The Effects of the Mongol Empire on Russia
This paper looks at the Mongol Empire’s impacts on Russia in terms of religion, art, language, government, and the ultimate rise of Moscow.
“The English Exodus to Ionia”: The Identity of the Anglo-Saxon Varangians in the Service of Alexios Comnenos I (1081-1118)
Most historians who focus on this period have examined the effects of the Norman invasion and its aftermath on the island itself, but few have studied the journeys of those who left England in search for new opportunities in foreign lands.
Haraldr the Hard-Ruler and his poets
If Haraldr’s contemporaries and the early writers did not know him as hardradi, what did they call him?
An 11th-Century Scandal
Complaints from Damian about the church’s unwillingness to confront the sexual behavior of the clergy, however, met with inaction. In 1049 Damian wrote to Pope Leo IX (1048-54) about the cancer of sexual abuse that was spreading through the church: boys and adolescents were being forced and seduced into performing acts of sodomy by priests and bishops; there were problems with sexual harassment among higher clergy; and many members of the clergy were keeping concubines.
Liber Confortatorius: The Book of Encouragement and Consolation, by Goscelin of St. Bertin
Goscelin’s Liber Confortatorius is extraordinary both as an example of high-medieval spiritual practice and as a record of a personal relationship.
New research on how the Bayeux Tapestry was made
A University of Manchester researcher has thrown new light on how the world famous Bayeux Tapestry was made over 900 years ago.
Death on the Dorset Ridgeway: a Viking Murder Mystery
Angela Boyle recounts the extraordinary archaeological discovery made in the summer of 2009 in Dorset in southwest England.
Death as a Symbolic Arena: Abbatial Leadership, Episcopal Authority and the “Ostentatious Death” of Richard of Saint Vanne
This is another paper from Haskins in: SESSION IV: Abbots between Ideals and Institutions, 10th–12th Centuries. This paper talks about Abbot Richard of Verdun and the politics, and ritual surrounding his death.
Abbot Majolus of Cluny, Ambassador to the Dead
This paper was part of a intriguing session on monasticism entitled: SESSION IV: Abbots between Ideals and Institutions, 10th–12th Centuries. Here, we meet the unsung hero of Cluny’s early history, Abbot Majolus.
SESSION III: The Medieval Experience of Siege
These are two papers from SESSION III: The Medieval Experience of Siege given at Boston College’s Haskin’s Conference. The first paper examined knightly interaction during sieges and the second paper delved into the actions of the besieged and besiegers during times of war.
Crusaders in Crisis: Towards the Re-assessment of the Origins and Nature of the “People’s Crusade” of 1095-1096
In his Historia Ierosolymitana, completed within one generation of the First Crusade, Albert of Aachen tells a curious story about some rustics, guided by divinely inspired goose and a she-goat to take the holy path to Jerusalem.
Organa doctorum: Gerbert of Aurillac, organbuilder?
He was born a peasant. Yet, through intelligence, political skill and uncommon good luck he came to be one of the most influential people in the Europe of his time…Pope Sylvester II.
Tolerance for the People of Antichrist: Life on the Frontiers of Twelfth-Century Outremer
Professor Jay Rubenstein deals with a fascinating aspect of the early Crusaders – how these Western European holy warriors quickly adopted the lifestyles and practices of the East, just within a few years of conquering the area.
A Historiography of Chastity in the Marriage of Edith of Wessex and Edward the Confessor
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
A book review of the new release “Edric the Wild”, by Jayden Woods
Macbeth: bloody tyrant or popular king?
Most of us know Shakespeare’s version of Macbeth. What was the reality? Jackie Cosh reports
The Rare Oxford Machzor Vitry: A Rosh Hashana essay
The Machzor Vitry work is, as mentioned above, not just a prayer book but includes much more, including many laws and a commentary. It consists of three portions; the halakhic legal portion, the liturgical formulae, and commentaries to the prayers taken from the aggadah.
Anglo-Norman defence strategy in selected English border and maritime counties, 1066-1087
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.
Glaber’s Cluniac preoccupations
In this thesis I examine a set of specific themes and ideas in the works of Rodulfus Glaber that type him as a Cluniac monk of the early eleventh century.
Marriage Impediments in Canon Law and Practice: Consanguinity Regulations and the Case of Orthodox-Catholic Intermarriage in Kyivan Rus’, ca. 1000–1241
This paper focused on marriage alliances in Eastern Europe and the issue of canon law and consanguinity.
The Construction of the Two Palaces: The Composition of the Song of Digenis Akritas and the Claim for the Anatolic Hegemony of Alexius Komnenos
The arrival of the Komnenos-Doukas faction at the imperial throne, with the rising of Alexius Komnenos in 1081, represents a strong change in the rhetoric and sharing of power in Byzantium.
Monastic ‘Centres’ of Law? Some Evidence from Eleventh-Century Rome
Cushing discusses her very preliminary research, which is part of a book-project about Monks and Canon Law in Italy.
Vikings’ demise on foreign soil – a case of ethnic cleansing?: The discovery of two mass graves containing the remains of Scandinavians in Anglo-Saxon England
The aim of this essay is to analyse the reasons for why a group of male Scandinavians met their fate in two mass graves during the Viking age (most generally taken to run from c. AD 800 to c. 1050) in Anglo-Saxon England.
The alternation between present and past time in the telling of the Bayeux Tapestry story
When an anonymous artist designed the Bayeux Tapestry shortly after the Norman conquest of England he presented some of the action as taking place in the present time and some in the past.