‘Script, scribes and scholars: Anglo-Saxon influence in Charlemagne’s Francia’

Professor Joanna Story

(University of Leicester)

Friday 5 May 2023

17.00 BST – in person at the Sir Ambrose Fleming Lecture Theatre, Roberts Building, University College London, and Online

Please see below for directions to the Lecture Theatre

Booking for this event is now available via eventbrite

Abstract

On 25 December 795, Pope Hadrian I died in Rome. Exactly five years later, on 25 December 800, Charlemagne was acclaimed as emperor in St Peter’s basilica and his son, Charles, was crowned as king.

In the intervening years, a large inscription was erected over Hadrian’s tomb in the south transept of the basilica, made of black marble that had been sourced in Francia, with an inscription cut in epigraphic capitals, self-consciously recalling the script of the ancient empire. Its verses proclaim that ‘I, King Charles’ had commissioned the epitaph. In fact, its author was Alcuin, a scholar from York in the kingdom of Northumbria, who had been part of Charlemagne’s inner circle and tutor to his children.

Alcuin is the best known of many English travellers to Charlemagne’s Francia. This lecture uses evidence from contemporary manuscripts to explore influences from the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms on the intellectual culture of Francia in the eighth and earlier ninth centuries. Books written using ‘Insular scripts’ survive in great numbers in European libraries; many were exported in the eighth century or were written on the continent at that time by scribes who had been trained to write and make books in Insular style.

These manuscripts include some of the greatest treasures of medieval European heritage, but many more are utilitarian and much less elaborate. The scripts, decoration and methods of making these manuscripts, as well as their content and context of survival, have much to reveal about the movement of books, ideas and people, and about connectivity between England and Francia in the age of Charlemagne.

Speaker biography

Jo Story is Professor of Early Medieval History at the University of Leicester. Her research falls principally within the period 600–900CE, covering the early English kingdoms, Francia, and Italy and connections between them. The material culture of the written word is central to her work using manuscript and epigraphic evidence as well as sculpture, coinage and archaeology.

Jo was lead academic advisor for the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms exhibition at the British Library in 2018–19, and early medieval manuscripts are at the forefront of her research on connections between England and the Continent in the Age of Charlemagne. Jo’s latest book is Charlemagne and Rome. Alcuin and the Epitaph of Pope Hadrian I, published by OUP in June 2023.

How to reach the Ambrose Fleming Lecture Theatre at UCL

The Lecture Theatre is part of UCL’s Engineering Department which is part of the main UCL campus in Bloomsbury: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/engineering/about/getting-here

The Department is reached via the entry to UCL on Tavistock Place (opposite Malet Street and the large Waterstones booksellers).

Entry to the Lecture Theatre is via the building immediately on your left as you head through the gates. This is the Roberts Building and is signed on the door.

You will be asked to confirm the event you’re attending and then be let through the gates to the lecture theatre. The theatre is on the ground floor and is accessed by walking straight on from the gates. From there, the location of the theatre will signed, and there will be RHS staff on hand to guide you.

Booking for this event is now available via eventbrite

More on the Royal Historical Society’s events programme, 2023 >

HEADER IMAGE: Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bibliothek, Cod. Guelf. 496a Helmst., f.1r, c.800 Fulda: CC-BY-SA

** This Society’s publications can be found in the Royal Historical Society collections in the UCL History Library

IRISH RECORD COMMISSIONERS (1826-1901)

Irish Record Commissioners Publications

IRISH RECORD OFFICE (1861-1958)

Irish Record Office Publications

ROYAL SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES OF IRELAND **

Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland Publications

The Society was founded in 1849 in Kilkenny to preserve examine and illustrate all ancient monuments and memorials of the arts, manners and customs of the past, as connected with the antiquities, language, literature and history of Ireland.

Enquiries to: The Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland, 63 Merrion Square, Dublin 2, Ireland; tel: +353 1 676 1749; email: rsai@rsai.ie; http://www.rsai.ie.

“What happens when a Written Constitution is printed? A History across Boundaries”

Professor Linda Colley FBA
Tuesday 8 December 2020

Watch the Lecture

Abstract

From 1750 onwards, the rate at which new constitutions were generated in different countries and continents markedly increased. By the First World War, written and published political devices of this sort already existed in parts of every continent barring Antarctica.

Yet for all the magnitude and diversity of this transformation, the history of written constitutions is often rigidly compartmentalized. Although constitutions spread rapidly across the world’s oceans and land frontiers, they have usually been examined only in the context of individual countries. Although they have been – and occasionally and arguably still are – tools of empire, they are generally interpreted only in terms of the rise of nationalism.  And although these are authored texts, and many of those designing them in the past were engaged in multiple forms of writing, written constitutions have rarely attracted the attention of literary scholars. Instead, these documents have tended to become the province of legal experts and students of constitutional history, itself an increasingly unfashionable discipline in recent decades.

In this lecture, Linda Colley looks at the dense, vital and varied links between constitutions and print culture as a means of resurrecting and exploring some of the trans-national and trans-continental exchanges and discourses involved. She also considers the challenges posed to written constitutions – now embedded in all but three of the world’s countries – by the coming of a digital age.

Linda Colley is Shelby M.C.Davis 1958 Professor of History at Princeton University. She was born in the UK, and is a Fellow of the British Academy. She is the author of six books and holds seven honorary degrees. Her latest work, The Gun, the Ship and the Pen: Warfare, Constitutions and the Making of the Modern World, was published in March 2021.

Header Image Credit: Photo by Kim Ludbrook/EPA/Shutterstock (8600528a)A member of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party holds a copy of the constitution during a mass protests to the Union Buildings calling for President Zuma to step down, Pretoria, South Africa, 12 April 2017.

Music Credit, closing panel of lecture: 'Dance Of Lovers' Jay Man - OurMusicBox http://www.youtube.com/c/ourmusicbox

Closing date for next application round:

Monday 27 May 2024

Associate Fellowship is a new membership category for the RHS, launched in November 2021. It recognises the contribution made by a wide range of historical researchers and advocates for History across many sectors. Some Associate Fellows are historians working in Higher Education who have not yet reached the extent of publications, or equivalent, required to join the full Fellowship. Others contribute to History through their work in sectors such as heritage and museums, libraries and archives, teaching, publishing and broadcasting, or through private research.

All Associate Fellows are welcome to apply for full Fellowship as their careers develop and contributions continue, and we warmly encourage this. 

November 2021 sees the introduction of two new membership categories: in addition to Associate Fellowship we now also offer Postgraduate Membership. These two options replace the previous category of Early Career Membership. Read more about these two new ways to belong to the Society. From August 2022 we are extending the benefits available to Associate Fellows of the Society.

To apply for the RHS Associate Fellowship please use the Society’s Applications Portal, and select your chosen membership category.

Benefits of Associate Fellowship

• Print and online copies of the RHS academic journal, Transactions.
• Online access to the current issue and entire searchable back archive of Transactions of the Royal Historical Society: the collection comprises 144 volumes and more than 2200 articles, published between the journal’s foundation in 1872 and the early 2020s.
• Online access to all 380 volumes of the Society’s Camden Series of primary source material, including the latest titles published in 2021 and 2022. Since 1838, the Camden Series has made primary records available in accessible scholarly editions, compiled and introduced by specialist historians. The Series is especially strong in material relating to British history, including the British Empire and Britons’ influence overseas.
• All other RHS publications offered at a substantial discount: includes the Bibliography of British and Irish History and  Camden Series volumes.
• 30% discount on all academic books (print only) published by Cambridge University Press.
• 30% discount on purchases of print copies of the Society’s New Historical Perspectives book series, offering monographs and essay collections, and produced in association with the Institute of Historical Research and University of London Press.
• 30% discount on History titles published by Oxford University Press.
• 20% discount on print subscription to History Today, Britain’s leading history magazine (£52 per annum, usually £65 full price). 20% discount on online subscription to the archive of History Today (£56 per annum, usually £70 full price).
• Receipt of the weekly ‘RHS News Circular’ (this example, August 2023): regular update on RHS activities, plus listings of events / calls for papers from other UK historical societies and research networks.
• Copies of RHS Newsletters and the Society’s annual reports.
• Eligible for RHS training and career development events / workshops reserved for Fellows and members.
• Eligible to apply for the Society’s Research Funding programmes available to historians at all career stages.
• Access to RHS members’ events, including Early Career training​ programmes 
• Access to the RHS Archive and Library collections, and  RHS Library rooms, at University College London (UCL).
• Become part of a thriving international community of historians, of all kinds and from many backgrounds.
• Help us support and advocate for the study and practice of history in its many forms. Society income also supports our grants programme for historians at the start of their careers.

Annual Subscription

From November 2021, annual subscription rates for Associate Fellows, payable on election, are: 

• for Associate Fellows, UK-based: £45 pa
• Associate Fellows, International: £55 pa
• Associate Fellows, Hardship Rate: £10.00 pa (online access to Transactions only)

The RHS subscription year runs July to June with renewals due on 1 July of each year. 

The Associate Fellow Hardship Rate is available to unemployed and low income/wage members (self-defined) and includes unfunded/self-funded students.

How to Apply

Prior to making your application, please consult the FAQs relating to Associate Fellowship. 

To apply for the RHS Associate Fellowship please use the Society’s Applications Portal, and select your chosen membership category.

Applications to join the RHS are welcome through the year. Dates for applications in 2024 are as follows: 27 May 2024, 12 August 2024 and 14 October 2024.

Rejoining the Society as an Associate Fellow

If your Associate Fellowship has lapsed / has been cancelled, and you would like to re-join the Society, please contact our Membership department at membership@royalhistsoc.org in the first instance. We will be glad to assist you.

All applications are considered by our Membership Committee which meets five times a year. You can expect to hear the outcome approximately six weeks after the closing date for your application. Incomplete applications will be held on file until we have received all the necessary information.

All enquiries about applying for election to the Fellowship should be addressed to the RHS office: membership@royalhistsoc.org.

Closing date for next application round:

Monday 27 May 2024

Membership of the RHS is open to all those who have an interest in the rich and varied world of the past. You may be involved in teaching, libraries, archives, museums, heritage, or the media in either a professional or volunteer capacity. You may be actively engaged in local or family history, or simply want to join our worldwide community of historians.

Membership is open to all applicants 18 years or older.

If you are a published or practising historian, our Fellowship or Associate Fellowship categories may be more appropriate for you. Please also consider these options before applying to join the Society. From August 2022 we are extending the benefits available to Members of the Society (please see below).

To apply for the RHS Membership please use the Society’s Applications Portal, and select your chosen membership category.

Benefits of Membership

• Print and online copies of the latest volume of the RHS academic journal, Transactions.
• Online access to the current issue and entire searchable back archive of Transactions of the Royal Historical Society: the collection comprises 144 volumes and more that 2200 articles, published between the journal’s foundation in 1872 and the early 2020s.
• Online access to all 380 volumes of the Society’s Camden Series of primary source material, including the latest titles published in 2021 and 2022. Since 1838, the Camden Series has made primary records available in accessible scholarly editions, compiled and introduced by specialist historians. The Series is especially strong in material relating to British history, including the British Empire and Britons’ influence overseas.
• All other RHS publications offered at a substantial discount: includes the Bibliography of British and Irish History and Camden Series volumes.
• 30% discount on all academic books (print only) published by Cambridge University Press.
• 30% discount on purchases of print copies of the Society’s New Historical Perspectives book series, offering monographs and essay collections, and produced in association with the Institute of Historical Research and University of London Press.
• 30% discount on History titles published by Oxford University Press.
• 20% discount on print subscription to History Today, Britain’s leading history magazine (£52 per annum, usually £65 full price). 20% discount on online subscription to the archive of History Today (£56 per annum, usually £70 full price).
• Receipt of the weekly ‘RHS News Circular’ (this example, August 2023): regular update on RHS activities, plus listings of events / calls for papers from other UK historical societies and research networks.
• Copies of RHS newsletters and the Society’s annual reports.
• Eligible for RHS training and career development events / workshops reserved for Fellows and members.
• Eligible to apply for the Society’s Research Funding programmes available to historians at all career stages.
• Access to the RHS Archive and Library collections, and RHS Library rooms, at University College London (UCL).
• Become part of a thriving international community of historians, of all kinds and from many backgrounds.
• Help us support and advocate for the study and practice of history in its many forms. Society income also supports our grants programme for historians at the start of their careers
• Read more on the Society’s 6 priority areas: Policy & Advocacy, Events & Training, Innovative Publishing, Grants & Support, Awards & Recognition, and Library & Archive.

Annual subscription

From November 2021, annual subscription rates for Membership, payable on election, are: 

• for Members, UK-based: £40 pa
• Members, International: £50 pa
• Members, Hardship Rate: £10.00 pa (online access to Transactions only)

The RHS subscription year runs July to June with renewals due on 1 July of each year. 

The Associate Fellow Hardship Rate is available to unemployed and low income/wage members (self-defined) and includes unfunded/self-funded students.

How to Apply

Prior to making your application, please consult the FAQs relating to Membership. 

To apply for the RHS Membership please use the Society’s Applications Portal, and select your chosen membership category.

Applications to join the RHS are welcome through the year. Dates for applications in 2024 are as follows: 27 May 2024, 12 August 2024 and 14 October 2024.

Rejoining the Society as a Member

If your Membership has lapsed / has been cancelled, and you would like to re-join the Society, please contact our Membership department at membership@royalhistsoc.org in the first instance. We will be glad to assist you.

All applications are considered by our Membership Committee who meet five times a year. You can expect to hear the outcome approximately eight weeks after the closing date for your application. Incomplete applications will be held on file until we have received all the necessary information.

All enquiries about applying for election to the Membership should be addressed to the RHS office: membership@royalhistsoc.org

Closing date for next application round:

Monday 27 May 2024

Fellowships are awarded to those who have made an original contribution to historical scholarship, typically through the authorship of a book, a body of scholarly work similar in scale and impact to a book, the organisation of exhibitions and conferences, the editing of journals, and other works of diffusion and dissemination grounded in historical research.

Election is conducted by review and applications must be supported by someone who is already a Fellow. The Society is able to offer assistance for applicants who do not know an existing Fellow – please contact us for advice. Applications are welcome from historians working within or outside the UK.

From November 2021, the Society has also introduced a new category of Associate Fellowship for historians from a wide range of backgrounds who may not yet have reached the stage of full Fellowship. Applicants are encouraged to consider this option as it may be the correct category for you given your career stage. From August 2022 we are extending the benefits available to Fellows of the Society.

To apply for the RHS Fellowship please use the Society’s Applications Portal, and select your chosen membership category.

Benefits of Fellowship

• Entitled to use the letters FRHistS after your name.
• Print and online copies of the latest version of the RHS academic journal, Transactions.
• Online access to the current issue and entire searchable back archive of Transactions of the Royal Historical Society: the collection comprises 144 volumes and more than 2200 articles, published between the journal’s foundation in 1872 and the early 2020s.
• Online access to all 380 volumes of the Society’s Camden Series of primary source material, including the latest titles published in 2021 and 2022. Since 1838, the Camden Series has made primary records available in accessible scholarly editions, compiled and introduced by specialist historians. The Series is especially strong in material relating to British history, including the British Empire and Britons’ influence overseas.
• All other RHS publications offered at a substantial discount: includes the Bibliography of British and Irish History, Camden Series volumes and New Historical Perspectives print volumes.
• 30% discount on all academic books (print only) published by Cambridge University Press.
• 30% discount on purchases of print copies of the Society’s New Historical Perspectives book series, offering monographs and essay collections, and produced in association with the Institute of Historical Research and University of London Press.
• 30% discount on History titles published by Oxford University Press.
• 20% discount on print subscription to History Today, Britain’s leading history magazine (£52 per annum, usually £65 full price). 20% discount on online subscription to the archive of History Today (£56 per annum, usually £70 full price).
• Receipt of the weekly ‘RHS News Circular’ (this example August 2023): a regular update on RHS activities, plus listings of events / calls for papers from other UK historical societies and research networks.
• Copies of RHS newsletters and the Society’s annual reports.
• Eligible for RHS training and career development events / workshops reserved for Fellows and members.
• Eligible to apply for the Society’s Research Funding programmes available to historians at all career stages.
• Eligible to participate in the Society’s Annual General Meeting.
• Eligible to vote in all RHS elections.
• Eligible to stand for election to the RHS Council.
• Access to the RHS Archive and Library collections, and RHS Library rooms, at University College London (UCL).
• Eligible to join UCL Libraries as a library member.
• Use of the Society’s Council Chamber at UCL for small group meetings (on application to the RHS office).
• Become part of a thriving international community of historians, of all kinds and from many backgrounds.
• Help us support and advocate for the study and practice of history in its many forms. Society income also supports our grants programme for historians at the start of their careers.

Annual Subscription

From November 2021, annual subscription rates for Fellows, payable on election, are: 

• for Fellows, UK-based: £60 
• Retired Fellows, UK-based: £40 
• Fellows, International: £70
• Retired Fellows, International: £50 

The RHS subscription year runs July to June with renewals due on 1 July of each year. 

How to Apply

Before applying for election to the Fellowship please read the Frequently Asked Questions and arrange for a current Fellow to act as your referee using the guidance supplied in the FAQs.

To apply for the RHS Fellowship please use the Society’s Applications Portal, and select your chosen membership category.

Applications to join the RHS are welcome through the year. Dates for applications in 2024 are as follows: 27 May 2024, 12 August 2024 and 14 October 2024.

Rejoining the Society as a Fellow

If your Fellowship has lapsed / has been cancelled, and you would like to re-join the Society, please contact our Membership department at membership@royalhistsoc.org in the first instance. We will be glad to assist you.

All applications are considered by our Membership Committee which meets five times a year. You can expect to hear the outcome approximately six weeks after the closing date for your application. Incomplete applications will be held on file until we have received all the necessary information.

All enquiries about applying for election to the Fellowship should be addressed to the RHS office: membership@royalhistsoc.org