L'Agenda des Médiévistes

International Virtual Conference
9–10 September 2021

Historical research has witnessed a rapidly growing interest in „networks“ since the turn of the twenty-first century. This is due not only to the utility of networks in describing interrelations between historical actors, but also to the adoption of the concepts and methodologies associated with social network analysis (SNA).

Communities and Networks in Late Medieval Europe aims to build on and contribute to this expanding field of research by exploring how the descriptive, conceptual, and methodological tools provided by the study of networks can deepen our understanding of the complex sets of relationships between and within different types of communities in the specific context of the last two centuries of the European Middle Ages. The fourteenth and fifteenth centuries were a time of great political, socio-economic, and cultural change in Europe: the period in question, therefore, offers numerous exciting opportunities (and challenges) for the application of network-based approaches to the study of community dynamics.

To register for this event, please go to https://communitiesandnetworks21.eventbrite.co.uk.

Programme :

9 SEPTEMBER 2021

09:00–09:15 Welcome (Teresa Barucci and Matthew Coulter, University of Cambridge)

09:15–10:45 Session 1: Communities in the Making (Chair: Matthew Coulter)

Invited Speaker: Prof. Christina Lutter (University of Vienna), How Do Groups Become Communities? Urban Spaces of Belonging in Late Medieval Central Europe

Dr Joana Balsa de Pinho (University of Lisbon), A Community and Networking Experience in Late Medieval Portugal: Art and Material Culture of the Confraternities of Mercy

Dr Julien Le Mauff (Paris-Sorbonne University), Communitas perfecta and Regimes of Exclusion in Aristotelian Literature (13th–14th Centuries): The Growing Wariness towards Peregrins and Gens de mer

10:45–11:00 Break

11:00–12:30 Session 2: Networks of Strangers? (Chair: Dr Rodrigo García-Velasco, University of Cambridge)

Dr Monica White (University of Nottingham), Lands of Opportunity in the Medieval Orthodox World

Filip Vukuša (Bielefeld University), Networks of Newcomers from the Apennine Peninsula in 14th-Century Zadar

Guillermo López Juan (University of Valencia/University of Picardie – Jules Verne), A Close-Knitted Community: Interrelation, Integration and Assimilation of the Conversos of Valencia (1391–1440)

12:30–13:30 Lunch Break

13:30–15:00 Session 3: Travel and Trade Networks (Chair: Jessica Tearney-Pearce, University of Cambridge)

Invited Speaker: Dr Flávio Miranda (University of Porto), Caught in a Web: Merchant Communities and Commercial Networks between Portugal and Flanders, 1300–1500

Dr Prajakti Kalra (University of Cambridge), The Mongol Empire and the Making of European Communities in Eurasia

Annabel Hancock (University of Oxford), Networks of Trade: The Benefits and Challenges of Using Network Analysis to Explore Connections in Literature, Archaeology, and Commercial Contracts, c. 1150–1400

15:00–15:15 Break

15:15–17:15 Session 4: Economics, Finance, and Networks (Chair: Annabel Hancock)

Nicolò Zennaro (University of Antwerp; presenting author), Dr Jeroen Puttevils (University of Antwerp), and Prof. Francesco Guidi Bruscoli (University of Florence), Per chagione della Moria: A Social Network Analysis of an Epidemic Shock in the Datini Correspondence

Dr Julia Exarchos (RWTH Aachen University), The Networks of the Labouring Poor in the Late Medieval Rhineland

Aviya Doron (Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Communities of Credit or Communities of Debt? Jewish-Christian Financial Networks in 14th-Century Frankfurt-am-Main

Angus Russell (University of Cambridge), Unjust Collection: Institutional and Monastic (Un-)Networks in Northern Rus

17:15–17:30 Break

17:30–19:00 Keynote Session (Introduction: Prof. Nora Berend, University of Cambridge)

Prof. Felicitas Schmieder (FernUniversität in Hagen), Did „Magdeburg Law“ Create a Network of Culturally-Mixed Urban Communities across Central Europe?

10 SEPTEMBER 2021

09:00–09:15 Welcome

09:15–10:45 Session 5: Urban Networks (Chair: Teresa Barucci)

Invited Speaker: Prof. Jan Dumolyn (Ghent University), Guild Politics in the Medieval Low Countries: Class, Communities and Networks

Dr Marios Dimitriadis (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens), Drama as a Means of Networking for the World of Labour and a Field for the Debate on Social Hierarchy in Late Medieval English Towns

Ward Leloup (Free University of Brussels/Ghent University), „All Good Friends“? Economic and Social Relations of Leatherworkers in Late Medieval Bruges

10:45–11:00 Break

11:00–12:30 Session 6: Material Culture and Social Networks (Chair: Rebecca Field, University of Cambridge)

Dr Natalie Calder (Queen’s University Belfast) and Dr Hannah Schühle-Lewis (University of Kent), Theorising the Early Guildhall Library’s Social and Codicological Networks

Johanna-Pauline Thöne (University of Oslo), Late Medieval Music Manuscripts: Diachronic Testimonies to Musical and Cultural Networks, c. 1400

Róisín Donohoe (University of Cambridge), „To my Daughter“: Childbirth Networks in Late Medieval English Parish Communities

12:30–13:30 Lunch Break

13:30–15:30 Session 7: Mobility and Communication (Chair: Dr Luca Zenobi, University of Cambridge)

Invited Speaker: Dr Justyna Wubs-Mrozewicz (University of Amsterdam), „Merchants“ Marks in Premodern Northern Europe: Communicating Networks

Chiara Melchionno (Scuola Superiore Meridionale of Naples), Qui nescit fingere nescit regnare: The Use of Paroemie in Italian Diplomatic Letters of the 15th Century and the Building of a Linguistic and Political Network

Dr Marco Ciocchetti (University of Rome Tor Vergata), Networks and Exchanges in the Cardinals’ College in the First Half of the Fourteenth Century

Dr Tamás Kiss (Eötvös Loránd University) and Dr Stephen Pow (St Petersburg State University), The Expansion of Social Networks in the Late Middle Ages from Samarkand to Castile: The Case Study of Two Medieval Women

15:30–15:45 Break

15:45–17:15 Session 8: Political and Dynastic Networks (Chair: Dr Vedran Sulovsky, University of Cambridge)

Dr Christa Birkel (Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf), The Foreign Prince and the Realm: On the Difficulty of Developing a Community in Late Medieval Luxembourg (c. 1380–1440)

Simon Bürcky (University of Giessen), Dynastic Networks of the Non-Princely High Nobility in the Holy Roman Empire during the 15th Century

Giovanni Contel (Sapienza University of Rome), The Italian Contribution to the „Imperial Community“ of Maximilian I during the First Italian Wars (c. 1490–1520)

17:15–17:30 Break

17:30–18:30 Concluding Session (Introduction: Prof. Jan Dumolyn)

Prof. Wim Blockmans (Leiden University), Concluding Remarks

All times in British Summer Time (BST)