Friendship Networks in Medieval Europe: New models of a political relationship
The relationship between friendship and politics in medieval Europe can appear to be fundamentally different from that experienced in modern societies. Friendship has, for some time, been recognised by medievalists as having an integral place in the formation of social bonds and political groupings and as contributing to the creation and maintenance of political order…
‘The Raw and The Cooked’: ways of cooking and serving food in Byzantium
Departing from ancient tradition, which associated the eating of uncooked food (ōmon) only with barbarians, raw food was widely consumed, above all in monastic communities, but also on an everyday basis in Byzantium.
Ritual, Behaviour and Symbolic Communication in the dispute between Thomas Becket and King Henry II
From the dispute between Becket and Henry II we see the continuation of many traditional forms of political communication, including the use of symbolic rhetoric and items in the conduct of rituals, and also the deliberate staging of emotions.
MOVIE REVIEW: Order of the Holy Grail (Captain Thunder)
This is a review of the Spanish medieval film: Captain Thunder or Order of The Holy Grail (El Capitán Trueno y el Santo Grial)
People of Medieval Edinburgh revealed from archaeological research project
Five years ago, archaeologists uncovered a graveyard dating back to the Middle Ages in the Scottish city of Edinburgh. Now a research project to analyze almost 400 people who were buried there has revealed new insights into their lives and even how they might have looked like.
Top 10 Medieval Places That Don’t Exist
Based on medieval legends, fictional stories, or somewhat less than useful geographic reports, here is our list of ten medieval places you won’t be able to visit!
The Tasty Medieval Pasty
What could be more medieval than a meat pie?
The Sisters of King Æthelstan
King Edward the Elder, son and successor of Alfred the Great of England, had many children.
Galbert of Bruges’ ‘Journal’: From Medieval Flop to Modern Bestseller
Galbert’s text was an utter failure in the Middle Ages. No medieval copies of the journal survive and there is no reason to believe that more than one copy of it every existed during the period.
The Unwritten Chapter: Notes towards a Social and Religious History of Geniza Magic
How might the historian of religions write a social and religious history of Jewish magic in the medieval Islamicate world?
Creation and Food in Old Norse Mythology
Not surprisingly, as we can ascertain by reading the Bible and many other religious and mythological texts of the past, also in Norse beliefs food and fecundity were central elements in the origin of all things
Bringing the State Back in: Toward a New Constructivist Account of the Medieval World Order
The crux of my argument, here as elsewhere, is not that fully evolved sovereign states populated Latin Christendom from 1300 on, but that a constitutive script of corporate-‐sovereign statehood had come to define the political imagination of the era, and that the enactment of this script was the defining dynamic of late medieval political life.
Viking Canada
Newfoundland is at the heart of what we may consider to be ‘Viking Canada.’
White Croatia and the arrival of the Croats: an interpretation of Constantine Porphyrogenitus on the oldest Dalmatian history
The article examines Constantine Porphyrogenitus’ (913–59) witness on the arrival of the Croats in Dalmatia during the seventh century. The emperor’s narrative proposes a migration from a land called White Croatia, located somewhere in central Europe, and a battle with the Avars in order to secure their new territory.
The Image of the City in Peace and War in a Burgundian manuscript of Jean Froissart’s Chronicles
The present essay, which complements a study scheduled for publication in 2000 in a volume arising from a colloquium on the theme Regions and Landscapes held in July 1997 at the International Medieval Congress, Leeds, attempts to build on this work.
The Byzantine Silver Bowls in the Sutton Hoo Ship Burial and Tree-Worship in Anglo-Saxon England
The ten Byzantine silver bowls included amongst the grave goods interred in the chamber of the Mound 1 ship burial at Sutton Hoo remain one of the most puzzling features of this site…
(Re)casting the Past: The Cloisters and Medievalism
In this essay, I focus on a variety of texts printed using Anglo-Saxon type between 1566 and 1623 in an effort to explore the use of Anglo-Saxon typeface in the early modern period as the use of the Old English language progressed from polemical truncheon to historiographical instrument.
Can you solve these Anglo-Saxon Riddles?
Here are ten riddles from Aldhelm’s Enigmata. See if you can figure out the answers
The American Dark Ages and the Terrorist Witch in Season of the Witch
In this article we argue that medieval films are not to be analyzed according to their faithfulness to the known historical sources, but that they can only be fully analyzed by understanding medievalist codes, traditions and (filmic) intertextuality.
Mole removal and sliced whale meat: The accounts of a medieval noble
What did medieval nobility spend their money on? A new book takes a look at the surviving accounting records of a 14th century noble – Elizabeth de Burgh, Lady of Clare.
Asteriscos et obelos suis locis restitui – the revision of the Psalter during the Carolingian Renaissance
Today, I would like to discuss one type of early medieval psalter and the one feature that discerns this type – and that is the presence of critical signs.
The Use of History in Dracula Tourism in Romania
In this article I will examine what kinds of history and tradition are used and told in Dracula tourism in Romania, and which eras of history are highlighted and why.
Making Sacrifices: Beowulf and Film
This essay reviews opening scenes in some recent film Beowulfs, which, although they have nothing at all to say about Scyld Scefing, suggest a sacrificial reading of the prologue and perhaps even the whole poem.
Ten Medieval Warrior Women
While Joan of Arc is well-known as a woman who was involved in medieval warfare, there are many more examples of women who took up arms or commanded armies during the Middle Ages.
Foreign dangers: Activities, responsibilities and the problem of women abroad
I consider a very important issue in dealing with the subject of Empires: the problematic position of women, and their contradictory witnesses not only in representations in early medieval sources but also those deriving from their gendered roles as they have been imagined