“Fiction Piled on Fiction”: The Uses and Abuses of King Arthur
Here we are in 2019 still discussing the possibility of an historical King Arthur. How and why that is the case is a fascinating story told expertly by the historian Nicholas J. Higham in King Arthur: The Making of a Legend,
Time, Myth and the Origins of the Lombards
Origins, Identities and ethnicities were all central concerns of Early Medieval writers
The world view of the anonymous author of the Greek Chronicle of the Tocco, 14th-15th centuries
Written in 3923 ‘political verses’, the anonymous Chronicle of the Tocco is an epic family chronicle, which describes the history of the Tocco family – mainly the deeds of Carlo I Tocco, as well as the events which took place in Western Greece and the islands of Zakynthos, Leukas, Cephalonia and Ithaca during the years 1375-1422.
Why did the Byzantines write History?
Our desires and expectations for good history do not align with those of the medieval authors of Byzantine histories.
‘A nation nobler in blood and in antiquity’: Scottish national identity in Gesta Annalia I and Gesta Annalia II
The origins and development of a sense of Scottish national identity have long been a matter of critical importance for historians of medieval Scotland.
Chronology and History in Byzantium
Compared with historiography, chronological writing develops against a wider background than human affairs, and it focuses on the order of events and the time intervals between them, rather than on their internal development, their meaning, or their causes.
The historical reputation of Edward IV, 1461-1725
This thesis comprises a chronological study of different historical accounts of Edward IV’s life and reign from his life until the early eighteenth century.
What is Universal about History?
Here I want to concentrate on three issues relevant to good historical practice with a global consciousness.
Viking invasions, a French failure?
Vikings never interested French Historians. Pagan, illiterate, barbaric, Germanic, everything was despicable in the eyes of the French Historians of the 19th century.
“Flanders was empty and uncultivated and heavily wooded”: Historiography as Urban Resource in the Twelfth Century
This sentence tells us little about the actual beginnings of the county of Flanders but it does tell us something about the way Lambert imagined the beginnings of the county in the first part of the twelfth century.
Five Things to Know About Gerald of Wales
Gerald of Wales, or Giraldus Cambrensis, was a twelfth-century cleric who wrote a whole raft of influential works on clerical reform, kingship, and history.
Reframing the Conversation on Medieval Military Strategy
This question of the history of strategy is a question of intellectual history: did medieval writers generate and transmit derivative and/or original ideas about how to wage war?
Episcopal Virginity in Medieval England
The literature on medieval sainthood is substantial, rich and varied, but on one point it is almost unanimous: sexuality, and in particular virginity, was of far greater significance to female saints than to their male counterparts.
The ‘joyous entry’ of Archduke Maximilian into Antwerp (13 January 1478): an analysis of a ‘most elegant and dignified’ dialogue
An in-depth analysis of a contemporary account of Maximilian’s joyous entry into Antwerp (13 January 1478) adds a new perspective to historiography by showing how the public urban spaces functioned as complex social products.
Which Witch?: Morgan le Fay as Shape-Shifter and English Perceptions of Magic Reflected in Arthurian Legend
The name Morgan le Fay holds many meanings and has appeared in various forms throughout the course of medieval and modern history.
Serbian scientific institutions and medieval research
Since the beginning of critical historiography, Serbian researchers and historians have dealt with the medieval history of Serbia, Serbian lands, and of its neighboring countries,
The Challenge of Folklore to Medieval Studies
When folklore began to emerge as a valid expression of a people during the early stages of national romanticism, it did so alongside texts and artifacts from the Middle Ages; it was only as folklore began to develop its own methodology during the nineteenth century that the fields were distinguished.
Eddic Poetry as World Literature
This article focuses on eddic issues including orality, dating, relationship to the ballad, provenance, international sources, and broadly typological literary relations.
The fall of Rome and the retreat of European multiculturalism: A historical trope as a discourse of authority in public debate
This paper examines one recent incident of the use of a highly charged trope of Classical history, the Fall of the Roman Empire, as a discourse of authority in current public debates on western multicultural policies, in relation to the tragic events of the Paris terrorist attacks in Paris in November 2015.
Archery in the Preface to Procopius’ Wars: A Figured Image of Agonistic Authorship
This article is a case study in the problems that can arise when a narrow interpretive lens is brought to historical texts by modern historians interested primarily in the facts of military history.
Making or Breaking a King: Kingship Ideals in Anglo-Saxon Historiography
This research will fit into the niche between works on specific kings and the analyses of those texts pertaining directly to them, since it will add a comparative angle. It will discover the ways in which written medieval sources created a literary image of a king, as opposed to only preserving the facts.
Medieval Sermon Studies since The Sermon: A Deepening and Broadening Field
Since the publication of The Sermon in 2000, the field of medieval sermon studies has matured into a well-established and growing interdisciplinary area of medieval studies.
The Nineteenth Century Memory of Renaissance Italian Warfare: Ercole Ricotti and Jacob Burckhardt
Renaissance Italian military history is a sad story of devolution, culminating in conquest by foreign powers. It stands as a “distant mirror” of the foreign oppression endured by nineteenth century Risorgimento Italy, when the academic study of Renaissance military history first began.
Pilgrim and patron: Cnut in post-conquest historical writing
This article examines a number of short narratives from the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries which relate to the activities of Cnut as king of England.
