Into the wilderness January 29, 2008
Posted by gesta in Academia, Boundaries, Medieval.Tags: Boundaries, chronicles, landscape, monasticism, Norman, Orderic Vitalis, wildnerness
6 comments
What is a wilderness? How did medieval chroniclers and other writers describe it? What is the significance of the wilderness? These and other questions were the subject of my most recent paper at a workshop on monasticism held to launch three books (mine and two of my colleagues’). (more…)
Gobbets, gobbets, gobbets January 9, 2008
Posted by gesta in Academia, Medieval.Tags: Norman, teaching
11 comments
No, this isn’t a cross between Gollum and a turkey but an exercise that strikes the fear of God into most third-year historians. Mention the word ‘gobbets’ and a good proportion of them will curl up into a self-protecting ball and go very pale. At my current institution, it is gobbet time again. So, what on earth am I talking about? (more…)
