Oswald's Raven

A wooden carving on the stalls in Peterborough Cathedral showing an abbot of Peterborough shown holding Oswald’s arm

Happy St. Oswald’s Day! To paraphrase the words of Henry of Avranches (who was commissioned to write a verse life of Oswald for Peterborough Abbey C13th), “May Oswald lay his incorrupt right arm on all your enterprises”!

Enjoy, Rebecca! A long time ago I did the journey all through France on a sailing boat (mast taken down in Port-Saint-Louis and re-stepped in Honfleur) The last section below Rouen was very memorable - we set a speed over ground record that we’ve never beaten since - that tide is something else!!!

I’ve got William and Harold Christmas decorations, courtesy of Reading Museum!

reading-museum-shop.myshopify.com/collections/...

Oswald church dedications - Google My Maps This map shows churches (or ruined churches) dedicated to Oswald of Northumbria. Only churches where the dedication (medieval or modern) to Oswald is certain are included. Currently chapels in monast...

I've now mapped 230 churches and chapels dedicated to Oswald in England, Scotland, France, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Italy, Slovenia, Czechia and Malta. Not a bad reach for a C7th Northumbrian!
www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/e...

I’d missed this one - thank you. It’s interesting to see that he was still popular as a patron saint in C20th - I’ve found a few of them!

Thanks to everyone who replied to the original post - I've now mapped all the churches you mentioned 😀

I've now mapped 212 Oswald churches & chapels and I'm sure there are more I'm still missing. Just found an interesting outlier in Malta - dedicated in 1921, it was the chapel of the Royal Naval Hospital in Mtarfa. 🇲🇹 #MedievalSky

Sorry I wasn't able to meet up you - sadly I was not sailing, but recovering from illness!

Proof of the title page of the edited volume, "Literature, Liturgy and History: Oswald of Northumbria and the Cult of Saints in the High Middle Ages"

Delighted to be a step closer to this book coming out. Honoured to be editor of a volume in the @britishacademy.bsky.social series & grateful to the contributors both for their wonderful essays & their prompt return of corrected proofs!
@livunipress.bsky.social @uclhistory.bsky.social #MedievalSky

Thank you, Catherine, your support, guidance and enthusiasm are all much appreciated!

A privilege to attend the first day of this brilliant conference, as well as the Advisory Board meeting for the Literary and Liturgical Landscapes project the previous day. Wide-ranging but also wonderfully coherent topics and perspectives - lots to keep on thinking about! Thank you and congrats.

We had an amazing two days of discussions about landscapes of sanctity, literal and metaphorical, medieval and modern. Thanks to @ucl-ias.bsky.social for hosting us and to all the speakers and delegates for the thought-provoking papers and questions!

Then we heard about Hild and Whitby from Tom Pickles and Barking from Josh Davies. I flagged a bit due to migraine (which thankfully went away), hence the lack of updates. It was an absolutely amazing conference. Many thanks to Johanna and Sarah and all the speakers. 2/2

During the rest of Landscapes of Sanctity we had some art history thinking about Christian rock art in caves from Bob Mills and Byzantine wall paintings involving biblical mountains from Andrei Dumitrescu. @oswaldsraven.bsky.social #medievalsky 1/

Good reminders that islands as places of isolation is much more a modern phenomenon that a medieval one. Sea is mapped and socialised. Petts also reminding us Bede's influences were European in a correction to 'Celtic' exceptionalism of Iona and Lindisfarne. 2/2

Day 2 of Landscapes of Sanctity @oswaldsraven.bsky.social. David Petts and Mary Kate Harley keeping is cool by talking about Cuthbert's islands and Andrew's journey to Mermadonia through freezing waters respectively. #medievalsky 1/

Yes, great first day thanks. Looking forward to continuing the conversations tomorrow.

Hello Adam!

Miranda Griffin compared 12thc versions of St Patrick's Purgatory with Onkalu, a nuclear waste facility in Finland bringing in Robert Macfarlane and Michael Madsen. Medieval Studies in the prophetic voice #medievalsky. 3/3

We've now had two papers relating to St Patrick, folklore and purgatory. Márie Ní Mhaonaigh talked about Dindshenchas as a way of reading the land. Very new stuff to me. 2/

Fantastic paper from Fiona Barsoum on inserting landscapes of sanctity into manuscripts, in this case, Wace's Brut. Pleased to hear she has fish miracles, too @oswaldsraven.bsky.social #medievalsky 1/

Really good conference so far @oswaldsraven.bsky.social. We've travelled through the Alps, across Iberia, between Rome & Cologne and heard about the movement of saintly soil, a sort of holy compost. 1/ #medievalsky

Fresco showing St Oswald kneeling and holding a martyr's palm with a threatening sky and thunder and snow in the background. From a wayside shrine in Sankt Oswald, Bad Kleinkirchheim, Austria

In the alps, Oswald is often prayed to as a weather saint. We're hoping he will intercede for us to ensure cooler weather for our project conference @ucl-ias.bsky.social this week!

www.ucl.ac.uk/institute-of...

#MedievalSky

Well done, Ryan!

Only just noticed today that MLGB was no longer available - be great to have it back again!

Today I'm writing my paper for this week's conference on 'Landscapes of Sanctity' @oswaldsraven.bsky.social. It's about Norman chronicles, funnily enough, and I'll be looking at the chroniclers' sources, where we find such landscapes (everywhere), and why include them in history writing. 1/

On our way north, we visited this popular place of pilgrimage in the Middle Ages: the cross at Heavenfield, nr Hexham, the site of St Oswald's victory in battle in 634. Miracles were attributed to the original cross.
The cross (like the church) is not the original.
1/2

Really looking forward to this !

It is less than two weeks until our project conference, kindly hosted by @ucl-ias.bsky.social. If you’d like to join in the conversation, do register for a free place.

@sarahbowdenkcl.bsky.social @uclhistory.bsky.social
@lvhicks.bsky.social @davidpetts1.bsky.social @tostig1066.bsky.social

Hope you'll come back once the book is out - the lovely Maldon Books do author events...
maldonbooks.com