Kate Wiles
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katemond.bsky.social
Kate Wiles
@katemond.bsky.social
7.6K followers 320 following 240 posts
Medievalist, linguist, manuscript botherer ❧ Co-Editor of History Today ☞ LOST VOICES (Penguin/Stanford, forthcoming, one day) ❧ Posting in a personal capacity ❡
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katemond.bsky.social
Some INCREDIBLE lines here. Hard to pick a favourite...

www.jstor.org/stable/2638715
Diplomatic history has rather fallen from academic grace recently. Schoolboys used to know as much about Mehmet Ali and Don Pacifico as they did about anything in the nineteenth century; now they are likely to be taught more about the conditions of factory workers in Victorian Rochdale. On the research level too the diplomatic field has been largely deserted for newer and greener pastures. Social history is the growth industry, diplomatic history an old and declining staple. For those nineteenth-century statesmen and diplomats whose sense of their own lasting importance is evidenced by the meticulous care with which most of them preserved their papers for posterity, it would have been galling to learn how indifferent that posterity has become to what they bequeathed to it, and how much more value is attached to a scrap left by a scarcely literate machine minder, than to all the most elegantly turned dispatches of one of Her Majesty's ambassadors abroad. Possibly this retreat into social history is an aspect of Britain's decline in the world generally. Only 'great powers' can expect to have foreign policies which are effective. Britain has long ceased to be, or even to consider herself to be, a great power.
September 9, 2025 at 2:57 PM
katemond.bsky.social
Fun 'Brand' quirk my colleague just noticed: once you click on 'Brand' you are stuck in 'Brand'. Clicking 'University of Warwick' takes you back to 'Brand'. There's no link to 'Study' or 'Research' or 'Departments' or anything university there.
The 'Explore our Brand' page from the University of Warwick. Black text on a purple background. It says 'This is University of Warwick. This is Beyond'.
July 23, 2025 at 9:56 AM
katemond.bsky.social
It’s all true! Here’s Alison in her box. Christina was in the stalls so we couldn’t see her but I found videos later! Very fun night. Very ridiculous.
View of the audience and stage for Burlesque. You can almost make out Alison Hammond and guests in the box
July 20, 2025 at 10:09 AM
katemond.bsky.social
It's absolutely not common sense. It's not only historically illiterate, it also ignores the actual status of languages in the parts of the UK that aren't England.
tweet from Kier Starker: 'If you want to live in the UK, you should speak English. That’s common sense. So we’re raising English language requirements across every main immigration route.'
May 12, 2025 at 3:25 PM
katemond.bsky.social
My parents have a small collection of L'illustration from Jun-July 1916 (one slightly moused) which they'd like to go to a good home. Are there any researchers or archives who could make good use of them?
seven copies of L'illustration Inside spread showing a diagram of ships An example page of advertisements Article inside a magazine on the death of Kitchener
May 8, 2025 at 1:36 PM
katemond.bsky.social
Incredible opener to monograph preface (pub. 1991).

He continues... 'It sometimes seemed as if I was dropped, against my will, in an ill-disposed world of computers where I did not belong'
'This study was started for no clear reason; it was pursued with diffidence at first and relief later: diffidence because the outcome was far from certain and some advisors expressed their doubts about the enterprise; relief because it soon turned out to be promising enough, and of course final relief at the end.'
April 26, 2025 at 3:20 PM
katemond.bsky.social
I went quite far back on your twitter... It felt stalkery. I also got these.
A small cat at rest, pose 1 A small cat at rest, loaf pose A small cat at rest, shrimp pose
April 6, 2025 at 11:28 AM
katemond.bsky.social
I'm a potter now!! Here's the photo I used, except I flipped it by mistake and then realised the markings on her face would be wrong so I had to do those backwards. It was a whole thing
A tiny cat curled up on a blanket
April 6, 2025 at 11:20 AM
katemond.bsky.social
The spammers have started targeting the medievalists, specifically... but I will be STRONG and I will resist!
Screenshot of two unopened spam emails, in which the letters ('CVS reward ending soon' etc) are made up of runes and rune-like characters.
January 14, 2025 at 8:04 PM
katemond.bsky.social
I’m not saying in the coolest person on this site or anything, but I have just bought myself a handheld manual shredder from Muji. BEHOLD!
Picture of a piece of paper half-shredded in a mini-shredder, which is a white cylinder shape. Behind it you can half see a framed linocut of a medieval snail.
December 4, 2024 at 8:08 PM
katemond.bsky.social
I feel like I was made for this moment. Have you seen Jonathon Green's timeline of slang? There are options! timelinesofslang.com/Intercourse3...
A screenshot of 17th-century slang terms for 'jism'.
November 26, 2024 at 1:23 PM
katemond.bsky.social
Here are some of Holbein's portraits. I don't think I managed to capture the delicacy or the life! But to be fair to myself, I'm not Holbein... I wanted to keep the notes and pen-trials on the page, like he did.
A portrait of a man by Hans Holbein. He's looking left, has an impressive handlebar moustache and very short hair. It's mostly ink drawing with a touch of colour on the nose and lips. Portrait of a man by Hans Holbein. He has a reddish beard, the features are very delicately drawn, and there are studies of his jewellery around the edge. A close-up of a man, by Holbein. It's so delicately drawn -his features seem to emerge out of the page Portrait of a man by Hans Holbein. He has an impressively long red beard and a cap perched on his head. His clothes are mostly outlines.
November 22, 2024 at 3:27 PM
katemond.bsky.social
Earlier this year I saw an exhibition of Holbein's court portraits, particularly his sketches, and I've been obsessed ever since - at how he managed so much with so little. So here's my attempt at He, Thomas Cromwell.
An ink, charcoal and sanguine portrait of Mark Rylance as Thomas Cromwell in Wolf Hall. The clothing is very sparse, his nose slightly red. There are a couple of pen trials and notes in the corner of the page. A crop of the previous image, focusing on the portrait itself.
November 22, 2024 at 3:22 PM
katemond.bsky.social
I didn't know about this shop but LOOK. These are incredible. If anyone wanted to get me a Christmas present...
A selection of medieval pots and jugs, mostly with green glaze, one terracotta coloured. One is horse-shaped, one has a face on it and I think little arms. A selection of pottery beasts. 'cruciform dogu' (little crosses with faces), a 'Tokoshinai Wild Boar Dogu' (a round boar), and a 'Todateishi Dogu' (a small pillar with a shocked looking face). A selection of roman pottery. Two jugs, one with a face, a votive arm, and a little pyramid shaped dude with a happy face. A different angle of the pyramid dude with a happy face, focussing on his serene, happy face
November 20, 2024 at 11:47 AM
katemond.bsky.social
The new issue of History Today is here and is beautiful! But does it have Oxford commas?? Only one way to find out…

(Available on our website (subscribe and get 3 issues for £5!) or at all good newsagents)
The December 2024 issue of History Today. It’s dark red and features a Byzantine emperor. The headlines are: ‘Christmas to Save the Byzantine Empire’, ‘Classic India: how Ancient Greece shaped the British Raj’, and ‘The sound of the Reformation: when the organ split the Church’.
November 19, 2024 at 9:43 AM
katemond.bsky.social
Just learned that John Singer Sargent, in his charcoal portraits (which he started doing because he got so bored of oils), used squished up bread because kneadable erasers hadn’t been invented yet.
Lady Helen Vincent, portrait in charcoal by John Singer Sargent, c.1905
November 15, 2024 at 9:50 PM
katemond.bsky.social
My day on Bluesky 🫥
A screenshot of my mentions feed showing two consecutive replies. One is Adam Sandler giving a thumbs down and blowing a raspberry. The other is an audience giving a standing ovation.
November 14, 2024 at 6:58 PM
katemond.bsky.social
Are we doing #thanksfortyping here? A classic of the genre...
Screencap of a book, which reads: 'Finally, I should like to express my heartfelt thanks to Jutta Gaskill for the many hundreds of hours spent typing and tirelessly checking the text. Macpherson can rarely have had a more patient reader. Thanks are also due to my parents for their constant help and encouragement. Anything that is good about this edition is dedicated to the memory of Peter Gaskill. Howard Gaskill, Edinburgh, August 1995'
November 11, 2024 at 5:31 PM
katemond.bsky.social
It’s Wolf Hall night!! I saw the first episode last week and it was so good. Very impatient to binge the rest of it.

And look how gorgeous the costumes are 🤌
November 10, 2024 at 5:48 PM
katemond.bsky.social
It’s not, but it’s exactly as audacious as mine!
November 10, 2024 at 1:19 PM
katemond.bsky.social
Cute fox NOT CUTE FOX
November 10, 2024 at 1:13 PM