We announce the program for our sponsored and co-sponsored sessions at the next International Congress on Medieval Studies, when we will celebrate our anniversary year, along with that of one of our co-sponsors, the Societas Magica<\/strong><\/a>.\u00a0 2014 marks the 20th anniversary of the Societas Magica.\u00a0 For the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence, it marks our 15th anniversary as a nonprofit educational organization and our 25th anniversary as an international scholarly society.\u00a0 This is the ninth year of our co-sponsorship with the Societas Magica<\/strong>, and the first year of co-sponsorship with the Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies<\/strong> at the University of Florida.\u00a0 The Events at this Congress celebrate these shared accomplishments.<\/p>\n This year, with the transition to our second, updated website (begun in 2014 and completed in 2015), we began to issue the announcements for a given Congress in a series of blogposts, rather than overwriting its statements, which had left only the final state in view.\u00a0 Here we offer the Congress Announced<\/strong>, with more to come.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Organized by Mildred Budny<\/strong> (Research Group on Manuscript Evidence<\/em>)<\/p>\n This fourth session in our recurring series on “Medieval Writing Materials” at the Congress will focus upon subjects and methodologies which call for attention, in turn or in further refinement, in response to new or continuing research.\u00a0 Topics for consideration include the production, trade, and use of medieval writing materials, and the artful combinations of form and contents in their very surfaces, substances, and enclosures.\u00a0 The case studies consider the evidence for the evolution of Christian manuscript production in Ethiopia from its origins onward, the significance of the materials employed in the records for the Catalan companies of Francesco di Marco Datini da Prato, and the features of specimens of European watermarked paper in Early Ottoman contexts.<\/p>\n Presider: Alan M. Stahl<\/strong> (Firestone Library, Princeton University<\/em>)<\/p>\n Presenters:<\/p>\n Respondent:<\/p>\n Our session explores the complex issues of recognizing, and distinguishing between, “Individual Style” or “House Style” in the hands of scribes, artists, and others creating distinctive works of whatever kind. Contributions and comments in our recent sessions and other settings make it clear that these issues of attribution impact numerous areas of study — Insular manuscripts, Carolingian workshops, Middle English palaeography, to name a few — while a suitably rigorous methodology deserves wider application. Our contributions discuss diverse areas of subject matters and research results.<\/p>\n Presider: Celia Chazelle<\/strong> (Department of History, The College of New Jersey<\/em>)<\/p>\n Presenters:<\/p>\n Respondent:<\/p>\n Co-sponsored by the Societas Magica<\/strong> (societasmagica.org<\/a>) and the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence<\/strong> This session aims to look at the archaeology of magic as it manifests over a broad temporal and geographic area. We embrace talks on magical objects from both East and West. What objects (talismans, tomes, sculptures, inscriptions, etc.) relevant to magic survive from the Medieval era? What marks their ritual use and\/or how do they distinguish themselves from ordinary artifacts?<\/p>\n Presider:\u00a0 Mildred Budny<\/strong> (RGME<\/em>)<\/p>\n Presenters:<\/p>\n Respondent:<\/p>\n Co-sponsored by the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence<\/strong> and the Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies<\/strong> at the University of Florida One of the most neglected European polities of the High and Late Middle Ages is the so-called “Second Bulgarian Empire” (1186\u20131396). Its history is moreover connected to the rise of Cuman power in the steppe lands north of the Black Sea, the medieval kingdom of Hungary, medieval Serbia, and the Latin Empire of Constantinople. Pope Innocent III wrote several times to Johannitsa Kaloyanes, the second ruler of the pEmpire. John Asen II won a great victory at Klokotnitsa against the Despotate of Epirus, thus enabling the rise of the Nicaean Empire, as well as the subsequent restoration of the Byzantine Empire in 1261. The lavishly decorated Tetraevangelion<\/em> of Emperor John Alexander, now in the British Library, is perhaps the best known “icon” of the extraordinary cultural development which occurred in 14th-century Bulgaria.<\/p>\n Our sessions propose to examine this \u201cexotic\u201d subject, little-known among Western medievalists, of the history of Southeastern Europe between the late 12th and the late 14th centuries. Our goal is to showcase recent research on the legal history of the Empire, the relations between Catholic and Orthodox Christianity in the political and cultural achievement of medieval Bulgaria, manuscript transmission, and fashions combining Western and Byzantine elements (revealed primarily through archaeological finds in medieval cemeteries in Silistra). Our explorations seek to shed new light on this \u201cneglected empire\u201d of medieval Europe.<\/p>\n Presider: Florin Curta<\/strong>\u00a0(Department of History, University of Florida<\/em>)<\/p>\n Presenters:<\/p>\n Presider: Ivan Biliarsky<\/strong> <\/strong>(Institute of History, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Sofia<\/em>) Presenters:<\/p>\n Reception for the Societas Magica and the Research Group on Manuscript Evidence, to celebrate shared anniversaries in this landmark year.\u00a0 Please join us at 9:00 pm on Friday 9 May at Fetzer 1020.<\/p>\n *****<\/p>\n Information about the International Congress on Medieval Studies and the Societas Magica appears on their websites:<\/p>\n Information about our sessions in previous Congresses appears on our pages on<\/p>\n Please watch our site and these sites for developing information about the next Congress.<\/p>\n *****<\/p>\n Updates:<\/p>\n The\u00a0 2014 Congress Report<\/strong><\/a> provides details of the events, with Abstracts for the papers, Corrigenda for the programs of the “Neglected Empire” sessions, the Posters for our sessions, and some photographs. Now these Posters are assembled in context in our Gallery of Posters on Display<\/a>.<\/p>\n A report of the Anniversary Reception<\/strong><\/a> focuses on this special event.\u00a0 All these events were a wonderful, collaborative way to celebrate our shared anniversaries.\u00a0 We thank all our participants and contributors!<\/p>\n *****<\/p>\n P.S.\u00a0 Do you have any suggestions for our next anniversaries?\u00a0 We’d love to hear.\u00a0 Please let us know.<\/p>\n You could Contact Us<\/a> and join the conversation on our FaceBook Page<\/a>.<\/p>\n *****<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 49th International Congress on Medieval Studies 8-11 May 2014 [Published on our first website on 8 January 2014, with updates there and here] We announce the program for our sponsored and co-sponsored sessions at the next International Congress on Medieval Studies, when we will celebrate our anniversary year, along with that of one of our […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[324,50,4,130,3],"tags":[54,65,29,61,55,60,78,686,81,62,33,66,57,36,77,64,82,85,71,72,21,58,84,56,69,68,59,35,80,11,73,6,53,34,86,13,67,75,76,79,87,685,83,74,63,70,28],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=240"}],"version-history":[{"count":86,"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12255,"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240\/revisions\/12255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}I. Sponsored Sessions<\/strong><\/h2>\n
![\"Logo](\"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Heavy-LOGO1-150x138.jpg\"){kind=logo}
<\/a>1. “Medieval Writing Materials: Surfaces, Fixtures, and Enclosures”<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n
\n“The Gospels<\/em> of \u018enda Abba G\u00e4rima and the Contexts of Early Christian Manuscript Production in Ethiopia”<\/li>\n
\n“The Paper Used in the Account Books of Francesco di Marco Datini da Prato”<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n
\n“European Watermarked Paper in the Early Ottoman Empire:\u00a0 Some Preliminary Observations”<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n2.\u00a0 “Individual Style or House Style? Assessing Scribal Contributions, Artistic Production, and Creative Achievements”<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\n
\n“Half-Uncial a<\/em> and Uncial a <\/em>at Line-Ends: The Division of Hands in the Book of Kells and an Insight into the ‘Calligraphic Imagination’ Evident in the Script”<\/li>\n
\n“Variability or Multiple Identities? A Question of Style, Constraints, and Potential”<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n
\n“Polygraphism”<\/li>\n<\/ul>\nII.<\/strong> Co-sponsored Sessions<\/strong><\/h2>\n
IIA.\u00a0 Co-Sponsored with the Societas Magica<\/h2>\n
![\"Societas](\"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/SocMaghead2.png\")
<\/a>3.\u00a0 “Visualizing Learned and Popular Magic Through Manuscripts, Objects, and Talismans”<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nOrganized by David Porreca<\/strong> (Department of Classics, University of Waterloo<\/em>)<\/p>\n\n
\n“The Musical Hand of Knowledge”<\/li>\n
\n“The Visual Trappings of Magic:\u00a0 McGill University, Special Collections, MCG 117”<\/li>\n
\n“Riding the Emerald:\u00a0 Lithic Talismans in Renaissance Visual Culture”<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n
IIB.\u00a0 With the Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies
\nat the University of Florida<\/h2>\n![\"Alternate](\"https:\/\/manuscriptevidence.org\/wpme\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/OrangeBluMEMSlogo-300x236.png\")
<\/a>4-5. “A Neglected Empire: Bulgaria Between the Late 12th and Late 14th Centuries, Parts I and II”
\n<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\nOrganized by Mildred Budny<\/strong> (RGME<\/em>) and
\nFlorin Curta<\/strong> (Department of History, University of Florida<\/em>)<\/p>\n\u00a0Part I. \u201cDefining, Shaping, and Redefining an Empire\u201d<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\n
\n\u201cThe Second Bulgarian Empire: Identity, Typology, Continuity, and Discontinuity\u201d<\/li>\n
\n\u201cSources and Patterns of State Identity of the Bulgarian Empire under the Assenids (1183\u20131396)<\/li>\n
\n\u201cBetween Past Glory and Imperial destiny: The Ideological Use of the Past and of the Imperial Idea in 13th-Century Bulgaria\u201d<\/li>\n
\n\u201cThe Second Bulgarian Empire and the Mediterranean\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\nPart II. \u201cEngaging in Empire, from Center to Periphery and Beyond\u201d<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\n<\/em><\/p>\n\n
\n\u201cThe Empire\u2019s Heart: The Significance of the Capital T\u0103rnovo in the History of Late Medieval Bulgaria\u201d<\/li>\n
\n\u201cAnti-Heretical Texts in 14-century Bulgarian Compilations of Canon Law\u201d<\/li>\n
\n\u201cWithin a Southeast European Multiple-Contact Zone: The Conceptualization of Medieval Bulgarian and Early Ottoman History\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\nIII. Reception
\n<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n
\n