Research Fellow @Kings_College @Cambridge_Uni on @KingsSilkRoads programme. Syriac Christianity, Central Asia, Islamic History, Mongol Empire, Global History.
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A new piece by me for
@seenunseenmag
about the long history of Christians living under non-Christian rule, and why it’s worth reflecting on amidst western anxieties about our Christian inheritance.
seenandunseen.com/other-half…
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RT @khalidsyossef: #NewPublication
Beyond the Silk Road
A New Economic History of the Ancient World from Eurasia to Africa
Sitta von Reden,…
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Pir Natal (Christmas mat) from the Asmat people of Indonesian Papua. Showing Mary giving birth in a traditional Asmat forest camp. Cambridge Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
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Benjamin Sharkey retweeted
Because Napoleon III lost a war?
I wonder if our @RoyalFamily have studied history and learned why there’s no Royal Family in France these days.
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Benjamin Sharkey retweeted
The identity of a skeleton found in a Roman sarcophagus in the grounds of Westminster Abbey more than 150 years ago appears closer to being solved.
The limestone sarcophagus was excavated on the North Green in 1869. It bears an inscription to Valerius Amandinus – a wealthy Briton who lived in the city in around 300 to 400 AD.
Also sculpted on the lid however is a Latin cross dating from the 10th or 11th century, suggesting that the human remains which were found within might belong to an Anglo-Saxon who had died many centuries later, when the coffin was re-used. The identity of that person has been a mystery ever since.
Now new research by our Consultant Archaeologist, Professor Warwick Rodwell, published in the Journal of the British Archaeological Association, concludes that the bones belonged to a high-ranking medieval monk.
Professor Rodwell believes the most likely candidate is Aelfwig, who served as Abbot of the medieval Benedictine monastery and died in around 1020. Another possibility is Aelfwig’s successor, Wulnoth, who died in 1049 and is also presumed to have been buried at the Abbey.
Reflecting on his research, Professor Rodwell said: 'We have two viable contenders for the occupant of the sarcophagus. We do not know the date of birth of either. But either would fit equally well if we assume the Abbot was in his early twenties when the appointment was made and close to fifty when he died. The fact Aelfwig was already a monk of Westminster might favour him.'
You can see the sarcophagus on permanent display in the our museum, The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Galleries.
ALT A high-angle shot captures an ancient stone sarcophagus displayed on a modern stand within a museum gallery with stone walls and wooden floors. Light streams through gothic-style rose windows in the background. In front of each window, a diamond-shaped stained glass panel is suspended on a vertical metal rod.
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Benjamin Sharkey retweeted
One of the coolest images in any Old English manuscript is that of King David in the Vespasian Psalter, who is depicted holding a lyre.
It’s interesting per se, but becomes doubly important when we compare it to actual Germanic lyres we’ve found, which look identical to his!
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Benjamin Sharkey retweeted
Tetrarşi ortaklarına ait ünlü heykel grubunda görülen kartal başlı kılıç kabzasının kazılarda bulunmuş bir örneği (Metropolitan Müzesi, MS 4. yüzyıl).
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Benjamin Sharkey retweeted
the sketchbook of villard de honnecourt, a 13th century french artist who would sometimes give up on drawing faces
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Henry III is my favourite English monarch (besides Elizabeth II) - hugely underrated
King John of England died #OnThisDay in AD 1216, succeeded by his son, Henry III. Henry's reign was a time of relative peace, good climate and a rapidly expanding population & economy. Many major building projects, such as the rebuilding of Westminster Abbey, were undertaken 1/2
ALT Illuminated manuscript depicting Henry III being crowned. A king sits on a throne as two bishops place a crown on his head.
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Benjamin Sharkey retweeted
Join us this Friday, the 23rd for @IrnaHofman
from @UniLeiden for:
'Frontiering and Frictions Around Fibre in Rural Tajikistan'.
2pm UK time, @Kings_College & online. All very welcome!
Sign up & info: kings.cam.ac.uk/events/front…
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You know, Les Misérables isn’t really about the student uprising. The revolution fails. It’s not abstract political love but the immense and ordinary personal acts of love and sacrifice by the priest and then Jean Valjean that really change the world.
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I don’t see how this is any less terrible than Jan 6 - populist politicians inspiring the storming of democratic institutions
This is Limoges city hall. On fire.
Storming and setting fire to seats of democratic government is insurrectionary violence. No grievance gives anyone the right to do this.
Students have legitimate grievances. This violence is burying them. The missing teachers, overcrowded classrooms and anxiety about the future disappear behind the destruction.
For a politics built on permanent confrontation, that can be useful. Mélenchon’s strategy connects separate grievances into a single indictment of the system. The confrontation becomes the cause.
And violence feeds on perceived weakness. When the state appears to have disappeared, people test its limits. Each retreat invites another challenge. A kind of madness takes hold: destroying the institutions we depend on comes to look like liberation.
I wrote in June that democracy rests on a promise: that the state is strong enough to guarantee everyone the same protection, the same rights and the same rules. When that promise breaks, the consequences extend far beyond security.
Fear spreads. People protect themselves because they no longer trust that they will be protected together. They retreat into their group, their community, their identity. Those promising order gain ground. Distrust replaces the confidence that makes a common life possible.
And is exploited by all those, inside and outside the country, who want to see it burn!
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Benjamin Sharkey retweeted
It is kind of hilarious that most people know Lewis as the Mere Christianity/Narnia guy and then think that makes him a lightweight.
god it’s so embarrassing that these guys present Lewis as like. a serious thinker
Community note
C.S. Lewis was a leading literary scholar: triple first at Oxford; Fellow & Tutor, Magdalen College, Oxford (1925–54); first Professor of Medieval & Renaissance Literature, Cambridge (1954–63); Fellow of the British Academy (1955).
Sources: britannica.com/biography/C-S-… · en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._S._Lew…
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Benjamin Sharkey retweeted
‘The current experience and trajectory of Christians in the west, facing a future as a minority in pluralist societies, is not unprecedented in Christian history. Indeed, it may perhaps prove to have been the norm for most Christians at most times.’
A new piece by me for
@seenunseenmag
about the long history of Christians living under non-Christian rule, and why it’s worth reflecting on amidst western anxieties about our Christian inheritance.
seenandunseen.com/other-half…
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Benjamin Sharkey retweeted
For scholars interested in #Late_Antiquity, pre-Islamic history, and #IslamicHistory: an online version of al-Ṭabarī’s Chronicle is now available on the Brill Reference (access requires a paid subscription.):
referenceworks.brill.com/dis…
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