Medieval Historical Writing: Britain and Ireland, 500-1500

Description

History writing in the Middle Ages did not belong to any particular genre, language or class of texts. Its remit was wide, embracing the events of antiquity; the deeds of saints, rulers and abbots; archival practices; and contemporary reportage. This volume addresses the challenges presented by medieval historiography by using the diverse methodologies of medieval studies: legal and literary history, art history, religious studies, codicology, the history of the emotions, gender studies and critical race theory. Spanning one thousand years of historiography in England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland, the essays map historical thinking across literary genres and expose the rich veins of national mythmaking tapped into by medieval writers. Additionally, they attend to the ways in which medieval histories crossed linguistic and geographical borders. Together, they trace multiple temporalities and productive anachronisms that fuelled some of the most innovative medieval writing.

Jennifer Jahner is Assistant Professor of English at the California Institute of Technology. Emily Steiner is Professor of English Literature at the University of Pennsylvania. Elizabeth M. Tyler is Professor of Medieval Literature at the University of York.

'The collection as a whole works to resist the potentially dangerous oversimplification of histories and historiography by highlighting their ongoing shaping as transmitted and interpreted texts.' D. W. Hayes, Choice '... this very fine book is a radical departure from Gransden's earlier work and one that deserves to sit alongside it as a very different but equally important contribution to the study of medieval historiography.' Helen Fulton, Studies in the Age of Chaucer 'The essays presented here are a useful introduction to medieval historical writing for any student, and they provide access points for a number of areas for further research.' Claire Macht, Journal of British Studies 'The expert editors of this rich, cohesive collection have worked hard to organize the twenty-seven essays gathered here so that each chapter contributes to an ongoing discussion and to the larger whole ... [a] serious, keenly engineered, and informative model of research and humanist scholarship. It is accessible, clearly purposed, and trenchantly researched.' Michael Calabrese, Modern Philology