Issue 17

On behalf of the Heroic Age board and my co-editor, I would like to announce the first parts of Issue 17!!  That will be further explained below. We are very happy to release these well-deserving materials out to our readers.

The forgoing also means the completion of Issue 16 of the journal. Truth be told, this issue has been done for some time, and I am just getting around to announcing it.  We have two articles in the general section and two related to Alcuin along with a translation of Alcuin’s De Virtutibus et Vitiis. The issue is rounded out with two columns and book reviews.

There have been a number of changes here at HA. Brad Eden who was our book editor, and has been since the beginning of The Heroic Age, has moved on to other projects. He does so with our very great and deep thanks for all the service he has done for the journal. For a time, Thjis Porck acted as our book review editor, but he too has moved on to other projects. So we now welcome Krista Murchison of Leiden University.

In addition to book review editor, columnist John Soderberg is now an associate editor as is Heather Flowers. Melissa Ridley Elmes and Richard Scott Nokes join our editorial board.  In addition we have new columnists!  Mary Kate Hurley joins us taking over and rethinking the Babel column. Richard Ford Burley takes over the Electronic Medievalia column from Dan O’Donnell who also has moved on to other projects though remains a stalwart board member.

Looking ahead, the editorial team has decided to change our release policy. Whereas since our inception we have released whole issues as the issue has been completed, we are now moving to a model that, at least in my view, is more consistent with our open source, internet environment. Now, we will release each column, article, or review as it completes our process and is ready, called a “rolling release.” Each issue will be a calendar year. And as fortune would have it, the current issue number coincides with the century’s year: 17.  So that’s all good!

We have growing pains. We have issues with not enough hands to do the work. Both co-editors teach 4/4 loads at their respective institutions plus carry on their own research and service requirements. Some who help are graduate students trying to finish dissertations. Some are undergraduates. Some are senior scholars lending a hand.  In short, HA is an all-volunteer organization and receives no support from any institution: neither in the form of graduate assistants nor in release time for the editorial team. So any help is appreciated.

The above paragraph outlines some of the issues we have in producing the journal. We welcome any new volunteers who would like to lend a hand. We need social media people, copy editors, section editors, coders, and of course authors! Both Deanna and I are working hard to ensure that the journal begins to appear more regularly, but that depends largely on how many capable hands we have assisting us.

Throughout the rest of this calendar year, additional articles, columns, and reviews will appear under the “current issue” tab, and I will try to make announcements as each is added. We are already in the planning stages for Issue 18, so if you have something you would like to submit for that issue, now is the time to send it in.

Thank you all for your support and patronage of The Heroic Age through the years. Believe it or not, our first issue was in 1999! I would like to especially thank my longsuffering co-editor Deanna Forsman, our associate editors, Heather Flowers and John Soderberg, my production assistant, Sarah Sprouse, and one of my former students, Nicole Mentges who provided copy editing services. And thank you for reading!