking on ‘The Viking Diaspora: Causes, Networks and Cultural Identity’.
The beginning of another term means a new set of exciting events to put in your calendars. The first version of the new Medieval Booklet of events can be found here. If you are organising an event or series this term, please have a quick check through: addenda and corrigenda to medieval@torch.ox.ac.uk.
Each week I will be emailing out a list of that week’s events and opportunities, bright and early on a Monday morning. This week’s selection can be found below.
EVENTS THIS WEEK:
Thursday 10th October:
The Celtic Seminar starts at 5pm in the Memorial Room at Jesus College.
The NEW Medieval MSS Support Group 11:30-12:30 in the Horton Room in the Weston Library: once or twice a term, 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. Alternatively, provide a good quality digital image that we can display on a large monitor. A second date this term will be on 6 December.
COMING UP
On Tuesday, 15 October, there will be a chance to meet together as a community with the Welcome Social, held in the Wellbeloved Room at Harris Manchester College. If you are hosting a reading group/ lecture series/event this year we highly encourage you to come along to help spread the word. See you all there!
OPPORTUNITIES
University College Dublin is advertising a PhD studentship in Early medieval political and/or intellectual culture (c.500-c.1000 CE), supervised by Dr Megan Welton. For more information, please see the recent blog post here.
If you know of anybody interested in the medieval who is not on this mailing list, please encourage them to register here for the mailing list.
I’m Miles Pattenden and I’d like to introduce myself as a new member of the OMS Steering Group who is taking responsibility as a commissioning editor for this website over the coming year. Those of you who have been around in Oxford for a while may know me from a previous life as an historian of the early modern papacy and Catholic Church. However, my work has also always taken a particular interest in the uses of the medieval Christian past during and since the Counter-Reformation.
Increasingly I now study ‘Medievalisms’ amongst contemporary groups and individuals: popes who fantasise about following the footsteps of medieval missionaries, the Far Right, and LGBTQ+ activists. A piece of the ‘cult of gay relics’ in AIDS-era Sydney and San Francisco is forthcoming in Past & Present (2025). It explains how gay men repurposed ideas encountered in Catholic schools and seminaries to sacralise public sex and build community in the face of police oppression (click here for a taster).
I look forward to meeting as many of you as possible at the various events we promote here, and which Tristan advertises via the termly booklet and weekly newsletter.
We’re always looking for new content for Oxford Medieval Studies: opportunities, publications, exhibitions, performances, conferences, workshops, etc. Blogposts about these can be informational or critically reflective, in advance or in retrospect.
Best wishes for the 2024–25 Academic Year – and do get in touch with me when you have ideas that merit wider publicity or visibility within our vibrant community of medieval scholars!
My name is Tristan Alphey, and I am the new OMS comms officer for the coming year. I’ll be popping up in your inboxes throughout the year with all sorts of opportunities and events, and so I want to take this quick chance to briefly introduce myself and my research.
My research explores the social implications of nicknaming in pre-Conquest and early Norman England. I look at the themes, number, and distribution of nicknames in an attempt to understand what motivated people to give and repeat names, and whether we can begin to unpick some of the social systems that lay behind these names. My approach draws on a body of scholarship known as socio-onomastics, increasingly popular among linguists and anthropologists, that sees names as playing an active role in shaping the ways people interact with each other.
We find these nicknames all over the place: in Domesday Book, within witness-lists of charters, in manumissions, in confraternity books, (very occasionally) in poetry. Some of these English nicknames are simple observations: two late 7th century missionaries are given the nicknames ‘Black’ and ‘White’ for their hair colour. Others are openly pejorative: one Domesday subtenant is named, simply, ‘Bad Neighbour’. Yet others are downright unintelligible: if anyone can offer me a convincing interpretation for the nickname of Alric ‘Winter Milk’, I am all ears…
Elsewhere in Oxford I run the Medieval Misuse reading group, which explores the ways in which the medieval past has been misused by modern political parties and extremist groups. We hope to bring this back in the coming term, so keep your eyes peeled.
I look forward to getting to know you all better, and meeting many of you in person – feel free to email me with any specific questions. I’m always keen to convert other medievalists to the thrills of onomastics, particularly socio-onomastics, so do please reach out if you’d ever like to discuss names. Until then, enjoy this week’s downpour of rain and I will see you all in first week.
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 Latinby 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 Camelotby 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
The Humanities Division Interdisciplinary Master’s Programmes are advertising an Academic Mentor & Communications Officer Joint Position for the MSt in Medieval Studiesand Oxford Medieval Studies (OMS). The deadline for applications is 2 September 2024. For an insight into the duties involved, read the blog post by two previous postholders, Dr Luisa Ostacchini: A Medieval Monologium, and Dr Karl Kinsella Heralding Oxford Medieval Studies.
The role of the Academic Mentor is to support the work of the programme convenors by fostering a group identity for the incoming cohort of students. The Academic Mentor will make an important contribution to the experience of students on this course.
The role of Oxford Medieval Studies (OMS) Communication Officer is to prepare the termly Medieval Booklet, send out a weekly news bulletin, and coordinate graduate students working with OMS.
The position will be offered for one year in the first instance. The holder will be expected to work 64 hours during Michaelmas term and 56 hours during each of Hilary and Trinity terms (for a total of 176 hours over the year). The hours should be divided flexibly between the MSt and OMS portions of the job, with a typical split of two-thirds MSt and one-third OMS. The remuneration offered is at point 7.1 of the casual pay spine; in 2023-24 this was £18.98 per hour.
Duties of the joint position
The role of the Academic Mentor is to:
help foster a sense of group identity and cohesion
contribute to the research mentoring and professional development of the students during the course
establish an informal space for group interaction
This will involve:
directing students towards relevant events and activities and helping them to navigate sources of information, including signposting to relevant learning opportunities and skills development provision
providing information and guidance on academic choice, including programme options and further study
discussing with students their future plans (whether professional or academic) and offering appropriate guidance by directing students towards relevant offices in the University
leading group discussions of academic and professional topics as may be relevant, depending on students’ needs
providing appropriate guidance on drafting research proposals for doctoral applications
coaching students in study skills (e.g., writing)
readiness to serve as ‘a helpful ear’ to students’ academic concerns or anxieties, liaising with the convenors where appropriate and/or where the mentor’s own concerns arise about a student. The mentor will not act as a welfare officer; however, they are advised to consult the convenors or the course administration should welfare issues arise so that students may be directed to the proper sources of support
The role will support the more formal work of the programme convenor to whom the Academic Mentor should report regularly and consult for guidance on offering advice to students (e.g., on University procedures)
The above is meant to act as a broad guidance; it is expected that the role will be flexible and responsive to the needs of individual cohorts.
The role of OMS Communications Officer is to:
Prepare the termly Medieval Booklet for publication two weeks before term starts
Write and circulate a weekly OMS email news bulletin
Coordinate graduate students working with OMS as events and social media officers
Help to administer the medieval.ox.ac.uk blog and the mailing list
Encourage graduate participation in blogging, application to OMS small grants, and so on
Work with the Directors of Oxford Medieval Studies to promote medieval studies
We welcome applications either from postdoctoral candidates, or candidates with relevant experience. Depending on availability and expertise, there might be scope for some collaborative teaching (for which additional payment would be made).
How to apply
Please write a letter of application outlining your suitability for the role, and send it, together with a CV, to interdisciplinary@humanities.ox.ac.uk by 2 September. Please ask two referees to send their references to the same address by the same date. Interviews for shortlisted applicants will take place in late August, and successful applicants will be expected to start from the beginning of Michaelmas term 2024.
by Caitlín Kane, Special Collections Curatorial Assistant New College
Back in February of this year, New College Library, Oxford had the pleasure of showcasing our wonderful collection of seven Books of Hours—beautiful manuscripts that once served as religious texts and treasured family heirlooms. Popular from the 14th century, especially in France, England, and the Netherlands, these were devotional texts that brought monastic routines into the daily lives of laypeople. Each typically included a calendar, the Office of the Virgin, Penitential Psalms, a litany, and the Office of the Dead, often decorated and customised to reflect the owner’s personal devotions. In collaboration with the Medieval Women’s Writing (MWW) Research Group, we hosted a workshop to show off, discuss, and examine these precious books. The event began with a talk by New College’s Special Collections Curatorial Assistant (that’s me!) on the significance of these books in studying lay devotion, particularly among women, and I shared tips on identifying their owners through text and decoration clues. Dr Jess Hodgkinson, New College Library’s Graduate Trainee, followed with a wonderful talk on her discovery of Eadburg in Bodleian Library, MS Selden Supra 30, thanks to innovative 3D recording technology from the ARCHiOx project.
Participants then had the chance to examine the manuscripts up close. A particularly lively discussion arose from an inscription I had found just that week in MS 369, where we debated whether the scribe’s name was ‘Claudius’ or ‘Claudine’.
It was wonderful to see these books being enjoyed, given that many hadn’t been closely studied since their donation in the 1980s. The enthusiasm and insights from everyone involved have been invaluable, prompting further research and discoveries about the lives of their former owners, some of which I will share now.
MS 369: A FRENCH CONNECTION
MS 369 is a late 15th-century French book of hours, possibly Use of Amiens, written in Latin. The last eight folios contain prayers to the Effusions of the Blood of Christ, written in vernacular French, and signed ‘Claudius Taconnet sripsit [sic]’. I had originally thought the name was Claudine or Claudina, but a further inspection of the horned ‘s’ in ‘les’ and ‘jesus’ suggested otherwise. Although there is a record of a Claude Taconnet, a juror for the linen-workers, in Paris in 1586, it’s unclear at this stage if this is our same Claude. The inclusion of these vernacular prayers suggests they were intended for someone less familiar with reading Latin.
New College Library, Oxford, MS 369, f. 9rNew College Library, Oxford, MS 369, f. 146rNew College Library, Oxford, MS 369, f. 128r
MS 369’s decoration is rich with burnished gold, floral borders, and miniatures. The face of St. John in one miniature has been worn away, likely through reverential touching or kissing of the page. This is commonly seen in books of hours, as the laity adopted not only monastic routines and prayers, but also imitated their priests in kissing holy images and books. As was pointed out to me during our showcase, a small figure depicted praying in an illumination of Saint Anne reading to Mary may potentially represent a member of Claude’s family or a woman for whom the book was originally commissioned.
MS 371: HERETIC HUNTERS IN DRENTHE
New College Library, Oxford, MS 371, f. 65rNew College Library, Oxford, MS 371, f. 2r
While preparing for our workshop, I thought Claude’s inscription in MS 369 would be the highlight. But thanks to the work of Prof. Henrike Lähnemann and Dr Friedel Roolfs, I was excited to discover that the inscriptions in MS 371 were even more intriguing. MS 371, a book of hours in the Middle Dutch vernacular, was likely made in a monastery in the Northern Netherlands around 1460-1480. Its calendar features saints linked to the dioceses of Utrecht, such as St Willibrord and St Walburga, and of Münster, including St Blasius and St George. This calendar and the decoration are strikingly similar to those in books of hours produced in the Benedictine double monastery of Selwerd in Groningen. Though the book’s exact origins need further examination, the endleaves record the births of Maria van Selbach and Roelof van Münster’s children from 1530 to 1538:
Item, in the year 1530, on Sunday after Candlemas, on St D.’s day, my daughter Katharina was born, whose godparents were John of Selbach, Marshal, my mother, and the wife of […]. Item, in the aforementioned year ‘31 on the Tuesday after Corpus Christi is my son Rolef born whose godparents were Kuntz von Selbach and the wife of Droste Bernt van Hackfort, my brother Jürgen van Münster. Item, in the aforementioned year ‘33 on the Tuesday after St Peter-in-chains is born my son John whose godparents were Henry van Münster, Bernt van Hackfort and the young lady van Eill to Klarenbeck, called Blankenstein. Item, in the year [15]34, on the 8th day after the birth of the BMV, on a Tuesday morning, my son Dirk was born whose godparents were my mother and Dirk van Baer. Item, in the year [15]36 on the Eve of Corpus Christi my daughter Agnes was born, whose godparents were her brother Roleff and Jutta Smullynck. Item, in the year [15]38 on a Tuesday after St Martin, my son David was born.
New College Library, Oxford, MS 371, f. 137vNew College Library, Oxford, MS 371, back board interior
All the names are clustered around the castle Klarenbeck in the Duchy of Cleves and the now destroyed Duirsum Castle in Loppersum, in the border area between the Netherlands and Germany. Maria van Selbach, born around 1510, grew up in Terborg and later moved to Coevorden with her father Johan van Selbach, the Drost of Drenthe and Castellan of Coevorden, and her mother Jutta Schmullynk. After her marriage to Roelof van Münster, the couple eventually settled in Duirsum Castle, Loppersum, in 1540, which Roelof inherited from his wealthy mother, Bauwe Heemstra. Agnes, one of their daughters, married Johan de Mepsche around 1561, a notorious Groningen heretic hunter and a staunch Catholic supporter of the Spanish monarchy during the Dutch Revolt. Their daughter, Mary de Mepsche, married Johan Kyff van Frens and inherited this treasured book. The manuscript then passed down to her sister’s son Egbert Clant and his wife Beatrix, and eventually to their daughter, Maria Catrina Clant. An additional note in the book traces its journey through the hands of women in the family:
This book is left as inheritance to Lady Agnes van Münster’s daughter Mary de Mepsche, and further to Egbert Clant and Beatrix van Ewssum who gave the same to their daughter Mary Catherine Clant, 4 April 1639.
MS 371 is the first book of hours at New College that we can definitively say was owned by women, though likely not the only one. Other additions by its owners, including the Ten Commandments in the vernacular, and notes on ‘watery’ zodiac signs, along with the worn initials on prayers and an image of Christ, reflect the deep personal devotion of this family over at least four generations. Their religious dedication is also evident from their sizeable donations to several monasteries, including Marienstatt, Keppel, and Ter Apel, where the coat of arms of Agnes van Münster and Johan de Mepsche can be found in a stained glass window.
AND MORE: MS 323 AND MS 310
Although MSS 369 and 371 have been the focus of my study, there are marks of use and ownership in each of New College’s books of hours. MS 323, a 16th-century Flemish manuscript, contains a Spanish inscription beginning ‘Estas horas van Lohesi(?)’ and further inscriptions in English detailing the births of two children, Jane and William Watson, in 1614 and 1615. MS 310, an early 15th-century book of hours, features a Middle English religious lyric and a signature possibly belonging to a ‘Henry Knyght’.
New College Library, Oxford, MS 323, f. 118 vNew College Library, Oxford, MS 310, f. 115r
There is still much to uncover about these manuscripts and their owners, especially the MSS I have mentioned only briefly. If anyone is interested in viewing these manuscripts themselves, please contact New College Library or the Head Librarian (Christopher Skelton-Foord) to arrange an appointment.
If you’d like to read more, my full article on these manuscripts has recently been published online, open access, in New College Notes 21 (2024).
My heartfelt thank you goes out to Marlene Schilling and Kat Smith from MWW, the New College Library team, and TORCH for making this event happen. I’m again deeply grateful to Prof. Henrike Lähnemann and Dr Friedel Roolfs for their incredible work on the transcription and translation of MS 371, and to Rakoen Maertens and New College Archivist Michael Stansfield for their assistance with the MS 323 inscriptions.
Bibliography:
Deschamps, J. and Mulder, H. (1998–2009). Inventaris van de Middelnederlandse handschriften van de Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België (voorlopige uitgave). Brussels: Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België.
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
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
