Matthías Ólafsson

So delighted to see my first book up online with @oxfordunipress.bsky.social! Huge thanks to @anzamems.bsky.social @memorients.bsky.social @earlymoderncircle.bsky.social. DM or email me for a review copy request form, and ask your uni librarian to buy the book!! global.oup.com/academic/pro...

Research Vacancies | University College Cork Learn, Study and Research in UCC, Ireland's first 5 star university. Our tradition of independent thinking will prepare you for the world and the workplace in a vibrant, modern, green campus.

A reminder that there are still a few days left to apply for this funded PhD, working on literary and cultural reception of the Vikings. University fees and a budget for conference attendance included in addition to the stipend: it's a great opportunity for someone! www.ucc.ie/en/hr/vacanc...

We are thrilled to announce this year's rendition of the Prize Papers Talks Special Edition - an online lecture series organised by the German Maritime Museum and the Prize Papers Project! The first talk will be on November 10th, with Jane Ohlmeyer, Tom Truxes, and John Shovlin on the Amity Papers!

Opened palimpsest codex (Leiden UL Or. 14236) with Syriac upper text and Armenian undertext. The upper text is written in black and red ink and decorated braided band patterns. There's also a fragment with Arabic on it between the two pages of the opened codex.

Mind-numbing how many layers of history there can be to a single manuscript page: Syriac upper text (10th c.), Armenian undertext (pre-10th c.), Arabic material used for binding (11-12th c.?), Coptic foliation in the margin (date?), modern foliation at the bottom. Image: Leiden UL Or. 14236, link ⬇️

Bandits & blasphemers: crime in 17th century Scotland Allan Kennedy unpacks what looking at crime and punishment can reveal about Scottish values in the 17th century

Pleased to see my interview with the BBC History Extra podcast has now gone live! Had great fun chatting with Emily Briffett about my book on 'Serious Crime in Late Seventeenth-Century Scotland'. www.historyextra.com/membership/c...

Missið ekki af erindi Péturs Húna í dag!

Professor Lyndal Roper will speak on ‘Turbulence and the German Peasants’ War of 1524-6’. She holds the Regius Chair of History at the University of Oxford. Her most recent publications include Summer of Fire and Blood: The German Peasants’ War (2025), Living I Was Your Plague: Martin Luther's World and Legacy (2021) and Martin Luther: Renegade and Prophet (2012). Lyndal Roper’s talk will be preceded by a brief session marking Michael Hunter’s retirement from active involvement with the seminar. This will commemorate Michael’s inauguration of the seminar in 1979 in conjunction with the late Bob Scribner and its continuous existence since its revival in 1987, when one of its co-founders was Lyndal Roper.

Final reminder about Lyndal Roper's talk on Thursday at the @ihrscb.bsky.social on 'Turbulence and the German Peasants' War of 1524-6'.

Register here for in-person or online attendance: www.history.ac.uk/news-events/...

After seven weeks at my residency here in Jónshús, Copenhagen and numerous hours spent at the Danish National Archives and Saxo Institute, I head back to Dublin. This stay has been a privilege, enriching my research and allowing me to meet new people and spend time with dear friends and family here.

Today is publication day for PAPER AND THE MAKING OF EARLY MODERN LITERATURE! Available in paper or digital form www.pennpress.org/978151282744... @pennpress.bsky.social

AHA26 Program 139th Annual Meeting January 8-11, 2026 in Chicago

At #AHA26, historians are exploring new approaches to research, teaching, professional development, and public engagement through panels, workshops, meetups, poster sessions, networking events, and much more. The annual meeting program—featuring 460+ sessions and events—is now available online.🗃️

Surgeon Christian Løvendahl’s 1768 letter of certification from Flensburg. A beautiful piece of work, produced on official, stamped paper (RA 232 F77).

A detail from a German pamphlet showing three male human heads: a Turk, A Hungarian, and a German. All heads have three mouths and you can see the tongues. The pamphlet was printed in 1605 and will be highlighted in more detail in my upcoming book about early modern news.

Gossiping is both an art and an annoying practice. In #earlymodern Europe, a gossipmonger would often be depicted as a person with three mouths. Like these three fellas that made it on a title page of a pamphlet in 1605, a Turk, a Hungarian, and a German. #skystorians #gossip

The Pushkin job: unmasking the thieves behind an international rare books heist The long read: Between 2022 and 2023, as many as 170 rare and valuable editions of Russian classics were stolen from libraries across Europe. Were the thieves merely low-level opportunists, or were bi...

Incredible.

Book cover for Susan Dackerman, Dürer's Knots: Early European Print and the Islamic East.

Book cover for Judith Herrin, Ravenna: Capital of Empire, Crucible of Europe.

Book cover for Jed Buchwald and Diane Greco Josefowicz, The Riddle of the Rosetta: How an English Polymath and a French Polyglot Discovered the Meaning of Egyptian Hieroglyphs.

Book cover for James Costa, Radical by Nature: The Revolutionary Life of Alfred Russel Wallace.

Through Oct. 31st, @princetonupress.bsky.social has a 70% off sale on a wide range of titles -- Susan Dackerman on Albrecht Dürer, Judith Herrin on Ravenna, Jed Buchwald & Diane Greco Josefowicz on the Rosetta stone, James Costa on Alfred Russel Wallace, and more: press.princeton.edu/sale/70-off

Definitely - and yes, I have used Sandvik's work extensively, as well as Imsen's and Nissen's. Otherwise, all tips on literature that deals with investigative commissions in Norway, especially those operating in the 18th century, are very welcome, thank you - I'll send you a PM!

Globalizing the Baltic in the Early Modern Period:

Conference CfP
'The Baltic Sea and Global Currents: 400 Years After the Battle of Oliwa. Maritime Expansion, Domination, and Water Spaces in a Globalizing World'

networks.h-net.org/group/announ...

#earlymodern #History

This 1749 commission investigated the Catholic conversion of Maren Boyesdatter, a young Lutheran girl from Fredericia, and her subsequent disappearance.

When I order documents from various #c18th investigative commissions at the archives, I most often receive a modest assortment of protocols, petitions, and numerous letters. But occasionally, I get something like this. It’s only about 2300 pages (RA 236 F4-17).

Many thanks to the editors at the @historicaljnl.bsky.social blog for publishing this short piece, and to @ellasbaraini.bsky.social for her help with it. My recent article, and one of the central ideas of the book manuscript I’m currently working on, in a nutshell.

www.cambridge.org/core/blog/20...

Within the same documents I also found this map of the Holy Roman Empire. Details!

A pleasant surprise to discover this stunning #c18th map of the Duchy of Holstein (then part of the Danish Oldenburg Empire) among the documents of an 1781 investigative commission which was to determine whether the surgeon Christian Løvendahl was indeed entitled to use his own name. (RA 232 F77).

There's stuff leaking out on social media about breakthrough research in the Apostolic Library of the Vatican that has apparently yielded a mention of Lithuania datable to 451AD, 558 years earlier than the previously accepted earliest mention 😱 #LithuaniaMentioned

This book applies the innovative work-task approach to the history of work, which captures the contribution of all workers and types of work to the early modern economy. Drawing on tens of thousands of court depositions, the authors analyse the individual tasks that made up everyday work for women and men, shedding new light on the gender division of labour, and the ways in which time, space, age and marital status shaped sixteenth and seventeenth-century working life. Combining qualitative and quantitative analysis, the book deepens our understanding of the preindustrial economy, and calls for us to rethink not only who did what, but also the implications of these findings for major debates about structural change, the nature and extent of paid work, and what has been lost as well as gained over the past three centuries of economic development. This title is also available as open access on Cambridge Core.

Cover of Whittle, Jane, Mark Hailwood, Hannah Robb, and Taylor Aucoin. The Experience of Work in Early Modern England. of Cambridge Studies in Economic History - Second Series. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2025.

Who did what in early modern England?

New #OpenAccess book, 'The Experience of Work in Early Modern England' by @jwhittle.bsky.social, @markhailwood.bsky.social, @hkrobb.bsky.social & @aucointaylor.bsky.social, based on thousands of #EarlyModern court depositions 🗃️

Read it: doi.org/10.1017/9781...

First page of 18th century Basque-Icelandic dictionary. A Basque-Icelandic pidgin was spoken between locals and Basque whalers from ~1600 including the well-known expression "Fenicha for ju" meaning F**k you! en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque%...

My latest article now out in Eighteenth-Century Ireland my first and probably last foray into Swift Studies liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/toc/10.3828/...

Sending good vibes from Copenhagen!

Front cover of a book called 'Understanding Early Modern Primary Sources', part of the Routledge Guides to Using Historical Sources series. edited by Laura Sangha and Jonathan Willis. The cover image is a painting of early modern objects - a pile of books and papers, a flask and glass, bread roll, lute and globe.

Editing revised chapters for the forthcoming 2nd edition of our guide to #EarlyModern 🗃️ sources today👌

The revised volume will also include 3 new chapters:

Part 1 'Sources':
- Digitised Sources

Part 2 'Histories':
- Race
- The Body, Mind & Emotions.

Juat arrived at my academic residency in Jónshús, Copenhagen. I’m really looking forward to spending the next seven weeks here doing research and digging in the Danish National Archives and the Royal Library. If you’re around, hit me up, and we can grab coffee!

Also, looking back at the conference, I am filled with optimism for the future of our collaborative sphere of Nordic history writing. The modern borders of nation-states often seem artificial, which is why it is crucial to work together to create broader and more meaningful narratives.

Great to be back home in Iceland to take part in the 31st Congress of Nordic Historians where I met some brilliant people working on fascinating projects.

I had the honour of presenting a paper at a session organised by a few of us on reimagining the #c18th Danish Oldenburg Empire.

Takk! #nhm2025