The Byzness, 7th June 2026
Oxford University Byzantine Society
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THE OXFORD UNIVERSITY BYZANTINE SOCIETY
The Byzness, 7th June 2026
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1. NEWS AND EVENTS
2. CALLS FOR PAPERS
3. JOBS AND SCHOLARSHIP OPPORTUNITIES
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1. NEWS AND EVENTS
Dear all,
It is my great pleasure to announce that last Friday, June 5th, the new OUBS Committee for 2026/7 was elected at the OUBS AGM.
The results are as follows:
President: Nidanu O’Shea
Secretary: Yu Hang Hui
Treasurer: Andrew McNey
IT Officer: Charlie Mason
Congratulations to the new committee!
It has been such a pleasure to serve as President for 2025/6, and whilst I am sad that my tenure will soon be coming to an end, I have full confidence in next year’s committee and could not be more excited to see what they are able to do. They will formally take on their roles from August, but do expect that you may start hearing from them over the summer.
All my best,
Madeleine
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Remember to follow us on all our socials, below!
Instagram: @oxbyzsoc
Bluesky: @oxunibyzantinesoc.bsky.social
X/Twitter: @oxbyz (if you do follow us on X, we are transitioning over to Bluesky, so please do follow us there in the first instance)
All my best,
Madeleine.
For those wishing to submit an event, call for papers, job or scholarship opportunity to the Byzness please send details to the committee at byzantin...@gmail.com indicating the relevant list for The Byzness our external to Oxford and year-round newsletter or The Byzantine Lists our Oxford-centered events and circulated only in term-time. Please keep listing brief and include all relevant information in the body of the notice. Outside of exceptional circumstances, we only share events once.
Conference | Greek manuscripts in Renaissance Venice: the library of Guillaume Pellicier
18 June from 14:30 19 June from 9:30
The library of Guillaume Pellicier (c.1490-1567), French bishop and ambassador to Venice, is a key resource for our understanding of the transmission of Greek culture in Europe. Its Greek manuscripts were copied for him during his stay in Venice (1539-42), then the political, cultural, and commercial bridge between East and West.
The final conference of the 4-year AHRC-funded project gathers members of the project and specialists in the discipline. Together, they will give a portrait of the fascinating bishop of Montpellier and they will use the results of the project to study in detail the contents of the library and the history of its formation. A first session will present recent research on the role of Pellicier as an ambassador and a bishop; the second and third sessions will present the contents of the library and the main results of our research; the last session will place the creation of the collection in a broader Venetian context.
Speakers include Guillaume Alonge, Luca Beltramini, Elisa Bianchi, Giacomo Cardinali, Morgane Cariou,Clément Desgrange, Richard Gartner, Ciro Giacomelli, Ottavia Mazzon, Thibault Miguet, Raphaële Mouren, Clément Pieyre, Rosa Maria Piccione,Dimitrios Skrekas, Pauline Van Thienem.
PROGRAMME:
Thursday 18 June
14:30
Welcome
Pellicier and his books in context
Chair: Elena Valeri (Sapienza Università di Roma)
Raphaële Mouren (British School at Rome/Warburg Institute/Centre Gabriel Naudé)
The Library of Guillaume Pellicier and the Pellicier project
Guillaume Alonge (Università degli studi di Torino/Centro Interdisciplinare Linceo Giovani)
Guillaume Pellicier à Venise et son entourage: espions, hérétiques, bibliophiles
Clément Desgrange (Centre d’études des mondes moderne et contemporain, Université Bordeaux-Montaigne)
L’ambassade à Venise de Guillaume Pellicier (1539-1542): diplomatie, espionnage et culture
Coffee break
Clément Pieyre (ENS de Lyon, Centre Jean Mabillon)
Guillaume Pellicier à Montpellier: jalons pour une étude biographique
Rosa Maria Piccione (Università degli Studi di Torino)
Una collezione europea da Venezia a Berlino: cosa raccontano i manoscritti?
Pauline Van Thienem (Institut national du patrimoine, Paris)
A European collection: from Venice to Berlin: what the archives tell us?
Friday 19 June
09:30
Inside Pellicier’s collection
Chair: Marilena Maniaci (Università di Cassino e del Lazio meridionale/ANVUR)
Dimitrios Skrekas (University of Crete)
The contents of the collection: insights on religious and liturgical texts
Ciro Giacomelli (Università degli studi di Padova)
Pellicier e i filosofi greci: riflessioni quantitative e filologiche
Thibault Miguet (Université Paris-Est Créteil)
Les manuscrits médicaux grecs de Guillaume Pellicier
Coffee break
Luca Beltramini (Warburg Institute, London)
Classical Texts in the Collection: Between Canon and Exegesis
Elisa Bianchi (Warburg Institute, London)
Actors, Roles, and Antigraphs: Scribal Collaboration and Copying Practices
Richard Gartner (Warburg Institute, London)
How to visualise the library and make it available
Lunch
14:15
16th century Greek libraries and collections
Chair: Daniele Bianconi (Sapienza Università di Roma)
Ottavia Mazzon (Università degli studi di Padova)
Loans from the Library of St Mark and circulation of Greek texts from Venice to Europe
Morgane Cariou (Sorbonne Université-IUF)
Les manuscrits acquis par Guillaume Pellicier pour le roi de France
Giacomo Cardinali (Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana)
Ateliers di copisti di manoscritti greci a Venezia nel 16 secolo
Concluding remarks
The event is hybrid. To attend in person, we look forward to welcoming you at the British School at Rome, Via Gramsci 61, Rome. To attend online, please register here.
Symposium Commemorating the 800th Anniversary of the Birth of Bar ʿEbroyo (1226–1286)
Date: Saturday, 5 December 2026
9:15 AM – 5:00 PM
Place: Mor Aphrem Center
55 West Midland Ave
Paramus, NJ 07652
All scholars, students, and friends of Syriac heritage are warmly invited to attend.
V LECTIO Interdisciplinary Summer School “Translations in the Premodern and Early Modern World”: Registration open until 30 June 2026
Kortenberg, 8–9 September 2026
Since 2022, the LECTIO Summer Schools have brought together early career researchers (PhD candidates and postdoctoral researchers) and professors to explore a specific theme from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, drawing on materials from Antiquity, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and the Early Modern Period. This year, the masterclasses will focus on the topic of translation.
Across many fields of research, one can observe a broad and growing interest in translations from the premodern and early modern world. Translations provide valuable insights into how historical actors understood, engaged with, and adapted texts as they sought to convey meaning from one cultural or linguistic context to another. They also allow us to tell more nuanced historical narratives that account for the interactions between multiple cultures. This summer school brings into dialogue research on translations from different historical periods.
The programme consists of 8 masterclasses, each of which will be combined with a slot for participants to pitch their research and receive feedback. The masterclasses will engage with one or more of the following three subtopics:
- the material dimensions of translation,
- translation techniques and methods,
- the role(s) of translators and interpreters within their societies.
The spirit of the summer school is to create a dialogue and allow the participants to learn about and compare approaches to the same subject across different disciplines. This interdisciplinary nature of the summer school brings everyone out of their immediate scholarly comfort zone and thus creates a space of mutual learning and opens up new perspectives.
The cost of participation is €80 and includes all meals and an overnight stay in Kortenberg.
Registration is open until 30 June 2026. Places are limited: if there are more applications than the school can accommodate, a selection will be made.
Learn more and register: https://www.kuleuven.be/lectio/events/summer-school/lectio-summer-school-2026-translations-in-the-premodern-and-early-modern-world
The Summer School is organised by LECTIO – KU Leuven Institute for the Study of the Transmission of Texts, Ideas and Images in Antiquity, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance (https://www.kuleuven.be/lectio).
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Conference: The Social Dynamics of Communal Affiliation in Early Islam
Universiteit Leiden
11th June - 12th June 2026
Please find details, including poster and programme, by following the link here.
2. CALL FOR PAPERS
CfP: British Archaeological Association postgraduate conference - deadline 31 July 2026
We are excited to announce that the next BAA postgraduate conference will take place online on Thursday, 26 November 2026.
We are inviting proposals by postgraduate and early career researchers in the field of medieval art history, architecture and archaeology. Papers can be on any aspect of the medieval period, from antiquity to the Later Middle Ages, across all geographical regions. Proposals of around 250 words for a 20-minute paper, along with a CV, should be sent by 31 July 2026 to postgr...@thebaa.org.
Workshop on Letters and Epistolary Culture in Syriac Christianity at the International Conference on Patristic Studies Oxford, 2-6 August 2027
The research group on “Syriac Epistolography” at KU Leuven is organizing a workshop on letters and epistolary culture in Syriac Christianity at the 2027 Oxford Patristics conference.
We are issuing a call for papers that investigate letters and letter writing in Syriac Christian communities, including translations of letters into Syriac, across the first millennium CE. Proposals are particularly invited in relation to three themes: (1) the principal actors involved in Syriac epistolary culture, from authors, recipients, scribes, patrons, and letter carriers to persons greeted, thanked, corrected, or otherwise addressed within letters; (2) the exchange of knowledge and the mobility of people, objects, languages, and ideas evidenced by Syriac letters; and (3) the circulation, collection, and transmission of Syriac letters, including in manuscripts, and the formation of epistolary corpora.
The aim of the workshop is to integrate Syriac letters into the growing study of letters in the ancient world (e.g., Allen and Neil 2020; Riehle 2020; Becker, Egelhaaf-Gaiser, and Fürst 2025) and to further our understanding of late antique Christian epistolary cultures across linguistic, political, and confessional boundaries. Various contexts in which letters were composed, received, read, and collected (e.g., monasteries, schools, episcopal sees, cities) as well as diverse epistolary genres may be addressed. Papers may employ both more traditional and newer methodologies and may focus on formal characteristics and conventions of late antique letters as well as on their contents and reception.
Abstracts: Please submit a title and abstract (up to 250 words) by 30 June 2026. Please send your submissions and any questions to Marion Pragt (marion...@kuleuven.be). The workshop organizers will review submissions and will notify applicants by 31 July 2026. (If your abstract is not accepted as part of the workshop, you should still have time to submit it as a short communication through the general submission on the conference website.)
The research group on “Syriac Epistolography” at KU Leuven comprises the following members: David Copan (Doctoral Researcher), Philip Michael Forness (PI), Marion Pragt (Post-Doc/Project Coordinator), and Karolina Tomczyszyn (Doctoral Researcher).
CfP: RSA 2027 - ‘Towers, Dungeons, and Prisons’
Call for papers for a panel proposal entitled ‘Towers, Dungeons, and Prisons,’ as part of the Renaissance Society of America’s 2027 Annual Meeting, to be held on 11-13 March 2027, in Philadelphia, United States.
This panel invites paper proposals on Medieval, Renaissance, and Early Modern studies of incarceration and captivity broadly conceived, and is open to any geographical and disciplinary scope.
Please send in your abstracts by July 31st to Amanda Summers (asum...@oberlin.edu) or Jessica Minieri (jmin...@binghamton.edu)
https://www.rsa.org/page/RSAPhilly2027
3. JOBS AND SCHOLARSHIP OPPORTUNITIES
FIAS Call for applications Deadline approaching! French Institutes for Advanced Study Fellowship Programme 2027-2028
The French Institutes for Advanced Study Fellowship Programme offers 10-month fellowships at the seven Institutes of Aix-Marseille, Cergy, Loire Valley (Orléans-Tours), Lyon, Montpellier, Nantes and Paris. It welcomes applications from high-level international scholars to develop their innovative research projects in France.
For the 2027-2028 academic year, FIAS offers 29 fellowship positions: Aix-Marseille (7), Cergy (3), Loire Valley Orléans-Tours (2), Lyon (3), Montpellier (2), Nantes (4), Paris (8).
The FIAS Fellowhip Programme is open to all disciplines in the Social Sciences and the Humanities (SSH) and to all other research fields interfacing with the SSH. Applicants are strongly encouraged to consult the webpages of the host Institutes for Advanced Study (IAS) to learn more about their specific scientific priorities, areas of focus, and institutional partners, as these should be carefully considered before applying.
FIAS fellows will benefit from the support and stimulating scientific environment offered by the IAS, characterized by a multidisciplinary cohort of fellows and strong connections to local research centers and laboratories. They will be free to organize their work and conduct research according to their own priorities and interests.
CONDITIONS
All IAS have agreed on common standards, including the provision of a living allowance (2,200€ per month), social security coverage, accommodation, a research and training budget, plus coverage of travel expenses.
ELIGIBILITY
FIAS awards fellowships to outstanding researchers of all career levels, from postdoctoral researchers to senior scientists. The minimum requirement is a PhD + 2 years of research experience at the time of the application (PhD training period will not be considered in the calculation of experience).
Researchers from all countries are eligible to the FIAS Fellowship Programme but they must have spent no more than 12 months in France during the three years prior to the application deadline.
APPLICATION
Applications are submitted online via www.fias-fp.eu where you will find detailed information regarding the content of the application, eligibility criteria and selection procedure.
Application deadline: June 25th, 2026 - 6:00 pm (Paris, France time)
SELECTION
The scientific selection is highly competitive, merit-based and conducted through an international independent peer review.
- July 2026: Eligibility Check
- August - November 2026: Peer review process
- December 2026: Preselection by the FIAS Selection Committee
- January - February 2027: Selection by IAS Scientific Advisory Boards
- March 2027: Communication of results
For more general information on the FIAS Fellowship Programme, please consult our website: www.fias-fp.eu
Royal Historical Society Funding Opportunities
Available to members of the Royal Historical Society at a range of career stages.
Postgraduate and Early Career Research Support Grants, due on Friday, June 5th 2026.
Collaborative Grants, due on Friday, June 5th.
Teaching Fellowship, due on Friday, July 10th.
Funded Book Workshop Grants, due on Friday, July 10th.
See here for more information: https://royalhistsoc.org/new-calls-for-research-funding-from-the-royal-historical-society-opening-in-march-2026/
Institute of Historical Research Fellowships
The IHR’s Fellowship Programme provides a home for researchers conducting historical projects and offers a formal IHR affiliation for those who will benefit from a period of time embedded within the IHR community and who wish to contribute to that community. Our Fellows are often non-affiliated historians, overseas visitors, or researchers working in other parts of the history world such as public history or museums and archives. Our overarching purpose in providing a Fellowship Programme is to facilitate the research activities of mutually supportive researchers.
Please note that The IHR Fellowship replaces our previous fellowship schemes: Senior, Associate and Alumni.
Applications are currently open with a deadline of 30th June 2026.
For more information, see here: https://www.history.ac.uk/fellowships-funding/non-funded-fellowships/ihr-fellowship
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Madeleine Duperouzel
DPhil in History
President, Oxford University Byzantine Society
http://oxfordbyzantinesociety.wordpress.com