Medieval Art Research

Job: Curator of Ancient and Medieval Manuscripts, The British Library, deadline 7 April 2024

Hours: Permanent – Full time

Grade: B

Salary: £33,600

The British Library holds an internationally renowned collection of manuscripts relating to the ancient and medieval world. As Curator of Ancient and Medieval Manuscripts, with a special responsibility for Classical, Biblical and Byzantine manuscripts, you will use innovative and traditional ways of interpreting and presenting these collections through online resources and engagement with academic and general users. You will also use your specialist knowledge to support the development, management and promotion of the ancient and medieval collections.

With a post-graduate degree, or equivalent, in a relevant subject, you will have extensive experience of research in Classical, Biblical and/or Byzantine Studies. Strong knowledge of Classical Latin and Ancient Greek, excellent written and oral communication skills in English, and the ability to promote the collections to a wide range of audiences are essential.

As one of the world’s great libraries, our duty is to preserve the nation’s intellectual memory for the future and make it available to all for research, inspiration and enjoyment. At present, we have well over 170 million items, in most known languages, with three million new items added every year. We have manuscripts, maps, newspapers, magazines, prints and drawings, music scores, and patents. We make our collections and programmes available to all. We operate the world’s largest document delivery service providing millions of items a year to customers all over the world. What matters to us is that we preserve the national memory and enable knowledge to be created both now and in the future by anyone, anywhere.

In return, we offer a competitive salary and a number of excellent benefits. Our pension scheme is one of the most valuable benefits we offer, as our staff can become members of the Alpha Pension Scheme where the Library contributes a minimum of 26.6% (this may be higher dependant on grade. Another significant benefit the Library provides is the provision of a flexible working hours scheme which could allow you to work your hours flexibly over the week and to take up to 5 days flexi leave in a 3 month period. This is on top of 25 days holiday from entry and public and privilege holidays.

Closing date: 7 April 2024

Interview date: 29 April 2024

We are unable to provide sponsorship under the UK Skilled Worker visa for this role, as it does not meet the eligibility criteria required for this immigration route

Find out more here.

New Publication: ‘Staging the Ruler’s Body in Medieval Cultures: A Comparative Perspective’

Edited by Michele Bacci, Gohar Grigoryan, Manuela Studer-Karlen

The fifteen studies gathered in the book reflect on the mise-en-scène and representational devices of medieval rulers’ bodily appearances in Angevin, Aragonese, Armenian, Byzantine, Carolingian, English, Ethiopian, Georgian, Leonese, Sasanian and Sienese traditions.

This book explores the viewing and sensorial contexts in which the bodies of kings and queens were involved in the premodern societies of Europe, Asia, and Africa, relying on a methodology that aims to overcoming the traditional boundaries between material studies, art history, political theory, and Repräsentationsgeschichte. More specifically, it investigates the multiple ways in which the ruler’s physical appearance was apprehended and invested with visual, metaphorical, and emotional associations, as well as the dynamics whereby such mise-en-scène devices either were inspired by or worked as sources of inspiration for textual and pictorial representations of royalty. The outcome is a multifaced analysis of the multiple, imaginative, and terribly ambiguous ways in which, in past societies, the notion of a God-driven, eternal, and transpersonal royal power came to be associated with the material bodies of kings and queens, and of the impressive efforts made, in different cultures, to elude the conundrum of the latter’s weakness, transitoriness, and individual distinctiveness.

Editor Biographies

Michele Bacci is Professor of Medieval Art History at Fribourg University, Switzerland, and a member of the Academia Europaea. His research has been focused on artistic interactions in the Medieval Mediterranean and beyond, and the history of cult-objects and holy sites from a phenomenological-comparative viewpoint. He is the author of numerous publications, including Il pennello dell’Evangelista (1998), The Many Faces of Christ (2014), the Mystic Cave (2017), and Veneto-Byzantine Artistic Interactions (2021).
Gohar Grigoryan, Ph.D. (2017), University of Fribourg, is currently senior researcher at the same university within an SNSF-funded project. She is the author of over two dozen peer-reviewed articles on medieval Armenian art and history and of an upcoming monograph on royal imagery in Cilician Armenia.
Manuela Studer-Karlen, Ph.D. (2010), University of Fribourg, is a SNSF Professor for Medieval Art at the University in Bern. She has published a monograph on late antique sarcophagi and recently her habilitation has been published with the title: “Christus Anapeson. Image and Liturgy”. Her research centres on the history of visual-cultural processes in late antiquity, the interactions among text, image and space in Byzantine churches, medieval Georgian art, and Gothic ivories.

Find out more about the book here.

CFP: ‘Embodied Preaching: Multisensorial Preaching Performances in Medieval Europe’, deadline 5 April 2024

The crucial importance of preaching in medieval Europe has long been acknowledged, not only for religious culture, but also for cultural, political and social history, art history and history of material culture. An interconnected pan-European phenomenon, to be effective preaching needed to be at the same time tailored to local tastes and conventions, shaping the message to the circumstances at hand. With the term “preaching” we understand the public performance of a speech believed to be divinely inspired and meant for religious and moral education. Most importantly, medieval preaching was not the static transfer of a text from preacher to audience: rather, it was an inherently dynamic and interactive activity, involving multiple actors through time and space, communicating religious knowledge within embodied and spatialized networks. The conference will focus on the multisensorial dimension of preaching, which goes beyond the content and style of the textual sermon, to include the personal appearance of the preacher, their voice and gestures (the “embodied” dimension), the material environment in which the preaching took place (the “embedded” dimension) and the use of “special effects” (such as sounds or fire) and objects as an integral part of the performance.

The role played by the material environment in which the preaching took place has received little attention, and mostly with reference to memory (Carruthers 1998, Bolzoni 2002). It has been pointed out that some late medieval religious leaders (such as Bernardino of Siena) referred in their speeches to specific elements of the material environment in which they were preaching (for example, artworks), presumably to help keep awake the attention of the audience and to “anchor” the teaching to material elements which could be seen by individuals on a daily basis. However, much remains to be done to understand whether and to what extent the specific material environment affected the overall experience of preaching (open vs closed space, specific environments such as churches, saint’s tombs, graveyards, squares and so on). Preachers operated amidst a visual network of objects and spaces, against a background of paintings, sculptures, and other images present within the same space where they performed, giving opportunity for the sermon to connect, contrast, or compete for attention. This also raises the question to what extent preachers adapted their preaching to the particular environment and planned the setting in which the preaching had to take place.

A further element that deserves to be considered is that, as an act of communication, preaching was not a one-way interaction: the audience, through their attitude, verbal and non-verbal reactions to the preaching played an active role which affected the experience both of the individuals gathered to listen and of the preacher. Based on this, we propose to approach preaching an interactive performance where multiple actors and multiple elements played a role. For this purpose, we will approach audiences using the notion of “socio-sensory environment”, and assuming the existence of specific sensoria depending on social, cultural and geographical factors. Preaching relied on the various senses to be properly understood and make a lasting impact: the oral and aural performance of the sermon took place within a visually accessible space, with the preacher using both voice and body (gestures, facial expressions) to convey a message. From the sermon text, listeners are often invited to fully employ their senses as well and to imagine themselves present at religiously significant moments: to see the scene before their eyes, to hear what was occurring, to smell, taste, and feel, their internal or imaginary senses giving rise for meditation and devotion. Meanwhile, the experiences of pleasant or unpleasant smells or feelings of cold, heat, or discomfort can also be investigated from a sensory perspective.

With a primary focus on Western Europe from the 12th to the 15th century, this conference aims to explore preaching in an innovative and holistic way, by considering the multisensorial dimension of the transmission and reception of the word of God in whichever form, verbal or non-verbal. By emphasising the range of activities aimed at communicating religious knowledge and devotional practice, and the multisensorial nature of such activities, this conference will explore new aspects of the multifaceted experience of medieval preaching.

We welcome abstracts for 20-minute papers in English. Scholars may address the topic with a broad approach but always considering the role of all the senses in the performance and reception of preaching. Paper topics may include, but are by no means limited to:

The role played by objects in the experience of preaching: for example objects and artworks used by preachers, devotional or practical items or other objects, such as hand warmers, used by the audience
Unconventional ways of preaching reliant on the senses, for example through music or theatrical performances
The role played by the senses in the experience of preaching, including smell, taste, and the interior senses (such as thermoception or proprioception)
The link between preaching and art or architecture, including when preaching outside of the church
How preaching was experienced differently by different audiences, including audience responses and interactions during preaching
Sermons or preaching that encompass discussions of physicality, embodiment, or materiality

Please send a title and abstract of no longer than 300 words, together with a short CV and personal data (max. 300 words), to the following emails: zuleika.murat@unipd.it; pieterhendrik.boonstra@unipd.it; micol.long@unipd.it

The language of the conference is English. More information can be found here.

Deadline: 5 April 2024. Notifications of acceptance will be given by 26 April 2024.

Selected papers will be invited for publication in a collective volume.

This conference is organised by the ERC research project SenSArt – The Sensuous Appeal of the Holy. Sensory Agency of Sacred Art and Somatised Spiritual Experiences in Medieval Europe (12th-15th century), Grant Agreement nr. 950248, PI Zuleika Murat, Università degli Studi di Padova (https://sensartproject.eu/).

Organising Committee:

Zuleika Murat (Associate Professor, Università degli Studi di Padova)
Pieter Boonstra (Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Università degli Studi di Padova)
Micol Long (Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Università degli Studi di Padova)

‘Afterlives: Reusing the Past’ – A Day of Short Papers to celebrate the Life of Jill Franklin, Tuesday 30 April 2024

Hosted by the Society of Antiquaries, BAA, and CRSBI
Location: Society of Antiquaries, Tuesday 30 April 2024
Tickets: £15 (use this link to register)
Places are free to students, but students must first register by sending an email to conferences@thebaa.org

Jill Franklin died in October 2023, after the cancer she had lived with for many years returned. She was responsible for the catalogue of paintings in the collections of the Society of Antiquaries (with Pamela Tudor-Craig and Bernard Nurse), was the Norfolk fieldworker for the CRSBI, and was a council member of the BAA. Jill had a lifelong interest in the architecture and architectural sculpture of the 11th and 12th centuries and a particular interest in Augustinian canons and their churches. This day is in celebration of her life.

10.00-10.30 – Registration and Coffee

SESSION 1: 10.30-12.30

Bob Allies, Something in the air: the poetics and pragmatics of the pre-existing

A reflection on how, over the course of the last forty years, an appreciation of the potential of the pre-existing has consistently informed and shaped the work of our practice, together with some observations on the extent to which the climate emergency is now provoking a fundamental shift in the architectural profession’s attitude towards the recycling of materials and the reuse of buildings.

Eric Fernie, Enlarging English Medieval Great Churches

A common feature of English medieval great churches, especially cathedrals built in the Norman period, is the later rebuilding and enlarging of their eastern parts, with examples ranging from Canterbury to Ely and York. The purpose of the paper is to ask what this tells us about the financial resources needed to pay for the work, whether there was an increase in the power of the patrons or because of a wider increase in the size of the economy.

Nicola Coldstream, A village that moved: the early adventures of Ascott-under-Wychwood, Oxfordshire

A late Romanesque capital built into an eighteenth-century gateway is among the few surviving remains of the early village site of Ascott-under-Wychwood in Oxfordshire. This paper discusses the original location of the capital and considers reasons why the village was moved.

John McNeill, A Norman Doric Cloister in the Aeolian Islands

The abbey of San Bartolommeo on Lipari was founded before 1088 by Roger I, count of Sicily, occupying an ancient Greek walled enclosure above the most important harbour in the Aeolian islands. Despite its replacement in the 16th century, the monastic church can be shown to have been aisleless and cruciform. To its south is the residue of a cloister made up, for the most part, of cut-down Doric columns and capitals. Usually dated to the 1130s, when its abbot was granted the title of bishop and San Bartolommeo became a monastic cathedral, the cloister seems more likely to date from the late 11th century, and to have formed a part of the original monastic complex. As a spolia curiosity off the north coast of Sicily, it is without rival.

David Robinson, The Augustinian Canons in the Twelfth Century: Reflections on an Architectural Identity

Our friend and much-missed colleague, Jill Franklin, devoted considerable energy to the occurrence and meaning of the aisleless cruciform church in Romanesque Europe. Jill’s interest in this particular form of building began in earnest with her contextual study of the Augustinian cathedral priory at Carlisle, delivered at the BAA annual conference held in that city in 2001. From there, Jill went on to write a number of extremely thought-provoking papers considering the twelfth-century churches of the Augustinian canons in general. Indeed, for many years, and almost single-handedly, Jill sought to give the early canons something of an architectural voice. This paper will offer a review of Jill’s important findings, assessing her contribution in a marginally wider overview of Augustinian architecture in England and Wales.

Questions/Discussion

12.30 – 1.30: Lunch

SESSION 2: 1.30 – 3.15

Richard Halsey and Sandy Heslop, The Church of All Saints, West Acre (Norfolk)

The parish church of All Saints West Acre stands immediately east of the ruins of the gatehouse of the adjacent Augustinian priory of St Mary, suppressed at the Dissolution. Existing discussions of its architecture imply that All Saints is a medieval building restored or upgraded in the post-Reformation period. We propose instead that it is a new building of c.1637 constructed at the behest of Sir Edward Barkham in large part out of fragments of moulded stones, freestone rubble and flint taken from the demolished priory, the site of which he owned. Indeed, it is likely to have been designed deliberately to reuse available features. Its Laudian date (Laud was archbishop 1633-45) suggests the possibility that it deliberately harks back to pre-Reformation parish worship located within an aisle of the destroyed monastic church.

Christopher Wilson, Salvage from a Mighty Wreck: A Clearstorey Window from Vale Royal Abbey, Cheshire

Not hitherto recognised as an instance of the post-Suppression salvage of monastic fabric is some incongruously ambitious stonework incorporated into the exterior of the parish church of c. 1500 at Northwich, 4 km from the site of Vale Royal Abbey. Begun in 1277 by Edward I, Vale Royal’s church was by far the largest built for the Cistercian Order in England, and work surged ahead until 1290, when Edward suddenly withdrew his support. In 1353 a new chapter opened under the patronage of Edward Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester (the Black Prince). In June 1359 he and the abbey contracted with a master mason for a French-style circuit of chapels whose plan was partly uncovered by excavation in 1958. Two years later a hurricane blew down the entire central vessel of the nave. What happened after the completion of the radiating chapels has always been unclear, but the evidence of the Northwich stonework indicates that the choir was completed in fine style. The only documented fact about the choir, generated by the famous heraldic dispute between Sir Robert Grosvenor and the Scropes of Masham, is that the Grosvenor arms decorated its interior. Joining up the available dots outlines a collaborative project due to the Prince of Wales (and, from 1363, of Aquitaine) and the Cheshire gentry comrades who played a major role in the dramatic expansion of English territory in south-west France during the 1350s.

Ron Baxter, The Early Days of the Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture

Officially the Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture began in 1988 when George Zarnecki and Neil Stratford approached the British Academy and asked for a grant to start up a project to record all the stone sculpture produced between 1066 and 1200. In fact, George had clearly been thinking about it for several years, and contacted Jill Franklin much earlier than this, as a kind of pilot study. This talk will give a brief history of the early days of the Corpus with special reference to Jill’s work in Norfolk.

Richard Plant, Anglo-Saxon Roods in Romanesque Contexts

The survival of pre-Conquest sculpture as part of the fabric of later churches in England is peculiar. Apart from attesting the long-standing tradition of stone sculpture in the Atlantic Islands the re-setting of images of the Crucifixion in later walling raises a number of questions about how they would have been understood and used by later viewers. This paper will look at the instance in Langford in Oxfordshire, and especially at Romsey in Hampshire, where the re-used crucifix is placed next to the entrance from the cloister into the church, suggesting a particular devotional focus on this earlier image.

Stephen Heywood, ‘Let’s Pretend!’ The decoration of the north transept and the reused throne at Norwich Cathedral

Jill worked on the architectural sculpture of Norwich Cathedral and successfully analysed the meaning and place of the extraordinarily accomplished sculpture. This short paper touches on the earlier or at least less skilled sculpture and the deliberate archaising in reusing forms believed to be indicative of pre conquest date and the believed actual re use of St Felix’s throne recovered from Elmham which achieved relic status.

Questions/Discussion

3.15 – 3.45 Tea

SESSION 3: 3.45 – 5.00

Lindy Grant, ‘Lapides pretiosi omnes muri tui’: Abbot Suger, buried capitals, and the laying of foundation stones

Recent excavations under the north-west tower at the Abbey of Saint-Denis have brought to light a set of capitals used as rubble in the foundations, adding to the capitals already extracted and now in the town museum. They are figural and narrative, if rustic in handling. Where were these capitals from, and by how long do they predate Suger’s new west front? I will suggest that they have parallels with work in Norman contexts in the late 11^th century, including the figured archivolt panels from Montivilliers, so brilliantly discussed by Jill in her paper for the British Archaeological Association Rouen Conference. But how should we read the burial of these capitals in Suger’s west front: as rejection of old-fashioned sculpture, or as precious stones providing a solid foundation – that the house of the lord should be ‘bene fundata…supra firmam petram’, as the liturgy for the consecration of an altar has it? And how widespread were liturgical ceremonies for the laying of foundation stones? Suger appears to have invented his own to lay the foundation stones of his new choir in 1140.

Agata Gomølka, Idolising stone: the case of the Konin pillar

The Roadside Pillar of Konin (Greater Poland) is one of the most original monuments of the Romanesque period. An inscription on the pillar proclaims its date, states it function, and names its patron. The pillar was one of the final commissions of the formidable royal fixer and castellan Piotr Włostowic (d. 1153). Piotr’s life and deeds, along with his extensive patronage of buildings and furnishings, were widely celebrated by contemporaries. The Konin pillar is the only surviving secular monument associated with Włostowic. Yet what is it? Is it a reused pagan monolith? This has been the consensus among most scholars. Or is it something else? Is it a tribute to a very tradition of spolia? This paper will seek to offer some answers.

Tessa Garton and Rose Walker, Andalusi ivories and metalwork re-imagined in the North for female saints

The re-use of Islamic ivory caskets decorated with courtly imagery as containers for the relics of Christian saints in northern Spain has been interpreted both as triumphalist and as a recognition of the aesthetic qualities of Islamic culture. The re-use of similar imagery on capitals in the sanctuaries of Romanesque churches suggests the assimilation and re-interpretation of this imagery for a Christian context. Likewise, metal objects were sometimes repurposed as reliquaries. Within church treasuries, as at Oviedo, they could even inspire the revival of a cult.

Paul Williamson, Late Antique ivory carvings, their reuse and afterlife

The ivory carvings of Late Antiquity and the Early Byzantine period owe their survival to reuse and transformation. Some secular carvings – including several consular diptychs – were incorporated into Christian settings such as reliquaries and pulpits, while others provided the raw materials for recarving in the Carolingian and later periods. This paper will explore the phenomenon of ivory reuse with a selection of case studies, some well-known, others less so.

Questions/Discussion

5.00 – Drinks

Lecture: Murray Seminar at Birkbeck: ‘Not Quite 3D: Representing Architecture in the Early Middle Ages’ with Karl Kinsella (Wed 20 March 2024, 5pm-6.30pm GMT)

In this lecture, Dr Karl Kinsella relates how, in 1971 in Bordeaux, a mosaic showing a plan and elevation was uncovered during a flurry of archaeological excavation. The mosaic was likely made in the fifth century and shows the Holy Sepulchre’s rotunda and basilica in stark black tiles set against plain white plaster. We are left with the impression of a diagram writ large (2m in height). The early date of the mosaic is surprising, and suggests that diagrams of the Holy Sepulchre were transmitted around Europe not long after the buildings were completed in the fourth century. This talk considers what the mosaic can tell us about the early development of architectural representation and the strategies needed to understand the complex figures they present to the modern reader. These strategies can offer insights into the evolution of architectural representation over the course of the early Middle Ages.

In-person and live-streamed versions are posted separately on Eventbrite. Please book for one only.

Eventbrite link to Karl Kinsella’s Murray Seminar at Birkbeck

Eventbrite link to LIVESTREAM of Karl Kinsella’s Murray Seminar at Birkbeck

CFP: ‘Scaling Conques – The Frames of Reference in Understanding an ‘Abbey in a Shell’, deadline 31 March 2024

10 October 2024, Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History, Rome
Organized by Tanja Michalsky and Adrian Bremenkamp

This conclusive conference of the project “Conques in the Global World. Transferring Knowledge: From Material to Immaterial Heritage” aims at reviewing the question implicit in the projects main title: How is the knowledge we generate about Conques conditioned by the frames of references we apply and what is the right scale of observation to answer our research questions? How does the choice of scale predetermine the results? Locating medieval Conques within a network of abbeys characterized by administrative, political or artistic relations; understanding Conques’ treasury as a means to manifest claims connecting the abbey to the major centers of Christianity; studying the long durée of Conques’ heritage within the broader framework of 19th century national heritage building as well as that of the 20th century tourism industry; analyzing the architecture of the abbey as a complex organism whose transformations are conditioned by the period eye of each historical phase – these are just four examples of “Scaling Conques”.

In continuity with the last conference highlighting interdisciplinary perspectives we would like to invite participants to reflect on the design of their individual research in order to understand what it means to position Conques in the Global World as well as in a timeframe ranging from the central middle ages until today. The call for papers is directed at researchers both from within the project as well as beyond, in order to present research results and to reflect on this outcome in dialogue with the broader scientific community working on Conques.

The conference will be held at the Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History, Rome on 10 October 2024. The project will cover the costs of accommodation, and part of the travel expenses. The conference languages are English, French and Italian.

Researchers wishing to contribute are invited to upload a proposal including a title, an abstract (ca. 300 words) and a short CV (max. 2 pages) as a single PDF on the following platform until March 31, 2024: https://recruitment.biblhertz.it

This workshop is organized as a part of the project “Conques in the Global World. Transferring Knowledge: From Material to Immaterial Heritage” (H2020_ MSCA-RISE 101007770)

Find out more on the Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History website.

New Publication: ‘Loci Sepulcrales: Places of memory and burial in the Middle Ages’

Edited by Carla Varela Fernandes, Catarina Fernandes Barreira, João Luís Inglês Fontes, Maria Joao Branco, Mario Farelo

Throughout the Middle Ages, the choice of a particular burial place remains a fundamental question in someone’s live.

Assembling the contributions of twenty-two authors, this volume aims at revisiting the question of the choice of burial sites throughout the Middle Ages, in their political, emotional, and devotional dimensions, across a wide chronology and in a vast palette of different social statuses. The choice of a burial site inevitably reflets very important statements, made by the living persons, not only regarding what they wished the memory of their passage on Earth to be, but equally enlightening us on what their concern for the future of their souls was and how it should be cared for, in the afterlife.

The first part of this volume is devoted to royal pantheons, considering their development and relevance in the construction of royal legitimacy. Kings and Queens were not the only ones considering their lineage and personal memory: noblemen, ecclesiastics, rich tradesmen, and their wives and daughters, were also involved in a world of changing tendencies, which are dealt with in the second part of the book. The third and last part looks at the strategies and interconnection between building a burial site and constructing collective memories, whether in stone or in writing through the performing influence of rituals, images, or symbols.

This book proposes, therefore a whole new set of approaches on the subject, addressed either in interdisciplinary and all-around syntheses or via analysis of specific case-studies, looking at panteons and other burial sites as the important witnesses of the lives, emotions, and devotions of the medieval society they served.

Contributors to this volume are Xavier Barral i Altet, Catarina Fernandes Barreira, Thiago José Borges, Maria Helena Cruz Coelho, Frederica Cosenza, Antonio Pio de Cosmo, Lorenzo Curatella, Mário Farelo, José Romón González de la Cal, Linsy Grant, Laurent Hablot, Orlindo Jorge, Emma Lano Martínez, Christian de Mérindol, Sonia Morales Cano, Jorge Morín Pablos, Pedro Redol, Martina Saltamacchia, Isabel Sánchez Ramos, Lydwine Scordia, Rosa Smurra and Christian Steer.

Find out more about the book here.

Job: Assistant Professor in Global History of Art, Trinity College Dublin, deadline 4 April 2024

The School of Histories and Humanities at Trinity College Dublin seeks to appoint an Assistant Professor in Global History of Art, based in the Department of History of Art and Architecture. Candidates can have expertise in any period from early modern to contemporary but, preferably, their research will encompass global histories of art. Candidates must demonstrate an ability to incorporate collections in Ireland in their teaching and research. It is also desirable that candidates should have experience of working with museum collections. The primary purpose of this post is to contribute to teaching and research in history of art and to undertake administrative activities in the Department and School. The successful applicant will have a proven ability or evidence of potential to establish a strong record of research and publication in the history of art and will be expected to contribute to both undergraduate and postgraduate teaching in this field and to interdisciplinary curricular teaching, supervision, and mentoring.

Post status: 5 Year Fixed-Term; Tenure Track Contract

Salary: Appointment will be made on the Lecturer Salary Scale (109BN) commensurate with qualifications / experience and in line with Public Sector Pay Policy [€39,469 –€95,441 per annum] https://www.tcd.ie/hr/assets/pdf/monthly-academic.pdf

Hours of Work: Hours of work for academic staff are those as prescribed under Public Service Agreements.

The successful candidate will be expected to take up post on 1 August 2024 or as soon thereafter as possible.

Applications will only be accepted through e-Recruitment and should include:

Cover Letter (1 x A4 page)
Full Curriculum Vitae to include your list of publications and the names and contact details of 3 referees (including email addresses).
Research plan (summarising research to be carried out in the next two years – maximum of 2 x A4 pages).
Teaching statement (summarising teaching experience and approach – maximum of 2 x A4 pages).
Outline of a semester-long research-based module suitable for students at senior undergraduate (4th year) or Masters level (maximum of 2 x A4 pages).

Please Note:

Candidates who do not address the application requirements above will not be considered at the short list stage.
Candidates should note that the interview process for this appointment will include the delivery of a presentation.

Informal enquiries about this post should be made to Prof Timothy Stott stottt@tcd.ie

Application queries about this post, please email Frédérique Roy-Boulet, Recruitment Partner at E: royboulf@tcd.ie and include the Competition ID number in the subject heading.

More details can be found via the link below. Search under School of Histories and Humanities: https://www.tcd.ie/hr/vacancies/

CFP: ‘The Jeweled Materiality of Late Antique/Early Medieval Objects and Texts From Cloisonné to Stained Glass to Experimental Poetry (4th–9th Centuries)’, deadline 30 April 2024

International conference, November 11–12, 2024
Center for Early Medieval Studies, Masaryk University, Brno
Organizers: Alberto Virdis, Marie Okáčová

The interface among the material, visual, and literary cultures of the long late antiquity and beyond has become a topic of scholarly interest ever since the publication of the seminal 1989 book The Jeweled Style by Michael Roberts. The visual–verbal dialectics of this period of geopolitical and cultural transformation, as manifested in various instances of spoliation, patterns of fragmentation, and a preoccupation with (exquisite) detail in different cultural media, were subsequently studied especially by Jaś Elsner and Jesús Hernández Lobato. The topical relevance of Roberts’ original concept more than 30 years after its invention is clear from, among other scholarly endeavors, the recent edited volume A Late Antique Poetics? The Jeweled Style Revisited (2023), which offers numerous insightful contributions on the topic across different genres, regions, and temporal contexts.

Following this fruitful line of scholarly discourse, we wish to expand and collectively rethink the “cumulative aesthetics” of the long late antiquity ranging from the 4th to the 9th century by examining material artefacts and literary texts which are, in one way or another, rooted in what came to be called the “jeweled style”. The aim of the conference is to offer a shared interdisciplinary platform to study late antique aesthetic developments across different media and territories (esp. late Roman and Merovingian Gaul, the British Isles, the Italian peninsula, Hispania, West Asia, and Northern Africa). By bringing together specialists from different disciplines, including, but not limited to, art history, aesthetics, classical philology, and archaeology, we would like to consider complementary methodological perspectives on the phenomenon of jeweled aesthetics in late antique art and beyond with a particular focus on the following topics:

the birth of so-called mosaic windows composed of fragmented quarries of colored glass, a direct ancestor of medieval stained-glass windows;
the image-fragmentation processes at work in parietal mosaics and opus sectile;
the development and diffusion of objects made in the cloisonné style featuring precious gems, glass, and enamels;
the tradition of illuminated manuscripts featuring letters formed from animal figures, human forms, or “aniconic” motifs, typical of Merovingian and Insular book painting but also existing in other contexts;
the “material” work with language (incl. stylistic features, genre mixing, etc.) in late antique authors such as Optatian, Ausonius, Sidonius Apollinaris, Venantius Fortunatus, Aldhelm of Malmesbury, Hrabanus Maurus, and Sedulius Scotus;
the phenomena of (not only) so-called Hisperic aesthetics, such as multi-mediality, conceptual ambiguity, and meta-textual/meta-visual self-referentiality, across different spheres of late antique/early medieval cultural production;
the applicability of the concept of the “jeweled style” and fragmented aesthetics to the artistic cultures of West Asia (from late Sasanian to early Islamic) and the respective material production (e.g. silverware, mosaics, textiles, architectural decoration).

The conference will be held under the auspices of the project “Fragmented Images. Exploring the Origins of Stained-Glass Art” (GA23-05243S) funded by the Czech Science Foundation.

Conference participants will have their travel expenses and accommodation costs fully or partially reimbursed.

Conference papers will be considered for publication in the Convivium Supplementum series, indexed in WoS and Scopus and published jointly by Masaryk University and Brepols. The deadline for submitting complete papers is 31 March 2025, and the issue will be published by the end of 2025.

Submit paper abstracts of about 300 words by 30 April 2024 to alberto.virdis@mail.muni.cz and marie.okacova@mail.muni.cz. Find out more here.

Acceptance notification will be sent by 15 May 2024.

New Publication: ‘Perception and Awareness: Artefacts and Imageries in Medieval European Jewish Cultures’

Edited by Katrin Kogman-Appel, Elisheva Baumgarten, Elisabeth Hollender, Ephraim Shoham-Steiner

What did the world look like for Jews living in medieval Europe? How did they perceive and make use of the elements of their daily life, from items on the street to religious iconography within holy spaces — in particular synagogues and at the exterior of churches — and profane elements from the home? And how did they experience the visual and material cultures of their non-Jewish neighbours?

These questions form the core of this volume, which explores pre-modern Jewish approaches to images and material objects from a variety of perspectives. From clothing to manuscripts, and from lighting devices to the understanding of the invisible, the chapters gathered together in this multifaceted volume combine analyses of images and artefacts together with in-depth analyses of texts to offer fresh insights into the visual cultures that informed the world of European Jews in the Middle Ages.

Editor Biographies:

Elisheva Baumgarten is a social historian of the Jews of medieval northern Europe at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Elisabeth Hollender is a Professor of Jewish Studies at the Goethe University Frankfurt specializing in medieval Jewish religious culture.
Katrin Kogman-Appel is a Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Münster with an expertise on medieval Jewish visual culture.
Ephraim Shoham-Steiner is a historian specializing in the History of Jews in Medieval Europe at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Beer Sheva

Find out more about the book here.