Norman Edge IV: Local boundaries and national frontiers of the Norman world

I have returned from my progress of the North simultaneously refreshed and knackered. Never again will I do two papers in such a short space of time. Fortunately, the hours spent on trains and their associated stations were rewarded with two very good and thought-provoking conferences: the IMC at Leeds and also the Norman Edge at Lancaster. I’ll blog Leeds in due course, but herewith an account of the latest adventures on the Norman Edge, which also returns us to the notional them of this blog – boundaries.

The 2010 Ford Lectures VI: Empire? From beginning to end

By the time we reached lecture number VI, this series was proving extraordinarily productive, not only from the point of view of listening to what David Bates had to say, but also from the amount of work I seemed to be doing while drinking tea with friends. In a term that was a long, old slog, I was tremendously grateful. Lecture VI had been given a huge build up so we were all eagerly anticipating David’s conclusion.

Normans on the edge and an edgy Normanist.

Earlier this year, I wrote about a new project at Lancaster called ‘The Norman Edge‘ and briefly commented on its first symposium. Unfortunately, I missed the second one in the summer due to a combination of circumstances, but did make it to the third one on ‘Colonial mentalities’ last week. Not only was this a very interesting collection of high quality papers, but it left me feeling reinvigorated after a long term. There are very few occasions as an historian when you feel part of something much bigger than your own research, but the Norman Edge is really fostering an idea of scholarly community, and what is more, inclusive of people at all stages of their careers from MA students right the way through to distinguished professorial types.

Normans online

It has been a dreadfully long time since I last posted. There are no excuses, other than I needed a little space from something over the past month and blogging was the most accommodating. So, let’s start back again with something Norman, specifically some newish projects and outcomes that have made their way onto the internet recently.