The medieval kingdom of Scotland was a rich amalgam of diverse ethnic elements which reflected the turbulent history of the first millennium of its development.
Matrimonial politics and core-periphery interactions in twelfth- and early thirteenth-century Scotland
December 31, 2012 By
Aspects of the English royal succession, 1066-1199: the death of the king
December 28, 2012 By
The death of any ruler in the twelfth century, even if it were expected, caused a considerable amount of shock and disquiet amongst those who were left behind.
England: One Country, Two Courts
December 26, 2012 By
The tension created by the two-court system is an integral part of England’s administrative and constitutional history. Exactly how integral has generated a considerable amount of scholarly work, from explanations of the sources of the conflict, to how the disagreement over jurisdiction was addressed throughout the Middle Ages, to what impact the issue had in shaping England’s overall political development.
King and magnate in medieval Ireland: Walter de Lacy, King Richard and King John
December 17, 2012 By
Perhaps the best way to capture the essence of the relationship between Richard, John and their magnates is to focus on one such relationship and to analyse the changes it underwent over the twenty-seven years the two brothers ruled England. The career of Walter de Lacy provides an excellent opportunity for such an analysis.
Trickster, Convert, Martyr, Saint: Four Ways of Dying in Dudo of St. Quentin’s History of the Normans
December 16, 2012 By
I want to push this a bit further here and argue that Dudo was aiming to produce something that we might term sacramentary history, to show the three-fold interaction of the linear time experienced by fallen humanity, the cyclical time in which events are continually re-enacted and foreshadowed in the sacraments, and the unchanging eternity of time as experienced by God.
“At the Tip of a Sword”: A Study of the Introduction of the Knight into Anglo-Saxon England
November 21, 2012 By
Nevertheless the introduction of the knight into England still remains a controversial topic of discussion among military historians, since the people who inhabited England prior to 1066 were part of warrior culture as well: the Anglo-Saxons.
Threads of resistance to the post-conquest Kings of Norman Descent
November 20, 2012 By
Produced almost 250 years after first contact with the Norman colonizer, the exclusive use of Middle English was a subversive choice that challenged the Norman claim to power and criticized the post-Conquest kings of Norman descent while working to re-make and re-claim an ‘English’ identity.
The Knighting of Henry, son of William the Conqueror, in 1086
November 19, 2012 By
This paper was part of SESSION VIII: Power & Politics in the Long Twelfth Century, at the Haskins Conference at Boston College.
Comital Authority, Accountability and the Personnel of Comital Administration in Greater Anjou, 1129-51
November 19, 2012 By
This paper was part of SESSION VIII:Power & Politics in the Long Twelfth Century. It examined the charters of Geoffrey of
The Archaeology of Colonialism in Medieval Ireland: Shifting Patterns of Domination and Acculturation
November 19, 2012 By
This project seeks to identify the processes at work in Scandinavian and Anglo- Norman colonialism in Ireland, and their interaction with the landscape, by examining the impact of each phase of activity on the settlement pattern in two representative case-study regions. The successes, failures, similarities and differences of Scandinavian and Anglo-Norman settlement and society in Ireland are examined and compared in this project in terms of three sub-phases of the overall process, namely expansion, consolidation and domination, within an overall developmental diachronic framework.
Medieval Book History Week Lecture: “Practical Latin and Formal English in the 14th-15th Centuries”
November 13, 2012 By
This lecture is part of Medieval Book History Week. Renown Professor Jeremy Catto spoke about literacy and language in England during the later Middle Ages at the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies at the University of Toronto.
The Lands and ‘Sisterlands’ of Aberdour, c.1100-1650
October 13, 2012 By
Of the lands in Aberdour, we begin in very uncertain time long before the Sisterlands became such and a period from which few documents are available. It is thought that shortly after 1100 some of the lands in what was later to become the burgh of Aberdour came to be held by a Norman-French family, the Viponts.
The Librarius and Libraire as Witnesses to the Evolving Book Trade in Ducal Brittany
October 7, 2012 By
In monasteries and cathedrals of the medieval West, the « custos librariae » functioned primarily as a custodian or keeper of bound codices, and we see a similar role emerge from extant medieval registers from Breton cathedral chapters.
The Fall of the Angevin Empire
October 5, 2012 By
A damned inheritance, hopelessly over-extended and out-resourced by the kings of France? Or an effective empire thrown away by incompetence and harshness? John Gillingham weighs the blame for John’s loss of the Angevin dominions.
A Historiography of Chastity in the Marriage of Edith of Wessex and Edward the Confessor
October 4, 2012 By
While records of Edith’s life and her marriage to Edward are poor, the historiography of those who narrated her life after her death is rich. In some ways, the historiography of her life was directly related to that of her husband’s.
BOOK REVIEW: Edric the Wild
October 2, 2012 By
A book review of the new release “Edric the Wild”, by Jayden Woods
God, Gold, or Glory: Norman Piety and the First Crusade
September 18, 2012 By
The Normans remain as the standard bearer of the pre-revisionist interpretation of crusader motives – for gold and glory, but not for God. However, examination of the evidence does not bear this distinction out.
Anglo-Norman defence strategy in selected English border and maritime counties, 1066-1087
August 22, 2012 By
Ella Armitage’s analysisof early Norman castles in 1912 provides a clear espousalof this view, in particular her statement that in England the reasonsfor the erection of mottes seem to have been manorial rather than military; that is, the Norman landholder desired a safe residence for himself amidst a hostile peasantry, rather than a strong military position which could hold out against skilful and well-armed foes.
Many Motives: Geoffrey of Monmouth and the Reasons For His Falsification of History
August 19, 2012 By
It is clear to most modern historians who have studied Geoffrey’s Historia that its contents bear little to no resemblance to real events. Even in Geoffrey’s own lifetime many historians condemned the work.
A Companion and Guide to the Norman Conquest
August 19, 2012 By
Peter Bramley’s beautifully illustrated field guide and companion to the Norman Conquest gives full details of both the events and the personalities associated with each of these sites, together with the historical background and the reasons for the end of Anglo-Saxon rule.
Cultural Complexity in Medieval Sicily
August 12, 2012 By
Sicily under Norman rule, dating from 1091 to 1266, embodies a multi-cultural society that produced some of the most eclectic architecture of the middle ages
The Meetings of the Kings of France and England, 1066-1204
July 15, 2012 By
Between 1066 and 1154 the kings of France and of England are known to have met each other on five occasions: in 1079, 1109, 1113, 1120, and 1137.
Cultural Changes in England resulting from the Battle of Hastings
June 28, 2012 By
This paper, in examining the reigns of the Ethelred, Canute, Harold Harefoot and Hardicanute, and Edward the Confessor, will show how they came to power, the legacy each left – if any — and how the events during each reign ultimately led to the Battle of Hastings, with William the Conqueror’s victory changing England forever.
First Catch Your Toad: Medieval Attitudes to Ordeal and Battle
June 18, 2012 By
Emma, the mother of Edward the Confessor, had walked over hot iron ploughshares to disprove an allegation of intimacy with Alwyn Bishop of Winchester, while Curthose, the Conqueror’s son, is reputed to have undergone the ordeal to prove his paternity.
Earthwork Castles of Gwent and Ergyng AD 1050-1250
June 4, 2012 By
The research addresses the presence of the castles and discusses their roles as weapons of conquest and structures of administrative control.
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