Alan Murray, University of Leeds, October 1st - December 4th 2009:
I am currently exploring the dichotomy between the idea that the medieval crusading movement was intended to unite Christendom in the common purpose of liberating or defending the Holy Land, and the reality that crusades were often hampered and weakened by disputes and conflicts deriving from national, regional or linguistic divisions. My time in Odense has been mainly devoted to starting work on a book with this theme, provisionally entitled
Crusades and Nations. To this end I researched and completed an article entitled ‘National Identity, Regional Identity and Language in the Crusades to the Holy Land, 1096-1192’, which will be published in the volume
The Crusades and the Near East: Cultural Histories, ed. Conor Kostick (Routledge, 2010). I presented a shorter version of this article as a paper at SDU on 3 December and also wrote a paper on ‘Norman Identities in the Principality of Antioch’, which I presented at the annual meeting of the Haskins Society in Boston on 8 November. These two pieces of work will be revised and expanded to eventually form 2 or 3 chapters in the monograph.
Mihail Raev, University of Cambridge, August 23rd - September 23rd 2009.
My PhD project at the University of Cambridge is entitled ‘Byzantine-Rus Relationships (c. 900 - 971) in light of the written evidence’. This project is an attempt to re-examine and reassess all Byzantine Greek, Slavonic, Latin, Arabic and Hebrew written sources related to the tenth-century Byzantine-Rus relationships. In my thesis, I try to build a historical reconstruction of their contacts. As the written sources are fragmentary, sparse, inconclusive, and contradicting, I argue that available data does not allow more complete reconstruction of the stages and dynamics of the Byzantine-Rus relationships in the first half of the tenth century. Perhaps, the low intensity of their contacts was due to Rus interest in conducting commercial exchange with Central Asian partners or that the centres of commerce and political power in Ancient Rus were emerging in this period. I have research interests in the processes of political and economic consolidation in Eastern Europe in the tenth century as reflected in the written sources; in archaeological evidence and numismatic data related to this process; in Scandinavian and Slavonic migrations to Eastern Europe; in the sources and narrative models applied in the composition of Rus Primary Chronicle; in Byzantine historical works from ninth to early twelfth century; and in the transition and transformation of heathen society into a Christian one.
Stefan Brink, Sixth Century Professor of Scandinavian Studies, University of Aberdeen, 11. maj-16. maj 2009.
Jag har sedan oktober 2008 ett Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship inom vilket jag arbetar med ett forskningsprojekt som jag kallar 'Landscape Interfaces'. Syftet är att samla in, studera och försöka förstå platser i vårt nordiska landskap där våra förfäder uppenbarligen ansett sig ha kommit närmare de däruppe och de därnere. Ofta rör det sig om vattenlokaler, men det kan även vara landlokaler, såsom tings- och samlingsplatser. En 'ledartfakt' i detta sökande är i mitt fall ortnamn, som kan indikera sådana platser. Jag har tidigare diskuterat dessa aspekter i några artiklar (se min hemsida nedan), men nu är tanken att skriva en bok härom. Ett annat projekt som jag startar i höst är ett stort lagöversättningsprojekt, där vi skall översätta till engelska och nykommentera våra äldsta lagar i Norden. Detta påbörjas under hösten 2009 och fortgår i tre år.
Dr. Henrik Janson, docent i Historia vid Göteborgs Universitet, maj, juni och november 2009.
Doktorsavhandling (1998) om Adam av Bremen och relationen mellan Skandinavien och övriga Europa under 1000-talet. Därefter har mina intressen främst rört sig kring kulturell identitet och maktlegitimering i Nordeuropa under tidig medeltid samt kring nordisk medeltida och modern historiografi. Mitt nuvarande projekt, som håller på att avslutas, är ”Eddalitteraturen och konstruktionen av en Nordeuropeisk forntid”, och jag står nu i begrepp att inleda ett tvärvetenskapligt projekt om runskriftens roll i Europa 100-1100 e.Kr. tillsammans med bl.a. Antoaneta Granberg.
Priv.-Doz.. Dr. Jan Rüdiger fra Goethe Universität, Frankfurt Am Main, 23. februar -25. april 2009.
Dr.phil. fra Basel (1998) med afhandling om aristokratiet i og omkring Toulouse før albigenserkrigene (12./13. årh.), Habilitation på Humboldt-Universitetet, Berlin (2007) med disputats om polygyni/frillevæsenet og politisk kultur i Norden i komparativt perspektiv (NV-Frankrig, kristent og muslimsk Spanien) i højmiddelalderen. Daglig leder af forskningsprojektet ”Politisk sprog i middelalderen – semantiske tilgange” ved universitetet i Frankfurt/Main (prof. Bernhard Jussen). Aktuel med forskning om sammenhæng mellem sprogenes hellighed og flersprogethed, samt om udviklingen af ikke-latinske (’folkesproglige’) politiske sprog i visse regioner af Vesteuropa (Norgesvældet mm). Arbejder for tiden med tidlige kongelige ’selvbiografier’: Sverris saga og Llibre dels Feits (Bedrifternes Bog) af kong Jakob 1. af Aragon.
Dr. Antoaneta Granberg, docent i slaviska språk vid Göteborg Universitet, 2. marts - 27. marts 2009.
Min aktuella forskning behandlar relationen mellan skrift- och språkutvecklingen i samband med statsformeringen och kristnandet. Studien fokuserar mest på det medeltida Bulgarien och Rus medan utvecklingen bland goterna och den i Skandinavien behandlas ur ett komparativt perspektiv. Arbetstitel för studien: Shift of Written language and Script as Part of the State Formation Process and the Christianisation.
Professor Anthony Perron, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, 25. maj - 27. juni 2008
Ph.D. Claes Gejrot, Riksarkivet Stockholm, 1. april - 30. juni 2008
Research project: Academic sermons, esp. those of Bero Magni.
Dr. Joonas Ahola, University og Helsinki, 15. april - 16. juni 2008
Research project: Recent literature historical theories concerning medieval literature and the sagas, esp those of Torfi Tulinius.
Dr. Jan Rüdiger, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, 14. maj - 22 juni 2007.
My project was research into Holsten as a "frontier" zone as part of the North Eastern European expansion zone of the High Middle Ages.
Raphaëlle Schott, Département d'Histoire Médiévale, Paris I, Panthéon-Sorbonne, 10.-18. april 2007.
Research project: The Nordic Counsils of the Realm and Queen Margaret (1375-1397).
Catharina Andersson, Historiska Institutionen, Göteborg Universitet, 13. februar - 6. april 2007.
Research project: Genderstructures in a medieval Scandinavian political context and culture.
Darius von Guettner, University of Melbourne, 10. december 2006 - 1. februar 2007.
Darius von Guettner arrived at the Centre for Medieval Studies, Odense in 2006 during the final stages of his doctoral research. He has spend a good few months in Europe completing his Ph.D. and the period of dedicated research in Denmark allowed his to clarify many of the issues related to European primary sources. With the CMS at Odense as the base Darius was able to spend some time at various research institutions in London, Rome, Warsaw, Poznań and Kraków. His doctoral work resulted in a number of journal articles and conference papers and the revised text of his doctorate will be published as “Poland and the Crusades in the Twelfth Century: The Idea of Holy War and its Reception in The Piast Monarchy.” Darius has also contributed articles to “The Crusades. An Encyclopedia” (ed. Alan V. Murray), “Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle” (ed. Graeme Dunphy) and “The Oxford Dictionary of the Middle Ages” (ed. Robert E. Bjork). Research themes of Darius’ work are related to aspects of religious warfare, crusading, military orders and identity in medieval cultural and religious history. He is currently writing a book provisionally entitled “Prussia. A History of Ancient Civilisation (before 1300)” as well as continuing working on a first critical English edition of a key central European narrative sources, Master Vincentius’ “Chronica Polonorum” and Peter of Dusburg's “Chronicle of the Prussian Land”.In addition to medieval history Darius teaches modern history subjects: Eighteenth Century France, Polish Partitions of 1172-1795, Revolutions (Russia, France, America, China) and Twentieth Century History.