1414 and 1914: the origins of ‘Prussianism’ Recent days have witnessed a heated debate between Michael Gove, the combative Secretary of State for Education, and Tristram Hunt, Gove’s shadow on the Labour benches, about the most appropriate way to commemorate the First World War. Reacting strongly against what he sees as a left-wing tendency to […]
As the year ends … more 2013 anniversaries An earlier entry to this blog pointed out that 2013 marks the 800th anniversary of the issue of Quia Maior, one of the key texts in the development of crusading. But there are other significant anniversaries to record before the last stroke of midnight on 31 December. […]
‘Holy war and cultural transformation in late medieval and early modern East-Central Europe’ The glorious medieval city of Kraków was the setting for this stimulating conference organised jointly by Mainz’s Johannes Gutenberg University and Kraków’s Jesuit University Ignatianum. It was fascinating to see how the themes explored at Kraków – in papers presented by colleagues […]
Exactly 800 years ago, and irrespective of the host of problems they were already battling with – ranging from predatory aristocrats to failing harvests – the prelates of medieval Christendom had to find time to absorb the content and think through the implications of a remarkable encyclical that arrived from Rome. This was Quia […]
‘As we venerate the martyrs of Otranto, let us ask God to sustain the many Christians who, today and in many parts of the world, now, still suffer from violence, and to give them the courage to be devout and to respond to evil with good’. Pope Francis, 12 May 2013 The Pope’s canonisation of […]
For further information on the symposium that I write about here, see: http://www2.le.ac.uk/departments/mrc/events/croatia-and-europe These are exciting times for Croatia. In June 1991 the country declared its independence from Yugoslavia, triggering that state’s demise. The founding fathers of the new Croatia were reasserting a sovereign status that their ancestors had lost as far back as 1102, […]
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