This looks full of riches.

How evocative is this very worn sword pommel from Guilton, Kent, now @liverpoolmuseums.bsky.social.

On another damp, fog-bound day here in the Pennines, I thought I’d share a few of the lustrous fragments of Saxon glass that I've just submitted for publication. Deposited in the early 8th century AD, they still sparkle with joy 1,300 years later 🏺✨

Hwær cwom diamond twill hwær cwom cloisonne buckle hwær cwom wād ond mædere Eala beorht tabletweave! Eala wool-wiga! Eala plant-dyed þrym! Hu seo þrag gewat, genap under beige cotton, swa heo no wære.

Call me old fashioned but this is NOT how MOD should do business: "Burghart said Palantir’s MoD contract “was granted by direct award”, without competition, and asked the cabinet secretary to check there were “no other such contracts, no other such undisclosed meetings”." apple.news/AV4gdfVtNSFi...

The next History of Liturgy Seminar is in London @ihr.bsky.social on Monday 16 Feb 17.30. The award-winning @drkrisztinailko.bsky.social on The Augustinian Friars & their Liturgical Cult of Saint Augustine. In-person (chat! drinks! people!) or online: www.history.ac.uk/news-events/... #medievalsky

Novels rooted in early medieval spirituality seem to be a thing at the moment. I spotted this in @blackwells.bsky.social recently. Anyone read it? Norfolk, AD 990. Deep in the Fens, an order of holy sisters lives in quiet isolation... www.panmacmillan.com/authors/dani...

The Conservative opposition on Oxfordshire County Council has proposed funding flags on lamp-posts. An amendment to the OCC budget, to be debated tomorrow, would “introduce a £50,000 funding pot […] for the provision of flags or banners on highway street light columns through an approved supplier”.

Calling all University students interested in learning more about #Radiocarbon dating & #Bayesian analysis. There are still free places available on this short course for #NERC & #AHRC students!

Here's a Friday thought for you. What if there was more than one Bayeux Tapestry made in the 11th century? Prof John Blair has a hunch about that open.substack.com/pub/historye...

It’s been a busy time leading up to this! Our tour of the north east celebrating Amiatinus finally starts this Wednesday with an incredible sound and light show produced by The Projection Studio

Mummy, if human beings don't like writing essays, if human beings don't like reading essays: why essays?

This is superb - & magic to be caught unawares by it - tuning in to R4 to ease the boredom of tidying up after dinner while my children were winding each other up - anxious as ever that I'm behind at work, & with family admin, that there's not enough time to see friends... #tobethegoodenoughmother

My god, the drabness of clothes for teenage boys!

On 2 May I'll be speaking about Edward I at the Medieval Canterbury Weekend. history-weekends.org/ticket-shop

I am sorry to report that George Speake, expert on Anglo-Saxon art, died on 15 January. His funeral will be this Friday, 6 February, in St Laurence's, Combe, Oxfordshire. I will miss his warm-heartedness & kindness, his curiousity, rigour, and willingness to take intellectual risks. I'll miss him.

... and, if you haven't seen it yet, what better time to catch up on the @timeteam.bsky.social special on @hugh-willmott.bsky.social's excvations at #cerneabbey: www.youtube.com/watch?v=DY68...

Stills from the most recent @timeteam.bsky.social on the princely burials at Cherrington (Glos.) which included a woman, relic-box hanging from her waist, beside a young boy with an adult's sword; eloquently presented by the ever-fabulous @helengeake.bsky.social. www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiPm...

Finally had a chance to go through some of our finds from last year's excavation at #CerneAbbey & thought I would share this gem. Book clasps are quite common finds on monastic sites but this little fella is the finest I've ever excavated & must have come from a pretty fancy prayer book or psalter

Wind, what wind? Today, hardy sheffielduni.bsky.social archaeology students have been out demonstrating their Yorkshire mettle at #CerneAbbey in Dorset, despite Storm Chandra's best efforts

Excited that my volume on the Early Bronze Age coffined burial from Tetney is now published open access by @antiquaries.bsky.social! Now everyone can read about this amazing find dated to 2032 BC and containing an amazing array of environmental and artefactual data. library.oapen.org/viewer/web/v...

New! The first comparative, international, cross-disciplinary study of silver in late antique Europe. And includes full catalogues of major UK hacksilver hoards: Norrie’s Law (Fife), Gaulcross (Aberdeenshire), Tummel Bridge (Perthshire) and Patching (Sussex). www.sidestone.com/books/silver...

A wonderfully warm and fitting tribute from @alixebovey.bsky.social to the medieval art historian John Lowden. What a long, hard winter this has been. courtauld.ac.uk/news-blogs/2...

‘We found that using AI assistance led to a statistically significant decrease in mastery. On a quiz that covered concepts they’d used just a few minutes before, participants in the AI group scored 17% lower than those who coded by hand’ Blog on Anthropic’s site www.anthropic.com/research/AI-...

I am sorry to report that George Speake, expert on Anglo-Saxon art, died on 15 January. His funeral will be this Friday, 6 February, in St Laurence's, Combe, Oxfordshire. I will miss his warm-heartedness & kindness, his curiousity, rigour, and willingness to take intellectual risks. I'll miss him.

Prof Hamerow hosted a celebration for the FeedSax project team & their amazing open access outputs inc. their book 'Feeding Medieval England'. The School's Sheaf of Wheat also attended - #archaeobotonists will understand! @erc.europa.eu @archanchistleic.bsky.social @oxunipress.bsky.social

I do not want to live by salary alone... Trying to write a grant application and struggling to get that phrase - which epitomises so much - out of my head.

The @nationaltrust.org.uk has this week secured the purchase of the land around the Cerne Giant. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

'I do not want to live by salary alone'... is quite the thing, isn't it?!

The Gefrin Trust is delighted to announce the publication of a landmark volume by Roger Miket entitled "Ad Gefrin: Brian Hope-Taylor and His Quest for the Early Medieval Kingdom of Northumbria." Get your copy at the Ad Gefrin Shop in Wooler! #Yeavering

A pretty crap time to be a woman..

I hardly ever buy clothes new any more but this was a startlingly good find in Shrewsbury today. www.avantgardedesign5.com

How did a poem composed by an aristocratic woman in fourth-century Rome become essential reading for an obscure author in early medieval England? Virgil, Proba, Theodore, Aldhem... something for (almost) everybody! New article by @maryhitchman.bsky.social jolcel.ugent.be/article/id/9...

A privilege to spend some time with the Thegns of Mercia @thegns.bsky.social; the quality of the work they are producing is astonishing and humbling and hugely helpful to think with. May they thrive! Photo from their bluesky banner. www.thegns.org

7-8th century Anglo-Saxon priest (team member James Wenn). “Dalmatic” by Æd Thompson. Previously we shared the foundations of James’ work to reconstruct a plausible image of the Gregorian missionaries and first bishops of the Anglo-Saxon church whose deeds are well documented but… 🧵

Child’s Silver Neck-Ring (c6th) — a simple symbol of status, or something darker? #findsfridsy This neck ring was found in the burial of a child in the piecemeal-excavated early #AngloSaxon cemetery at Ruskington Lincolnshire. (Displayed at Lincoln Museum). Rare #archaeology finds, such collars…

The California State University system spent $16.9 million last year giving ChatGPT to all students, faculty, and staff. We are asking the CSU chancellor not to renew the contract with OpenAI when it expires. Anyone can sign the petition — link below!

Someone can now write the American version of this, mutatis mutandis ... www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/the...

Palin says, 'I love the skill with which he underplays things to great effect... He writes in a wonderfully quiet and very convincing way.' www.thetimes.com/culture/tv-r...

A seventh-century paten, 23cm wide, from Sarria, near Lugo, Spain. There seems to be no agreed reading of the inscription at the centre: fntrvdieta / fntrudi et al / a tt f ntrudie. Museo Provincial de Lugo inv. no. 3313

Hard not to see this rabbit-hole-into-which-I've-tumbled through the astounded eyes of a seventh-century goldsmith!

'It’s a lot easier for AI to destroy journals than to do science.' Interesting/ depressing thread on dealing with AI-generated journal submissions. Although, as ever, AI can't do anything, it's the people using it in this way that are the problem.

Very exciting job announcement! Permanent early medieval (Britain and/or Europe) teaching post at KCL. I know first-hand that this is a great opportunity to work with amazing colleagues and students. www.kcl.ac.uk/jobs/136727-...

Often it seems little is happening to improve maternity safety so it was good for @ekhuft.bsky.social families tonight to hear directly from Edile Murdoch, Bill Kirkup & the team who've developed the new MOSS signalling system, esp about what happens after an early warning is issued. #mayithelp

🚨 CLARION EXCLUSIVE 🚨 £10m of Government funding for Oxford was sent back. Could it have paid for the cancelled Dutch-style cycleway on Woodstock Road? In a deep dive, we ask why a Government grant was returned, and if it could have been spent elsewhere in Oxford. oxfordclarion.uk/exclusive-10...

All right, all right: no need to rub it in!

Gordon Noble's latest in @antiquity.ac.uk. 'Why did stone carvers, after millennia of generally abstract mark-making, begin carving naturalistic forms?'