Just watched the new Knives Out and I think it's really important you know that the scene in the Seminary's Gym is filmed in the same place Rick Astley filmed the music video for Never Gonna Give You Up. I saw the window tracery and immediately made my friends pause the film so I could tell them.

Registration is now open for my 13 Jan 2026 public lecture, "The Transformation of Infectious Disease Histories: Three Decades of Paleogenetics and Historians’ Responses," csmbr.fondazionecomel.org/events/onlin... Sponsored by @csmbr-pisa.bsky.social. #histmed #aDNA #PandemicThinking

A Christmas message.

All set for Christmas here. Teenaged Thing #1 is pretending to not care. Smaller Thing #2 is very excited. Wishing peace, love, safety, and sanity to everyone whether you celebrate or not.

James Merril’s poem “Christmas Tree,” written while he was dying of AIDS. 1995.

I kind of like this whole “We won’t buy your liquor but we will air your state-suppressed news stories” niche that Canada’s apparently carved out.

[approaching Americans in a dark alley wearing a trench coat] you kids want to try some, uh… political documentary footage?

The MS of the week is RIA MS D ii 1, the Book of Uí Mhaine. This late 14th century manuscript contains a late Middle Irish versified form of the 17 Wonders of the Night of Christ’s Birth. This apocryphal tradition includes miracles such as fruiting vines in the middle of winter🍇

It’s the “season of love and giving”…but this year, doesn’t it seem more like a “season of fear and taking”? Like many of you, I’ve been saddened by the human impact of draconian government budget cuts and how angry many housed Americans are at unhoused Americans. 🧵 1 of 9

Ah they finally convinced me to submit my extra articles or abstracts. This journal is different: it's "high-quality".

New 2-year Postdoc: Ancient #Metagenomics & #Microbiome Sciences! 🧬🦷 Join Prof. @christinawarinner.bsky.social ’s group at @mpi-eva-leipzig.bsky.social to study the evolution and ecology of ancient oral microbiota. 📅 Apply by Jan 20, 2026: www.microverse-cluster.de/en/career/jo...

New job: 3-year postdoc position in medieval studies University of Southern Denmark jobs.h-net.org/jobs/69652

Officinal Plants 29: Carlina vulgaris ("oculus bovis"), Italy, 15th from "Codex Bellunensis", Add MS 41623, f. 97v, British Library, London. #CSMBR #MedicalHistory #MateriaMedica #CarlinaVulgaris

JOIN US for the CSM's annual conference at St F-X University in lovely Antigonish, NS, 26-28 May 2026! We welcome proposals for sessions or individual papers. Submissions due 15 January 2026. Details: www.canadianmedievalists.org/Annual

Medievalist friends! Applications are open until end of Feb for a fully-funded PhD in Arthurian Literature with the brilliant Louise D'Arcens @medievalafterlives.bsky.social and myself, based between Sydney (Australia) and Groningen (The Netherlands). Please share widely! tinyurl.com/f7su6urv

Clay letters from ancient Mesopotamia are alive with idiom, sayings, and everyday language that I love. Here are just a few random ones so you can enjoy them too.

A break from Christmas content to enjoy this capybara eating a banana. From François Froger's 'A relation of a voyage ...' (London, 1698).

📣 Call for Participants - New Workshop Series: Saints Outside Hagiography

We light the first Hanukkah candle this evening, but we could all use some light right now, so here’s my 254th #ScholarSunday thread of public scholarly writing, podcasts, new & forthcoming books from last week. Add more below, share widely, & solidarity, all.🗃️ blackwhiteandread.com/scholarsunda...

Just seen this obituary of Darleane Hoffman. She was an absolute giant of superheavy elements. @kitchapman.bsky.social's Superheavy gives a great account of her contributions to the field. www.nature.com/articles/d41...

The recording of yesterday's #CoffeeWithACodex is now up on YouTube! youtu.be/K4N-znpYxOk

Made a site comparing the sizes of living things :) The great Julius Csotonyi spent 5 months painting over 60 illustrations for the site, no ai used > neal.fun/size-of-life/

Just out! My essay for @thesowhat.bsky.social on plague, doctors, and the parallels between two pandemics: “Shouting at the Air: Plague Medievalisms for the Covid Era in Netflix’s The Decameron”.

We’re thrilled to announce that issue 3 is up & features a special cluster on Netflix’s The Decameron!m! The full issue is available here: www.arthuriana.com/tsw-issues! #pubhums #medievalsky #arthuriansky And now, a quick teaser 🧵 of the pieces in this issue… /1

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...

Happy 76th Birthday, Tom Waits!

We got Weird Al out here singing Killing In The Name, the time for moderation is over

Our intensive course on editing Medieval Latin texts returns for summer 2026! Ideal for graduate students working with unpublished texts. In person, in London. Book now👇 ☀️📖📚✍️ @ies-sas.bsky.social @ihr.bsky.social @warburginstitute.bsky.social #MedievalSky ies.sas.ac.uk/study-traini...

Researchers have marshaled ice core and tree-ring data to suggest that a previously unknown volcano erupted in 1345 and triggered climate changes that eventually led to the Black Death. 🏺🧪 (Thanks to @monicamedhist.bsky.social for commenting!)

Join us online tomorrow for 'Creating ‘Gothic Modern’: Medieval Afterlives as Modernity Re-Imagined'. Juliet Simpson & Jeanne Nuechterlein discuss Gothic Modern with Bill Sherman — exploring the proximity of late medieval art & worldviews to our sense of modernity warburg.sas.ac.uk/news-events/...

Alt text version. Thanks for sharing Harry.

Please share! Two new postdoc positions have opened in the RADHEART project at the University of Bergen. The first is on ancient Rabbinic literature from the 2nd – 7th century CE. #AcRel #sblaar #AncientBlueSky www.jobbnorge.no/en/available...

Look at this! For the first time since it was found, partially excavated and dispersed in the 1950s, someone has digitally reconstructed the 6th century mosaic from Qasr el-Lebia in Cyrenacia, Libya. 😮🤯 #MosaicMonday

Thank you, Tom Stoppard, for showing us a way.

“I Want to Break Freeze” is pure genius.

I am very pleased and grateful to share this announcement of our recent award from the @wellcometrust.bsky.social for a project on history of smallpox and measles #histmed #histsci news.exeter.ac.uk/faculty-of-h... The project will be based @exeter.ac.uk @cceh-u24.bsky.social led by ... 1/2

Are you interested in how people thought about the past in Middle Ages? Want to understand the books they wrote about it? We have an online short course for you! Book now for January 2026 👇 #MedievalSky palaeography.uk/study/short-...

How have books shaped the way we think? In January Anna Somfai will teach an online short course on books about science and philosophy in the Middle Ages. Book now 👇 #MedievalSky @ies-sas.bsky.social @warburginstitute.bsky.social @sas-news.bsky.social palaeography.uk/study/short-...

Oh wow! This is what happens when you're photographing MSS & don't capture the text in the inner gutter. 1st, here's the photograph (made about 100 yrs ago) of the Codex Salernitanus, f. 82ra. Although that big tear of the page is obvious, the inner gutter hasn't been fully captured in the photo.

Calling anyone interested in saints, sanctity, and the weird and wonderful world of primary sources outside the conventional hagiography form! ❤️‍🔥

Every decade, we hear "the kids can't read or write!" Interventions that don't work are proposed. Those that do work are ignored: reducing class sizes, making kids & families feel safe at school and welcome, becoming a community resource. When their expensive reform fails, they yell at us again.

The Courtauld is offering a a new fully funded Peter Fergusson PhD Scholarship in English Medieval Architecture for eligible projects focusing on England from the eleventh to the early sixteenth centuries. Statement of intents are due by 17 November 2025.

In 2006 a high school English teacher asked students to write to a famous author & ask for advice. KURT VONNEGUT - born 103yrs ago today - was the only one to respond. His reply was a doozy.

11th November is the feast of St Martin who is here depicted sharing his cloak with a beggar. BL Stowe MS 17; 'The Maastricht Hours'; 14th century; f.98r

Inside the Roman Catholic chapel at Biddlestone in Northumberland is an intriguing remnant from life on the home front during the Second World War. 1/6

guys I was able to access a British Library digitized manuscript today for the first time in years. Check it out. www.bl.uk/collection/d... click on the pdf [save that!] and use its hyperlinks! + for the post I wrote for today's MEDIEVAL NATURE class

How else to spend my birthday? Queuing for the British Library on a rainy morning to touch the old books.

Going to stamp my nerd foot, and complain that this meme doesn't include Late Caroline (doo doo doo). Made you sing it.

We're hiring in history of science at UW Madison! TT Assistant Professorship with a focus on water. Joint appointment between the History and Integrated Liberal Studies depts, and part of a university-wide hiring cluster on earth/sustainability science. jobs.wisc.edu/jobs/profess... #STS #HSMT