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• 20 sep 2013

  Call for papers - Middle Ages

  Empire of letters and Tigers of parchment

  International Medieval Congress

  Script is not a neutral communication medium. Scripts were particularly used throughout the Middle Ages to stage the idea of Empire, power and domination. The writing has the ability to connote authority and Empire and to inspire respect. On the other hand, the scriptural domain is a world in itself with its coherence and history. The idea of an ‘Empire of letters’ may have emerged within this world too. Both parts of this “empire of letters” are relevant for the palaeographical sessions on the specific thematic strand of ‘Empire’ organised at the International Medieval Congress 2014 in Leeds and sponsored by Apices and Cap Digital.

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• 23 sep 2013

  24 sep 2013

  Paris

  Conference, symposium - History

  The distinctions of the chancellery: between administrative technique and government knowledge

  Middle Ages - modern times

  Les mentions de chancellerie sont de brèves notes portées au bas des actes de chancellerie médiévaux par les différents services en charge de leur élaboration. Il s’agit là d’une technique de gestion de l’écrit qui recèle des enjeux pratiques et symboliques, que le présent colloque entend explorer dans une perspective comparée, en diachronie et en synchronie. On vise en particulier à définir les conditions dans lesquelles s’est constituée cette technique administrative, en étudiant sa genèse, sa diffusion et son érection en savoir, ainsi que les compétences individuelles mises en jeu par ces phénomènes. Il s’agira également d’explorer la transformation progressive de cette technique en un outil par lequel l’autorité émettrice représente son pouvoir, et de déterminer les modalités d’une transformation qui a conduit les mentions de chancellerie à devenir un enjeu politique.

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• 16 jan 2013

  Lisbon

  Call for papers - Africa

  Administrative and Legal Documentation in Pre-colonial Africa and Beyond

  Fifth European Conference on African Studies (ECAS 5)

  Historians, anthropologists as well as specialists of various scholarly traditions are invited to reflect on the question of production, transmission and preservation of administrative and legal documentation in pre-colonial Africa. The aim of this panel is to foster dialogue between scholars working on non-narrative sources, whether land charters, weddings contracts, deeds, funerary inscriptions or other archival materials. Presentations of methodological issues rather than case-studies would facilitate a comparative approach leading to a renewed understanding of the social organizations that produced these documents.

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