But go on, you were saying that universities don't need to teach medieval history...

Hi guys. Please find attached my book. Some people say it will shape the idea of the English people. Don’t miss the section on the Synod of Whitby. My information is a little patchy, and I’m no fan of the Brits. Maybe you should supplement my work with archaeology? All the best, the Venerable Bede

This week on the blog, I get grumpy about Graeber and Wengrow’s The Dawn of Everything and talk about medieval ideas of inequality (add your anarcho-syndicalist peasants here). #medievalsky salutemmundo.wordpress.com/2026/03/19/a...

The Carolingian South is now available for preorder! Edited by me and @graemeyward.bsky.social and out in May, the book assembles a crack team of scholars (and me) to turn Charlemagne's empire upside down. @manchesterup.bsky.social #medievalsky manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/978152617630...

Today on the blog, I talk a bit about the latest article I’ve been involved with, ‘The Caliph and the Falcons’, how I came to the subject and what I hope we managed to do with it. #medievalsky salutemmundo.wordpress.com/2026/03/16/s...

Was glad to be able to give some of my thoughts to New Scientist in response to some new aDNA results that have been published in a (not yet peer reviewed) preprint. www.newscientist.com/article/2519...

Delighted that my study of "Archbishop Hraban Maurus, King Lothar II and the Roman Army" is now published in the Festschrift for Geneviève Bührer-Thierry, alongside many other (much better) contributions! brill.com/display/book...

This was fun, thanks for inviting me @pieterbeullens.bsky.social

Yesterday, @jkeskiah.bsky.social opened the FitMA lecture series with a wonderful presentation. Have a look at our website for an overview of the upcoming talks! hiw.kuleuven.be/dwmc/researc...

Join us tomorrow morning for the first lecture in the FitMA series with @jkeskiah.bsky.social!

Last day to register for the first FitMA lecture if you want to attend remotely! #philsky

Next week, the first FitMA lecture series will start! Our first invited speaker is @jkeskiah.bsky.social. He will talk about "The Soul in the Early Medieval West (400–900)". Remote attendance is possible (see our events page for a summary and contact details)! hiw.kuleuven.be/dwmc/researc...

My article on dreambooks in the early middle ages has been published! brill.com/display/book...

The inkless doodles of Eadburg, an 8th-c. nun, discovered by new technology: now published by Jessica Hendy-Hodgkinson in EME doi.org/10.1111/emed... (Open access)

Excellent news - @monumenta.bsky.social to the rescue of online access to Deutsches Archiv!

Good to have an early medieval story for New Year! This time, it's Andy Seaman's @cuhistarchrel.bsky.social excavations at Fonmon Castle. So exciting that he's digging a site of a type I'm currently writing about (or will be when there's time to write!) www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

26th December is the feast of St Stephen whose martyrdom is depicted in this 'Da' at the beginning of the Collect for the Mass of St Stephen. #StStephen BnF MS Latin 9428; Sacramentarium of Drogo; 9th century (between 826/837 CE & 855 CE); Metz; f.27r @gallicabnf.bsky.social

Now Boxing day leftovers

Absurd, no-one can get funding for more than a 1 year project these days. And Gandalf would still be trying to hold down a 0.5 lecturing job at Osgiliath University while commuting to the archives in Minas Tirith on his non-teaching days

Enmeshed in marking, but just thought I'd point out that this article is now out, open access: Simon MacLean, arguing that the Astronomer's Life of Louis the Pious could be rather later than historians have assumed: might 'the Astronomer' be Jonas of Orleans? onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

My new article has now been published in the 2025 volume of Traditio. I use a little examined episode on the lower Rhine in the late 350s with the aid of agricultural archaeology to reveal fiscal dependency relations between the Empire & Barbaricum, & the consequences of their rupture. #medievalsky

I'm very happy to see that my new article on the martyrs of Zaragoza is out in this year's Traditio. Many thanks to the Traditio team, who were wonderful to work with! doi.org/10.1017/tdo....

hey on Mondays we try and post something about the Middle Ages, the study of the Middle Ages, the work we're doing, the work others are doing, and more. You can subscribe for free. We liked this study that used multiple disciplinary models to make an argument about biodiversity ca 500-100.

For the feast of Columbanus, d. 615, let me repost this thread, which links to other threads, about the script of Luxeuil, which was founded by Columbanus. Note that Columbanus founded Luxeuil in the 590s but the famous script dates from the early 700s.

Palaeography 🧵! Or why it can take a historian a while to confirm what they already suspected must be the case and not really get any further than they were—but this time with confidence 😂 I'm working with documents that list the incomes of medieval French lordships, so a lot of it is about grain.

This is the feast–in all the churches!–of Willibrord, Apostle to the Frisians, d. 739. 🕯️ First up: the Calendar of Willibrord, BNF lat 10837, an early-8c manuscript written on the Continent, probably at Echternach, mainly in Insular majuscule. #medievalsky 🧵 portail.biblissima.fr/en/ark:/4309...

‘For every genuine relic-bearing cleric, however, there was a peddler of fake goods. What were authorities to do in cases where crowds seemed to legitimise miscreants?’ Pablo Scheffer on the early medieval crowd regime: www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

Happy to report that our book 'Local Priests in the Latin West, 900-1050' has been published! It is Open Access, so you can read (or download) it here: doi.org/10.1017/9781...

Five years, four authors, one book. Out now (fully open access), our new book on local priests in the tenth century 🌟 www.cambridge.org/core/books/l... @jbwaagmeester.bsky.social

Congrats to @laurysarti.bsky.social on her new book on Merovingian Francia and the Roman Empire, open access and downloadable here (scroll to bottom of page) brill.com/display/titl...

Do colleagues have favourite readings to give graduate students to help them think about the problems as well as possibilties of doing inter-disciplinary work in medieval studies? I'd be grateful for suggestions please.

New in open access #medievalsky: Bede's Medical Books! www.cambridge.org/core/journal... Keepin' it Old School this time

Interested in letter-writing in early medieval Britain? A three-year postdoc on @francescatinti.bsky.social’s and my project is now available. Apps close on 17th Oct. Let me know if you have any questions and please circulate! 🙂 jobs.kent.ac.uk/Vacancy.aspx...

Tämä ei ole hyvän mielen postaus, mutta ehkä syksyn tärkein postaukseni. Suosittelen kaikille tutkijoille ja tutkimusryhmille: käsitelkää törkyriskejä ja suunnitelkaa toimenpiteitä etukäteen yhdessä. Lähiaikoina on tiettävästi odotettavissa törkyä tiedeyhteisöä kohtaan. Ketjusta muutama pikavinkki.

This is the feast of Theodore of Tarsus, d. 690, Archbishop of Canterbury. 🕯️ Let's look at a few early manuscripts of works that have been attributed to him. 🧵 The most securely-attributed work is the Laterculus Malalianus, seen here in the earlier of 2 surviving MSS, BAV Pal. lat. 277, 8c.

'sickos' vocitantur, de eo quod per fenestram ridentes, 'ha ha ha... sic!' clamant -Isidorus Hispalensis

2046: the american empire lies in ruins. in the east, the trump dynasty holds sway over the remains, united in the orthodoxy that charlie kirk is of one substance with the Father; in the west, barbarian successor kingdoms have recently converted to a heresy that holds him to be of similar substance

A two-line verse dedication: "Non rodant mures, non ausint tollere fures Librum, qui domino datus est a patre Frowino." Engelberg, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. 76; Expositio S. Hieronymi duodecim prophetarum; 1143-1178; Engelberg; f.1r (www.e-codices.ch/en/list/one/...)

Well, BretPal is coming to a swift end as of 30 September. Between now and then, I'll be posting my favourite Breton manuscripts, starting with the iconic horse Mark from the Boulougne Gospels (Boulogne sur Mer, MS 8).

The last page of the first part of Gratian's Decretum, ending with D.101 d.p.c.1 in a manuscript from the 1190s, written in Bologna. The second gloss layer in the bottom contains a version of the apparatus "Ecce vicit leo" on C.1 authored before 1210 by Petrus Brito, professor in Paris. 1/

This is a tale of two castles One of those buildings is fully original, an almost model example of its style; the other one is fake, built on the ruins of a medieval castle with a fully modern interior. 1/

Charles West @pseudo-isidore.bsky.social has gone through EME’s back catalogue to create this timely virtual special issue on tariffs and tolls in early medieval Europe gathering five contributions originally published between 1992 and 2025. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/toc/10.1...

'In nomine Domini, Clemens Uuillibrordus anno sexcentessimo nonagessimo ab incarnatione Christi ueniebat ultra mare in Francea.' A collection of all my posts related to my research on #Willibrord & early medieval #Echternach in one thread. #MedievalSky

Vase, reputed to be the one used by Saint Martin to collect the blood of the martyred Theban Legion - according to legend, it was brought to him by an angel for that very purpose. In reality it's a Roman sardonyx vessel from around the year 0, set in a gold cloissoné mount from around the year 500.

We need a Star Trek episode about how the invention of the universal translator caused people to stop valuing actually learning languages, while they fatally overestimated the UT's accuracy and the resulting misunderstandings led to a massive war that tore the quadrant apart

I aced my early medieval palaeography exam in 2013. Can confirm.

Just described the Carolingians to a student as "boring glory" and I think I'm gonna stick with that.

Apparently I need to spend money to make my dissertation Open Access on Proquest, so I've instead hosted it on my blog. If you want to read "From Usurper to Emperor: Political Practice and Dynastic Tradition in the Reign of Arnulf of Carinthia, 887-899" just follow this link: #medievalsky

Corpus of Early Medieval Latin Medicine getting some attention today in the Times! If you missed it last week our handlist of "new" pre-1000 medical manuscripts can be found here cemlm.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk/handlist/ #medievalsky