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      • Symposia on ‘The Transmission of the Bible’
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        • 2019 Anniversary Symposium Registration Open
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      • Meetings of the Friends of the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence
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        • Mildred Budny, ‘Catalogue’
        • The Illustrated Catalogue (1997)
      • The Illustrated Handlist
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2024 International Congress on Medieval Studies: Report

May 15, 2024 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Anniversary, Announcements, Conference, Conference Announcement, Events, ICMS, Illustrated Handlist, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, POMONA, Postal History at Kalamazoo, Societas Magica

2024 International Congress on Medieval Studies: Report

59th ICMS (9–11 May 2024)

Held in a transitional ‘hybrid’ form
with RGME Co-Sponsored Sessions,
an Open Business Meeting,
and Co-Sponsored Reception

In a Nutshell:
Mission Accomplished!

With Thanks to our Participants,
Co-Sponsors, Audience, and Friends

[Posted on 14 May 2024]

Western Michigan University, Valley III from the side. Photograph: David W. Sorenson.

Western Michigan University, Valley III from the side. Photograph: David W. Sorenson.

After the successful completion of all our activities at the 59th Annual 2024 International Congress on Medieval Studies International Congress on Medieval Studies (ICMS), we report our accomplishments and give updates about changes to the Program which we announced (with updates as appropriate) for its items. See the full ICMS Program issued by its organizing Committee:

  • 2024 Congress Program, with Corrigenda.

The Journey

Already from our first preparations toward the 2024 Congress,

  • starting with the 2023 Congress and our Open Business Meeting there to invite proposals,
  • moving on to our proposals for Sessions for 2024 submitted to the Congress Committee by 1 June 2023,
  • progressing with the approved Call for Papers for the 2024 ICMS,
  • reaching the firm conclusion of that Call on 15 September 2024, and
  • selecting the Program for our Sessions according to responses to that Call and related developments,

we have made revisions and provided updates for our plan.

They gave rise to our announcement for our own (and co-sponsored) Program (including the details of Sessions, their speakers, titles of papers, order of presentation, and so on; as well as ancillary events such as the Anniversary Reception), its updates throughout the months from October to May and the start of the Congress.  Now we follow up with the Report.

The proposals received not only yielded Programs for which the order of Papers and the follow-up invitation to Presiders and Panelists, but also encouraged us to combine resources within the Research Group, with our frequent co-sponsor, the Societas Magica, and with others.  Thus we collaboratively created a strong program of activities for the 2024 Congress.

Along the way, between

  • the submission of our selected Program to the Congress Committee by 15 October 2023,
  • its acceptance,
  • the assignment of dates, times, and venues for the individual activities for the 2024 Congress Program as officially published (with a series of Corrigenda, not affecting us, as the date of the Congress approached), and
  • the start of the Congress itself on Thursday 9 May 2024, with events variously in online and/or in-person formats,

our own 2024 Congress Program has had a few minor revisions, as people and technological arrangements permitted.

These changes did not interfere with the overall success of our activities.  Our 2024 Congress Program reported various changes up to the Congress; this Report describes those effected at or around the Congress.

Access Included

As in 2023, the RGME responded to the partly ‘hybrid’ conditions of the Congress by providing its Zoom Meetings for two scheduled solely ‘In Person’ Sessions, as well as for our In-Person catered lunchtime Open Business Meeting, and by reserving an onsite Remote Participation Room on campus for those participants for a scheduled ‘Virtual’ Session who were present at the Congress to be able to gather to sign on to the online Session hosted by the Congress Confex Portal. The RGME managed all these extra Zoom provisions and reservations, as part of its contribution to sponsoring or co-sponsoring Sessions at the ICMS over the years.

It can be worth noting that those donations — at the cost of the RGME, are made possible by donations to enable its Zoom Subscription, by our own provisions for technical backup, and principally by the many pro-bono donations by its Director as overall organizer and co-ordinator of the RGME activities at the Congress and elsewhere — are not covered within the costs to produce the Congress, which registration fees by attendees online and in-person work to subsidize. The extra efforts by the RGME to provide features or facilities for the contributors, participants, and attendees of its activities at the Congress, whether online or onsite, correspond with our approach to our activities of many kinds.

In this spirit, the RGME has consistently stepped up to the plate in response to changes in the facilities for the ICMS before and after the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, when the Congress was successively

  • 1) cancelled outright (2020),
  • 2) rescheduled in online format only (2021), and
  • 3) re-introduced in a partly in-person, partly virtual, ‘hybrid’ format (2022, 2o23, 2024, and more).

Throughout these developments, responding to their changing requirements, the RGME has continued to seek, insofar as possible with our own limited resources, to provide access to our sponsored and co-sponsored Congress activities to as wide an audience as possible, including those with disablilities, health issues, and difficulties in finding resources to travel and cover expenses to attend the Congress in person.

These ‘extras’ which we provide stand alongside the RGME tradition for many years of promoting our authors and the contributions of their work to our Congress Programs (see our Congress Activities) by the series of RGME promotional notices for the year’s Congress (with updates):

  • on our official Website (You are Here),
  • on our Social Media (listed Below),
  • in the Posters for each of our Congress activities, and
  • in the Congress Abstracts which we publish for the Authors’ presentations.

The Posters normally are displayed in printed form at the Congress — where permitted, such as on cork boards in the different buildings and in the rooms where our events take place — and on the RGME website, with printed copies also sent to presenters as souvenirs to display in their offices or studies and to give to their mothers.  For example for the 2015 Congress:

Derek Shank stands beside the RGME Poster Display for the 2025 ICMS. Photography by Mildred Budny.

The Abstracts appear in their own individual webpages — which can 1) extend for a longer span than the assigned limit (100 words) for the submission of a proposal for a Congress Paper; 2) add notes, links, and bibliography; and 3) include images — as publications in their own right.

Moreover, we take care to index all the Authors’ Abstracts for a given Congress to grant wider access both:

  • Alphabetically by Author’s Surname and
  • Chronologically by Year of Author’s Presentation.

The Arrival

After the Journey to arrive, there remained some bumps in the road at the destination.  The RGME Director was unable to travel for health reasons, and so had to attend online.

Program

One person on the Program for one Session decided not to attend.  Technical issues with one Speaker’s PowerPoint Presentation and its Zoom projection interrupted a short span of the flow of slides in an expertly crafted presentation in another Session, but this interruption could smoothly be kept to a brief minimum through co-ordination prepared ahead of time between the Speaker and the RGME Zoom Host, together with the Session Organizer.  The prepared co-ordination ahead of time for hybrid access dropped the ball between one scheduled in-person Session and the RGME-hosted Zoom online facility, required, it turned out, not as an extra, but as an essential, so as to enable the Presider and two of the Speakers unable to travel to the Congress to participate in the Session.

Audience Participation

At the last minute, an audience member generously offered to lend his computer so that the Organizer / Second Speaker could connect the Zoom Meeting for the Session and the In-Person Room.  We give thanks to collegiality and generous resourcefulness.

Posters

Another surprise came for the RGME Posters for our Congress Activities when the eve of the Congress arrived and participants came on site.  We suddenly discovered that the 2024 Congress prohibited the display of posters anywhere in a printed form, apart from selected tables requiring horizontal piles, rather than enabling vertical display for which our Posters are designed.

This change meant that the extra efforts by our Trustee and Co-Organizer David Porreca in the days before the Congress to produced printed Posters for display and distribution there — while our Director could not travel to the Congress to bring them as usual — were thwarted.  Henceforth, we will plan accordingly and distribute our Posters outside the Congress walls, both in digital and printed formats.

By fortunate choice, without knowing about the Congress’s redirections, the Director had posted the newly-designed Posters in a Web Gallery of their own on our website just a couple of days before the Congress, in a new departure for our tradition of sponsorship and co-sponsorship. Customarily, she would post them in the RGME webpost for the year’s Congress shortly after it had been accomplished, as part of its Report. (See 2023 International Congress on Medieval Studies: Report.)

Now, see the special Pop-Up Exhibition!

  • RGME Pop-Up Poster Exhibition for the 2024 ICMS
2024 ICMS Alchemical Session Poster 2

2024 ICMS Alchemical Session Poster 2

The Program as Accomplished

Our Program comprised:

  • three Co-sponsored Sessions 
  • our Open Business Meeting and
  • a co-sponsored Anniversary Reception.

In stages, first (in November 2023) we announced the Sessions, and reported the sequence of papers for them.  Next (January 2024), with information from the ICMS, we could report their assigned times, days, and locations on campus in cases of the in-person events, along with our other activities at the Congress.  Then we began to publish the abstracts for them; that process is now completed. Soon we will complete the Indexes for them.

For the In-Person Sessions and the Open Business Meeting, the RGME provided an online option for Congress Registrants through our Zoom Subscription and our Eventbrite Registration Portal:

  • Eventbrite: Research Group on Manuscript Evidence

‘Hybrid’ Facilities

Like last year (see 2023 International Congress on Medieval Studies: Report), the RGME offered Registration (without charge) for Online access through our Zoom Subscription to some of our In-Person events this year.  Likewise we offered registration for our two In-Person events to help us to learn how many to expect to attend for our planning and the catering for our Open Business Meeting and Co-Sponsored Reception.

For one Online Session, a remote-participation conference room was reserved so that participants and attendees on campus for the Congress might gather to join the online format while in company.

At ICMS for the RGME Anniversary Year

In 2024, the RGME celebrates its Anniversary Year to mark 25 years as a nonprofit educational corporation based in Princeton, New Jersey, and 25 years as an international scholarly society founded out of a major research project at Corpus Christi College in the University of Cambridge.

For our Anniversary Year, the theme is “Bridges”.

  • “Bridges” for our 2024 Anniversary Year
Ada Bridge pylon, Belgrade, Serbia

Ada Bridge pylon, Belgrade, Serbia. Photograph Petar Milošević (1 August 2021). Image via Wikimedia Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

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Tags: Abstracts of Congress Papers, Bridges, Early Printed Books, History of Alchemy, ICMS, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Manuscript studies, P.-O.M.o.N.A., Postal History at Kalamazoo, RGME Anniversary, RGME Anniversary Reception, RGME Business Meeting, RGME Posters, Societas Magica
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2024 International Congress on Medieval Studies: Program

November 24, 2023 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Announcements, Business Meeting, Conference Announcement, ICMS, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, POMONA, Postal History at Kalamazoo, Reception, Societas Magica

2024 International Congress on Medieval Studies: Program

59th ICMS (9–11 May 2024)

To be held in a transitional ‘hybrid’ form
with RGME Co-Sponsored Sessions,
an Open Business Meeting,
and Co-Sponsored Reception

[Posted on 23 November 2023, with updates]

Ravenna, Sant’Apollinare Nuovo, Mosaic. Artwork in the public domain; photograph provided by The Yorck Project / Wikimedia Commons (GFDL).

After the successful completion of our Call for Papers for the 2024 International Congress on Medieval Studies (ICMS), we announce the Program for our activities, with:

  • three Co-sponsored Sessions 
  • our Open Business Meeting and
  • a co-sponsored Anniversary Reception.

In stages, first (in November 2023) we announced the Sessions. Next (4 January 2024), with information from the ICMS, we could report their assigned times, days, and locations on campus in cases of the in-person events, along with our other activities at the Congress.

Now we can report the sequence of papers for the sessions; we also begin to publish the abstracts for them.

Note that for the In-Person Sessions and the Open Business Meeting, the RGME provides an online option for Congress Registrants through our Zoom Subscription and our Eventbrite Registration Portal.  See below and

  • Eventbrite: Research Group on Manuscript Evidence

Congress Information

  • 2024 Congress Program for the full ICMS

Registration (required) for the Congress has opened in February:

  • Registration via ICMS website

‘Hybrid’ Facilities

Like last year (see 2023 International Congress on Medieval Studies: Report), the RGME offers Registration (without charge) for Online access through our Zoom Subscription to some of our In-Person events this year.  Likewise we offer registration for two of our In-Person events to help us to learn how many to expect to attend for our planning and the catering:

  • Open Business Meeting (In Person)
    and
  • Co-Sponsored Reception (In Person)

For an Online Session, a remote-participation conference room has been reserved so that participants and attendees on campus for the Congress might gather to join the online format while in company.

(For information, see below.)

At ICMS for the RGME Anniversary Year

In 2024, the RGME celebrates its Anniversary Year to mark 25 years as a nonprofit educational corporation based in Princeton, New Jersey, and 25 years as an international scholarly society founded out of a major research project at Corpus Christi College in the University of Cambridge.

For our Anniversary Year, the theme is “Bridges”.

  • “Bridges” for our 2024 Anniversary Year
Ada Bridge pylon, Belgrade, Serbia

Ada Bridge pylon, Belgrade, Serbia. Photograph Petar Milošević (1 August 2021). Image via Wikimedia Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

RGME Sessions (1–3) at the 2024 ICMS

For the 59th International Congress on Medieval Studies in 2024, with responses to our Call for Papers, the RGME co-sponsors these three Sessions.  Two of three are scheduled to take place in person, with the other online.

Arrangements have been made so that all three can be accessed both in person (whether as scheduled in the Congress Program or as arranged by especially reserving a room on campus) and online (whether as scheduled or as arranged for a Zoom Meeting hosted by the RGME).  Thus their access can constitute a truly hybrid approach to the conference.

We begin (2 May) to post the Abstracts of the Papers for the Sessions.

Locations on Campus

For the locations on campus, see these campus maps:

  • WMU Visitors’ Map
  • Parking Combined
  • Interactive Map with Building, Parking, Accessibility Information.

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Tags: Alchemical Books, Curtains, Early Printed Books, Hermes Trismegistus, Hieronmus Brunschwig, History of Magic, Manuscript studies, Medieval History, Medieval Studiies, Merchant Letters, Postal Couriers, Postal History, Postal History at Kalamazoo, RGME Anniversary Reception, RGME Open Business Meeting, Societas Magica
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2022 Autumn Symposium Program Booklet

October 21, 2022 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Conference, RGME Program Booklet

2022 Autumn Symposium
Program Booklet

Symposium on “Supports for Knowledge”
Saturday, 15 October 2022
Online via Zoom

56-page illustrated Booklet with the Symposium Program,
Abstracts, and Illustrations
compiled and edited by Mildred Budny
laid out in RGME Bembino (our multi-lingual digital font)
according with our RGME Style Manifesto

2 of 2:  2022 Spring and Autumn Symposia
on “Structured Knowledge”

[Posted on 20 October 2022]

© British Library Board, London, British Library, Add. MS 1546, folio 262v, detail. Opening of the Book of Sapientia (“Wisdom”) in the Moutier-Grandval Bible, an imposing Carolingian manuscript of the Latin Vulgate Bible.

We announce the publication of the illustrated Program Booklet for our 2022 Autumn Symposium, for circulation in printed and digital forms.  A Preview Version as a downloadable pdf was available to participants and attendees of the Symposium, held online on Saturday, 15 October 2022.

See

  • the 2022 Autumn Symposium on “Supports for Knowledge”
  • the 2022 Autumn Symposium Program and
  • the series of 2022 Spring and Autumn Symposia on “Structured Knowledge”.

The high-quality version of the 2022 Autumn Symposium Program Booklet, incorporating a few small corrections, is now ready.

This 56-page Booklet marks a return to our Research Group tradition of preparing Program Booklets for Symposia and some other events.  (See our Publications.)  Most recently, the Program Booklet for the 2020 Spring Symposium — which had to be cancelled at the start of shutdowns for the Covid pandemic — was produced as a form of record, souvenir, and promise for the intentions for the two-day event at Princeton University. You may find it freely as a downloadable pdf in either consecutive pages or foldable booklet.

Printed copies of the 2022 Autumn Symposium Program Booklet will be distributed on request, to the participants and others.  If you wish a printed copy, please contact please contact [email protected] and provide your mailing address.

The digital version can be downloaded freely here.  We provide two formats, or ‘flavors’, of the digital Program Booklet, in consecutive pages and as a foldable booklet.  The choice depends upon your printing facilities and preferences.  Experience shows us that the choice can be helpful for downloads of our Program Booklets and Research Reports.

  • Consecutive Pages (quarto size, or 8 1/2″ × 11″ sheets)
    consecutive pages
  • Foldable Booklet (11″ × 17″ sheets), to be folded in half, producing a nested group of bifolia
    foldable booklet

2022 Autumn Symposium Program Booklet, Front Cover (Page 1)

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Tags: BASIRA Project, Catalogues & Metadata & Databases, DRAGEN Lab, Early Printed Books, Early Printing, Fragmentology, Giovanni Bellini, History and Uses of Paper, Hybrid Books, Index of Medieval Art, Jain Manuscripts, Manuscripts in the Curriculum, Moutier-Grandval Bible, Otto Ege Manuscript 6, Otto Ege Manuscript 6 (Vulgate Bible), RGME Program Booklets, RGME Symposia, Richard Twiss' Farrago, Schwenkfelders' Books, Teaching with and through Manuscripts, The Living Library, University of Oregon MS 027, Warburg Institute Library, Watermarks
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2022 Spring Symposium on “Structures of Knowledge”

March 15, 2022 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Conference, Conference Announcement, Uncategorized

2022 RGME Spring and Autumn Symposia
on “Structured Knowledge”

1 of 2: Spring Symposium
“Structures of Knowledge”
Saturday, 2 April 2022 (Online)

2020 Spring Symposium "From Cover to Cover" Poster 2

2020 Spring Symposium Poster 2

[Posted on 15 March 2022, with updates]

In 2022, the Research Group returns to our series of Symposia (formerly held in person). The series underwent an interruption with the cancelled 2020 Spring Symposium, “From Cover to Cover”. See its record in the illustrated Program Booklet, with Abstracts of the planned presentations and workshops. Its core and its promise inspire this renewal.

This year, each Symposium in the pair is designed as a one-day event, with sessions and workshops of about 1 and 1/2 hours, giving scope for discussion. The Spring Symposium will be held online by Zoom. (The Autumn Symposium would be held online, but, conditions permitting, it might be hybrid, that is, partly in person, as well as online.) See 2022 Spring and Autumn Symposia.

  1. Structures of Knowledge (Spring)
  2. Structures for Knowledge (Autumn)

These events, by request, flow in addition to — and partly from — our other activities during the year:

1) Continuing Episodes in the online series of The Research Group Speaks (2021–)

  • https://manuscriptevidence.org/wpme/the-research-group-speaks-the-series/
  • Catalogs, Metadata, and Databases (Part I)

2) Our four sponsored and c0-sponsored Congress Sessions at the 57th International Congress on Medieval Studies (online) in May

  • https://manuscriptevidence.org/wpme/2022-international-congress-on-medieval-studies-program
    (Abstracts of the Papers are included).

Structured Knowledge (Parts I and II)

The interlinked pair of Spring and Autumn Symposia examine themes of Structured Knowledge.

Some proposed presentations at these Symposia offer refreshed materials which had been planned for the cancelled 2020 Spring Symposium.

  • See https://manuscriptevidence.org/wpme/2020-spring-symposium-save-the-date, with a published Program Booklet including illustrations and Abstracts.
The Spring Symposium is dedicated to “Structures of Knowledge”. The Autumn Symposium considers “Supports for Knowledge”. Sessions include approaches to databases and library catalogs; specific case studies and projects; issues relating to reproductions and display, research and teaching, and more.

Part I: Spring Symposium (Saturday, 2 April 2022)
on “Structures of Knowledge”

Note: If you wish to register for the Symposium, please contact [email protected].

Eugene, Oregon, University of Oregon, Knight Library, MS 027, folio 25r. Manicle as outstretched paw, with cuff. Photography Zoey Kambour.

Presenters, Respondents, and Presiders for the Spring Symposium include (in alphabetical order): Phillip A. Bernhardt-House, Linde M. Brocato, Mildred Budny, Katharine C. Chandler, Barbara Williams Ellertson, Howard German, Hannah Goeselt, Thomas E. Hill, Eric. J. Johnson, Zoey Kambour, David Porreca, Jessica L. Savage, Derek Shank, Ronald Smeltzer, and David W. Sorenson.

As the Program evolves, adapting to changes in some speakers’ plans or requirements, we thank all the speakers who responded willingly to such changes, even at short notice, for example by expanding an intended “Response” to a “Presentation”, or the reverse, so as to keep to the time-allotments of the Sessions. We also thank the Presiders for their help in monitoring each of the Sessions during the course of the Symposium.
We acknowledge, with thanks, the renewed sponsorship of the Symposia this year by Barbara A. Shailor.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: Advertisements in Early Scientific Publications, BASIRA Project, Book Arts, CANTUS Chant, Decretals of Gregory IX, Esoterica, Fragmentarium Database, Gobelin Tapestries, History of Cataloging, History of Paper, Library Catalogues, Lima (OH) Public Library Staff Loan Assistance Fund, Louise Ege, Manuscript studies, Otto Ege Collection, Otto Ege Manuscript 6, Otto F. Ege, Shahnameh, Structured Knowledge, Structures of Knowledge, Tale of Cupid and Psyche, The Ohio State University, University of Oregon MS 027, Vassar College Library, Warburg Institute Library
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Medieval Magic in Theory

May 6, 2021 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Conference, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, Societas Magica

Medieval Magic in Theory:
Prologues to Learned Texts of Magic

Session Organized by Vajra Regan

***

Hermes Trismegistus. Frontispiece image (Lyons, 1669) via Wikimedia Commons and Wellcome Images (Wellcome_L0000980).

Hermes Trismegistus. Frontispiece image (Lyons, 1669) via Wikimedia Commons and Wellcome Images.

Session (1 of 3) Co-sponsored by
the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence
and the Societas Magica
at the
56th International Congress on Medieval Studies
(10–15 May 2021)

2021 Congress Program Announced

Congress Session 103, Virtually on
Tuesday, 11 May at 11:00 am EDT

= 2021 Congress Program, pages 38–39

Our plans for this 2021 Session adapt its plan for the cancelled 2020 Congress. Now it is co-sponsored by the Research Group and the Societas Magica, and parts of the contents have been updated.

Scope & Aims

The prologues to medieval texts of learned magic could serve a variety of functions. They were a space for their authors to announce the theme of the work, to situate the work within a specific literary, philosophical, or theological landscape, and to lay special claim to the reader’s attention. Consequently, these prologues have much to tell us about the traditions and beliefs underlying certain magical texts. Moreover, because many magical texts are substantially anonymous compilations, their prologues often provide unique access to the lives and contexts of the men and women behind the parchment.

The aim of this session is to explore these still largely understudied prologues which testify to the variety of medieval approaches to ‘magic’. We are especially interested in how magic is theorized in these prologues. What insights do these prologues offer into contemporary debates about the epistemological status of magic? Moreover, what can they tell us about the social, religious, and institutional contexts of their authors and readers?

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Tags: Areola Diagram, Astral magic, Bartholomei de Ripa Romea, Book of Hermes, Collected Treasures, Glossa ordinaria, Hermes Trismegistus, History of Magic, History of Prologues, Lapidaries, Liber dabessi, Magicians in History, Picatrix, Saint Gall Incantations, Sorcerers, The Emerald Table
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2021 Congress Program Announced

December 16, 2020 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Announcements, Business Meeting, Conference, Conference Announcement, Events, Index of Medieval Art, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, Societas Magica

Activities of the
Research Group on Manuscript Evidence
At the
56th International Congress on Medieval Studies
(10–15 May 2021)

Following the Call for Papers
(due by 15 September 2020)
and the Selection of Papers (due by 1 October 2020)
We announce the Program for our Sessions

#kzoo2021 / #kazoo2021

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. Dutch Book of Hours made for a female patron in the mid 15th century. Opening page of the Hours of the Virgin: "Here du salste opdoen mine lippen". Image via Creative Commons. At the bottom of the bordered page, an elegantly dressed woman sits before a shiny bowl- or mirror-like object, in order, perhaps, to perform skrying or to lure a unicorn.

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. Dutch Book of Hours. Image via Creative Commons.

Following the 2021 Congress Call for Papers, the Selection of proposed Papers, and the submission of the Programs for our Sessions to the Congress Committee (see our 2021 Congress Planning), we announce the Program for our Sessions and our other Activities for the 2021 ICMS Congress.

All activities at the Congress are scheduled to take place only “virtually”.  For such virtual plans, see the Congress page of the Medieval Institute. 

Watch this space. We await instructions from the Congress Committee regarding the revised approach to Sessions.

Note that, once the Committee announced that the Congress would have to go ‘virtual’, all 3 co-sponsors for our planned Reception agreed that it would make sense to wait for such an event until some suitable occasion in person.  However, we continue to plan for all 5 Sessions and our Open Business Meeting.

Update on 26 March 2021:
The Program of the Congress is now available. For information about the Congress, see its website.

*****

In a Nutshell

Open Business Meeting:  All are Welcome

Thursday, 13 May at 12:00 pm EDT.

  • 2021 Congress Program, page 99.

Sessions

Seal the Real, I–II

Congress Sessions 259 and 279, Virtually on
Thursday, 13 May at 11:00 am EDT and at 1:00 pm EDT

  • 2021 Congress Program, pages 92–93 and 100–101.

Medieval Magic in Theory:
Prologues to Learned Texts of Magic

Congress Session 103, Virtually on
Tuesday, 11 May at 11:00 am EDT

  • 2021 Congress Program, pages 38–39.

Revealing the Unknown, Parts I–II

Congress Sessions 181 and 201, Virtually on
Wednesday, 12 May at 11:00 am and 1:00 pm EDT

  • 2021 Congress Program, pages 66 and 73.

Details follow here.

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Tags: Bibliomancy, History of Documents, History of Magic, Manuscript studies, Matthew Paris, Medieval Lapidaries, Medieval Prologues, Medieval Seals, Picatrix, Reused Antique Gems, Scrying, Seals and Signatures, Sortilège, Thomas Hoccleve
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Keeping Up: Updates for Spring 2020

April 4, 2020 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Announcements, Bembino, Business Meeting, Conference, Conference Announcement, ICMS, Index of Medieval Art, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, Manuscript Studies, Princeton University, Societas Magica

Keeping Up:

Updates for Spring 2020

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. Dutch Book of Hours made for a female patron in the mid 15th century. Opening page of the Hours of the Virgin: "Here du salste opdoen mine lippen". Image via Creative Commons. At the bottom of the bordered page, an elegantly dressed woman sits before a shiny bowl- or mirror-like object, in order, perhaps, to perform skrying or to lure a unicorn.

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. Scrying, Perchance? Image via Creative Commons.

This Spring, the cancellation of 2 of our major events planned for this year, and intended to take place in mid-March and mid-May, produces perforce a redirection of energies and activities.  Call it “Regrouping”.

We report updates.

1.  Our 2020 Spring Symposium:  “From Cover to Cover”

Planned for 13–14 March at Princeton University
But Cancelled or Postponed

As preparations were proceeding apace, the event was cancelled by Princeton University — along with other events — on 9 March, in response to growing concerns for the spread of COVID-19 on a global scale.  Although at short notice, it was possible swiftly to cancel reservations for the venue, catering, and other services before participants had begun their journeys.

What We Planned

  • 2020 Spring Symposium: Save the Date
2020 Symposium "From Cover to Cover" Poster 2

2020 Symposium Poster 2

We aimed to consider, “From Cover to Cover”, activities dedicated to manuscripts, early printed materials, and beyond, from collecting and cataloguing to deciphering and beholding.  We prepared to gather specialists, teachers, students, and others engaged or interested in activities such as “Collecting, Curating, Conserving, Cataloguing, Deciphering, Reading, Reconsidering, Editing, Teaching, Displaying, Accessing, Beholding, and More”.

The focus was designed to center primarily upon medieval and early modern materials, both Western and non-Western.  The presentations would include reports of discoveries, work-in-progress, cumulative research, and collaborative projects by specialists from multiple centers, including independent scholars and younger scholars.

Included were workshops over original materials in manuscript and early print, a demonstration of materials and processes for medieval scripts, discussions about databases devoted to manuscripts and rare books, and sessions addressing multiple activities approaching medieval, early modern, and other textual resources.  Subjects would span a wide range geographically and chronologically, and take care to attend to the material and bibiographical evidence.

What We Can Do

There are requests for rescheduling the Symposium, or parts thereof, when conditions might permit.

Meanwhile, we can publish the Symposium Booklet.  At the time of cancellation, it had come close to completion for printing and distributing at the event and then afterward, as is our custom.  For example:

  • 2019 Anniversary Symposium on “The Roads Taken”
  • 2016 Symposium on ‘Words & Deeds”
  • 2014 Symposium on “Recollections of the Past”
  • 2013 Symposium on “Identity & Authenticity”

For all these and our other Booklets (see our Publications), the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence is the nonprofit publisher and distributor.  The design and layout conform with our Style Manifesto and employ our own digital font Bembino .

Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, Anonymous, Still Life of an Illuminated Book, German School, 15th century. Oil on Wood. Opened book with fanned pages. Image via Wikimedia, Public Domain.

Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, Anonymous, Still Life of an Illuminated Book, German School, 15th century. Image via Wikimedia, Public Domain.

The new 44-page Symposium Booklet contains the 2020 Symposium Program, Abstracts of the Papers and Masterclasses, and a set of accompanying Illustrations (some published for the first time).  The Booklet includes corrections and revisions offered by several of the authors as we completed the layout and editing, after the cancellation of the event.

It is the longest so far of all our Symposium Booklets. The 2019 Booklet for “The Roads Taken” has 28 pages, and the 2016 Booklet for “Words & Deeds” has 24 pages.  Only the Booklet for our multi-lingual digital font Bembino is longer, at 56 pages, including all the font tables for the different styles and languages. That Booklet and the font itself (now in Version 1.6) are freely available for download and use (commercial use included).  Here:  Bembino .

Our illustrated 2020 Spring Symposium Booklet is likewise freely available for download. As with other cases, for your convenience, we make it available in 2 versions, which may suit different printing arrangements, as wished.  The versions are:

  • printable in consecutive quarto-sized pages (8 1/2″ × 11″)
    2020 Spring Symposium Booklet as Consecutive Pages
  • printable as double sheets (11″ × 17″) which can be folded into the booklet, nesting the bifolia within each other
    — a design which does not require staples for closure and perusal
    2020 Spring Symposium as a Foldable Booklet

We thank our hosts, sponsors, contributors, owners and donors of images, editor, copy-editor, and layout designer. The publication is our gift to all who aimed to participate in the event and to follow its ‘ripples’ after the accomplishment of the Symposium. We offer it as a ‘souvenir’ of what our contributors, and the spirit of generous participation, intended for the event.

While we may explore plans to reschedule the event, or its parts, in some way or ways, the Booklet stands as a place-holder, and as a vivid glimpse of what could be and, indeed, can be. The gathering energy and enthusiasm for the event, as the weeks and days advanced toward it, remain a testimony to the constructive collective spirit which inspired it.

2020 Symposium "From Cover to Cover" Poster 1

2020 Symposium Poster 1

_____

With these observations, I am reminded of the Motto which I chose, years ago, for the 2-volume Illustrated Catalogue, co-published by the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence.

For Books are not absolutely dead things,
but doe contain a potencie of life in them
to be active as that soule was whose progeny they are;
nay, they do preserve as in a violl the purest efficacie and extraction
of the living intellect that bred them.

John Milton, Aeropagitica (1644)

Perhaps same as it ever was.

_____

Cover Page for Sorenson (2020 Spring Symposium Paper as Draft for Comment), with an array of illustrations and the title "Introduction to Indian Manuscripts"

Cover Page for Sorenson (2020 Spring Symposium Paper as Draft for Comment)

P. S.  Already one of our speakers, David W. Sorenson, has provided a draft version of his intended Symposium Paper for feedback. It expands the Abstract which appears in the 2020 Spring Symposium Booklet.

The paper provides “A Quick Introduction to Indian Manuscripts for the Non-Specialist”, with examples and illustrations.

With permission, we offer here his pdf.

Please contact us with your questions or suggestions.  (Contact details below.)

*****

2.  Our Activities at the 55th International Congress on Medieval Studies

Planned for 7–10 May at Kalamazoo
But Cancelled or Postponed

On 17 March, this year’s International Congress on Medieval Studies in May was cancelled, and with it all the activities which we were to sponsor and co-sponsor there, including Sessions and other meetings.  The Congress organizers declared that “We invite the organizers of sponsored . . . sessions approved for the 2020 Congress to re-propose them for the 2021 congress.  If proposed, they will be approved automatically”.

Unlike some organizations, who have declared this intention to re-present for the 2121 Congress, we do not know automatically if such a course would be appropriate for us, or for each and every one of our sessions.  Time will tell.

2019 Anniversary Reception Invitation. set in RGME digital font Bembino.

2019 Anniversary Reception Invitation.

Poster for our Session co-sponsored with the Societas Magica on "Celtic Magic Texts", organized by Phillip A. Bernhardt-House and sponsored by both the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence amd the Societas Magica at the 2018 International Congress on Medieval Studies. Poster set in RGME Bembino.

2018 Poster

The cancellation came in time before all reservations for the journey had been set into place.  Because our customary year-long preparations for the Congress had not reached the last weeks of its approach, we had not yet prepared the customary Posters for our Sessions or the Invitations to the Reception and Business Meeting, nor had the Agenda for that Meeting yet been drawn up.  Posters for previous Congresses show the standards.

However, we did in place have a series of posts on our website (You Are Here) announcing the plans for our 2020 Congress Activities, in stages with updates:

  • the Call for Papers for our approved Sessions, with descriptions of their aims and with selected Images (poster-worthy when the time would come) to exemplify their subjects and scope
  • the 2020 Congress Program, with the authors and titles of the selected Papers for each Session — including a permitted extra Session, given the strength of the responses to the Call, for our proposed Session “Seal the Real”
  • the 2020 Congress Program Announced, with the times and rooms assigned by the Congress Committee for our Program Activities, and with some of the Abstracts for the Papers.

In keeping with custom, we had begun, one by one (starting with the New Year), to post the Abstracts, as a foretaste for the presentations and discussions to come.

The cancellation of the Congress brought these stages to a halt, for a while, during which time we turned to other tasks — including the on-going follow-up from the cancellation or postponement of our Spring Symposium, and the completion of its Booklet.

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. Dutch Book of Hours made for a female patron in the mid 15th century. Opening page of the Hours of the Virgin: "Here du salste opdoen mine lippen". Image via Creative Commons. At the bottom of the bordered page, an elegantly dressed woman sits before a shiny bowl- or mirror-like object, in order, perhaps, to perform skrying or to lure a unicorn.

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. mage via Creative Commons.

What We Planned

  • 2020 International Congress on Medieval Studies Program Announced

We prepared for 5 Sessions with Papers, an Open Business Meeting, and a Reception.

These resemble the numbers and sorts of our activities in recent years at the Annual Congress.  For example:

  • 2019 Congress
  • 2018 Congress
  • 2017 Congress
  • 2016 Congress
  • 2015 Congress

This year’s plans also involved our 2 co-sponsors in recent years for Sessions and/or Receptions.

A.  Sessions

We prepared for 5 Sessions this year.

3 Sessions Sponsored by the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence

1–2. Seal the Real: Documentary Records, Seals & Authentications

organized by Mildred Budny

Part I.  Signed & Sealed
Part II.  × Marks the Spot

3. Prologues in Medieval Texts of Magic, Astrology, and Prophecy

organized by Vajra Regan

Logo of the Societas Magica, reproduced by permission

Logo of the Societas Magica

2 Sessions Co-Sponsored with the Societas Magica
in the 16th year of this collaboration

4–5. Revealing the Unknown

organized by Sanne de Laat and László Sándor Chardonnens

Part I.  Scryers and Scrying in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period
Part II.   Sortilège, Bibliomancy, and Divination

B.  2020 Open Business Meeting of the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence

1-Page Agendas customarily provided at the time.  This year we send it out already.  (See below.)

C.  Reception co-sponsored with the Index of Medieval Art at Princeton University
in the 3rd year of this collaboration

_____

P. S.  Part of Mildred Budny’s on-going research on the subject of seals and signatures, which would have figured in her Response to Session II of our “Seals” Sessions, now appears on our blog, Manuscript Studies, presenting Preston Take 2.  (See the Contents List for the blog, as more discoveries await publication.)

_____

P. P. S.  It is not lost on us that some of our planned Sessions for 2020 were to consider aspects of the history of divinatory skills across time and place.  But when we collectively chose these, as well as other subjects, last year for our sponsored and co-sponsored Sessions this year, it was not easy to guess then that this year’s Sessions would not take place, after all, at their appointed time and place.

Adèle Kindt (1804–1884), The Fortune Teller (circa 1835). Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten. Image via Wikimedia Commons. A young lady, brightly lit and beautifully dressed, looks outward as an older woman, beneath a dark hood, holds a set of cards and stares at them with intent.

Adèle Kindt (1804–1884), The Fortune Teller (circa 1835). Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten. Image via Wikimedia Commons.

What We Can Do

A.  Abstracts for the 2020 Congress Papers

Detail of opened book with schematic text. Photography © Mildred BudnyOur custom is to post on our website the Abstracts for the Papers of our Sessions at the Congress.  (See our Abstracts for Congress Papers.)  This year is no different.

In the winter of 2019–2020, we had begun to post the 2020 Abstracts, one by one, as is our custom.  They are linked to our announced Program: 2020 Congress Program Announced. The Abstracts function as a foretaste of the ‘Menu’ of the Sessions, and can provide a record of their subjects, aims, and scope of the presentations.

Already in earlier years (as with the 2016 Congress and the 2014 Congress), as a sign of appreciation, we chose to adopt the tradition of posting Abstracts even when a contributor was unable to travel to the Congress and to present the paper in person.  The publication of such Abstracts states that, although proposed, accepted, and scheduled within the Session and Congress Program, the paper was not, in the event, presented.

Before March 2020, only once before, in more than 30 years of activities in many centers in the United States and elsewhere (see our Events and Congress Activities), has the Research Group had to cancel an event itself.  That case was only 1 Session among 7 sponsored and co-sponsored Sessions at the 48th International Congress on Medieval Studies in May 2013.

This year, after the cancellation of both our 2020 Spring Symposium (see above) and the 2020 Congress, we first turned to completing the Symposium Booklet, and then to completing the posting of the 2020 Abstracts.

Those tasks are now accomplished.  For these Congress Abstracts, see

  • 2020 Congress Program Announced and Abstracts of Congress Papers Listed by Year.

For the Symposium Booklet, see

  • 2020 Spring Symposium: Save the Date

Thus we honor the intentions of our participants and their readiness to contribute to our events.

Next, we might turn to contemplating further activities, and perhaps rescheduling some of these ones.

[Update:  In the summer and autumn of 2020, we advance with planning to hold the same Sessions, albeit with a few changes, at the 2021 Congress.  See the 2021 Congress Program in Progress.]

B.  Agenda for the 2020 Business Meeting

Meeting to be rescheduled:  Time and Place to be Determined

The Annual Agendas for our Open Business Meetings, customarily held at the International Congress on Medieval Studies, remain available for consultation.

  • 2019 Agenda
  • 2018 Agenda
  • 2017 Agenda
  • 2016 Agenda
  • 2015 Agenda

These 1-page statements serve as concise Reports for our Activities, Plans, and Desiderata.  After the Meetings, the Abstracts are available for download on our website.  Some of them remain among the most popular downloads here.

Normally, the Agenda is presented at the Meeting.  This year, we send it out ahead of time.  It incorporates the updates of Spring 2020 and their constructive measures.

  • 2020 Agenda

It is not yet clear when this year’s Meeting, which had to be postponed, will take place.  Under present circumstances, we may contemplate a virtual meeting, say via online conferencing in some form.

Please let us know if you wish to participate in the Meeting.  We invite your comments, questions, and suggestions.  (See below.)

C. More

We thank all our contributors to the 2020 events.  The continuing momentum for such activities is a tribute to you all.

Please Contact Us with your questions and suggestions, for example to items on our  2020 Agenda.

For updates, please visit this site, our News & Views, and our Facebook Page .

For our nonprofit educational mission, with tax-exempt status, your donations in funds and/or in kind (expertise, materials, time) are welcome. Join us!

Tags: 'Manuscript Studies' Blog, 2020 Congress, 2020 Symposium, Bembino, Bembino Digital Font, Business Meeting, Early Printing, History of Documents, Manuscript studies, Medieval Studies, Seals and Signatures, Style Manifesto
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2020 Spring Symposium Cancelled or Postponed

March 10, 2020 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Announcements, Conference, Conference Announcement, Index of Medieval Art, Princeton University, Uncategorized

Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, Anonymous, Still Life of Illuminated Book (circa 1510). Image via Wikimedia Commons..

“From Cover to Cover”

Activities Devoted to Manuscripts, Early Printed Books & Beyond
From Collecting & Cataloguing to Deciphering & Beholding

2020  Spring Symposium
of the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence

Princeton University
* Friday & Saturday 13–14 March 2020

Update 5 April 2020

The Symposium Booklet is now published and available for download. See Keeping Up: Updates for Spring 2020.

* Update 9 March 2020 

This event is now cancelled, as Princeton University and other institutions respond to current health concerns, and take precautions regarding travel and meetings of various kinds in person.  The Symposium might be rescheduled, conditions permitting.  

Its plan is described in the announcement to Save the Date for our 2020 Spring Symposium .

Meanwhile, the Research Group aims to complete the Symposium Booklet and distribute it to contributors, registrants, and others, as a souvenir of our speakers’ good intentions.  Already, as a sign of appreciation, the Research Group has adopted the custom of posting on our website the abstracts of contributors who become unable to attend to present in person (as with the 2018 Congress, among others).

This time, under wider — even global — circumstances affecting the ensemble as a whole, we wish to show appreciation for the remarkable enthusiasm and dedication for the collaborative event demonstrated by our hosts, sponsors, speakers, moderators, and others.  This knowledge is something to remember with satisfaction, gratitude, and praise.

The publication could, perhaps, give a token to show for our shared efforts, and to demonstrate something of the spirit of dedication and focus which prepared to assemble for the event itself.

This aim might help to ease some of the disappointment over cancellation, while the cancellation itself might ease some uncertainties about travel at present.

*****

P. S.  Only once before, in more than 30 years of activities in many centers in the United States and elsewhere (see our Events and Congress Activities}, has the Research Group had to cancel an event.  It, however, was only 1 Session among 7 sponsored and co-sponsored Sessions at the 48th International Congress on Medieval Studies in May 2013, when the Session organizer and 2 presenters were unable to travel to the Congress.  We honored their intentions to contribute by continuing to record their abstracts and the statement of purpose of the Session on this  website.

Similar solidarity pertains to our record of this intended 2020 Spring Symposium.  This post (You are Here) reports the Cancellation or Postponement.

In the post announcing the Symposium, describing its scope, and providing its Program, not only do we now report the Cancellation or Postponement (as here), but also we preserve the description of the event in the updated version just before the decision to cancel this Symposium, among many gatherings at Princeton University and elsewhere at the beginning of the week in which the Symposium was planned to take place. See Save the Date.

2020 Symposium "From Cover to Cover" Poster 2

2020 Symposium Poster 2

New York, Grolier Club, \*434.14\Aug\1470\Folio. Flavius Josephus, De antiquitate Judiaca and De bello Judaico, translated by Rufinus Aquileinensis, printed in Augsburg on paper by Johannn Schüsseler in 2 Parts, dated respectively 28 June 1470 and 23 August 1470, and bound together with a manuscript copy dated 1462 of Eusebius Caesariensis, Historia ecclesiastica.

New York, Grolier Club, *434.14Aug1470Folio. 15th-century German binding for historical texts in print (Augsburg, 1470) and manuscript (1462). Image courtesy Meghan Constantinou.

*****

Watch this space and visit our FaceBook Page for updates.  For questions and suggesions,  please contact [email protected].

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2020 International Congress on Medieval Studies Program Announced

January 18, 2020 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Announcements, Bembino, Conference, Conference Announcement, Index of Christian Art, Index of Medieval Art, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, Societas Magica

Research Group on Manuscript Evidence
at the 55th International Congress on Medieval Studies
7–10 May 2020

Program Announced
[NOW CANCELLED OR POSTPONED]

[Update on 12 July 2020:  Now see 2021 International Congress on Medieval Studies Call for Papers]

[Published on 18 January 2020, with updates.

Adèle Kindt (1804–1884), The Fortune Teller (circa 1835). Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten. Image via Wikimedia Commons. A young lady, brightly lit and beautifully dressed, looks outward as an older woman, beneath a dark hood, holds a set of cards and stares at them with intent.

Adèle Kindt (1804–1884), The Fortune Teller (circa 1835). Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten. Image via Wikimedia Commons.

Update on 17 March.  The 55th Congress has been Cancelled. 

According to the website for the International Congress on Medieval Studies:

The health and safety of our attendees and our community are our first priority. Due to the COVID-19 outbreak and the most recent recommendations of the CDC and the WHO regarding social distancing and public gatherings, we have made the difficult decision to cancel the 55th International Congress on Medieval Studies (May 7-10, 2020).

As for the future, according to the Congress organizers:

We invite the organizers of sponsored and special sessions approved for the 2020 Congress to re-propose them for the 2021 congress. If proposed, they will be approved automatically.

Meanwhile, with the preparations for the Congress set aside, the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence continues to advance with posting the Abstracts of the intended Papers for our 2020 ICMS Sessions, to stand alongside their Statements of Purpose as designed for the Call for Papers and announced in this post.

Our tradition regularly has been to post on our website the Abstracts before our Sessions in a given Congress, as a foretaste of the Menu.  Years ago, as a sign of appreciation, we adopted the custom of posting the Abstract of one or other contributor who became unable to attend to present in person (as with the 2016 Congress and the 2014 Congress).  Thus we honor the intentions of our participants to present the results (or interim results) of their research and reflections, even when they could not do so at the event.

Before March 2020, only once before, in more than 30 years of activities in many centers in the United States and elsewhere (see our Events and Congress Activities), has the Research Group had to cancel an event itself.  That case was only 1 Session among 7 sponsored and co-sponsored Sessions at the 48th International Congress on Medieval Studies in May 2013.

This March, in stark contrast, 2 of our major events for 2020 have had to be cancelled as a whole.  This change pertains both at the Congress and elsewhere.  First, our 2020 Spring Symposium, From Cover to Cover, intended for 13–14 March at Princeton University, has been Cancelled or Postponed.  Now, the 55th ICMS intended for May at Kalamazoo. 

For the former, we aim to complete the Symposium Booklet, with the Program, Abstracts, and Illustrations, as planned,and distribute it to contributors, registrants, and others, as a souvenir of the collective aims for the gathering.   Here we similarly honor our participants’ intentions by recording their Abstracts.]

*****

What We Planned

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. Dutch Book of Hours made for a female patron in the mid 15th century. Opening page of the Hours of the Virgin: "Here du salste opdoen mine lippen". Image via Creative Commons. At the bottom of the bordered page, an elegantly dressed woman sits before a shiny bowl- or mirror-like object, in order, perhaps, to perform skrying or to lure a unicorn.

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. Image via Creative Commons.

With the achievement of our Activities at the 2019 International Congress on Medieval Studies (ICMS), described in our 2019 Congress Report, we prepare for the 2020 Congress. With the conclusion of the Call for Papers on 15 September 2019 for our sponsored and co-sponsored Sessions, we have assigned their Programs and reported them to the Congress Committee.

Now, as the new year begins, we announce the programs as well as our other activities at the 2020 Congress.  As the Congress announces its Sneak Preview of the 2020 Congress Program, we report the times and room assignments. Soon, as is our custom, we will publish the Abstracts for their Papers and Responses.

*****

Our events at the Congress, as always, are designed to represent, to explore, to promote, to celebrate, and to advance aspects of our shared range of interests, fields of study, subject matter, and collaboration between younger and established scholars, teachers, and others, in multiple centers.

This year, the response to the Call for Papers for our Session on Seals received so strong a response that we have been granted 2 sessions in the place of the one as accepted. Again this year we co-sponsor Sessions with the Societas Magica (2 Sessions this year). It will be the 16th year of this co-sponsorship.

Also, like the 2015–2019 Congresses, we plan for

  • an Open Business Meeting and
  • a co-sponsored Reception.

Again, like the 2016–2018 Congresses, we co-sponsor a Reception with the Index of Medieval Art at Princeton University (formerly the Index of Christian Art).

Abstracts for previous Congresses appear in our Congress Abstracts, Indexed both by Year and by Author.  The Abstracts for this year’s Congress will join their company.

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Tags: 'Toulouse deformity', Bibliomancy, Divination, History of Documents, History of Magic, Manuscript studies, Medieval Seals, Scrying, Seals and Signatures, Sortilège
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2020 International Congress on Medieval Studies Program

September 18, 2019 in Abstracts of Conference Papers, Announcements, Business Meeting, Conference, Conference Announcement, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, Manuscript Studies, Reception, Societas Magica

Research Group on Manuscript Evidence
at the 55th International Congress on Medieval Studies
7–10 May 2020

[Published on 18 September 2019, with updates.]

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. Dutch Book of Hours made for a female patron in the mid 15th century. Opening page of the Hours of the Virgin: "Here du salste opdoen mine lippen". Image via Creative Commons. At the bottom of the bordered page, an elegantly dressed woman sits before a shiny bowl- or mirror-like object, in order, perhaps, to perform skrying or to lure a unicorn.

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, MS W.782, folio 15r. Van Alphen Hours. Image via Creative Commons.

With the achievement of our Activities at the 2019 International Congress on Medieval Studies (ICMS), described in our 2019 Congress Report, we prepare for the 2020 Congress.  With the conclusion of the Call for Papers on 15 September 2019 for our sponsored and co-sponsored Sessions, we assign the Programs for our 5 sponsored and co-sponsored Sessions. Meanwhile, we describe their aims.

Soon, when appropriate, we will announce the Programs for the Sessions and publish the Abstracts for their Papers and Responses.

*****

Our events at the Congress, as always, are designed to represent, to explore, to promote, to celebrate, and to advance aspects of our shared range of interests, fields of study, subject matter, and collaboration between younger and established scholars, teachers, and others, in multiple centers.

This year, the response to the Call for Papers for our Session on Seals received so strong a response that we have been granted 2 sessions in the place of the one as accepted.  Again this year we co-sponsor Sessions with the Societas Magica (2 Sessions this year). It will be the 16th year of this co-sponsorship.

Also, like the 2015–2019 Congresses, we plan for

  • an Open Business Meeting and
  • a  co-sponsored Reception.

Again, like the 2016–2018 Congresses, we co-sponsor a Reception with the Index of Medieval Art at Princeton University (formerly the Index of Christian Art).

As usual, we publish the Program for the accepted Papers, once the Call For Papers has completed its specified span. We will publish the Abstracts for these Papers as the preparations for the Congress advance and as their Authors permit. Abstracts for previous Congresses appear in our Congress Abstracts, Indexed both by Year and by Author.

Read the rest of this entry →

Tags: Bibliomancy, Divination, History of Documents, History of Magic, Manuscript studies, Medieval Seals, Prologues in Medieval Texts, Scrying, Seals & Signatures, Sortilège
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