Late Antique artefacts, and the images they carry, attest to a highly connected visual culture from ca. 300 to 800 C.E. On the one hand, the same decorative motifs and iconographies are found across various genres of visual and material culture, irrespective of social and economic differences among their users – for instance in mosaics, architectural decoration, and luxury arts (silver plate, textiles, ivories), as well as in everyday objects such as tableware, lamps, and pilgrim vessels.
Author Archives: Roisin Astell
CFP: Gender and Medieval Studies conference 2021: ‘Gender and Mobility’ (11–13 January 2021), deadline 31 August 2020
The organisers welcome proposals on any aspect of gender and mobility in the medieval world from scholars at any stage of study or career.
CFP: Research Group on Manuscript Evidence at the ICM Kalamazoo (13–16 May 2021), deadline 15 September 2020
The Research Group on Manuscript Evidence invites proposals for 5 sponsored panels for the International Congress on Medieval Studies 2021.
New Publication: Dissimilar Similitudes: Devotional Objects in Late Medieval Europe, by Caroline Walker Bynum
From an acclaimed historian, a mesmerizing account of how medieval European Christians envisioned the paradoxical nature of holy objects. Between the twelfth and the sixteenth centuries, European Christians used in worship a plethora of objects, not only prayer books, statues, and paintings but also pieces of natural materials, such as stones and earth, considered toContinue reading “New Publication: Dissimilar Similitudes: Devotional Objects in Late Medieval Europe, by Caroline Walker Bynum”
CFP: ‘Sinne / Senses’, VIth Forum Kunst des Mittelalters (Frankfurt am Main, 29 Sep – 2 Oct 2021), deadline 15 October 2020
On the conference topic “Senses”: The arts and the senses have always been reciprocally related to one another. In the Middle Ages, sensual encounters with art and architecture offered a variety of ways to perceive, comprehend and structure the world.
New Podcast: Modern Medieval
Hosted by Meaghan Allen and Eleanora Narbone, the podcast explores various connections between the modern world and the medieval, from pop culture references to marginalia details, Modern Medieval strives to bridge the gap of knowledge in a fun, engaging and accessible way.
CFP: ‘Space and the Hospital’ (Lisbon, 26-28 May 2021), deadline: 30 September 2020
The International Network for the History of Hospitals (INHH), the ‘Hospitalis: Hospital Architecture in Portugal at the Dawn of Modernity’, and the ‘Royal Hospital of All Saints: city and public’ health Research Projects are pleased to announce the call for papers for Space and the Hospital. The conference will take place in Lisbon, Portugal from 26-28 May 2021.
New Publication: Byzantium in Eastern European Visual Culture in the Late Middle Ages, edited by Maria Alessia Rossi & Alice Isabella Sullivan
Byzantium in Eastern European Visual Culture in the Late Middle Ages, edited by Maria Alessia Rossi and Alice Isabella Sullivan, engages with issues of cultural contact and patronage, as well as the transformation and appropriation of Byzantine artistic, theological, and political models, alongside local traditions, across Eastern Europe.
New Publication: The Oxford Handbook of Latin Palaeography, Edited by Frank Coulson and Robert Babcock
Latin books are among the most numerous surviving artifacts of the Late Antique, Mediaeval, and Renaissance periods in European history; written in a variety of formats and scripts, they preserve the literary, philosophical, scientific, and religious heritage of the West. The Oxford Handbook of Latin Palaeography surveys these books, with special emphasis on the variety of scriptsContinue reading “New Publication: The Oxford Handbook of Latin Palaeography, Edited by Frank Coulson and Robert Babcock”
CFP: Marco Manuscript Workshop 2021: ‘Immaterial Culture’ (5-6 February 2021), deadline 9 October 2020
How can our field, which has always emphasized the importance of physical place and tactile artifacts, work successfully in isolation and at a distance? What does it mean for us when our work takes place in an incorporeal world of light and numbers rather than ink and flesh, in matrices of data rather than dusty rooms?
Medieval Art Research 