News Archive
2010 Annual Newsletter
View the 2010 Annual Newsletter here
Saims Essay prize
The SAIMS essay prize 2010-2011 was awarded to Matthew Hudson
Annual Lecture: William of Newburgh and the New Titus: Richard I and the Jews of York
The Annual Lecture of the Institute of Mediaeval Studies was delivered by Professor Nicholas Vincent on Wednesday 2nd March 2011.
Nicholas Vincent is Professor of Medieval History at the University of East Anglia. He has published several books and some fifty academic articles on various aspects of English and European history in the 12th and 13th centuries, having arrived at Norwich via Oxford, Cambridge, Paris and Canterbury. He made his name on a seminal study of cult and ritual at the court of Henry III and is is currently finishing an edition of the charters of the Plantagenet kings and queens from Henry II to King John.
2009-10 Donald Bullough Fellowship
The St Andrews Institute of Medieval Studies has appointed Dr Ross Balzaretti as the Donald Bullough Fellow for 2010-11
Dr Ross Balzaretti has taught History at the University of Nottingham since 1990, where he is currently Associate Professor. His most recent book is Narrative and History in the Early Medieval West, edited with Elizabeth Tyler (York). He has published widely in the fields of early medieval gender and sexuality, and was editor of Gender & History between 2004 and 2010. At St Andrews, he will be writing a short book, Liguria in the Early Middle Ages, to be published by Duckworth in a new series edited by Prof. Ian Wood. This will draw together written, archaeological and ecological sources. The current chapter titles are: 1. Ligurian Landscapes; 2. Archaeological approaches; 3. Written Sources and political change; 4. Case Study I: Genoa; 5. Case Study II: Vara Valley; 6. Liguria and Europe. He has been working on the history of Liguria since 1994, and a book of interdisciplinary essays Ligurian Landscapes (edited with Mark Pearce and Charles Watkins) was published by Accordia in 2004, in which he has an essay ‘The History of the Countryside in sixteenth-century Varese Ligure’. He will also be putting the final touches to his book on The Lands of St Ambrose: Monks and Society in Early Medieval Milan (Brepols).
2009 Annual Newsletter
View the 2009 Annual Newsletter here
Saims Essay prize
The SAIMS essay prize 2009-2010 was awarded to Chantal Gustaw
Professor Michael Clanchy (FBA) Institute of Historical Research, University of London
Professor Clanchy held two workshops, Wednesday 17th March 2010 entitled "From Memory to Written Record": Abelard and his masters, Anselm of Laon and William of Champeaux. Thursday 18th March 2010 entitled Latin charters before 1300 conserved at St Andrews.
Annual Lecture: Ordinary Beauty in the Middle Ages
Professor Carruthers is Erich Maria Remarque Professor of Literature and Professor of English at New York University. She is author of several seminal works, including 'The Craft of Thought: Meditation, Rhetoric and the Making of Images 400-1200' (Cambridge, 1998). While she was in St Andrews Professor Carruthers led a workshop on her most famous work, 'The Book of Memory' (Cambridge, 1990. second edition 2008)
Workshop led by Professor Julia Smith
Professor Julia Smith held a workshop entitled 'Contexts for Early Medieval Hagiography', on Wednesday 9th December 2009.
The Quality of Scottish Mercy: Royal Letters of Remission in Scotland, c.1100- c.1600.
Professor Cynthia Neville, the 2009 Bullough Fellow at SAIMS, held a workshop entitled The Quality of Scottish Mercy: Royal Letters of Remission in Scotland, c.1100-c.1600.
2009-10 Donald Bullough Fellowship
The St Andrews Institute of Medieval Studies has appointed Dr Cynthia Neville as the Donald Bullough Fellow for 2009-10
Dr Cynthia Neville, George Munro Professor of History at Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada, will be a visiting fellow in the Department of Mediaeval History from September to December 2009. She has published extensively on various aspects of the legal and social history of the Anglo-Scottish border lands in the later Middle Ages and, more recently, on the social and cultural encounter between Gaels and Europeans in Scotland in the period between 1100 and 1400. She is the author of two books: Violence,Custom and Law: The Anglo-Scottish Border Lands in the Later Middle Ages (Edinburgh University Press, 1998) and Native Lordship in Medieval Scotland: The Earldoms of Strathearn and Lennox, c.1140-1365 (Four Courts Press, 2005). A third, entitled Land, Law and People in Medieval Scotland will be published by Edinburgh University Press in the fall of 2009. While in St Andrews she will be completing work on Volume Four of the Regesta Regum Scottorum: The Acts of Alexander III, the Guardians and John, 1249-1306 (forthcoming from EUP in 2010, with Alan Young) and on a comprehensive study of pardon in Scotland between 1100 and 1603.
Barbara Crawford Elected President
Barbara has recently been elected President of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland for a three year term.
This is Scotland's oldest antiquarian society, founded in 1780, and has a membership of over 3500 Fellows.
SAIMS In The News
On 18th December - the day the government published the result of its audit of university research culture in the UK - the Times Higher Education newspaper gave a prominent slot to our very own rock band, Dry Island Buffalo Jump, several of whose members met through the Institute. As the THE put it, quoting Chris Jones, 'The Institute makes St Andrews a real kick-ass place to study Mediaeval History, Culture and Literatures'.
The band was gifted it's unusual name by fellow SAIMS member Alex Woolf who had dreamed of a band of that name during his student years. The band played and were interviewed on Radio Scotland on March 17th.
Professor Robert Bartlett has been awarded a Leverhulme major research fellowship.
Dr Simon MacLean has been awarded a prestigious prize by the Leverhulme Trust.
Alex Woolf wins Scottish History Book of the Year Award.
Dr Bettina Bildhauer has been awarded the Philip Leverhulme Prize, a prestigious prize by the Leverhulme Trust. She will be working on the German late Middle Ages and the way they are perceived in modernity.