Medieval Histories is a News site where anyone - professionals or just generally interested - can read about new exhibitions, books, research, excavations, finds, treasures... and much more! The site is created and owned by Karen Schousboe (http//:www.karenschousboe.com)
North-Western Europe is currently teeming with new Viking museums and exhibitions. In the crucible is the huge renovation of the museum at Bygdoy in Oslo and Copenhagen is finally planning to exhibit its grand collections, the Viking exhibition in Stockholm recently reopened,. While we wait, a new publication offers a fine introduction to the material culture of the Vikings
Stevns is a peninsula in South Eastern Zeeland in Denmark. Flat, although it raises towards the east, where it breaks into the sea in the form of high cliffs, it has recently been suggested as the location for Heorot, the hall of Hrodgar, and the home of Grendel. What did it look like in the 6th to 10th century?
In 1962 an Alemannic graveyard in Niederstotzingen in Southern Germany was discovered and excavated. The graves of thirteen individuals – ten male adults and three infants - were buried with an array of inscribed horse gear, jewellery, arms and swords. In the graveyard, the archaeologists also found three horses buried.
Vertical, emotional, illusional, terrifying… Gothic Art dominated the architecture as well as minor art forms from the 13thto 15thcenturies, lifting the soul of mankind towards the heavens. This autumn Paderborn houses a major exhibition on Gothic Architecture
Gothic Style is primarily identified with architecture – breath-taking cathedrals, mounting pillars, soaring vaults. It pays, though, to think of it as the physical expression of a special theological motive, the transgressing soul climbing through the Heavens. As such, it marked a plethora of other art forms.
From the fourth to the seventh century, the Germanic Languages underwent a series of rapid shifts, when the language split into a number of dialects. A new study maps the geographical routes along which these dialects spread.
The World Heritage Committee of UNESCO recently added seven more medieval sites to its World Heritage List. Of special interest are the nomination of Danevirke and Haithabu (Hedeby), The Cathedral of Naumburg, and the Caliphate city of Medina Azahara.
A cloister is a covered walk surrounding the inner courtyard of a monastery or convent. But it is also a synonym of the wider institutions, in which they were found - the abbeys, the friaries, the priories, the monasteries, and the convents. New book tells the story of how the cloister became more than an element of architecture
The exhibition, In Tempore Sueborum, invites us to explore the life and times of the Sueves and how they lived together with the Gallo-Romans in Late Antiquity.
When winter came to Italy in the 6th century, people took to the hills and had to find new ways of surviving. This changed their subsistence and diet.
Studies of ancient DNA on skeletons from two migration period cemeteries in Hungary and Italy tells us in detail about the social structure in the 6th and 7th centuries.
Europe is constituted by an impressive number of separate states and inhabited by numerous people separated by any number of distinct languages, traditions and histories. A gift of the Middle Ages, we still live in the aftermath of these strange fragmented times
After a local medieval festival in 1999 the plan was hatched to create an open-air museum dedicated to telling the story of medieval life c. 1400.
In the Late Middle Ages, the immersion into the corporeall horrors of the crucifixion led to a new devotional practice, the sensual contemplation of the wounds. Arnulf of Leuven led the way
The chances of dying from violence in the Middle Age were seven times higher than it is today. It appears culture and state-formation plays important roles.
From Sweden comes an old bishop’s manual dating from c. 1520. It tells the story of how Christmas was celebrated in Linköping in Östergötland.