Conference: ‘Les arts de l’autel médiéval: De la genèse des objets aux stratégies muséographiques’, Paris EHESS / Musée du Louvre, 3-5 February 2025 

Au cours des dernières années, l’équipe interuniversitaire TEMPLA a développé un projet de recherche qui étudie, à partir de sources documentaires et des dispositifs visuels conservés in situ ou dans des musées, la mémoire des cultes permanents ou changeants pratiqués par des religieux et des laïcs dans des églises médiévales. Ce projet propose une étude holistique des sanctuaires d’une série de sites cathédraux (IXe-XVe siècles). L’étude des contextes matériels des sanctuaires est menée de front avec l’examen des dispositifs artistiques destinés à orner les autels et leur environnement immédiat, à révéler et à exalter les saints titulaires et la divinité et à identifier le promoteur et le concepteur de l’œuvre (à travers l’héraldique et l’écriture).

Les analyses de la matérialité des structures architecturales et des dispositifs visuels sont combinées avec une approche phénoménologique des œuvres et une compréhension liturgique des rites et des dévotions spécifiques. D’un point de vue méthodologique, nous examinons le décor visuel en relation avec les manifestations sociales attendues au moment des célébrations rituelles. Ce colloque est convoqué pour suivre cette ligne de pensée, dans laquelle le maître-autel est envisagé comme l’épicentre rituel, spirituel, mais aussi matériel et émotionnel de toute église.

Au fil du temps, et dans le contexte de l’autel de nombreuses productions artistiques ont été privées de l’usage, du contexte et des significations envisagées lors de leur genèse. La matérialité de certaines de ces œuvres a pu être détériorée, altérée voire fusionnée avec d’autres supports pour revêtir de nouvelles valeurs sémantiques. Les questions de conservation et d’exposition dans des musées fondés à partir du XIXe siècle offrent une excellente occasion de réfléchir à la biographie de ces objets. Ces transformations montrent qu’une œuvre peut être lue selon de nouvelles conditions de perception et d’usages culturels, contextuels ou environnementaux modifiés, de telle sorte qu’elle peut être reconsidérée et réinterprétée dans son intégralité.

En prenant en considération ces différents angles d’approche et des méthodes éprouvées dans le cadre de l’étude de la « longue vie » des objets, ce colloque a pour objectif d’attirer l’attention sur ce phénomène répandu, mais largement négligé par l’historiographie, à travers diverses lignes thématiques :

– la « seconde vie » et la réception ultérieure de certains artefacts à usage liturgique ayant perdu leur fonction originelle, mués en objets de collection ou destinés à la contemplation esthétique ;

– les valeurs théologiques, apotropaïques et thaumaturgiques conférées à certains objets à travers des stratégies religieuses ou des traditions populaires quant à leur matérialité ;

– l’influence des multiples facteurs (politiques, religieux, commerciaux) qui ont conduit à la variation matérielle et idéelle des œuvres d’art liées à des autels médiévaux ;

– la prise en compte d’exemples de ces phénomènes dans les collections des musées, à commencer par celles du Musée du Louvre, du Musée national du Moyen Âge, du Museu Episcopal de Vic et du Musée de l’Université de Bergen.

Ce colloque offre l’occasion de reconsidérer les œuvres en elles-mêmes, comme autant de points de départ pour la compréhension de significations modulables en fonction des contextes successifs de leur usage. Les discussions et les résultats de cette rencontre permettront également d’envisager de nouvelles stratégies muséographiques et de médiation pour présenter ces œuvres au public.

Conference Programme

Lundi 3 février 2025

Location: Musée de Cluny

15.00-17.00 : Visite et débat sur place guidée par Christine Descatoire (réservé aux intervenants)

// Rendez-vous: 6, pl. Paul Painlevé //

Mardi 4 février 2025

Location: École des hautes études en sciences sociales

// CAMPUS CONDORCET. HUMATHÈQUE 10 cours des Humanités, 93322 Aubervilliers //

Inscription: vincent.debiais@ehess.fr

08.45 : Bienvenue – Présentation du colloque. Gerardo Boto (Univ. de Girona)

Président de séance : Jean-Claude Schmitt (EHESS)

09.00: Bissera Pentcheva (Stanford Univ.) – Choros of Fire: Crowns, Altars, and Saints in the Ecclesiastical Space

09.30: discussion

09.45 : Vincent Debiais (EHESS – CNRS – Templa) – Déplacements d’écriture autour de l’autel : la crypte de la cathédrale d’Essen

10.15 : discussion

11.00 : Devis Valenti (Soprintendenza Archeologia Belle Arti e Paesaggio per il Comune di Venezia e Laguna (Ministero della Cultura) – La chapelle de la crypte de la cathédrale de Torcello (IXe siècle) : nouvelles découvertes à la suite des récentes restaurations

11.30 : discussion

11.45: Francesca Dell’Acqua (Univ. di Salerno) – 3D glowing holy. The altar and its surroundings in eighth- and ninth-century Rome, Milan, and Francia

12.15 : discussion

Président de séance : Dominique Iogna-Prat (EHESS)

14.00 : Marc Sureda (Museu Episcopal de Vic – Templa) – Décor et sacralité de l’autel médiéval en Catalogne romane

14.30 : discussion

14.45 : Manuela Gianandrea (Sapienza Università di Roma) & Elisabetta Scirocco (Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max-Planck-Institut für Kunstgeschichte) – In ambitu altaris: dispositivi spaziali per potenziare il sacro

15.15 : discussion

15.30 : Sophie Kelly (Univ. of Bristol) – Objects from tomb of Hubert Walter (d. 1215) in Canterbury Cathedral and the material evidence for altar furnishings in medieval England

16.00 : discussion

16.45 : Fernando Gutiérrez Baños (Univ. de Valladolid) – Decoraciones de altar de los siglos XIII y XIV en la Corona de Castilla : retorno a las fuentes literarias y documentales

17.15 : discussion

17.30 : Marcello Angheben (Univ. Poitiers – CESMC – Templa) – La création des retables de Burgos à la fin du Moyen Âge : une réponse originale aux besoins de la liturgie, du culte et de la dévotion

18.00 : discussion

18.15 : Esther Lozano (Univ. Nacional de Educación a Distancia-Templa) & Marta Serrano (Univ. Rovira i Virgili-Templa) – Visibilia et invisibilia dans les sanctuaires des cathédrales de Tarragone et de Saragosse. Retables-cloison et redéfinition des espaces rituels et de circulation

18.45 : discussion

Mercredi 5 février 2025

Location: Centre Dominique–Vivant Denon – Musée du Louvre

// Porte des Arts, 2 Quai François Mitterrand, Paris //

Inscription : programmation-centre-vivant-denon@louvre.fr

Président de séance : Philippe Cordez (Musée du Louvre)

09.30 : Pierre Alain Mariaux (Univ. Neuchâtel) – Mettre en scène le numineux ? Le reliquaire, de l’autel à la vitrine

10.00 : discussion

10.15 : Julie Glodt (Univ. Paris I) – Entre l’autel et le musée. Regards modernes sur les antependia textiles médiévaux

10.45 : discussion

11.15 : Christine Descatoire (Musée de Cluny – Musée National du Moyen Âge) & Frédéric Tixier (Univ. de Lorraine) – Parements et décors d’autel des collections du musée de Cluny

11.45 : discussion

12.00 : Florian Meunier (Musée du Louvre. Département des Objets d’art) – La question des chandeliers de la cathédrale de Bethléem (XIIe siècle) du Terra Sancta Museum de Jérusalem

12.30 : discussion

Président de séance : Anne-Orange Poilpré (Univ. Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne)

14.00 : Gerhard Lutz (Cleveland Museum) – Hans Schnatterpeck and Hans Schäufelein in Niederlana (South Tyrol). Questions on Alpine altarpieces around 1500

14.30 : discussion

14.45 : Justin Kroesen (Univ. Bergen – Templa) – Medieval Altar Furnishings at the University Museum of Bergen. From Cult to Culture

15.15 : discussion

15.30-15.45 : Conclusions. Xavier Barral i Altet (INHA)

16.00-18.00 : Visite et débat sur place guidée par Pierre-Yves Le Pogam (réservé aux intervenants)

Informations pratiques

Entrée gratuite. Capacité d’accueil limitée

Study Day: Miracles in Glass: the Study and Conservation of Canterbury’s Stained Glass Heritage, Canterbury Cathedral, 31 March 2025

Monday 31 March 2025, 10:45-17:15

Organised by the Stained Glass Studio and the Archives and Library of Canterbury Cathedral, in conjunction with the Centre for Medieval and Early Modern Studies, University of Kent.

Canterbury Cathedral is a storehouse of some of Europe’s finest medieval stained glass, including the unique Thomas Becket ‘Miracle Windows’ portraying medieval men, women, and children experiencing the healing touch of the saint.

This study day takes advantage of the removal of one of the Miracle Windows for a day of lectures and guided tours, including the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for participants to see panels from the window up close in the Cathedral’s Stained Glass Conservation Studio.

Speakers will include Prof Rachel Koopmans of York University, Toronto; Leonie Seliger, Director of the Stained Glass Studio; Dr Emily Guerry of the University of Oxford; and Dr Tom Nickson of the Courtauld Institute.

Participants will become acquainted with the many twists and turns of the long history of the conservation and study of the Cathedral’s glass. Rare archival materials will be on display in the Cathedral Archives, alongside a newly acquired set of material relating to recent study of the glass.

Participants will also be provided with a guided tour of the Trinity Chapel, where the miracle windows were installed around Thomas Becket’s shrine in the early thirteenth century.

Booking essential. Spaces are limited.

On the day, please arrive promptly at 10:30 for registration.

See full event details and outline programme

General admission: £60. Includes lunch and refreshments.

Bursaries available for unwaged/students. Please enquire, via email: email archives@canterbury-cathedral.org

New Publication: ‘Art and Drama on a Late Medieval Rood Screen: Unveiling a Mystical Passion’ by Michael Calder

With little scholarly attention having been given to the late medieval iconography that features on rood screens in the southwest of England, the significance of the figures painted at Berry Pomeroy has long been underappreciated. The unlocking of their meaning by the author has led to the discovery of a unique iconographic program. The gestures adopted by many of these figures belong to a common visual culture in the art and drama of the medieval church. The iconography, which reflects a Gothic Mannerist style of the early sixteenth century, displays a marked theatricality giving expression to the mysteries of the faith in the form of a drama. The narrative recorded has notable similarities to that found in a dramatic trilogy which was once performed in Cornwall called the Ordinalia. This book makes an important contribution to scholarship in the genre of mysticism in art and to our understanding of popular devotional practices on the eve of the Reformation.

Find out more about the book on De Gruyter website. 

About the author

Michael Calder, an independent scholar and author who worked as a specialist advisor to the National Trust in England, brings a multi-disciplinary approach to art history.

CFP: ‘Sanguis Christi: Visual Culture / Visionary Culture (13th–18th centuries)’ (December 2025), deadline 1 April 2025

Dates of conference: December 3–5, 2025  |  Location: Louvain-la-Neuve

The subject of the Blood of Christ has fueled Christian devotional culture in Europe since the mid-Middle Ages. Rooted in the veneration of relics, it quickly became central with the progressive establishment of the dogma of transubstantiation, particularly at the Fourth Lateran Council (1215), and the development of a liturgy specifically celebrating the Corpus Christi: the Feast of Corpus Christi, universally promoted within Christendom by the papal bull Transiturus (1264).

This interdisciplinary conference aims to explore how devotion to the Holy Blood, in its various forms and manifestations (relics, sacraments, miracles), shaped and nourished the emergence of a visual culture in Europe from the Middle Ages to the 18th century.

Through the lens of visuality—whether visible and/or visionary—this colloquium will examine the theological debates, the development and evolution of a devotional culture, including its social and political dimensions, and their impact on modes of representation in iconography. By visual/visionary culture, we aim to investigate what is rendered visible of the Blood of Christ and to explore the tension between what miracles make perceptible to the senses and what remains beyond perception, opening the faithful to a spiritual and sacred dimension and inspiring new modes of rendering the divine visible.


Proposals for contributions may align with one of the following three thematic axes:

1) Doctrinal Foundations and Eucharistic Liturgies

This axis will address the doctrinal points leading to or following the establishment of the dogma of transubstantiation and the institution of the Eucharistic liturgy. The question of the visible/visionary, which arises with the affirmation of Christ’s full and real presence in each species, created profound theological challenges concerning the status of miracles that made Christ’s Blood visible (mirari). Proposals may focus on theological debates or disputes surrounding this dogma and liturgy, examining key milestones such as the Fourth Lateran Council (1215), the Council of Constance (1418), or the Council of Trent (1545). Special attention could be given to the Feast of Corpus Christi, the cult of the Holy Blood, or specific Eucharistic miracles, such as those of Bolsena (1263), Florence (1230), Fécamp (11th century), Louvain (1347), Bruges (1146), Brussels (1370), Paris (1290), Passau (1477), or Deggendorf (1337). Contributions might also consider theological writings that sought to define or interrogate the status of these miracles and their narratives.

2) Visual/Visionary Culture in Social and Cultural History

This axis will explore the role of visual/visionary elements in cultural and social history related to the devotional culture surrounding the Holy Blood and transubstantiation. Proposals might examine dynamics contributing to a new visual culture, particularly in lay contexts and observance practices. Submissions could also address the materiality-centered liturgies, sensory-focused preaching styles blending sensory, mental, and spiritual images, or the construction of miracle narratives at the intersection of the visible and the visionary. Social and political dimensions may also be considered, analyzing how accounts of Eucharistic miracles and manifestations of the Holy Blood (pilgrimages, rituals, theatrical performances, processions) were used by clerical and secular authorities to foster community unity or as instruments of division and controversy.

3) Visualizing the Holy Blood: Object-Image Culture

This axis focuses on the visual and visionary devices that rendered the Holy Blood visible through a culture of object-images, which diversified and expanded over the centuries with the development of new media. Contributions could explore visual/visionary strategies in liturgical and para-liturgical ceremonies, increasing attention to images and their staging, the use of mobile images, the interplay of veiling and unveiling, the theatricality of certain representations, or the dialogue between illustrated manuscripts and image walls. Proposals might also consider the proliferation of small-format prints. These facets of the Holy Blood’s visual culture provide an opportunity to analyze how images functioned in thaumaturgic, visionary and soteriology, mediating between the visible and invisible and shaping new visual or visionary experiences for the faithful.

Submission Guidelines

The conference will take place from December 3–5, 2025, at the Université Catholique de Louvain (Louvain-la-Neuve). Proposals, in French or English, should not exceed 500 words and must include a CV. Submissions are due by April 1, 2025, and should be sent to manon.chaidron@uclouvain.be and mathilde.mares@gmail.com.

Selected contributions will be published in a collective volume. Proposals should emphasize themes related to visibility/invisibility and visual/visionary dynamics.
Where possible, accommodation and travel expenses will be covered.

We encourage participation from researchers across disciplines to enrich the analysis of visual culture mechanisms and foster a collective reflection on their modes of apprehension. This interdisciplinary approach offers an opportunity to situate these dynamics within a broader mental and social history of devotional movements.

Online lecture: ‘Golden Wreaths for Hippocrates: Art, Learning, and Lineage on a Medieval Cup’ with Dr Mary Franklin-Brown, 4 February 2025 (5:30 – 7pm GMT)

Join this lecture on a medieval cup made for Humfrey & Eleanor, Duke & Duchess of Gloucester, and owned by Lady Margaret Beaufort.

Register for a spot over on Eventbrite. 

For the coming months, Christ’s College, Cambridge has lent its Foundress’ Cup to the British Library, where it is featured in the exhibition ‘Medieval Women: In Their Own Words’ (25 October 2024-2 March 2025).

Medieval cups of this shape were used during dinner for drinking wine or after dinner for a sweetened, spiced wine called ‘Hippocras’. This drink was named for the ancient physician Hippocrates because it was thought to promote health by aiding digestion. Cups were large because they were commonly shared between two individuals. At the end of a meal a cup could be passed round the whole table.

The Christ’s College cup is one of the few to survive. It was commissioned in the 1430s by Humfrey and Eleanor, Duke and Duchess of Gloucester. Humfrey was the son of the first Lancastrian king, Henry IV, brother to Henry V and uncle to the ill-fated Henry VI. The cup disappeared from the historical record during the Wars of the Roses, but after the accession of the first Tudor king, Henry VII, the cup reappeared in the possession of the king’s mother, Lady Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond. At her death in 1509, it came to Christ’s College.

Christ’s was not the first learned community to have used the cup. The Gloucesters established a humanist court at their property in Greenwich, now the Royal Observatory, and they commissioned new copies, translations, and summaries of inherited knowledge. Duke Humfrey made generous donations to Oxford University Library. Lady Margaret was an influential patron of early English printers and endowed two Cambridge colleges.

Despite its beauty and significance, the cup has never before been studied as an artwork. No one has considered its relation to other Gothic arts or attempted to identify the many plants in the garlands figured on its surface. How do the plants relate to the intellectual interests and familial affections of the Gloucesters? What meaning may have been attributed to the cup by Lady Margaret and College Fellows of the early Tudor period?

These questions are asked in new research by Dr Mary Franklin-Brown, Fellow in Medieval Studies and Honorary Keeper of the Plate at Christ’s, University Associate Professor in Modern and Medieval Languages, and author of Reading the World: Encyclopedic Writing of the Scholastic Age (University of Chicago Press, 2012). In this lecture, she will present her current understanding of the cup. She will show how the goldsmith asserts the specificity of his craft and materials in relation to the other arts of the age and how the patrons adapt the canons of Gothic ornament to create a shining spiral of references to poetry, heraldry, cuisine, medicine, and alchemy.

The event will be hosted by Dr Sophie Read, Fellow of Christ’s and University Associate Professor of Renaissance English Literature. Dr Read is the author of Eucharist and the Poetic Imagination in Early Modern England (Cambridge University Press, 2013), and she is now at work on a new book, Speaking Sweet: Renaissance Rhetorics of Smell.

Job announcement: Elizabeth A.R. Brown Archivist, University of Pennsylvania Libraries

The Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts at the University of Pennsylvania is seeking to hire the inaugural Elizabeth A. R. Brown archivist. The archivist will work with scholars and colleagues at Penn and around the world to establish, catalog, and develop a central repository of archives, project files, working papers, and born-digital materials belonging to medievalists and professional organizations. This new, permanently endowed position has been enabled through the extraordinary generosity of the late Elizabeth (Peggy) A. R. Brown, and is of major significance to the field of medieval studies in North America. It also represents an exciting opportunity to work with a dynamic group of archivists, librarians, and medievalists active at Penn, at the Kislak Center, and at the Schoenberg Institute for Manuscript Studies.

Find the full posting here. 

Job summary

The Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts seeks an enthusiastic processing archivist to work with curators and processing staff to lead a new Penn Libraries initiative to acquire process, and make available the archives assembled by scholars in medieval studies and of professional organizations that advance the field. Situated in the Kislak Center for Rare Books, Manuscripts and Special Collections, the Elizabeth A.R. Brown archivist will be a member of the Schoenberg Institute for Manuscripts Studies (SIMS) team and the Archives and Manuscripts Processing Unit. The archivist will arrange and describe analog, digital, and hybrid archival collections, create EAD finding aids using ArchivesSpace in order to provide access to collections, and will contribute posts to the Kislak Center blogs and other social media. The archivist will work with the Schoenberg Center for Electronic Texts and Imaging (SCETI) to ensure that selected material is digitized according to established best practices so that they are made available to a global community of scholars in a timely fashion. The processing archivist will work with fellow archivists within the Penn Libraries and across campus to improve workflows, policies and practices in an effort to respond to and anticipate the evolving needs of the archival profession and the Penn Libraries’ vision of responsibly and ethically promoting access to collections.

Job Description

Job Responsibilities

  • Physically process analog and hybrid archival collections of medieval studies scholars and the records of relevant professional organizations; arranging the material and rehousing for permanent archival storage. 
  • Describe collections, creating EAD finding aids, via ArchiveSpace. 
  • Write blog posts & participate in activities or events for the Kislak Center in order to promote collections and raise awareness to Penn faculty and students and the wider research community.
  • Serve on Elizabeth A.R. Brown Medievalist Archive Advisory Committee, which is charged with identifying, assessing, and coordinating the acquisition of new collections in accordance with the Penn Libraries and Kislak Center’s policies and procedures.
  • With the Kislak Center’s Born Digital Archivist and the Digital Preservation Librarian, accession, preserve, process, and make accessible natively digital collections, including electronic drafts of scholarly work, professional email, audiovisual assets, accumulated data sets, and other documentation.
  • Serve as an associate member of the Schoenberg Institute for Manuscript Studies (SIMS) team, contributing archival expertise to a broad range of conversations about the Institute’s programs and collections-based initiatives.
  • Supervise student and temporary staff processing assistants.
  • Perform onsite assessments and preliminary triage on collections in situ, traveling to homes, offices, etc., and attending relevant scholarly gatherings to discuss potential acquisitions.
  • Work with Special Collections Processing Center, University Archives, and Katz Center staff to improve workflows, policies, and best practices and develop methodologies to reduce backlog and/or enhance accessibility; including participation in large-scale agile processing and collections management projects that increase accessibility to distinctive collections.
  • Perform additional duties as assigned.

Required Qualifications

  • Master of Science, MLIS, Master of Arts, and 3 to 5 years of experience or equivalent combination of education and experience is required.
  • A minimum of 3 years’ experience processing analog and digital archival collections.
  • Expert knowledge of DACS, EAD, XML, MARC and ArchivesSpace.
  • Experience using born-digital processing hardware (Forensic Recovery of Evidence Device) and software (Archivematica, Archive-It, BitCurator, and others).
  • Reading knowledge of French and/or Italian and/or Latin and/or Spanish.
  • The ability to work both independently and with others in a collaborative work environment
  • Demonstrated ability to manage time and complete projects efficiently and effectively
  • Fluency with Microsoft Office software, in particular Excel
  • Excellent oral, written, and interpersonal communication skills
  • Willingness to promote collection material through social media and events
  • A commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion

Preferred Qualifications

  • Demonstrated interest in and/or knowledge of medieval studies
  • Knowledge of Alma (Penn’s integrated library system)
  • Experience with agile processing and/or innovative methods for reducing backlog
  • Evidence of high level initiative and self-motivation

Application Requirement

A Cover Letter and Resume/CV are required to be considered for this position. Please upload your Cover Letter where it asks you to upload your Resume/CV; multiple documents are allowed.

Oxford Medieval Manuscripts Group, Hilary Term 2025, Fridays 5pm (BST)

Hilary Term 2025 | Fridays 5 pm (unless otherwise stated) 

Organisers: Irina Boeru, Fergus Bovill, Ana Dias, Charly Driscoll, Antonia Delle Fratte, Elena Lichmanova, Mathilde Mioche, Celeste Pan, Klara Zhao 

For all enquiries, please write to: elena.lichmanova@merton.ox.ac.uk         

Week 1, 24 January 2025, 15:00                

Balliol Historic Collections Centre Visit  

Previous experience of handling medieval manuscripts is desirable

Limited places, write to the email above by 22/01/2025

Week 3, 7 February 2025, 17:15                 

The Queen’s College Library Visit 

Limited places, write to the email above by 1/02/2025

Week 4, 14 February 2025, ONLINE    

Reading Group: Interpretation and Meaning:

  • Beatrice Kitzinger, ‘Working with Images in Manuscripts’ (2020)      
  • Paula Mae Carns, ‘Making and Unmaking Love in the Macclesfield Psalter’ (2023)
  • Michael Camille, ‘Introduction’, in The Medieval Art of Love (1998)

Write to the email above to join.    

Week 5, 21 February 2025, Merton College, Hawkins Room                

Work-in-Progress Session

Emma Nelson, University of Manchester, Book Owners and Donors in Twelfth-Century Lincoln

Blanche Darbord, University of Cambridge, Alexander the Great and Chivalry in Plantagenet England

Week 7, 7 March 2025, Merton College, Mure Room    

Nancy Thebaut, History of Art Department and St Catherine’s College, Oxford, Learning to Look: (Mis)reading the Visitatio sepulchri, ca. 900-1050 

Murray Seminar: ‘Charles of Luxembourg as a visitor at the papal court in Avignon’, Dr Alexandra Gajewski, 21 January 2025 (5-6.30pm GMT)

  • Location: Birkbeck, 43 Gordon Square, Keynes Library and Online
  • Date and time: 21 January 2025, 17:00 — 18:30 GMT

When on 23rd May 1365 Emperor Charles IV arrived in Avignon accompanied by five hundred knights, he encountered a city that had changed substantially compared to the Avignon he saw on his visits in c.1340, 1344 and 1346, when he was still Margrave of Moravia. The Porte Saint-Lazare, through which the imperial procession probably entered, had not existed in the 1340s, new city walls had been built from 1357/58. The city’s churches had been rebuilt. The Papal Palace had been enlarged with a new entrance, a new staircase and new chapel in the 1340s; dazzling new wall-paintings adorned the walls, a new kitchen been built and polyphonic music had been introduced. Charles slept in Petit Palais whereas in 1340 he had stayed in the Livrée of Pierre de Rosiers. Although, there are only snippets of evidence for the earlier visits, Charles’s adventus in 1365 is reported in a number of sources, in particular in the chronicles by John of Reading and Jan Neplach, who probably based their reports on eyewitness accounts. By crossing the sources relating to Charles’s visits with the topographical and architectural evidence, this paper hopes to show that the documents throw light on the unfolding of the emperor’s visit, in a way that has not been previously understood, and, more broadly, that the walls, the religious topography and the enlarged Papal Palace were active parts in making Avignon a fitting stage for the greatest moment in the city’s history, the entry of the emperor.

Alexandra Gajewski is the Deputy Editor of The Burlington Magazine and a Fellow at the Institute of Historical Research, London. She studied art history at the Courtauld Institute of Art, where she obtained her Ph.D. on Gothic architecture in northern Burgundy. Her research ranges from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries, with a focus on regionalism, monasticism, the role of women, and, especially, late medieval Avignon.

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British Archaeological Association Study Day: Coventry (Friday 21 March 2025), deadline 7 February 2025

Locations: St Mary’s Guildhall, Holy Trinity Church, St Michael’s Cathedral

Late medieval Coventry was the fourth largest city in England with a population of around 10,000. It rivalled the other regional capitals of York, Bristol and Norwich. Henry VI set up court in Coventry in the 1450s during the early part of the Wars of the Roses. Coventry’s wealth from the sale of wool and woollen broadcloth at this time helped pay for a building boom and investment in remarkable art and material culture. A surprising amount survives to this day and deserves closer attention.

St Mary’s Guildhall is one of the most important medieval guildhalls in the country. It is the former guildhall of Coventry’s Holy Trinity Guild, formed in 1392 when Coventry’s four most prestigious guilds amalgamated. St Mary’s lies in the heart of Coventry’s medieval quarter, adjacent to the ruined St Michael’s parish church, Holy Trinity Church and the remains of St Mary’s Priory, Coventry’s first cathedral.

We will visit St Mary’s Hall in the morning to discuss an impressive early sixteenth-century Flemish tapestry in its original location. The tapestry has recently been subject to multi-disciplinary study, with the results published in a book edited by Dr Mark Webb, who will lead the session. There will also be a unique opportunity to observe an infra-red survey conducted by Dr Constantina Vlachou-Mogire, Heritage Science Manager at Historic Royal Palaces. Abi Brown (MA) will present some rare and relatively unknown fifteenth-century wood carvings currently on display in the Treasury. Dr Heather Gilderdale-Scott will lead a session analysing the medieval stained glass in the Guildhall. 

After lunch, we will reconvene at the nearby Holy Trinity Church for a talk on the Doom painting by Dr Miriam Gill. We will then explore the remains of the stained glass from the medieval cathedral of St Michael’s.

Find out more about the timetabling for the day over on the BAA website.

Travel and practicalities:

Trains run regularly from London to Coventry and the fast train takes just under an hour. Coventry is also served by regular trains from Birmingham, Glasgow and Manchester.

St Mary’s Guildhall is a 15 min walk from Coventry train station (see map below). There are regular buses (every 20 mins) that run from the station to the city centre (number 11, X30, 9 or 87). Holy Trinity Church is a 5 min walk from the Guildhall and well signposted. We will walk as a group from Holy Trinity Church to St Michael’s Cathedral (also a 5 min walk).

The cost of the day will be £25 for members. The event is free for students, for whom travel grants (to a maximum of £50) are also available.

Places are limited to 20, of which up to 10 are reserved for students.

To apply please e-mail studydays@thebaa.org by February 7th 2025. Please state in the email whether you are a member of the BAA or a student. All names will be entered into a ballot for the study day and the successful applicants will be notified by February 10th 2025. 

Essay competition: Church Monuments Society Essay Competition, deadline 31 January 2025

The Council of the Church Monuments Society offers a biennial prize of £500 called the Church Monuments Essay Prize, to be awarded with a certificate for the best essay submitted in the relevant year. The prize will only be awarded if the essay is considered by the judges to be of sufficiently high standard to merit publication in the peer-reviewed journal Church Monuments. Entries in addition to the winner may be considered for publication.

The competition is open only to those who have not previously published an article in Church Monuments. Entrants need not be members of the Church Monuments Society, but are recommended to familiarise themselves with Church Monuments: abstracts and indexes can be found on the website https://churchmonumentssociety.org.

The focus of the essay must be a monument/s in a church, churchyard or cemetery, of any period and location. Entries must be submitted in English.

The length (including notes) should be between 6,000 and 10,000 words, with a maximum of 10 illustrations.

The closing date for new entries is 31 January 2025.

Please contact the Hon. Journal Editor for a copy of the rules and the guidelines to contributors and/or for advice on the suitability of a particular topic.

Jonathan Trigg
jrtrigg@gmail.com