This conference, organized by IS-LE COST Action (CA18129) Islamic Legacy: Narratives East, West, South, North of the Mediterranean (1350-1750), aims to bring together scholars who work on the perception of Islam in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe.
The image of Islam in Europe was usually studied from a Christian-Western point of view, and without a longue durée approach. The aim of this workshop is to create a methodological framework for studying this topic, comparing different case studies through time and space, from the Middle Ages to the end of the Early Modern period, from Iberia to the Balkans, from the Christian and non-Christian point of view. We would like to map this game of perceptions between image and self-image, between identity and representation, breaking with the stereotypes and preestablished ideas and proposing new paths of analysis.
Scholars who have been working on these topics and have material related to them are invited to submit a proposal for consideration.
The themes may include, but are not limited to: – The Muslim as a literary and historical character. – Race, religion, and cultural stereotypes. Methodological considerations. – Images and self-images of Islam at odds. – Key moments and key places of the construction of the image of Islam in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe.
Deadline and details: This call for papers is now open for those researchers who are interested to participate in the conference. They are invited to submit their proposals with a title, an abstract (no more than 300 words) and a brief bio (maximum of 15 lines) before March 10, 2022 to: Borja FRANCO LLOPIS (bfranco@geo.uned.es).
Reimbursement of expenses: Due to budgetary reasons, the number of reimbursed participants will be limited. CA1829 might be able to reimburse travel and accommodation expenses to a limited number of researchers not yet affiliated to the Action. Applications should be submitted along with the proposals.
More information: please, see https://is-le.eu/ Working Group: 1 Scientific Coordinators: Youssef El Alaoui (youssef.elalaoui@univ-rouen.fr) and Luis Bernabé (Luis.Bernabe@ua.es)
The History of Art and Architecture at DePaul University would like to announce the existence of its Jaroslav Folda Archive. The Folda Archive, housed in the department, is a collection of slides, photographs, books, and object files from the private library of Jaroslav Folda (Professor Emeritus, UNC, Chapel Hill). These materials relate to the study of the medieval world, with a particular emphasis on the Latin Kingdom and its affiliated states. Archive images and books will eventually be searchable online.
In the meantime, please contact Prof. Lisa Mahoney at FoldaArchive@depaul.edu for image and object file requests. The archive does not lend its materials, but they are available for in-person consultation to both DePaul faculty and students and to outside researchers.
Desks will open for this purpose in July of 2022, provided COVID protocols allow for it.
The Hungary in Medieval Europe Research Group at the Department of History, University of Debrecen, the Centre for the History of Society and Culture (CHSC) of the University of Coimbra and the Histoire et Cultures de l’Antiquité et du Moyen Âge (HiscAnt-MA) Laboratoire of the University of Lorraine, Nancy are pleased to announce that the interdisciplinary conference on Mercenaries and Crusaders (1202-1480s) will take place 22–24 June 2022, at the University of Debrecen, Hungary.
Crusades and mercenaries were inextricably intertwined throughout the Middle Ages. Mercenaries were employed in and against crusading armies in all major theatres of war from the Middle East to Poland, particularly between 1202 (the siege of Zara/Zadar) and the 1480s (King Matthias Corvinus’ anti-Ottoman ventures). The history of crusades coincides with that of medieval mercenaries. Medieval mercenaries were the only soldiers for and against whom crusades were organised and conducted in the name of the Lord. To bring forward just a few examples, several popes from Innocent VI to Gregory XII tried to find a way out of the predicament caused by the mercenaries in France and Italy. Captains like Sir John Hawkwood or Arnaud de Cervole were often either excommunicated or recruited in the crusading enterprises in the 1360s. Amadeus VI, the Green Count of Savoy employed mercenaries in his crusade of Gallipoli. The Teutonic order recruited mercenaries from Bohemia, Silesia, and even from the West.
The organisers encourage thematic panels, but individual papers may also be submitted. Each paper – in a panel or independently – will be of a duration of 20 minutes. Panels preferably consisting of three to four papers should ideally include a brief 5-minute introductory presentation of their theme and rationale. All sessions will be followed by a brief discussion.
The conference does not have a specific theme, however, the organisers welcome panels and individual papers that fall under the following topics:
We are, however, open to any variations of the general theme.
All interested lecturers, researchers, independent scholars and PhD-students are invited to submit an abstract via the contact form below.
Abstracts for individual papers should not exceed 400 words, while abstracts for papers that are part of a panel should be up to 300 words each. Additionally, panel proposals should also be accompanied by an abstract of up to 400 words on the general theme of the panel, explaining how the papers are interconnected and how they contribute to the theme. The latter is to be submitted by the panel leader only, i.e. the person taking the initiative to organise the panel.
The working languages of the conference are English, French and German.
The extended deadline for submission of proposals is 31 January 2022..
All panel and individual paper proposals will be examined by an international advisory board that will be appointed by the three institutions (Debrecen, Nancy, and Coimbra). The selection process is double blind, following the established academic practice for peer review. The Organising Committee will announce the results of the selection process by 28 February 2022.
The organisers will provide accommodation, light lunch and coffee breaks between the conference sessions.
The Organising Committee
Prof. Attila Bárány (Debrecen)
Prof. José Pedro Paiva (Coimbra)
Prof. Guy Vottéro (Nancy)
Tamás Ölbei (Nancy-Debrecen)
Joao Nisa (Coimbra)
https://mercenariesandcrusaders.com/?page_id=51
ARABIC POETRY IN THE CAIRO GENIZAH is seeking abstracts for our workshop:
History and Anthropology Through Literature: APPROACHES AND METHODOLOGIES TO THE STUDY OF MEDIEVAL AND MODERN TEXTS AND MANUSCRIPTS
15th of July 2022 @ Trinity College Dublin, Ireland
The Cairo Genizah is a treasure trove of medieval and early-modern manuscripts stored away in Egypt’s Ben Ezra Synagogue over nearly a thousand years. All manner of written texts, from lost works of Jewish literary legend to the mundane ephemera of everyday life have been found there. Until recently, however, there has been comparatively little focus on the Arabic literary manuscripts of the Genizah, particularly its poetry. These fragments of literary history are fascinating insights into the multicultural Cairo cosmopolis, demonstrating a rich cultural exchange through the literature, as well as their Hebrew-Arabic transcriptions. But the study of these texts poses challenges in understanding Jewish life and Jewish-Arabic relations in Islamic lands. On the one hand, it seems self-evident that Arabic poetry had a tremendous influence on the culture of the Jews of the Genizah world, as so many Arabic poems are found in the Genizah. But on the other hand, some manuscripts contain just small excerpts from much larger or epic Arabic poetical works. To what extent can we say this is an instance of artistic exchange? Or perhaps it is the case that such excerpts become adages, common currency of Cairene culture? How do we investigate the nuances of pre-modern manuscripts in such a cosmopolitan atmosphere, whilst maintaining authentic translation and linguistic analysis? How might the study of such texts – their creation, their copying, their circulation, and their reuse – shed light on the Arabic and Jewish communities, their communal interrelations and shared experience of cultural life?
This one-day workshop seeks to bring together scholars of various disciplines, including, but not limited to, manuscript sciences, history, anthropology, literary criticism, philosophy, and sociology for an exciting workshop on emerging approaches and challenges to the investigation of history, sociology, and anthropology though pre-modern literature and its manuscripts.
If you would be interested in taking part and giving a paper, then please send us an abstract of 300-800 words, with your approach to the workshop theme. Abstracts related to the following topics are particularly encouraged to apply:
Please submit two documents, an Abstract with CV by February 1st 2022 with the subject ‘APCG Abstract Submission’ to:
Ben Outhwaite: bmo10@cam.ac.uk and Mohamed Ahmed: ahmedm4@tcd.ie
Authors will be notified by March 1st 2022. Successful candidates will receive a bursary toward their travel costs and accommodation for two nights. Should you wish to participate online, please let us know in your submission email.
For more information, please contact Raymond Davidson: rdavidso@tcd.ie
This workshop is part of a project that has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant agreement No. 851411)
Military Orders VIII: In a Wider World
Nottingham Trent University (online) 8-16 September 2022
Call for Papers
This online conference encourages discussion on the military orders’ interactions with their broader environment whether political, spiritual, or economic etc. It also provides a forum for those wishing to pioneer new methodologies or to ask fundamentally new questions about either the military orders or the crusading movement in general. Key topics for discussion include:
§ The military orders’ place in the broader monastic world
§ cross-cultural dimensions
§ their activities beyond the cloister
(i.e. in courtly, commercial, or diplomatic contexts)
§ their broader significance both within Western Christendom and globally
§ their role in driving social, economic or technological change
§ 20th-21st century deployments of their memory
§ their theological ideas (and their origins)
§ new methodologies (esp. digital and interdisciplinary) and sources
Submission deadline: 1 March 2022 / Email: militaryorders8@gmail.com
Structure
This will be an online conference with a distinctive structure. Rather than giving their papers live, speakers will be invited to submit a video recording of their papers several months in advance (which can consist of them solely speaking to camera accompanied, should they wish, by a presentation). Delegates joining the conference will be invited to complete an online sign-up following which they will be given access to the recorded presentations, several weeks prior to the commencement of the conference, which they can then watch at their leisure. The live conference itself in September will consist primarily of daily 2hr discussion panels, each focused on specific clusters of papers, during which delegates can pose questions to the speakers via a mediator who will also lead a broader discussion on the questions raised by this cluster of papers. There will also be a single live plenary lecture on the first day of the conference.
The provisional timetable is as follows:
Instructions for speakers
If you would like to apply to contribute a recorded paper to this conference then in the first instance please submit a title + 250-word abstract for your proposed talk by 1 March 2022. This should be emailed to the dedicated conference mailbox: militaryorders8@gmail.com. We will aim to give your our decision on your paper proposal soon afterwards, giving you time to complete your recorded paper over the following months.
Instructions for delegates
Whether you wish to give a paper or just to attend, you will be prompted by email to complete an online registration form which will give you access to an online platform containing the recorded lectures as well as the timetable and other conference details (to be circulated in April-May). We do not intend to levy any registration charge for attending this conference. If you are not already on the Military Orders VIII mailing list then please email us at the above address and we will add your name and contact details.
As previously we will aim to publish the conference proceedings in an edited collection of essays.
The full PDF of the Call for Papers can be viewed here: Military Orders VIII cfp.pdf
On 30 June-1 July the SSCLE held its first online Postgraduate/Early Career conference, hosted by Royal Holloway, University of London. Over 240 people registered for the event, participants from 20 nationalities spoke in 16 panels and we had audience members from South America, the Middle East and Australia, as well as Russia, Europe and North America. The conference provided a fascinating platform for younger scholars to broadcast their research to their peers and to a wider audience, including the senior scholars who chaired the sessions. The chronological, thematic and geographical range of the papers was similarly huge – a testimony to the energy and diversity of the event; for the full programme see here. Gordon Reynolds (University of Edinburgh), winner of the Bernard Hamilton Prize for best Postgraduate/Early Career essay submitted to Crusades opened the event, chaired by Professor William C. Jordan (Princeton). Professor Nick Paul (Fordham University, New York), chaired by Professor Benjamin Z. Kedar (Hebrew University of Jerusalem), gave a closing plenary by way of showing a senior scholar’s own ‘work in progress’ and sending us on our way towards our next planned meeting, the postponed 10th quadrennial SSCLE conference, now scheduled for 27 June - 1 July 2022.
As announced in an email to members of the society, the following were the electoral results for the 2020 election, which was postponed to 2021 due to the ongoing COVID-19 Pandemic. The announcement material is appended here:
We are pleased to announce the results of elections for the new SSCLE committee. A total of 202 ballots were cast. Here are the results:
Jonathan Phillips received 95.7% of votes in affirmation of his election as President.
Nikolaos Chrissis received 63.8% of the votes for Secretary, with Judith Bronstein receiving 36.2%.
Danielle Park received 99% of votes in affirmation of her election as Bulletin Editor.
Simon Parsons received 99.5% of votes in affirmation of his election as Treasurer.
Kyle C. Lincoln received 99.7% of votes in affirmation of his election as Webmaster.
William Purkis and Anna Gutgarts received 54.1% of votes for Postgraduate Officer, Andrew Buck received 38.6%, and Dirceu Marchini Neto received 7.2%.
Dear fellow members of the SSCLE,
We are saddened to inform our members of the passing of Professor Jean Richard, just two weeks short of his centenary. Professor Richard, Emeritus Professor at the University of Dijon, was a founding member of our society and its first president. He numbers among the great modern scholars of the crusades and his outstanding career as a medievalist included many other interests, among these as an eminent scholar of Burgundian history. He was a member of several learned societies, among them the Institut de France, the Académie des sciences, arts et belles-lettres de Dijon, the Société éduenne des lettres, sciences et arts, the Regional Association for the Conservation of Heritage of Burgundy, and the National Society of Antiquaries of France. He was recipient of numerous prestigious awards including those of Knight of Arts and Letters, 1991, Knight of Military Merit, 1963, officer of the Legion of Honor in 2000 and Grand Officer of Merit in 2004.
Professor Richard was known and respected by our members and by students of the crusades in general for his eminence as a scholar of the crusader period and the Latin East. He was author of several major studies in the field, and his classic work, Royaume latin de Jérusalem (Paris, Presses universitaires de France, 1953) remains today among the finest syntheses on the subject of Frankish history and society. He was a warm and kindly man and will be sorely missed by our society.
We send our deepest condolences to his family.
Adrian Boas President SSCLE
It is with considerable sorrow that we learn of the death of our distinguished member, Professor Giles Constable. Professor Constable was an eminent historian of the Middle Ages, author of numerous publications including many major works on medieval religious and intellectual history. He was highly regarded by his colleagues, friends and students, both as a scholar and as a kind and caring man.
On behalf of our organization, I send our deepest condolences to his family.
Adrian Boas
President
SSCLE
It is with the deepest regret that I inform our members of the tragic and untimely death of our colleague, Professor Ronnie Ellenblum. Ronnie was a outstanding figure in Crusader studies, a brilliant, bold and original thinker whose contribution to the field is beyond measure. Ronnie was more than a colleague for me. He was a personal friend. I spent several years in close contact with him when we-co-directed the project that he had organized at the remarkable Templar fortress of Vadum Iacob. I regard that period as one of the high points in my own career as an archaeologist. The opportunity to observe how his mind worked, to exchange and develop ideas, and the pleasure of his company was one that I cherished. Of the many and significant contributions to the field of Crusader studies and to the other areas of his interest, to his colleagues and students, there is much to say and much will be said. For the moment let me just, on behalf of our members, express our deepest condolences to his family in their tragic loss and to the academic community as a whole in the loss of one of its brightest stars. He will be sadly missed.
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