Empress Matilda and the anarchy: the problem of royal succession in medieval England
Why is it that Matilda was unable to secure the throne in her own right? And why do historians continue to debate the legitimacy of her brief lordship?
Royal and Magnate Bastards in the Later Middle Ages: The View from Scotland
Theory and Practice in Scotland and Elsewhere Medieval Scotland’s law on bastardy is set out in the lawbook Regiam Majestatem (c.1320)…In England things were different, as Michael Hicks has demonstrated. Admittedly, English heraldic practice eventually followed the French, and the formula ‘X bastard of Y’ is occasionally found for magnates’ bastards.
CONFERENCES: Count Hugh of Troyes and the Crusading Nexus of Champagne
This is my summary of a paper given at the Institute of Historical Research at the University of London.
THINGS TO SEE: Murder in the Cathedral
This is my review of the T.S. Eliot’s play, “Murder in the Cathedral”, on at St. Bartholomew in Smithfield, London.
The Christina of Markyate Psalter – A Modern Legend: On the Purpose of the St. Albans Psalter
The early 12th century psalter manuscript of St. Albans in Hertfordshire, which is currently in the possession of the church parish of St. Godehard in Hildesheim, Germany, has attracted much attention due to the richness of its illustration.
Holy rulers and the integration of the medieval Serbian space
This paper proposes a new line of analysis of the rich body of medieval Serbian royal hagiography.
Medieval Widowhood and Textual Guidance: The Corpus Revisions of Ancrene Wisse and the de Braose Anchoresses
In this article, I shall examine the lives of Loretta and her siblings as templates for the kind of audience imagined by the authors of the Ancrene Wisse Group and, in particular, by the author of Ancrene Wisse as he revised his original text.
Power relations in the royal forests of England patronage : privilege and legitimacy in the reigns of Henry III and Edward I
The England of the Plantagenets (1189–1377) which honed the royal forest system was a typically medieval land. Its ultimate foundations lay upon the long established notion of the three estates: those who fought, those who prayed, and those who worked.
MOVIE REVIEW: Barbarossa – Siege Lord
MOVIE REVIEW: Barbarossa – Siege Lord “I order Milan to be raised to the ground. None of its towers will ever be standing.…
Time, space and power in later medieval Bristol
With a population of almost 10,000, Bristol was later medieval England’s second or third biggest urban place, and the realm’s second port after London. While not particularly large or wealthy in comparison with the great cities of northern Italy, Flanders or the Rhineland, it was a metropolis in the context of the British Isles.
Monastic Space and the Use of Books in Anglo-Norman England
My summary of a paper given at the Institute of Historical Research on: Monastic Space and the Use of Books in Anglo-Norman England.
Chivalry, Feudalism, and Source Criticism: The Writing of Medieval German Military History
A paper from the 49th International Congress on Medieval Studies
Andronikos I Komnenos: A Greek Tragedy
The life and death of Andronikos I Komnenos provide us with a window into the aesthetic, moral, intellectual, religious, economic and emotional world of Byzantine society in the 12th century.
Is the story of the Battle of Clontarf more fiction than fact?
The Cogadh Gaedhel re Gallaibh is considered one of the most important sources about the Battle of Clontarf in 1014. However, new research is suggesting the tale is based more on the Trojan War than on historical sources.
Unlocking the secrets to Sweden’s Holy King
Researchers in Sweden have opened the casket of King Erik IX, and hope to analyze his bones to understand more about the health of the twelfth-century ruler and to even make sure these remains are his.
Gesta Danorum and the Wendish Crusade
The Wendish Crusade from 1147 marks the beginning of ‘Holy Wars’ fought against the Balto-Slavic and Finno-Ugric populations from the Baltic See.
Least of the laity: the minimum requirements for a medieval Christian
This article investigates the minimum level of religious observance expected of lay Christians by church authorities, and the degree to which legislation and procedures attempted to enforce these standards.
Leiðarvísir: Its Genre and Sources, with Particular Reference to the Description of Rome
For the last two centuries, Leiðarvísir has been the subject of great interest by scholars from a variety of disciplines: not only Old Norse scholars, but also historians, geographers, toponymists and scholars of pilgrimage have studied and analysed this work.
Greek in Marriage, Latin in Giving: The Greek Community of Fourteenth-century Palermo and the Deceptive Will of Bonannus de Geronimo
This article discusses the pitfalls that can occur in the study of ethnicity in the me- dieval period in the context of the potential existence of two separate Greek minori- ties—one indigenous and one immigrant—in fourteenth-century Latin-dominated Palermo, Italy.
Living stones : the practice of remembrance at Lincoln Cathedral, (1092-1235)
This thesis analyses four different aspects of devotional life at one of England’s largest and wealthiest medieval cathedrals between the years 1092 and 1235.
Ermengarde de Beaumont, Queen of Scotland
Very little is known of Ermengarde de Beaumont who became Queen of Scotland in 1186 when she married the forty three year old King William I of Scotland, later known as ‘The Lyon’.
BOOK REVIEW: A King’s Ransom – Sharon Kay Penman
A King’s Ransom is the follow up to Lionheart and tells the story of King Richard I’s imprisonment in Germany at the hands of Duke Leopold of Austria and Emperor Heinrich VI and of his battle to win back his Kingdom from his rapacious brother John.
Unpleasant Affairs That Please Us: Admonition and Rebuke in the Letter Collections of the Archbishops of Canterbury, 11th and 12th Centuries
From the Norman Conquest in 1066 up to the famous “murder in the cathedral”2 in 1170, six archbishops of Canterbury ruled over the English church…
Military Technology in the writings of John of Salisbury
John was one of the best-educated men of his day and worked as a clerk to the archbishops of Canterbury; later in life, he became the treasurer of Exeter Cathedral and also the bishop of Chartres. John was a prolific author who wrote three major books, two saints’ lives, two moralistic poems, and 325 personal letters.
Bernard of Clairvaux’s Writings on Violence and the Sacred
Monk, exegete, political actor and reformer, Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153) was not just a man of his times; he was a man who shaped his times.