This tickled me (posted by Rhoda Bracewell on the other place)

Lovely to see that Hetta Howes' book on the lives of medieval women is now in paperback!

sending a river boat to sea might actually be the single dumbest thing this admin has ever done and I say that knowing who this admin is

Sun pencilling in 2028 in the newsdesk diary.

Can't help thinking this is the sort of thing a 12th-century chronicler would record as an unheard-of prodigy, just before something really bad happens www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

😂

This feels like important content.

Strange Scandi Stories!” This week’s #WyrdWednesday topic. Surely one of the strangest characters in Norse mythology is Ratatoskr, a squirrel who runs up and down Yggdrasil carrying messages between the eagles perched on top and the dragon Níðhöggr beneath one of the roots.

Ich wünschte, es wäre nicht zu meiner Zeit geschehen. Wie J.R.R. Tolkiens ›Herr der Ringe‹ heute Mut machen kann. Der Auftakt zu der deutschlandweiten Veranstaltungsreihe ›Selbstverteidigung, literarisch‹ findet am 10.2. (19 Uhr) @dnb-aktuelles.bsky.social statt: www.dla-marbach.de/presse/press...

Europe is the epicentre of Epstein fallout. Meanwhile, in the US - nothing. The rule of law there is clearly breaking down, as authoritarianism proceeds the way it always does. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

New post! I take an in-depth look at Seamus Heaney's Beowulf, alongside forays into Victorian translations by William Morris and the brilliantly named Athanasius Diedrich Wackerbarth. This is based on an undergraduate lecture I gave at Oxford in 2020. nikolasgunn.co.uk/2026/02/09/o...

it tells you something about the depth of feeling in Europe when you compare the reception that the US delegation got from the olympics opening ceremony crowd, to that the French got, who arrived just after, and you keep in mind that the French have invaded Italy multiple, multiple times

From yesterday's Irish Times.

My books cartoon for this week’s @theguardian.com

Lovely chat with @profcarolyne.bsky.social about stories, myths, dragons, and more! vikingology.substack.com/p/myth-and-b...

New post! Part two of my series on philology and translation. I look at the challenges of translating even a few lines of an Old English text. Does "wyrd bið ful aræd!" mean "fate is fully determined!", "shit happens!", or something else entirely? nikolasgunn.co.uk/2026/01/13/b...

I did a podcast with @goingmedieval.bsky.social shows.acast.com/gone-medieva...

Als Output einer unserer Cooperative Research Groups ist zum Start ins neue Jahr der von @profcarolyne.bsky.social, Hans Rudolf Velten und @heyouonline.bsky.social hrsg. Band „Popu­la­ri­sing the Middle Ages in Modern Fantasy. Neome­die­va­lism, Video Games, and Vikings“ bei D.S. Brewer erschienen.

Since he isn’t, now’s as good a time as any:

From Facebook

My book on Pan and his journey through myth, story, art, music and pagan spirituality is available in paperback from Reaktion Books or through your favourite bookseller.

If you feel you don't know enought about Richard Cleasby who was the guiding spirit behind the first Old Norse-English dictionary, my new biographical article has just been published in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography -- along with other lexicographers @oxfordacademic.bsky.social

For those Old Norse and Viking lovers, the Norse in the North conference has made it to Bluesky! As we’re finalizing the CFP for 2026 at Leeds, please follow @norseinthenorth.bsky.social for updates! #oldnorse #medievalsky #postgraduate #conference #medieval

I live in Wales and today received my Join Us letter from Reform UK, complete with SAE which I posted back to them, immediately, empty. If every other person in Wales did this, Reform would spend over £1.5 million on postage. Not sorry. Join me Cymru.

Universities: investing millions so students ”develop literacy in the language of AI” Also universities: defunding the humanities so students are illiterate in ordinary languages

Attention creative medievalists! Eleanor Barraclough & I are co-editing a special issue of Public Humanities entitled CREATING THE MEDIEVAL NOW! See the cfp for details: essays of 2,000-3,000 words due 1 May 2026. (Amazing artwork by @hellomizk.bsky.social). 1/ www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

For academic friends researching fantasy and mythic/folkloric literature:

Call for papers for a special issue of Humanities journal, edited by Professor Bartłomiej Błaszkiewicz. Here are the details: www.mdpi.com/journal/huma...

Up here in Elgin we have a real witch on a new estate.

Consider the following before adopting a Manticore for your family

Burn it all down

It’s that time again - the M. R. James ghost story Christmas countdown! 👻 There are 31 days until Santa arrives, so if you read one* story a day, you’ll finish the Collected Ghost Stories in time to get merry. Like a haunted advent calendar! ❄️ #Christmas #GhostStories

Goodnight. 🖼️ Tove Jansson

In this compact volume, @profcarolyne.bsky.social explores how dragons have captured the human imagination across time and space. Discover The Little Book of Dragons: bit.ly/47SWqjc #ArtHistory #LiteraryStudies

Excellent piece of journalism here. Puts the mainstream media to shame. The findings are what you might expect, and here's the proof. www.birminghamdispatch.co.uk/the-men-who-...

Lost grave of daughter of Black abolitionist Olaudah Equiano found by A-level student

Come and hear me talk Trolls and Dragons next Tuesday! checkout.square.site/merchant/ML2...

After submitting a FOIA request UKRI, I obtained success rates by three grant call scheme and I can only say that I am disheartened by the results: - AHRC Responsive Mode 2025: 2% - ESRC New Investigator Grant 2025: 1% - ESRC Research Grant Round 2025: 1%

Oh man, the New York Young Republicans implicated in the Nazi groupchat scandal ran up a $23,000 tab eating filet mignon and drinking at a hotel in Syracuse -- a city with one of the highest child poverty rates *in the nation* -- and then refused to pay the bill.

Our OWC/English Faculty #Shakespeare webinar series continues! Next up, Henry VIII on 3 Nov at 6pm. Join @oldfortunatus.bsky.social and @laurajaynewright.bsky.social to explore the play & how we might approach it differently in the twenty-first century. All welcome! FREE but registration required

Worth saying that despite asking for more than 12 hours we’ve had nothing back from Labour on this

Trolls and Dragons in Frankfurt!

Thanks @goingmedieval.bsky.social, @mattlewishistory.bsky.social and @profcarolyne.bsky.social for the norse myth eps of Gone Medieval. Perfect listening for drawing pictures of Loki. On the qu of "is loki a drinker", I think Lokasenna at least proves he's a MEAN drunk, whatever his liquid capacity

The Bloomsbury Oxford Summer School in Fantasy is in full swing. A wonderful first day with exploration of fantasy past. Tomorrow the present and Thursday is fantasy future. Livestreamed and recorded too.

The Vestmannaeyjar in glorious weather. Spot the sheep who must have been wearing crampons. And a pufflingur awaiting a launch out to sea.

Coming next spring ... yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300...

The west fjords looking particularly splendid today