Member Darius von Güttner-Sporzyński has recently published an edited collection in the Brepols series ‘East Central Europe’: The Jagiellon Dynasty, 1386–1596: Politics, Culture, Diplomacy. https://www.brepols.net/products/IS-9782503598970-1

The volume offers a re-examination of the rise of the Jagiellon dynasty in medieval and early modern Central Europe. Originating in Lithuania and extending its dominion to Poland, Hungary, and Bohemia, the Jagiellon dynasty has left an enduring legacy in European history. This collection of studies presents the Jagiellons as rulers with dynamic and negotiated authority. It begins with the dynasty’s origins and its dynastic union with Poland, milestones that have shaped the political and cultural trajectory of the dynasty’s reign. The volume places significant emphasis on the role of royal consorts, thereby broadening traditional gender-focused perspectives. Far from being mere accessories, queens had a considerable influence on governance, economic matters, and diplomacy. The cultural impact of Jagiellon rule is analysed through interactions with humanists and the intellectual milieu of the court. The performative aspects of Jagiellon power, including the use of words, gestures, and even intentional silences, are examined as powerful tools of articulation. Emotional factors that influence governance and intricate dynastic relationships are explored, revealing how political decisions, especially constitutional reforms, are made more rapidly when faced with perceived dynastic vulnerabilities. In Poland, the rise of parliamentary institutions under the earlier Jagiellon monarchs epitomises the concept of negotiated authority, underscoring the growing political role of the nobility. This volume thus provides a multi-faceted and nuanced understanding of the Jagiellon dynasty’s legacy in political, cultural, and gender-related spheres, enhancing understanding of European history.

Member Anna Dorofeeva has recently published a monograph with Arc Humanities Press entitled ‘Reading Nature in the Early Middle Ages: Writing, Language, and Creation in the Latin Physiologus, ca. 700–1000’.

As the recipient of the 2021 ANZAMEMS–ARC Humanities Award for Original Research, Anna’s book has been made available as open access: https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/85029

This book is a new cultural and intellectual history of the natural world in the early medieval Latin West. It examines the complex relationships between language, texts, and the physical world they describe, focusing on the manuscripts of the Physiologus—the foundation of the medieval bestiary. The Physiologus helped to shape the post-Roman worldview about the role and place of human beings in Creation. This process drew on classical ideas, but in its emphasis on allegory, etymology, and a plurality of readings, it was original and distinctive. This study demonstrates precisely how the early medieval re-contextualization of existing knowledge, together with a substantial amount of new writing, set the course of ideas about faith and nature for centuries to come. In doing so, it establishes the importance of multi-text miscellanies for early medieval written culture.

Member Georgina Pitt has recently published a monograph with Arc Humanities Press entitled ‘The Persuasive Agency of Objects and Practices in Alfred the Great’s Reform Program’.

As the recipient of the 2022 ANZAMEMS–ARC Humanities Award for Original Research, Georgina’s book has been made available as open access: https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/92882

Alfred the Great’s early English kingdom was the only one to resist Viking conquest. His reform program strengthened the kingdom and enabled it to hold fast against the Vikings. But texts are largely silent on the process of reform. There has been a tendency to assume that these reforms would obviously be beneficial, but Alfred’s elites were not to know that in advance. What motivated them to do as their king bid them? This book analyzes how objects and behaviours shaped aristocratic response to the reform program, using assemblage theory and social practice theory. The Alfred Jewel (as shown on the cover) exercised a powerful persuasive agency in Alfredian reform. Broadening the frame of inquiry beyond textual evidence, giving objects and behaviours their due, permits a richer and more nuanced understanding.

Member Matthew Firth has recently published a monograph with Routledge entitled Early English Queens, 850-1000: Potestas Reginae.

The book offers a comprehensive, biography-led examination of queenship in England between 850 and 1000, tracing the development of the queen’s role from bed companion to institutional office.

The period 850–1000 is critical to the development of English queenship. In the aftermath of viking invasion, the kings of Wessex expanded their hegemony over neighbouring regions, gradually establishing themselves as the kings of England. Parallel to this broad narrative of political change is the lesser-known story, told in this book, of the royal women who took part in it. The lives of three remarkable women – Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians, and the West Saxon consorts Eadgifu and Ælfthryth – are central to the story, here retold through the careful analysis and reappraisal of source documents. These biographies set the stage for detailed study of the agency and advocacy of all women who held queenly office in England between 850 and 1000, as well as their legacies and reception by later generations.

Early English Queens, 850–1000 gives important insights into the role women played in the first 150 years of the West Saxon dynasty, offering a compelling narrative that will appeal to students and scholars of early medieval England and royal studies.

The book is available in ebook, softcover and hardcover. Available in all good bookstores, it is currently 20% off at Routledge with discount code EFLY03.

Member Esther Theiler has recently published a monograph with Brepols entitled Painters and Sitters in Early Seventeenth-century Rome: Portraits of the Soul.

Significant innovations in portraiture occurred during the transitional period from the end of the sixteenth-century to the early seventeenth-century in Rome. Portraits by Annibale Carracci, Valentin de Boulogne, Anthony van Dyck, Simon Vouet and Gianlorenzo Bernini display a loosening of formality and a trend towards movement. These artists produced a portrait type that was more inclusive of the viewer, more communicative, more revealing of a private face. The portraits in this study were less likely to celebrate achievements, family or social standing, titles, rank or station. Instead they portray individuals who exist apart from their professional personae. They reveal unique and characteristic traits of their subjects captured at a particular moment in time. They used subtle affetti, painting technique and colour to express mood and atmosphere and evoke the presence of the sitter. The sitters include poets, courtiers, buffoons and the artists themselves, and each composition is attentive to the thoughts, emotions and imaginative life of the individuals.

Painters and Sitters in Early Seventeenth-century Rome is available for purchase through Brepols.

Susan Broomhall and Carolyn James have recently published a volume with the Cambridge Elements series: Elite Women and the Italian Wars, 1494–1559.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/elements/abs/elite-women-and-the-italian-wars-14941559/CBF84B82C87FB7F2E0986264628BF4E0

The volume analyses the critical importance of elite women to the conflict conventionally known as the Italian Wars that engulfed much of Europe and the Mediterranean between 1494 and 1559. Through its considered attention to the interventions of women connected to imperial, royal and princely dynasties, the authors show the breadth and depth of the opportunities, roles, impact, and influence that certain women had to shape the course of the conflict in both wartime activities and in peace-making. The work thus expands the ways in which the authors can think about women’s participation in war and politics. It makes use of a wide range of sources such as literature, art and material culture, as well as more conventional text forms. Women’s voices and actions are prioritized in making sense of evidence and claims about their activities.

Congratulations to current ANZAMEMS secretary, Katie Barclay, and former ANZAMEMS president, Megan Cassidy-Welch, for their recent election as Fellows of the Australian Academy of the Humanities.

Long-standing ANZAMEMS members Constant Mews and Kathleen Neal have just had their edited collection, Addressing Injustice in the Medieval Body Politic, published with Amsterdam University Press.

Justice and injustice were subjects of ongoing debate in medieval Europe. Received classical and biblical models both influenced how these qualities of moral and political life were perceived, discussed and acted upon. Important among these influences was the anonymous seventh-century Irish text, On The Twelve Abuses of the Age, a biblically-inspired discussion of the moral duties particular to each sector of society. This volume probes its long influence, and its interaction with the revival of classical ideas. By bringing together scholars of political thought and practice, in lay and religious contexts spanning the seventh to fourteenth centuries, this volume crosses boundaries of periodisation, discipline and approach to reflect upon the medieval evolution of concepts of injustice and means of redress. Contributions address how ideas about justice and injustice were discussed among scholars and theologians, and how those ideas were translated into action through complaint and advice throughout the medieval period.

CONSTANT J. MEWS is Emeritus Professor and formerly Director of the Centre for Religious Studies, Monash University (Australia). He specializes in the religious and intellectual history of Europe in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, on which he has published widely, but is also completing Aidan Breen’s edition of DDAS for the Corpus Christianorum.

KATHLEEN B. NEAL is Senior Lecturer in History and Director of the Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies at Monash University (Australia). She specializes in later-medieval political culture and communication. Her monograph The Letters of Edward I: Political Communication in the Thirteenth Century was published by Boydell Press in 2021.

Order your copy of Addressing Injustice in the Medieval Body Politic here!