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earlymedievalist.bsky.social
Early Medievalist
@earlymedievalist.bsky.social
Tim Clarkson. PhD, FRHistS. Historian and author.
Early medieval history and archaeology.
See my books at http://senchus.wordpress.com/my-books/
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Just in: the first review of my edited collection, Pre-Conquest History and its Medieval Reception: Writing England's Past. The reviewer states 'the variety of approaches and diverse materials discussed in this collection spark exciting possibilities and avenues for future research'. Perfect! (1/2)
November 28, 2025 at 5:48 AM
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📚 The Viking Age in Scotland: Studies in Scottish Scandinavian Archaeology 📚

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November 28, 2025 at 1:56 PM
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The brilliant Prof. Alex Woolf @standrewshist.bsky.social is back on the podcast to tell us what the Scandinavian diaspora got up to in the Middle Ages & why 'The Vikings' is a problematic concept. @maynoothuniversity.ie @researchireland.ie @tiagoovsilva.bsky.social open.spotify.com/episode/3ljZ...
Spotify – Web Player
open.spotify.com
November 28, 2025 at 12:41 PM
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Just out!

As @sarahsemple.bsky.social says, '544 pages and 190 images of pure sculptural joy!'

A fantastic cast list and a tremendous achievement @ascorpus.bsky.social.

boydellandbrewer.com/book/early-m...
November 26, 2025 at 8:18 PM
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Máel Sechnaill mac Máele Ruanaid, styled king of all Ireland in his obituary, died #OTD in 862. In 856, he had battled ‘heathens’ with the help of the Gallgoídil, ‘foreigner-Gaels’, a group thought to have been of mixed Scandinavian and Gaelic origin in both Scotland and Ireland. #medievalsky
November 27, 2025 at 9:04 AM
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Happening today! Still time to sign up!

It it helps, I can promise that a picture of a walrus will feature in the presentation.
We are really pleased with the response to our second Public Seminar for this week. Still time to book your free place. Families, Networks and Informants: The Making of Orkneyinga Saga by Tom Fairfax. Thursday 27th November 2025. 7.00pm - 8.30pm UK time.

tinyurl.com/s9fc3nyx
November 27, 2025 at 1:03 PM
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Fellows of the Society are elected for their 'original contribution to historical scholarship'.

Our new guide provides more on the many ways Fellows achieve this - with activities going well beyond publications bit.ly/48mpcJa We welcome Fellowship applications from historians of all kinds 1/2
November 27, 2025 at 12:46 PM
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@lollardfish.bsky.social has set in motion a positive social media trend urging authors to advertise their own book! too often it can feel like we do this too much, but perhaps it is never enough

Anyway, my new book! www.pen-and-sword.co.uk/Little-Kingd...
Little Kingdoms
Before England, Wales, and Scotland were created, before Alfred the Great and the Great Viking Army, before even a raid on Lindisfarne, the kingdoms that…
www.pen-and-sword.co.uk
November 27, 2025 at 7:24 AM
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Delighted that our co-authored paper on Woodstown is in good company in the new Journal of Irish Archaeology! Thanks to Dr Kerri Cleary, Wordwell & @iaiarchaeo.bsky.social

It details what the recent geophysical surveys have revealed about Woodstown ... including *spoiler alert* 61 structures!
November 27, 2025 at 2:22 PM
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Professor Alex Sanmark & PhD candidate Peter Randall presented their research supported by students from Viking and Early Medieval Studies at the Scottish Society for Northern Studies Day Conference.

tinyurl.com/5h2ry4wr
INS Researchers Highlight Research at the Exciting SSNS 2025 Conference!
Staff and students from the University of the Highlands and Islands Institute for Northern Studies gathered at the Scottish Society for Northern Studies Day Conference in Arbroath on 22nd November …
institutefornorthernstudies.com
November 27, 2025 at 1:46 PM
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For anyone interested in vikings: a symposium on the impact of the viking Great Army, to be held at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge on 24 April 2026.
November 27, 2025 at 3:29 PM
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Wow! @lollardfish.bsky.social & @profgabriele.com going all in on a new study using pollen to document biodiversity at & around the Abbey of St Gall in the Carolingian Age. buttondown.com/ModernMediev... #MedievalSky #interdisciplinarity
Carolingian Biodiversity
How Interdisciplinary Can and Should Work
buttondown.com
November 24, 2025 at 4:43 PM
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Today's knowledge commons free download "Vikings' Settlements in Ireland Before 1014" (2014) #ireland #vikings #medievalsky #history #archaeology
works.hcommons.org/records/4ae7...
November 24, 2025 at 10:28 PM
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🗣📹📼 Watch the recordings of Prof. Steve's Dalrymple Lectures!

Either click FOLLOW THIS LINK here:

www.gla.ac.uk/schools/huma...

Or, this link should take you to the recordings of both lectures:

echo360.org.uk/section/e305...
November 25, 2025 at 12:41 PM
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Máel Coluim (II) mac Cinaeda, king of Alba, died at Glamis, Angus, #OTD in 1034. He slew predecessor Cinaed (III) mac Duib at Monzievaird, Perthshire, in 1005, and, with Owain the Bald, king of Strat Clut (Strathclyde), crushed a Northumbrian army at the Battle of Carham in 1018. #medievalsky
November 25, 2025 at 8:57 AM
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Officially out in the Journal of Medieval History vol. 51.5, my article on the intersection of viking activity and the Icelandic conversion (c. 1000AD) and how religious concerns shaped saga conceptions of the viking past.
Víking Across Conversion: Depictions of Víkingar in the Sagas of Icelanders
Vikings commonly feature in the Íslendingasögur (Sagas of Icelanders). The words víking (the act of raiding) or víkingr (a raider) appear over 180 times across the forty-some texts of the corpus. H...
www.tandfonline.com
November 25, 2025 at 1:35 PM
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We're delighted to see @davidwoodman45.bsky.social’s The First King of England selected by @proflroach.bsky.social as a @historytoday.com Book of the Year! Learn more about this brilliant biography of Æthelstan here—
The First King of England
From one of today’s leading historians of the early medieval period, an enthralling chronicle of Æthelstan, England’s founder king whose achievements of 927 rival the Norman Conquest of 1066 in…
press.princeton.edu
November 24, 2025 at 4:06 PM
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At least ive made a start on the talk Im giving on Dec 10! Ps, hardly a horse in sight....
www.communities-ni.gov.uk/events/pictn...
Pict’n Mix: art and identity in Ireland and Scotland’s Iron Ages
New research of a small collection of unusual Iron Age artefacts, mostly found in the north of Ireland, has led to a re-examination of communication between Ireland and Scotland, well before the early...
www.communities-ni.gov.uk
November 22, 2025 at 10:50 AM
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The Society is happy to announce Amanda Boeing as the winner of the 2025 Magnusson Prize! She received the award for her insightful comparative essay on the Battle of Brunanburh poem and Egill Skalla-Grímsson's Höfuðlausn.

Many congratulations to Amanda!
2025 Magnus Magnusson Prize Winner Announced - Scottish Society for Northern Studies
Congratulations to Amanda Boeing, who has been awarded this year's Magnus Magnusson Essay Prize
www.ssns.org.uk
November 22, 2025 at 1:38 PM
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This print reproduces the Alfred Jewel, a masterpiece of goldsmithing, ft. a tear-shaped slice of rock crystal, gold filigree & cloisonné enamel. It's believed to have been commissioned by King Alfred the Great as indicated by the inscription ÆLFRED MEC HEHT GEWYRCAN = Alfred ordered me to be made.
November 21, 2025 at 3:44 PM
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I just drew this because I love the evocative imagery but its interesting considering this alongside the other example in the sagas of someone afab but assuming a male name/role
and if that burial at Birka was along similar lines
November 20, 2025 at 6:30 PM
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On advance access: "Economic Change, Silver, and the Plague of 664-687 in England"

by @rorynaismith.bsky.social (University of Cambridge)

#OpenAccess

doi.org/10.1093/past...
Economic Change, Silver, and the Plague of 664–687 in England*
Abstract. Bede and other authors describe a destructive wave of plague sweeping across Britain and Ireland in the period 664–87. In the decades around and
doi.org
November 14, 2025 at 2:39 PM
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A good intro/summary of a lot of ideas about the discussed EM Irish Primary Sources. I still have 1 question, if current copies are 12thc onwards, did the murder of Thomas Beket influence the promotion of the cleric sapiens in the choice of works which were copied/preserved?
November 15, 2025 at 7:18 AM
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Out next Monday.
November 20, 2025 at 9:56 AM