I got to go on @mikemotia.bsky.social 's podcast, New Books in Late Antiquity, and talk about my new book, Things Unseen! podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/n...

Middle Ages, gray, dark, all mud, no color, grim. St Zeno Verona: you were saying?

"The Renaissance" is not a result of a linear "revolution". It was a medieval phenomenon, rooted in ideas circulating for centuries (Giotto was born c. 1267). The Middle Ages had multiple periods of seeing "classical" ideas as fashionable. Works like Vitruvius were widely read and influential. 1/

A reminder that we have no colloquium event this week! However, our affiliated program, the Philadelphia Seminar on Christian Origins, is holding a book event on Zoom with Prof. Ellen Muehlberger (Michigan) from 6:30–8:00 pm on Thursday, Oct. 30. Details here: rels.sas.upenn.edu/events/2025/...

…and people act like medieval accounts of diplomatic missions are implausible.

Took a while but nice to get my author’s copy!

Mind-numbing how many layers of history there can be to a single manuscript page: Syriac upper text (10th c.), Armenian undertext (pre-10th c.), Arabic material used for binding (11-12th c.?), Coptic foliation in the margin (date?), modern foliation at the bottom. Image: Leiden UL Or. 14236, link ⬇️

Alte Geschichte, ancient history, late antiquity

Alte Geschichte, ancient history, late antiquity

Probably my favourite long late antiquity piece of art. The so-called "palimpsest" fresco in Santa Maria Antiqua in Rome shows consecutive layers of paintings from the sixth century (Mary as empress of heaven) all the way to the seventh and early eight century. The level of detail is just amazing.

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/

Peer-reviewing an article: "Why is this an article, and not a book?" Peer-reviewing a book: "And why is this a book, and not an article?"

I moved all my stuff from Academia_dot_edu to HCommons.

Is your conference taking place in a palace? Because ours

The Bonn Center for Dependency and Slavery Studies is hiring three postdoctoral researchers. We investigate the causes and mechanisms that contribute to the persistence of strong asymmetrical dependencies across historical and contemporary contexts. Pre-modern perspectives are very welcome!

We are in Potsdam to talk about nature, labour and economy in the second half of the first millennium!

Tomorrow my first slide is this

We are in Potsdam to talk about nature, labour and economy in the second half of the first millennium!

I, Rowboat: Mechanical Propulsion and Individual Agency in the Viking Era North Atlantic #FakePaperTitles

Sturm *UND* drang? In dieser Wirtschaft??

Germany. On a plate

You know how you're supposed to put your own mask on before helping others on an airplane? This is why I make my coffee first in the morning.

Sharing this on behalf of George Kiraz: There will be an introductory Syriac course at Cambridge in the winter term (January 2026). Please share with anyone who might be interested!

I made an early Christian studies group---come join! hcommons.org/groups/early...

Expert here: We were not, in fact, ever puzzled. It has been and always will be a writing tablet. www.indy100.com/news/ancient...

This is how your email finds me.

CRAC is getting five! And is going to celebrate this anniversary with a conference The Shady Trade of Hermes: Theft, Thieves and Thievery in the Ancient World to be held on 25-27 September 2025 at the University of Warsaw. If you happen to be in town, do join us! Programme: bit.ly/42JturY

Yes, e-codices is down full time at the moment. We're working on it. It may come back by itself if the attack ends.

Plum cake time, it does feel like autumn already!

Oh and if you think that you are "saving the field" by maintaining decorum in times of decomposition through policing how people present their otherwise top-notch scholarship. You are not.

Seriously peer-reviewers, this is not 19th century and we are (I hope!) no longer publishing in Mitteilungen der Akademie für Geschichte der Gelehrtengesellschaft Göttingen. Let people actually submit writing that others want to read and stop policing "academic style".

📜 CfP! Join us at #imc2026 in Leeds for our sessions on "Temporalities" in late medieval charters. We're exploring how formulaic markers changed over time using cutting-edge methods. https://didip.hypotheses.org/3832 🗓️ Deadline: Sept 24, 2025 #cfp #DigitalHumanities #medievalstudies #MiddleAges

This sums up my writing pretty well

The Victoria & Albert museum holds many treasures, one of which is this late antique pair of shoes from Roman Egypt (400-600 CE). 10/10 would wear today (photo is my own).

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

Duke UP has put the Introduction to my book online! See here: bit.ly/42yhObv

For absolutely no reason, in case you were wondering if, you know, historians did not have an inkling, just a hunch really, that after 410 there might have been some stuff going on in Britain. www.cambridge.org/core/books/r...

I just checked the calendar and realised today's the 15th. Who knew? If you're a little behind (like I am), drop me an email to let me know your thoughts on a potential abstract. #medievalsky

There is no more money must be the most ridiculous fallacy ever invented in politics.

Ah yes the fake urgency and the ever-so-slightly veiled anti-intellectualism, peddling towards the lowest populist instincts. Watching UK dismantling its university system in slow-mo is a thing to behold.

With the caveat that I've been the editor for all of three minutes, here's a thread about the goings on at the Journal of Early Christian Studies---far rosier, for reasons that I think have to do with size

Finally got my contributor copy of this great new resource!

Guess by now postdocs are a more secure job than the prime minister of France

This is basically the range of the emotions that you experience if you catch a train from Cologne to Berlin. You will live all of this in the space of four hours.

Very much this. There are still some academic cultures that think you can bibliography yourself into a career. Citation is a practice and a craft to be used consciously not an exercise in sorting alphabetised lists.

I‘m very sympathetic to this, but I suspect as long as academics continue to use minor bibliographical gaps as a weapon to discredit other scholars, people are going to be a bit nervous about making themselves vulnerable.

Congrats to France for staying on brand once again

Looking forward to it!

The Sillymarillion.