The Week's News Folks!!

Yorkshire the Most Anglo-Saxon according to DNA


A Review of the Fitz's MSS Display


More on That Large Viking Axe


Evidence of the First Monastery at Lindisfarne, Maybe


A Feature on the Prince from Beckum


A Rare 15th cent painting of St. Luke to remain in Britain


Vikings Buried with Board Games


Another Feature on the Sunstone


On the construction of Vordingborg in Denmark


American Student Finds 12th Century Irish Brooch


More 1066 Artifacts in York


Vatican Library has digitized the Vatican Vergil


A Large Merovingian Cemetery Discovered 


Anglo-Saxon Cemetary discovered at Rotham

CALL FOR PAPERS

52^nd International Congress on Medieval Studies

May 11-14, 2017, Kalamazoo, Michigan, United States

Sessions Sponsored by the Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies (HSMS)

1) Ibero-Romance languages before the 11^th century

Much has been written on the Romance languages of the Iberian Peninsula after the 12^th  century, and especially after the 13^th century, due mostly to the preservation of a larger and more easily datable body of documentation either dated or estimated to be dated after 1100. The studies of Ibero-romance linguistic varieties prior to the Christian reconquest of Toledo in 1085 are, however, scarce and far more polemic. This session seeks to bring together innovative research on the Ibero-romance languages prior to 1085, coinciding roughly with the colonization of Iberian territories by the Almoravid dynasty. The conquest of Valencia by El Cid in 1094, the particular situation of the Mozarabic population of Toledo, and the later Almohad incursions are additional forces that cause important changes in the linguistic map of Iberia after the second half of the 11^th century. Any aspect related to the linguistic situation of Iberia between the Roman conquest and the so-called Christian “reconquest” of Toledo in 1085 are, thus, welcome. Please send abstract and Participant Information Form (available athttp://www.wmich.edu/medievalcongress/) to Vicente Lledó-Guillem, Vicente.LledoGuillem@hofstra.edu by Sept. 15, 2016.

2) Workshop on Ibero-Romance Paleography

This session is devoted to the presentation of different paleographic standards for the transcription of Ibero-Romance documents, with emphasis on the medieval and early-modern periods. Mention to both manuscript and early printed documents, be they in textual, paratextual or iconographic form, will be made to illustrate the different practices. Emphasis will be placed on conflicting or problematic issues in transcribing Ibero-Romance documents and in the different approaches to their resolution. Proposals for participation as a presenter in this workshop, led by Francisco Gago-Jover and Pablo Pastrana-Pérez, should include the following information in the abstract: a brief background of the presenter, including paleophraphic work performed, and a description of the presentation. Please send abstract and Participant Information Form (available at http://www.wmich.edu/medievalcongress/) jointly to Francisco Gago-Jover, fgagojov@holycross.edu and pablo.pastrana@wmich.edu by Sept. 15, 2016.

Seminario Internazionale

La Collectio Avellana e  le altre Collezioni canoniche di ambiente italico: formazione, contenuti e contesti
(Perugia-Gubbio 21-24 Settembre 2016)

http://www.lifu.unipg.it:8080/jspui/bitstream/123456789/114/3/programma-seminario-collectio-avellana_def.pdf

http://www.constantinusmagnus.unipg.it/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=1&Itemid=4&lang=en
Segreteria del Convegno:
Dott. Giulia Marconi–Maria Cristina Mandoloni
giulimarconi@tiscali.it
mariacristina_mandoloni@hotmail.it
Dott. Moretti Chiara
Chiaramoretti225@hotmail.com

Call For Papers for two sponsored sessions on "Women in the Age of Bede (I
and II)," at the International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, MI.
(Apologies for cross posting!)

Organizers:
Sharon M. Rowley, Paul C. Hilliard, and Máirín MacCarron

In the last half century, feminist studies have sparked a tremendous amount
of work by a wide range of scholars on the topic of women and women’s
intellectual history in early Anglo-Saxon England. As Virginia Blanton and
Helene Scheck have noted recently, however, “more work needs to be done”
regarding female religious communities and education “before we can specify
the nature and degree of women’s learning in any one community, let alone
for an entire period or region.”* Bedan studies have also changed
significantly over the last half century, with the exploration of the
intellectual and theological implications of Bede’s own exegetical,
computistical and homiletic writings shedding new light on his community
and his work, especially the Historia Ecclesiastica. However, along with
these Bede-on-Bede reconsiderations, feminist studies have also contributed
dramatically to the transformation of Bede studies in recent decades.

In the spirit of recent calls for greater inclusivity in Anglo-Saxons
Studies, BedeNet and CNU’s program in Medieval and Renaissance Studies are
sponsoring two sessions on “Women in the Age of Bede,” to highlight and
foster this ongoing dialogue. Papers on any aspect of women's studies in
early Anglo-Saxon England, are welcome, as are papers on Bede’s
interactions with and impact on women’s intellectual history, education and
writing.

Contact Sharon Rowley at srowley@cnu.edu with questions and submissions.


  *Helene Scheck and Virginia Blanton, “Women,” in A Handbook of
Anglo-Saxon Studies, 1st Ed., ed. Jacqueline Stodnick and Renée Trilling,
Blackwell (2012), p. 267.


-- 
Dr. Sharon M. Rowley
Professor
Department of English
Director of Medieval and Renaissance Studies
Christopher Newport University
1 Avenue of the Arts
Newport News, VA 23606
757.594.8874
fax 757.594.8870

Dear manuscript scholars,

Still three days to go before the deadline for submitting proposals for the 20th Colloquium of the Comité international de paléographie latine (Beinecke Library, Yale, 6-8 September 2017) on 31 July 2016!  

For the cfp, see http://palaeographia.org/cipl/yale/index.htm (in all four congress languages).  We are looking forward to submissions!

Best wishes,

Outi Merisalo (outi.o.merisalo@jyu.fi)

Secretary General, CIPL

--

SLRC
BP 35 (F)
FIN-40014 UNIVERSITÉ DE JYVÄSKYLÄ
Tél. +358 40 8053211, fax +358 14 260 1401
http://staff.jyu.fi/Members/merisalo
Projet "Transmission of Knowledge in the Late Middle Ages and the Renaissance"
http://staff.jyu.fi/Members/merisalo/Transmission

This CFP posted by:

C. W. Dutschke, Ph.D.

Curator, Medieval and Renaissance Collections

Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Columbia University

535 W. 114th Street

New York  NY  10027

email:  cwd3@columbia.edu           phone:  212-854-4139

CALL FOR PAPERS: 

52^nd International Medieval Congress, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo MI (May 11–14, 2017)

Networks of Books and Readers in the Medieval Mediterranean I: Books

Networks of Books and Readers in the Medieval Mediterranean II: Readers

Sessions sponsored by the CU Mediterranean Studies Group/Mediterranean Seminar 

These sessions address the study of networks of books and readers in the Medieval Mediterranean. How did texts and ideas circulate in a Mediterranean context? What types of motifs, topics, and ideas travelled? What books were translated and why? Were there Mediterranean networks of readers who circulated particular texts? These two panels, one focusing on books and the other on readers, seek papers of a comparative, interdisciplinary and/or methodologically innovative nature that focus on how members of various faith and ethnic communities circulated texts and ideas in the broader Mediterranean. 

Contact Núria Silleras-Fernandez at silleras@colorado.edu for further information or to submit a proposal (300-word abstract, one-page CV, and media equipment request by 15 September 2016).

=========================

Núria Silleras-Fernández, PhD

Associate Professor

University of Colorado at Boulder

Department of Spanish and Portuguese

278 UCB

Boulder, CO 80309-0278

USA

e-mail: silleras@colorado.edu

office phone: 303-492-5864

fax: 303-492-3699

CONFERENCE

“Getting Medieval”: Medievalism in Contemporary Popular Culture

This conference, organized at the Jean-François Champollion National University Institute (“Champollion University”) in the historic episcopal city of Albi, France – site of the thirteenth-century Albigensian Crusades – will take place on 25-26 November 2016.  Please send proposals of 100-250 words for 20-minute papers (in English, French or Spanish) to john.ford@univ-jfc.fr along with a brief CV before 31 July 2016 for full consideration.

PRESENTATION:

Today’s “pop” culture is rich with allusions to the Middle Ages, not only in literature and visual arts – as it always has been in past centuries (e.g., the pre-Raphaelites or Twain’s Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, Tennyson’s Idylls of the King, Tolkien’s Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, etc.) – but also in graphic novels and comics, on the big screen and the little one, not to mention the computer screens of electronic gamers as well as amusement parks, festivals and fairs. 

But how much of what is presented in a medieval context – either as actual “remakes” of old accounts or simply loosely employing a medieval setting or theme – accurately reflects the Middle Ages, and to what extent do these medieval constructs change or distort the reality of the age? When changed, to what extent is the epoch romanticised as, for example, an idealized Camelot where “the rain may never fall till after sundown?” To what extent is it vilified, making the expression “to get medieval on [somebody]” suggest a horrific vengeance? How do these constructs inform our understanding of the Middle Ages, and how important is it (if at all) to be entirely accurate? Finally, to what extent do such alterations update the texts or tales, keeping them alive and evolving, and why is it a perennial favourite, replayed year after year, decade after decade, indeed, century after century?

This conference hopes to respond to some of these questions by opening a dialogue between various disciplines: literature, history, historical linguistics, visual arts, cinema, theatre, television, etc., in order to study the enduring popularity of medieval themes and the ways in which medieval tales and texts are transmitted, preserved, distorted, renewed and built upon in the creation of new, decidedly modern popular culture in Europe, North America and the world of the 21^st century.

This conference hopes to explore ways in which medieval texts, tales and traditions are used (or abused!) and used to fashion entirely new works that ultimately form part of contemporary pop culture in its own right, not only in the modern age, but in ages past. It might also address ways in which authors from the Renaissance until now (e.g., Spenser, Shakespeare, Yeats, etc.) have contributed to our modern conception of the Middle Ages, both myth and reality.

Some aspects to consider might include the importance of accuracy in portrayals purportedly based on actual texts (such as the Vikings series, or various remakes of Beowulf), and to what extent is liberal treatment acceptable, even to be encouraged?  To what extent is received wisdom, often quite dubious, employed in original works with a medieval feeling or theme, though not necessarily a medieval setting like Game of Thrones or Harry Potter?

In addition to the works listed above, the conference is open to any proposition addressing the use of medieval works or themes in any aspect of popular culture in any subsequent age, leading to its entrenched place in the pop culture of today – not only in fiction and art, but in any form of entertainment or representation.  Finally, the value of both medieval literature and culture, as well as popular culture, and the interdependence of both, is to be explored.

The Linnean Society of London, in collaboration with the Transcribe Bentham initiative at University College London (UCL), is hosting a one-day conference on 10 October 2016 to showcase how innovative technology is being applied to the humanities and natural sciences.  The “Digital Toolbox” conference will demonstrate how researchers, curators and enthusiasts can use digital tools to explore historical and scientific material in new ways.

An example is the EU-funded READ project, which seeks to unlock complex handwritten material in archival collections, to automatically index digital images of text, and to teach computers how to transcribe handwritten text. Cutting-edge transcription technology developed as part of the READ project will be demonstrated and discussed.

The conference will be a platform to share ideas on the best means of exploiting complex research data and opening it up to a wider audience. We are delighted to welcome Melissa Terras, Professor of Digital Humanities at UCL as keynote speaker.

More details on the full programme will be available soon. 

There will be a small registration fee of £15 for the event.  This will cover tea/coffee, lunch and a wine reception.  Please find the registration form here: https://www.linnean.org/meetings-and-events/events/what-should-be-in-your-digital-toolbox

--------------------------------------------------

Dr. Louise Seaward

Research Associate

Bentham Project, Faculty of Laws, University College London, Bidborough House, 38-50 Bidborough Street, London, WC1H 9BT

Email: louise.seaward@ucl.ac.uk

Tel: 020 3108 8397

Web: Transcribe Bentham; Recognition and Enrichment of Archival Documents (READ)

Digital Medievalist --  http://www.digitalmedievalist.org/

Southern African Society for Medieval and Renaissance Studies Biennial Conference

26 – 28th August, 2016

We are pleased to announce that the 23rd biennial conference of SASMARS will be held at Mont Fleur in Stellenbosch, South Africa on 26 – 28th August 2016.

“Texts and Transformations: Medieval and Early Modern Cultures”

Medieval and Early Modern societies weathered various socio-cultural transformations, ranging from economic developments to religious conflicts, across a range of different geographies and in urban and rural spaces. How did poetry, theatre, prose, visual art, architecture, and other forms of art respond to such changes? How do we historically understand and assess various kinds of social transitions?

At this year’s SASMARS conference, Professor Carolyn Dinshaw (New York University), an acclaimed medievalist, will be our keynote speaker, and she will deliver the following keynote to the conference attendees:  

“Black Skin, Green Masks: Medieval Foliate Heads, Racial Trauma, and Queer Worldmaking”

Professor Dinshaw’s profile can be accessed at http://english.fas.nyu.edu/object/carolyndinshaw.html

The convener for the conference is Dr Derrick Higginbotham (derrick.higginbotham@uct.ac.za). Any inquiries can be directed to him.

For the latest SASMARS Newsletter and information about previous SASMARS conferences, click onhttp://sasmarsnewsletter.blogspot.com/.

News! O the News!

Some Proto-Indo-European news: https://www.facebook.com/groups/220255454652480/    How the Mother Tongue probably sounded.


Such a modern sign: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/22/us/viking-ship-draken-harald-harfagre-great-lakes.html?_r=0: a Viking ship held up by red tape.  If only Charles the Fat had thought of that!


For a brief foray out of Medieval Europe, a 9th century Jain temple: http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/tamil-nadu/amateur-archaeologists-find-9th-century-jain-temple/article8867900.ece


Poop to the rescue!!  Feces on the Silk Road tell us about spread of disease:  http://phys.org/news/2016-07-ancient-feces-earliest-evidence-infectious.html


Daisy Wheel Protection Spell in Lincoln Cathedral? Read all about it: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-36857607


Medieval Water Harnessing Cause Salmon Stock Depletion:  http://phys.org/news/2016-07-medieval-power-collapse-salmon-stocks.html


Excavations at Stegeborg, Sweden:  http://scienceblogs.com/aardvarchaeology/2016/07/18/first-week-of-2016-excavations-at-skallvik-castle/


Witch Prison Discovered in Scottish Castle: http://www.livescience.com/55452-witch-prison-revealed-in-scottish-chapel.html


Vikings were not kind to their slaves:  http://sciencenordic.com/vikings-abused-and-beheaded-their-slaves


Largest Viking Axe Ever found in "power couple's" grave: http://www.livescience.com/55490-mighty-ax-discovered-in-viking-tomb.html


Student Archeology yields evidence: http://www.suffolkfreepress.co.uk/news/latest-news/pupils-dig-deep-for-anglo-saxon-artefacts-1-7490319


Reuse of Sacred Spaces, or at least one such, by Anglo-Saxons: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/07/160721072831.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Ffossils_ruins%2Farchaeology+%28Archaeology+News+--+ScienceDaily%29


Richard III might be innocent?  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3705167/Now-Richard-III-s-skull-prove-DIDN-T-kill-princes-Mystery-missing-teeth-clear-king-murder-Tower.html


Jousting as Medieval Sport?  You bet!  http://kdal610.com/news/articles/2016/jul/21/british-jousters-want-medieval-martial-art-made-olympic-sport/


Medieval (really much older) war tactics succeed in modern Iraq: http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/iraq-turns-to-medieval-tactic-to-keep-isis-out-of-fallujah-1.2999333


Oldest Anglo-Saxon Buildin in Scotland: https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/evidence-of-largest-anglo-saxon.html#euKOTrwMhuMVMYwJ.97


Anglo-Saxon Cemetery in Rothey: http://www.loughboroughecho.net/news/local-news/bronze-age-barrow-anglo-saxon-11645677

International Congress on Medieval Studies 2017!

As many readers will know, the CFP for 2017 is now up at the Congress website: http://www.wmich.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/u434/2016/medieval-call-for-papers-2017.pdf


Many mini-CFPs for sessions are now forthcoming in many a venue.  I've pasted several here and will continue to do so.  Many others are using my International Congress group and other medieval groups on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/220255454652480/  Feel free to check those as well.

Keep watching this space!

We are pleased to announce the launch of the Beyond Words website, which provides information about dates, venues, public programming, the symposium, and the catalogue of the upcoming exhibit Beyond Words: Illuminated Manuscripts in Boston Collections: http://BeyondWords2016.org

 

When the exhibit opens in mid-September, we will launch the object-centered portion of the website: a searchable database of all 260 manuscripts described in the catalogue, with essential metadata and images for each manuscript and, when available, codicological descriptions and full digital facsimiles.

 

Please visit the website regularly for updates and, if you use Twitter, follow @BeyondWords2016 for sneak-peeks, updates, and announcements. We hope to see you in Boston this fall.

 

- The Beyond Words Curatorial Team: Jeffrey Hamburger, William P. Stoneman, Anne-Marie Eze, Lisa Fagin Davis, and Nancy Netzer

CFP: Technical Communication in the Middle Ages

International Congress on Medieval Studies (Kalamazoo, 2017)

Proposals due: September 15, 2016

Submit to Wendy Hennequin (mwhennequin@gmail.com)

Scholars have long recognized Chaucer’s “Treatise on the Astrolabe” as an early technical document, yet relatively few medieval texts have been discussed as specimens of technical communication. This session seeks to consider the traditions and conventions of medieval technical communication, as well as the connections between medieval and contemporary technical writing.

Possible texts for consideration might include (but are not limited to) penitential and conduct manuals, monastic rules, business correspondence, medical treatises, scientific and pseudo-scientific manuals (including alchemical and astrological ones), cookery books, law codes, and government and military documents. Papers should consider the texts as technical communication, but may focus on any aspect, including writing, layout, design, etc.

Please submit proposals to Wendy Hennequin (mwhennequin@gmail.com) by September 15, 2016.

-- 

Dr. M. Wendy Hennequin
Department of Languages, Literature, and Philosophy
Tennessee State University
3500 John A Merritt Blvd.
Nashville, TN 37209
MWHennequin@gmail.com

Greetings,

Those who may be interested in, or who have used the pages before, I would like to alert to the new URL for the Usk site:

http://users.clas.ufl.edu/ras/USK%20Th/foliaNEW.htm​

Migration of files following my retirement is far from complete -- eventually, I hope to archive my digital books with UF's Smathers Library -- but for now they may be reached, including the Usk, at 

http://people.clas.ufl.edu/ras/research/​

Thank you,

Al

 

R. Allen Shoaf, Alumni Professor of English Emeritus

University of Florida, P.O. Box 117310, Gainesville, FL 32611-7310
Fellow of the National Endowment for the Humanities 1982-1983 & 1999-2000
Co-founding Editor, EXEMPLARIA (1987-2008)ras@ufl.edu; http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/ras/            
FAX 352.392-0860; VOICE 352.371-7149 (Home); 294-2841 (Office); 317-0247 (Cell)
2016 NW 19th Lane, Gainesville, FL 32605-3917

The International Pearl-Poet Society is sponsoring the following two paper sessions at the 52nd International Congress on Medieval Studies (May 11-14, 2017) at Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI:

I: Death and Rebirth in the Pearl-Poet
II: The Transformative Pearl-Poet: Translation and Adaptation

We invite abstracts from scholars of all levels, dealing with one or all of the Pearl-Poems. Papers should be no more than 20 minutes long. Submissions should include one-page abstracts and the completed Participant Information Form (https://wmich.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/u434/2016/medieval-pif-2017.doc). Please send these by September 13, 2016 to:

Kara Larson Maloney
kmalone3@binghamton.edu
Department of English, General Literature & Rhetoric
Binghamton University
PO Box 6000

Binghamton, NY  13902-6000

Kara Larson Maloney

Department of English, General Literature and Rhetoric

Binghamton University

kmalone3@binghamton.edu

Dear colleagues (with apologies for cross-posting),

On «Ad fontes», an e-learning platform provided by the University of Zurich, all abbreviations from the «Cappelli» have been digitised and are now fully searchable.

In October 2015, the University of Zurich hosted the Cappelli-Hackathon, a very successful crowd sourcing project, during which all 14'357 abbreviations collected in Adriano Cappellis' «Lexicon abbreviaturarum» were digitally registered and systematised through a specifically for the task designed web interface. Since then, the registered abbreviations have been checked and – where necessary – corrected through expert validation. They are as of now freely available, either as part of the Ad fontes platform (Cappelli online) or through the new app, App fontes.

The search interface not only allows to search by the readable letters, with the possiblity to set wildcards for non-identifiable characters, but also to search by visual criteria. Through the use of a 3x3 grid, the abbreviations have been systematised by the placement of abbreviation marks and other visual features; user may now use this grid in the search interface to help them find results.

Thus, the project allows a better and easier way to access the «Cappelli», an invaluable tool for everyone working with handwritten sources. Since «Ad fontes» offers also a link to the digitised original page, it is even possible to cite from the «Lexicon abbreviaturarum» using the project.

P.S.: The data as well as the pictures can be downloaded (http://www.adfontes.uzh.ch/5232.php)

------
Tobias Hodel, lic. phil.
Koordinator
Universität Zürich
Historisches Seminar
Projekt «Ad fontes»
Culmannstrasse 1
CH-8006 Zürich

tobias.hodel@hist.uzh.ch 

We are happy to publish the program for the XII Syriac Symposium which will begin this August 19 (19-21 August). In the coming days the program for the Arab-Christian Studies Congress (22-24 August) will follow. Both programs are structured according to the major areas of interest with a schedule of morning and afternoon interventions, beginning at 09:00 and ending at 18:30.

We kindly invite all presenters to verify the accuracy of the information, in particular the title of your paper, and to send us word immediately of any changes that should be made, using the following email address: conference@pontificio-orientale.it.

Gratefully,

The Organizing Committee

Dott.ssa Nicoletta BorgiaResponsabile Pubbliche Relazioni & Ufficio Stampa

Pontificio Istituto Orientale

Piazza Santa Maria Maggiore 7 - 00185 Roma

Tel.: +39 06.44.74.170 | Fax: +39 06.44.65.576 | www.unipio.org | PIO on Facebook 

Digital Classicist London 2016 Seminar

Institute of Classical Studies
Senate House, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HU
Friday July 8th at 16:30 in room 234

*Chiara Palladino (Leipzig & Bari)*
*Annotating and resolving geographical names in historical sources*

This seminar will focus on ancient Greek and Roman texts containing geographical information referred to real-world space. These sources challenge our perspective on way-finding and navigation, as the way they interpreted and expressed space was substantially different from ours. We will inspect currently existing strategies for the representation geospatial documents in the digital environment, focusing on the topics of Named Entity Recognition, semi-automatic and geo- annotation. We will highlight existing problems in the encoding of geospatial patterns in ancient geographical descriptions, focusing on what is currently available and what can be done to improve this research.


ALL WELCOME

Recommended reading: http://www.digitalclassicist.org/wip/wip2016-06cp.html

Live screencast: https://youtu.be/Ng4pJNdkRWQ