The 2010 Ford Lectures I: The Normans and empire

This year the Ford Lectures at the University of Oxford are being given by Prof. David Bates (UEA and Caen-Basse-Normandie) on the subject of ‘The Normans and Empire’. This series is named after James Ford who left a legacy to endow a lectureship in British history. Thankfully, the rules are flexible enough to encompass a large slice of European history courtesy of David Bates and the Normans. I hope to be able to attend all six and blog about them in due course.

Battle Conference 2008 report

It’s the day after the conference for five days before. The fact that I am exhausted, but more than content with life will tell the seasoned conference goers reading this that the 31st Battle Conference on Anglo-Norman studies was superb; the best conference I have been to in fact. I expected to hear some very well-argued papers; enjoy some stimulating conversation; and perhaps walk the battlefield at dusk, but I didn’t expect to play Jenga in the dark. More of that after giving you some idea of what was discussed.

IMC Leeds 2008 report

The International Medieval Congress 2008 will be memorable for two things in particular: rain and cloves. It was the wettest Leeds for a good few years and it did cut down on the opportunities for catching up and bumping into people on the grass. As for the cloves, more of them later.

Looking forward to Battle 2008

A couple of posts ago, I mentioned that I was also looking forward to attending the Battle conference on Anglo-Norman studies, which will be held later this month. Rumour has it that this will be the last time for a while that Pyke House (bordering the site of the actual Battle of ‘Hastings’ will host the conference, so it looks like the conference may be moving into a new era.

Looking forward to … IMC 2008

The teaching, marking and exams boards are all done for the year and it is time for me to switch my brain back to research mode for the next three months. Helping me to do this in the coming weeks is a couple of conferences: the International Medieval Congress held, as always at Leeds, and the Battle Conference on Anglo-Norman Studies held, unsurprisingly at Battle in East Sussex. More of that one later, but here’s what I’m looking forward to at Leeds.