Chris Callow

Job Opportunity at the University of Kent: Postdoctoral Research Associate Are you passionate about early medieval Britain?  Do you have advanced knowledge of Old English and proficiency in Medieval Latin?  If yes, then you may be interested in this fixed term full time post...

The ad for the second postdoctoral position on our @leverhulme.ac.uk Britain’s Early Medieval Letters project is now live. We’re looking for an Old English specialist (who also works with Latin). 32-month FT post. Deadline for apps is 16 Jan 🙂 jobs.kent.ac.uk/Vacancy.aspx...

This is a terrific article by Tim, with fascinating implications for people interested in manuscripts, magic and beekeeping 🐝 #medievalsky

Farage just said “I didn’t wear a mask last time and I won’t wear them this time. This is nonsense.”

Here he is, not only wearing a mask, but also getting vaccinated…

Health insurance premiums rose nearly 3x the rate of worker earnings over the past 25 years While hospital CEO salaries and health insurance premiums have increased, health care quality has not.

Health insurance premiums rose nearly 3x the rate of worker earnings over the past 25 years theconversation.com/health-insur...

I hope you avoid everything this winter.

It’s 4am in the UK and I seem to have flu. I’ve been awake on and off for hours alternating between feeling too hot and too cold. I had a vaccine about two months ago; I feel bad enough as it is but I bet it would be worse without vaccination. It costs £25 to get vaccinated. I would recommend it.

✨From the archives: St Mary’s, Breamore in Hampshire, is one of the most complete late Anglo-Saxon churches we have — a building that’s held its ground for over a millennium. Here I photographed it with the Elizabethan Breamore House behind it, two eras folded into one view.

The battle for Sheringham bus shelter: protesters defiant as bailiffs sent in Norfolk county council wants to demolish a ‘beloved’ 1950s bus shelter in Sheringham, but campaigners are staging a 24/7 sit-in

The fight to save Sheringham's 1950s 'Streamline Moderne art-deco design' bus shelter (where I used to catch the bus to school from) has now made the national news:
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Helpful post here from @theironroom.bsky.social about using new version of online catalogue.

YouTube video by Alan Partridge - Quote of the Day Alan explains World Cup football tournaments.

Alan explains World Cup football tournaments.

This is a really broad discussion of the impacts of climate on coasts in parts of England. It emphasises again the importance of historians’ contributions to discussions of climate change.

Experimental vaccine prevents dangerous allergic attack for a year By blocking a molecule that pushes the immune system into overdrive, a vaccine protects mice from life-threatening anaphylaxis

If you've got a food allergy and constantly watch ingredients, or sometimes have to avoid hugging or kissing someone because of what they've eaten, this news could be for you: An experimental vaccine can prevent life-threatening allergic reaction in mice 🧪

www.newscientist.com/article/2507...

Two women - one older; one elderly - cycling on a segregated cycle lane in the Netherlands.

In the Netherlands, where the Dutch invest in safe cycling, the over-65s cycle around a quarter of their journeys, while the over-80s cycle around 10% of theirs.

Low Traffic Neighbourhoods and cycle lanes don't 'restrict freedom', they expand it.

Manchester Evening News Article shows a woman wearing a KN95 respirator while taking the subway. The Headline says, “UKHSA says’wear a mask’ as four viruses spread in UK.” https://bit.ly/UKHSA_WearAMask   Quote: "Washing hands regularly and ensuring indoor spaces are well ventilated is important and if you need to go out with symptoms, consider wearing a face mask.”— Dr. Alex Allen

Manchester Evening News @manchestereveningnews.co.uk warns about the surges of flu, COVID, RSV and Norovirus as a reason why Dr. Alex Allen, Consultant Epidemiologist at @ukhsa.bsky.social asks people to #MaskUp to stop the chain of transmission. www.instagram.com/p/DRs45MukR5...

Conferência 3: Northern Chaos Gods: Eddas and Sagas in Heavy Metal Music YouTube video by NEVE: Núcleo de Estudos Vikings e Escandinavos

Public lecture about Viking metal! Many thanks to the Universidade Federal de Paraiba!
www.youtube.com/live/ZyCNi-a...

This is poignant.

‘A precarious position’: almost 3,000 species at risk of disappearing from Wales, report finds Environmental body says modest investment and changes can help preserve long list of animals, fungi and lichen

The Sixth Mass Extinction is the vilest crime of our time, bar *nothing*.
share.google/aivyd4jGG5eA...

Photogrammetry map of a round hill (Brusselstown Ring hillfort) annotated with potential roundhouse footprints, test trench locations and a potential cistern

NEW Have archaeologists identified the largest nucleated settlement in prehistoric Ireland and Britain? Survey at Brusselstown Ring, one of the largest hillforts in Ireland, found evidence for potentially hundreds of occupied roundhouses!

Learn more 🆓 doi.org/10.15184/aqy...

🏺 #Archaeology

I wish I didn’t have to share this. But the BBC has decided to censor my first Reith Lecture.

They deleted the line in which I describe Donald Trump as “the most openly corrupt president in American history.” /1

A call for editors for a new edited volume on the Working Ladies Guild. The volume is expected to focus on the late-Victorian period, with the case-histories of women based in London who approached the Guild for relief providing the bulk of the material. The records of the Guild’s Chelsea group, covering the period 1884 to 1897, will provide the core of the material to be transcribed and edited. Readers who are interested in potentially taking on this task should contact Dr Anne Summers (chair@friendsofthewomenslibrary.org.uk) or Prof Jerry White, Honorary General Editor (Modern Records) of the LRS (jerry.white@bbk.ac.uk) to discuss the project further.

New publishing opportunity!

The London Record Society are looking for someone to edit a volume based on the archive of the Working Ladies' Guild, which supported impoverished women in late nineteenth-century Britain.

Further information and contact details in the text below.

I hope you enjoyed the evening. I did have questions btw but I’ll see if my copy of the translation and its intro answers them. Hoping it arrives soon.

A shame but it is a long way!

Penda’s Fen reinvents Mercia for the modern age How an experimental British 1970s television play pioneered a folk horror revival

The excellent @birminghamdispatch.bsky.social (which has done such great reporting on the flag epidemic over the last few months) delivers the goods again today with this deep dive into the Midlands mythology of Penda's Fen.

It’s always a pleasure to hear the thoughts of @judithjesch.bsky.social on Orkneyinga saga, poetry, runes and vikings. This evening her lecture for the Viking Society was interesting and thought-provoking. I’m looking forward to getting my copy her translation of Orkneyinga.

Protest and Public Space in Fourth-Century Rome Popular discontent in Late Antiquity has traditionally been interpreted as a sign of social disfunction and urban decline – a framework that has underestimated the political agency exercised by non...

How did the built environment shape social contention in Late Antiquity?

Very pleased that this article, which has been in Early Access for just shy of a year, is now also out in print www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

You probably won’t see this in mainstream media - aka the right wing press - coz it’s against their narrative. Wind energy in Britain broke a new record last week with nearly 23GW on the grid one cold windy evening.

buff.ly/twsgH5c

Inside the old church where one trillion webpages are being saved | CNN Business The Internet Archive has been saving web history for nearly 30 years. CNN’s Hadas Gold goes inside its headquarters to see how the archive is innovating for the AI age and protecting itself from both ...

From @cnn.com: Inside the old church where one trillion webpages are being saved www.cnn.com/2025/11/16/b...

Dorestad and Everything After @ Sidestone Press Dorestad was the largest town of the Low Countries in the Carolingian era. As an inland port on the edge of the Frankish Empire, it functioned as an international hub, connecting the North Sea World w...

Interested in early medieval history? Read the proceedings of the latest Dorestad conference online FREE here, including my chapter about gold and silver in Frisia after Dorestad's disappearance in the 850s. For a .pdf of my chapter, DM/email me. #medievalsky
www.sidestone.com/books/dorest...

Corporate profit margins have increased by 30% since the pandemic. Electricity companies have trebled their margins. The 4 big banks made £45bn in 2022 (up by 75%). But instead of talking about corporate profiteering our gov talks about taking jewellery and “identifiable assets” from migrants.

"Given that the UK needs more graduates with languages qualifications, the task of universities is not to accelerate the decline of language learning but to find ways to bolster their student intakes."