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Last minute changes to our lectures this week

10th November 2019 | Categories: Lecture, Up and coming events

Viking longship reconstruction in ShetlandUnfortunately Dr Batey is unable to deliver her lectures on Monday and Tuesday evenings.  While we have had to cancel our Shetland event on Tuesday, the Monday evening event will be going ahead as usual, with a changed line-up of speakers.  Several early career researchers have very generously stepped in at late notice to give us a flavour of current and recent Viking research:

Chris Cooijmans: “Abandon Ship: Examining Viking Encampment across Continental Europe”
Like any other early medieval mariner, vikings venturing across the Frankish waterways would not have been perpetually on the move. As hunger and fatigue may have induced individuals to make landfall, so too would overarching requirements for Scandinavian fleets to take on armaments and supplies, carry out repairs, exchange intelligence, or settle down for the winter. Accordingly, over the course of the ninth and early tenth centuries, the existence of dozens of continental viking encampments is alluded to by various (near-)contemporary Frankish authors, many of whom saw fit to disclose valuable details on the size, layout, and intramural activity of these riverside fortifications. Even so, relatively little scholarly research has thus far ventured beyond a cursory glance or comparative affirmation in dealing with them. By reassessing the functional development of Scandinavian encampment around the Frankish realm, this paper affirms that these outposts represented much more than mere docile hideouts to intersperse bouts of conflict: whilst providing the fundamental benefits of protection, provision, rest, and repair, they likewise came to support viking hosts as versatile stations of assembly, withdrawal, production, and exchange – representing a mainstay for the sustained viability of the viking phenomenon across the European mainland.

Chris Cooijmans is a Research Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities in Edinburgh. Having recently obtained his doctorate from the University of Edinburgh, his research reconsiders the reach and repercussions of viking activity across the Frankish realm. His upcoming book on the topic, Monarchs and Hydrarchs, is due to be published with Routledge in early 2020. At the same time, Chris will also take up a British Academy Research Fellowship at the University of Liverpool, dealing with the historiography of the vikings in the late medieval Low Countries.

Megan Kasten: “Revealing the Govan Stones”
Dr Megan Kasten has recently completed her PhD in Archaeology, and was supervised jointly by Prof Stephen Driscoll of the University of Glasgow and Dr Stuart Jeffrey of the Glasgow School of Art: School of Simulation and Visualisation. Her research focuses primarily on the use of digital imaging technologies, including photogrammetry and RTI, in the analysis of early medieval sculpture.

Michelle Hay: “Identifying disease in the Viking World”
My research focuses on identifying vector-borne disease in the Viking world. I am specifically interested in Yersinia variant strains, associated disease ecology and subsequent effects on Viking society. Through the development of a more efficient protocol I aim to explore the possibilities of accessing information contained within sub-fossils with sub-optimal preservation. This exploratory research may deliver useful and important insights into the Viking world.

Orla Craig: “Landscapes of the Galloway Hoard”
Orla completed her undergraduate degree in Archaeology and masters in Celtic and Viking archaeology at the University of Glasgow. She then worked at GUARD archaeology for two years before returning to do her PhD in the archaeological, landscape and historical context of the Galloway Hoard.

There will be an opportunity as usual for Q&A with all the participants at the end of the presentations.

Apologies for the late notice, and we hope that this does not inconvenience you at all.  We extend our thanks to the presenters for stepping in so late notice!

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