Since 1966, Cornell’s Program in Medieval Studies has combined the best aspects of an interdisciplinary program with the focused training required for academic careers in a variety of traditional disciplines. The Program’s faculty are drawn from nearly every humanities department at Cornell; together, they offer expertise in a wide array of disciplines and area studies spanning more than a millennium of languages and cultures—from Old and Middle English literature to Byzantine monuments; from Viking studies to Andalusian architecture; from Chinese intellectual history to Islamic legal history.
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Student Groups
The Medieval Studies Graduate Association is an independent entity. Its funds are purely and wholly for the disposal of its own working brief. The MSGA is dedicated to being a forum for sustained discussion and debate within the student medievalist body on campus and to strengthening connectivity between these students.
Click here for more details on the Medieval Studies Graduate Association
Quodlibet provides a lively forum for all those interested in all things medieval on campus, and organizes a series of lectures to highlight current research topics relating to medieval studies.
Medieval Language Reading Groups
Spring 2024
Language | Day and time (all times listed as Eastern/Ithaca time) | Location | Group leaders |
Latin |
Mondays, 2-3pm Starts 12 February |
Location TBD | Andrew Hicks (ajh299) |
Old French |
Mondays, 3-4pm Starts 5 February |
Feb 5: Olin Library 402 Feb 12 -- end of semester: Klarman G44 |
Thari Zweers (tlz5) Chiara Visentin (cv284) |
Old English |
Biweekly*, Thursdays, 11am - noon |
Zoom (email Lisa or Lars for the link) |
Lisa Camp (lc939) Lars Johnson (log6) |
Middle English |
Biweekly*, Fridays, 5-6pm |
Zoom (email Lisa or Ryan for the link) |
Lisa Camp (lc939) Ryan Randle (rar348) |
Old Norse Icelandic | Wednesdays, 4-5pm | Zoom (email Tom Hill for link) |
Tom Hill (tdh1) |
*Old English and Middle English meet on alternate weeks. Contact the group leaders to check on specific schedule.
News
Book brings elusive Greek technical writer into focus
Hero of Alexandria's writings on things like pneumatics, pure geometry and catapults have influenced many others through the ages and his principles touch early modern inventions including the player piano and the fire engine.
Read more2024 Medieval Studies Student Colloquium (MSSC): "Subjectivities"
Saturday, March 2 on Zoom
Read moreMedieval Studies faculty lecture, Thursday 15 February
Simone Pinet will give the Romance Studies annual faculty lecture entitled "Silence, Voice, Noise: Sound Scenes from the 'Poem of the Cid'"
Read moreSpring 2024 Medieval Studies Graduate Student Roundtable
Select Thursdays, 4:30-6:00pm in Olin Library 703
Read moreSophia D'Ignazio, Ph.D. 2022, publishes article in Medieval Feminist Forum
Sophia D'Ignazio, Cornell Medieval Studies Ph.D. 2022, publishes her article "Women’s Public Language in the 'Old English Apollonius of Tyre'" in Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality 59, No. 1 (2023).
Read moreZachary Thomas publishes translated edition in the Thomistic Ressourcement Series
Thomas' edition and translation of Fr. Franck Quoëx's "Liturgical Theology in Thomas Aquinas: Sacrifice and Salvation History" has been published as part of the Thomistic Ressourcement Series (The Catholic University of America Press, 2023).
Read more