Tuesday 14 February, 5:00pm
South School, Examination Schools
This lecture explores the ways in which deliberate legal change came to have unintended effects, especially on substantive law. It considers the interplay of legal learning, legal reasoning, and legal change. In so doing, it ponders Sir Henry Maine’s view of substantive law being secreted in the interstices of procedure.
All are welcome.
Link to their page here.
Link to their page here. For anybody interested, watch a lecture by the organiser Dr Johanneke Sytsema johanneke.sytsema@ling-phil.ox.ac.uk:
Students will learn about Old Frisian language, text corpus, culture and history in the context of Old Germanic languages. Linguistic comparisons will be drawn between Old Frisian and the other (West) Germanic languages. Settlement history of Frisians in Britain, Old Frisian Law and Literature and Old Frisian manuscripts will be discussed in lectures. Library visits will focus on the Old Frisian manuscripts in Oxford. The OFSS will close with a social day in Oxford. The OFSS is about learning to read Old Frisian and to place Old Frisian in a wider linguistic, literary and historical context.
The summer school is aimed at students, PhD candidates and early career researchers with an interest in (Old) Germanic languages who want to familiarise themselves with Old Frisian.
There will be two lectures in the mornings and a translation workshop or library visit in the afternoons. The programme will cover the Old Frisian grammar in lectures by experts in the field and in translation workshops. Students will read Old Frisian texts in the afternoon workshops with help of modern handbooks and learn about the Old Frisian text corpus
By the end of the week, students should be able to translate a medium level Old Frisian text with the help of handbooks and have gained a good level of knowledge of the place and importance of Old Frisian within the Old Germanic language family
A visit to the Bodleian Library will enable students to view the Old Frisian manuscripts that are kept at Oxford.
Blog about the 2019 OFSS http://blogs.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/taylorian/2019/09/25/the-first-oxford-groningen-old-frisian-summer-school/
And video report https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIkV2PkKf48 (by Fardau Visser)
Hybrid fees will include access to all streamed lectures and electronic access to the grammar and dictionary during the week.
Participants can book accommodation in student halls belonging to St Edmund Hall (email address susan.mccarthy@seh.ox.ac.uk first come first served) or find accommodation in another college in Oxford via https://www.universityrooms.com/
For further information about the Summer School please contact: oldfrisian@ling-phil.ox.ac.uk (for all interested) or ofss@rug.nl (for students of Groningen University)
Please complete the application form and payment details will be sent to you by email.
Heathrow Airport is most convenient for Oxford. The Airline Bus Service to Oxford is frequent and cost-effective.
Most lectures and workshops will be held at St Edmund Hall. Information about travel to St Edmund Hall can be found here.
It’s fifth week, the most notorious week in the Oxford term! If you are feeling the fifth week blues, you might perhaps be comforted by the fact that Spring will be arriving soon. The days are already getting longer, and we are enjoying more sunny days in Oxford. Here is Alcuin on the importance of Spring:
Cuculum, vernalem avem, vestrae direxi sanctitati cum munusculis parvitatis meae
[“I have sent your grace the cookoo, the bird of Spring, with some little gifts from me” Ep. 167]
Though I can’t bring you Spring right away, I can offer many little gifts in the form of a delightful schedule of weekly events! Please check the weekly listings below to chase those fiften week blues away:
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
EVENTS THIS WEEK:
Monday 13th February:
Tuesday 14th February:
Wednesday 15th February:
Thursday 16th February:
Friday 17th February:
OPPORTUNITIES:
- CFP: Interfacing with linguistic norms, 323 BCE – 1453 CE: panel in Coimbra (14th Celtic Conference in Classics). This panel focuses on the use of linguistic norms in literature between Antiquity and the Middle Ages. From the idea of Hellenismos/Latinitas/ʿArabiyya until the development of the concept of ‘national language’, the promotion of language correctness and the imitation of canonical texts are elements of continuity in the endless compromise between norms and usage. Interested scholars are invited to submit abstracts of maximum 500 words by 20th February 2023 to the organisers (chiara.monaco@ugent.be; ugo.mondini93@gmail.com). For full details, see the blog post here.
- CFP: The Stanford-Berkeley English Graduate Conference 2023, Otherworlds. The Stanford-Berkeley English Graduate Conference seeks proposals for 20-minute papers that address any aspect of worldmaking in the context of otherness, alterity, subaltern studies, and literal other worlds, from any period, for a one-day conference, “Otherworlds,” to be held on April 22nd, 2023, in Stanford, CA, at Stanford University. The conference is open to any student currently enrolled in a graduate or undergraduate program in English or a related discipline. For full details, please see the full CFP here.
Of course, it is also Valentine’s day tomorrow, and it would be improper of me to leave you without an appropriate Alcuin quote on academic love:
quia semper te amabo, semper te ammonere no cessabo
[“I will always love you, and so will never cease to give you advice”, Ep. 42]May you give and receive kind advice this week! Of course, as your devoted news herald, I will never cease in providing weekly “advice”, but you are also served by the excellent graduate students Ashley Castelino, Eugenia Vorobeva, and Coral Kim, who are keeping the twitter and calendar updated with all of the latest updates on seminars, events, and strike action! Please remember to send them some love for their hard work, and to enjoy the fruits of their labours. I look forward to returning to your inboxes next week with even more gifts!
The Fair Field of Folk. Piers Plowman: A Potted Adaptation of the B Text
When: 11 February 2023, to be repeated partially during the Medieval Mystery Cycle 22 April 2023
Where: St Edmund Hall, Queen’s Lane, OX1 4AR Oxford
Director: Eloise Peniston
Welcome to our mervelous sweven, the Middle English prose B text of Piers Plowman dramatized and brought to stage by an eclectic mix of English students, medievalists, business students, historians, even a mathematician! Starring
With original music by Anna Cowan (harp) and Rachael Seculer-Faber; ceremonial trumpet: Henrike Lähnemann, special advice: Jocelyn Wogan-Browne. Supported by Oxford Medieval Studies and St Edmund Hall
The play follows a man named Will, who falls asleep beside a stream on a May morning in Malvern Hills with a succession of dreams, beginning with a tower on a hill, a dungeon, and a fair field of folk. On his quest for Truth, Will meets a host of allegorical personifications, wandering through the marriage and later trial of Lady Mede, the confession of the Seven Sins, the Crucifixion, and the Harrowing of Hell. In the midst of all, Piers Plowman emerges, taking only momentary repose from his plough to guide Will towards Truth and, rather scandalously, chastise members of the clergy.
Scenes
Piers Plowman is an allegorical text that exists in different versions. The A text is the incomplete earliest version, the B text is the most broadly translated and edited, while also being highly scandalous, and the C text is highly censored, notably failing to mention the Peasants Revolt and the Tearing of the Pardon, which our performance presents.
The B text can be approximately dated to 1388, and has quite the volatile position in history, especially in relation to the peasant’s revolt and heresy. While locked inside Maidstone Castle, John Ball penned his radical Letter to Essex Men, citing Piers Plowman and Robin Hood as comrades in the fight. In short, Piers Plowman is a working class hero, a Billy Bragg if you will, representing the right of common man. The concept of class struggle is deeply entrenched into the text, carrying the relics of the Domesday Book serfdom, to the climbing taxes in the midst of the 100 years war, the dwindling population as the Black Death roamed the country. All of these tensions boiled over on the 30th of May, 1381, as John Bampton arrived in Essex to collect unpaid poll taxes. In consideration of 1990 Poll Tax riots, the UK Miners’ Strikes in 1984, and the recently unveiled Strike Laws, clearly class struggle repeats itself. With a ploughman at the helm, the voice of the working people is vital in the text. With all that in mind, sit back, relax, and enjoy the chaos. God spede þe plouȝ!
Read a full version of Eloise Peniston’s reflection on her blog. Elise writes: I first discovered Piers Plowman at a bus stop. I was characteristically lost with a dead phone and only a charity shop book to keep me company. While no one murmured ‘Thou still unravished bride of quietness’, at me, I was acutely aware of being in the presence of the literary as I thumbed through the wind-swept pages. I was intensely confused, which, at the age of fifteen, I supposed was the hidden intention of all literature. With the charmed hand of A. V. C. Schmidt to guide me, I followed Will fallling asleep. I remember after being “found” an hour later how I, rather breathlessly, recounted the events of the B text to my mother as she, mid-flap, chastised me about reckless spontaneity and the need for charged phones.
At that bus stop, I knew that, by the fortuity of an Oxfam find, I had discovered something wonderful, but I had no idea that seven years later, I would be scavenging liripipes and slit-mittens in an attempt to bring this dream-vision to life. Now, I often take that humble copy with me to Malvern Hills, and it is positively crammed with pressed, may-morning flowers. However, little did I know then how deeply entrenched this text was in the public sphere or about the literary and literal rebellions that have emerged beneath the mouldboard.
From the pen of a man who described Piers Plowman as “not worth reading”, Gerard Manley Hopkins perfectly captured the flesh-good of the text:
And features, in flesh, what deed he each must do –
His sinew-service where do.
He leans to it, Harry bends, look. Back, elbow, and liquid waist
In him, all quail to the wallowing o’ the plough: ‘s cheek crimsons; curls
Wag or crossbridle, in a wind lifted, windlaced –
See his wind – lilylocks – laced;
Churlsgrace, too, child of Amansstrength, how it hangs or hurls
Them – broad in bluff hide his frowning feet lashed! raced
With, along them, cragiron under and cold furls –
With-a-fountain’s shining-shot furls.
Harry Ploughman
G. M. HopkinsThis particular poem encapsulates the essence of Piers Plowman: pure inscape, or as Stephen Medcalf calls it, an “extraordinary combination of roughness and a delicate magic.” It is incredibly difficult to describe what happens in Piers Plowman but “churlsgrace” is certainly the perfect descriptor for the essence of the text. A mere ploughman knows the way to Truth and is gracious enough to guide the reader, in return for help in plowing and sowing a half-acre.
Piers Plowman is ultimately a text that encourages mental labour, in a field, at a bus stop, or even in the gardens of St Edmund Hall…
We invite you to toil with us at Teddy Hall. From a tower on toft, a trumpet shall hail the dream, before the gentle plucking of a harp will guide you to sleep. Come and set forth on a dream-pilgrimage, exploring political satire, social upheaval, and spiritual crisis.
We hope to see you soon in the fair field. God spede þe plouȝ!
February marks LGBTQ+ history month in the UK. Alcuin, who frequently wrote of his male colleagues with romantic affection, is celebrated by many LGBTQ+ scholars as part of our history. Here are some appropriate words from the 8th Century:
Haec ideo, frater, tibi scripsi, ut scias, si tamen scire potes, qua te caritate diligo; nam me ipsum fateor edicere non posse – fordan etiam nec tu, qua me diligas – Deus scit, qui hanc infudit cordibus nostris.
[I have written you this, my brother, so that you might know how much I love you; for I confess that I cannot express it – and perhaps you too cannot say how much you love me – but God, who poured this love into our hearts, knows it, Ep. 17]
In the spirit of uplifting LGBTQ+ scholars and scholarship, I’d like to bring special attention to one of our newest additions: the Queer and Trans Medievalisms Reading and Research Group, which meets at 3pm on Monday at Univ College, 12 Merton St Room 2 to discuss the wonderful Yde et Olive! All are welcome!
On another note, please keep in mind that over the coming weeks, many seminars, reading groups etc. may be cancelled or postponed at late notice in solidarity with UCU strike action. For all the latest updates, please check our Calendar (on the right hand side of our blog) or Twitter (@OxMedStud). If you are cancelling an event, please let me know so that we can update the community!
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
EVENTS THIS WEEK:
Monday 6th February:
Tuesday 7th February:
Wednesday 8th February:
Thursday 9th February:
Friday 10th February:
Saturday 11th February:
OPPORTUNITIES:
- The Vatican Film Library at Saint Louis University invites applications to short-term fellowship programs available for research in its collections. The library holds over 40,000 medieval and Renaissance manuscripts reproduced in microfilm and digital formats. Fellowships are available to graduate students and established scholars regardless of nationality. For further information on application details and submission deadlines, see our fellowship guidelines.
- Call for Submissions: The Database of Religious History. The Database of Religious History (DRH) is currently recruiting historians, archaeologists, and religious studies scholars in all areas of expertise (PhD students and above). If you have academic expertise in the history or anthropology of religion, please consider contributing to the DRH. In an effort to build the database in as swift a manner as possible, and improve the quality of any analyses produced with it, the DRH is offering $300 CAD honoraria for each completed entry. If you are a PhD candidate or above and would like to contribute an entry on any religious group, place, or text, please contact Dr. Ian Randall (irandall@mail.ubc.ca) or sign up for the database at https://religiondatabase.org/landing/get-involved and select Dr. Randall as your entry editor. For more information please see here.
- CFP: Priests and their Manuscripts in the Holy Land and Sinai (Vienna, 8–10 November 2023). Please send the title of your paper and an abstract (max. 300 words) to Giulia Rossetto (giulia.rossetto@oeaw.ac.at) no later than March 15, 2023. The speakers will be notified by April 15.For full details, see our blog.
I leave you with another quote from Alcuin’s letters, on the power of love, as a little preview for next week’s Valentine’s day:
Dulcedo sanctae dilectionis vestrae omnibus horis etiam et momentis aviditatem pectoris mei habundantur
[The sweetness of your righteous love makes the desire of my heart overflow every hour and every minute, Ep. 78]May love (of this medieval community and your research) make your heart overflow this week!
I hope that you have all settled back into the rhythms of Oxford life. It’s terribly cold this week, with a thick layer of fog covering Oxford’s spires. Here’s some advice from Alcuin on how to wrap up warm:
Nullatenus capitis cura obmittenda est; levius est pedes dolere quam caput
[Care of the head should never be neglected: it is less serious that the feet should suffer than the head, Ep. 114 ]
I interpret this to mean: don’t forget to wear a warm hat! If you want to care for the head in a less literal sense, we of course have a whole host of intellectually stimulating seminars, reading groups and events for you to enjoy this week:
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
EVENTS THIS WEEK:
Monday 23rd January:
Tuesday 24th January:
Wednesday 25th January:
Thursday 26th January:
This weekend marked Lunar New Year: Happy New Year to all who celebrate! This year is the year of the rabbit. I wanted to provide a suitable quote and image but to my knowledge, Alcuin has nothing to write about rabbits, and nor are any to be found in the Ashmole bestiary. So please forgive a temporary departure from our usual material. Here is Albertus Magnus describing the importance of camraderie amongst rabbits:
Est […] animal timidum, et ideo injuriatum relinquit habitationem, quod videns grex totus de loco transit, ac si indignetur ad injurias sociorum
[It is a shy animal, and for that reason when disturbed it flees its home, and seeing this the whole colony leaves the place too, as if offended by the insult to their companion 20:29]
May we medievalists enjoy such loyal companionship!
We’d like to draw your attention to the first of the TOSCA seminars, details below!
-who: Andrew Honey, Bodleian Library, University of Oxford and Conservation Inspector to the Mappa Mundi Trust
-when: Thursday 2 February 2023, 4.30–6pm (GMT)
-where: Sir Victor Blank Lecture Theatre, Weston Library and online via Zoom
-This talk will examine the conservation needs of the Hereford Mappa Mundi, chart the effects of some of the historic repairs and cleaning campaigns carried out in the past, explain the ingenious methods used to mount the map, and outline future conservation needs, as well as presenting some discoveries from recent conservation inspections.
–Book here to attend, in person or online
There are two opportunities this term to discuss medieval Germanic languages: the Comparative Philology Graduate Seminar and the Germanic Reading Group.
We will present general aspects of the language and delve into specialist topics. All are welcome, basic linguistic knowledge is assumed. The seminar will take place on Tuesdays in weeks 2–8, 2.15–4 pm, at the Lecture Theatre of the Centre for Linguistics and Philology (Walton Street). Convenor: Dr Howard Jones
24 January Introduction/Phonology (Luise Morawetz/Howard Jones)
31 January Nominal morphology (Will Thurlwell)
7 February Verb morphology (Luise Morawetz/Howard Jones)
14 February Syntax (Howard Jones)
21 February Lexis (Will Thurlwell)
28 February Metre (Nelson Goering)
7 March The place of OHG (and Old Saxon) among the Germanic languages (Patrick Stiles)
We’ll be holding four online meetings of the Germanic Reading Group this term, every other Thursday at 4:00 starting second Week in Oxford.
Thursday, 26 January, 4:00─5:00. Old Norse skaldic verse (Nelson Goering leading)
Thursday, 9 February, 4:00─5:00. Old High German charms (Will Thurlwell leading)
Thursday, 23 February, 4:00─5:00. Medieval Yiddish (Kerstin Hoge leading)
Thursday, 9 March, 4:00─5:00. Old High German glosses and glossaries (Luise Morawetz leading)
Please contact Howard Jones Howard.Jones@sbs.ox.ac.uk to be added to the list
Image: OHG Paternoster, St. Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 56, p. 68 – Evangelienharmonie des Tatian (https://www.e-codices.ch/de/list/one/csg/0056)
Welcome back to Oxford, and to Hilary term! I hope that you all had a peaceful and enjoyable vac, and are returning to Oxford well rested and ready for an exciting and busy term. Since many of you have newly returned to Oxford, here is some wisdom for Alcuin about returning:
ex pietatis vestre apicibus audita prosperitate itineris vestri atque reversionis in patriam … toto cordis affectu animoque letissimo gratis egi
[Hearing from your letter of your successful journey and your return to our country … I gave heartfelt and joyful thanks, Ep. 190]
To welcome you all back, we have a new medieval booklet for Hilary 2023: please find a pdf copy attached to this week’s email, and a high-quality version on our website here. We also have a special blog post by Laure Miolo, who has the honour of giving the first medievalist paper of the term, at the Seminar in Manuscript Studies and Palaeography, today at 2.15-3.45pm! To read more about Laure’s paper, see the blog post.
Please note also that this week’s Medieval Church and Culture Seminar, on Tuesday 5pm, Harris Manchester College, is a special medievalist social! Please do come along to enjoy tea, coffee, biscuits, and a chance to catch up / advertise your seminars and events! All very welcome.
Please see below for full details of the week’s events:
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
EVENTS THIS WEEK:
Monday 16th January:
Tuesday 17th January:
Wednesday 18th January:
Friday 20th January:
OPPORTUNITIES:
Finally, some more wisdom from Alcuin:
novi rerum eventus novos iterum caritatis penna exarare meam devotionem apices exhortantur
[New events urge me to write anew in devotion with the pen of love, Ep. 156]
I’m delighted to be writing anew to you all with the week’s round-up of events, announcements and opportunities, and look forward to seeing you all throughout the term. Wishing you all a productive and enjoyable Hilary!
The Oxford Medieval Commentary Network is delighted to announce an upcoming Seminar Series for Hilary Term 2023. We will welcome four distinguished speakers from different disciplines, who will share their insights into different aspects of the commentary tradition. Seminars will take place on Thursdays of weeks 2, 4, 6, 8, at the Thatched Barn at Christ Church. There will be a free lunch at 12.45pm, followed by a one-hour seminar 1.15-2.15pm. Further details below, and on our website.
