The 68th International Sachsenymposion is drawing to a close today after four and a half days of guided tours, workshops, poster displays, a public lecture, and academic debate following a plethora of high-quality academic papers on a wide range of early medieval ‘Saxon’ topics.
TAG: Dover
Maritime Kent – place-names, sea songs and Anglo-Saxon ‘invaders’
Keeping with the maritime theme, at least for part of this blog, I thought I would report on a presentation I went to last Saturday at the Beaney in Canterbury. This was the second in a series of lectures and other events organised by the Kent History and Library Centre at Maidstone under the title ‘Life along the Kent Coast’ that works with an exhibition at Maidstone called ‘Bawleys, Barbels and Owlers’.
Burial mounds, workhouses and maritime Kent
Having had a number of meetings this week about prospective Centre events for 2018, I thought I would just mention them before reporting on the last of the Kent History postgraduate seminars for this academic year.
Black Prince, Cinque Ports and Canterbury Cathedral
Faversham’s history – attracting a growing audience.
On Wednesday evening, the Canterbury Christ Church University bookshop hosted the launch of Michael Jones’ new book on the Black Prince, but before I give a short report on that event, I just want to mention a conference that took place in Chartham last Saturday.
From Rendlesham to Canterbury – valuing co-operation
This week has brought another round of meetings. However, on Wednesday I also managed to attend a fascinating lecture given by Professor Christopher Scull, organised by Dr Andy Seaman and Dr Darrell Rohl, as part of the staff-student archaeology seminar series at Canterbury Christ Church.
Becket Lecture and Operation Nightingale Heritage
This week saw two events that were to a greater or lesser extent linked to the Centre. The first, and the one organised by the Centre through Professor Louise Wilkinson as co-director, was the Eleventh Annual Becket Lecture. Readers of the blog will know that Dr Paul Webster, from Cardiff University, was due to give his talk on royal responses to the martyrdom and cult of St Thomas of Canterbury last night.
Dover and Canterbury
Progress on the Tudors and Stuarts History Weekend website continues but is not quite finished. Consequently, this week I am going to concentrate on a fascinating lecture I heard last night by Keith Parfitt of Canterbury Archaeological Trust.
Exploring Canterbury Christ Church campus
The first weekend in September will see the Society for Church Archaeology’s conference on ‘Church and Industry’ at Canterbury Christ Church.
Richborough through the Ages
Keeping with the idea of excitement at conferences among participants – speakers and audience, yesterday I was at the Centre’s ‘Richborough through the Ages’ conference, hence the photo above. Perhaps one of the major differences between last week and this was that the MEMS conference at Kent University was by definition to a great degree inward looking as far as the university community is concerned – it was by academics at various stages in their careers for an audience that was roughly comparable.
Canterbury Medieval and Early Modern Studies
I thought this week I would provide photos from two events that I attended over the last three days because they involved several people – staff and students – from Canterbury Christ Church. However before I get to that I thought I would share with you other matters, and the prospect of an exciting event next Saturday. It is now just six days before the ‘Richborough Through the Ages’ conference and Dr Martin Watts and I will be sorting out the final details early next week. Numbers have greatly exceeded expectations and it will be great to welcome a hundred or so participants what to looks like a very exciting programme exploring Richborough down the centuries, including its very important role during the Great War. In addition, I would just like to point out that Early Medieval Kent 800–1220 was published by Boydell yesterday – a major milestone in terms of the Kent History Project (primarily funded by Kent County Council) that is now complete. As I have mentioned before, there will be a one-day conference to mark this publication on Saturday 10 September at Canterbury Christ Church. Details of this event will follow shortly. Among the contributors to this volume is Dr Diane Heath, who has taught on the History undergraduate programme at Christ Church over the last few years, and this publication marks Diane’s second article this week. On Thursday she received notification that her essay on Burnellus, a rather special ass in terms of medieval beast literature, has been published in the South Atlantic Review. This is an excellent achievement.