Conference Programme
New Directions in Old English Prose
30–31 March 2026
Faculty of English
University of Oxford
Day 1: 30th March 2026
08.30–9.00: Welcome and Registration
09.00–10.30: Session 1: Early Prose
- Samuel Cardwell (University of Nottingham), ‘The Earliest English Sentence? Old Northumbrian psalm glosses in MS Pal. Lat. 68’
- Maura McKeown (University of Oxford), ‘The Four Senses of Scripture and the Vespasian Psalter Glosses’
- Emily Kesling (University of Bergen), ‘The Old English Exhortation to Prayer and the “Mercian Prefacing Tradition”’
10.30–11.00: Tea and coffee break
11.00–12.00: Session 2: Putting Prose in its Place
- Christine Rauer (University of St Andrews), ‘Assigning Mercian Texts to Places and Individuals’
- Tristan Major (Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies), ‘Old English Prose at Winchester, c. 940–c. 1100’
12.00–12.15: Comfort break
12.15–13.00: Keynote 1:
John Hines (University of Cardiff), ‘Syntax, Style and Semiotics: How Anglo-Saxon Inscriptions help to frame and define Old English Prose’
13.00–14.00: Lunch break
14.00–15.30: Session 3: New Contexts for Alfredian Prose
- Nagore Palomares (University of the Basque Country), ‘Weaving the Vernacular: Tracing Frankish Influences in Old English Texts’
- Alice Jorgensen (Trinity College Dublin), ‘Gesceadwisnes in the Alfredian Prose Translations’
- Eleni Ponirakis (University of Nottingham/UCL/University of Oxford), ‘Swa swa leof on treowum: Eriugena and the Alfredian Solioquies’
15.30–16.00: Tea and coffee break
16.00–17.30: Session 4: Repurposing Prose
- Courtnay Konshuh (University of Calgary), ‘Missing Ealdormen: Editing Chronicle Prose’
- Claudio Cataldi (University of Palermo), ‘Rewriting Christianisation in King Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’
- Gabriele Cocco (University of Bergamo), ‘From Cloak to Allegory: Christian Adaptations in the Old English Apollonius of Tyre’
17.30–17.45: Comfort break
17.45–18.30: Keynote 2:
Luisa Ostacchini (University of Oxford), ‘Thinking Global, Acting Local: The Old English Martyrology's Worldview and Mercian Prose Composition'
18.30: Drinks Reception and Book Celebration
20.00: Conference Dinner
Day 2: 31st March
09.00–10.30: Session 5: Prose beyond the Pulpit
- Stefan Jurasinski (SUNY Brockport), ‘Beyond Wulfstan: The Homiletic Element in Old English Legislation’
- Anine Englund (University of Oxford), ‘Revisiting the Old English Soul-and-Body Homilies’
- Elaine Treharne (Stanford University), ‘Women Readers (and Writers?) of Old English Prose’
10.30–11.00: Tea and coffee break
11.00–12.00: Session 6: Inclusion and Exclusion, Then and Now
- Juliet Mullins (University College Dublin), ‘Ignored and Obscured: “Behind the Scenes” of Ælfric´s Lives of Saints’
- Rebecca Stephenson (University College Dublin), ‘Weeding out the Danes: An examination of gardening metaphors in Latin and Old English prose texts describing Viking attacks and/or religious conversions’
12.00–12.15: Comfort break
12.15–13.00: Keynote 3:
Daniel Anlezark (University of Sydney), ‘West Saxon Prose from Alfred to Ælfric’
13.00–14.00: Lunch break
14.00–15.30: Session 7: Wulfstan's Style
- Winfried Rudolf (University of Göttingen), ‘Wulfstan’s Autograph Homily on Baptism and Its Echoes’
- James Titterington (University of Oxford), ‘Prose in Progress: Tracing Wulfstan’s Intellectual Development through Autograph Evidence’
- Thomas A. Bredehoft (Chancery Hill Books), ‘Wulfstan’s Prose’
15.30–16.00: Tea and coffee break
16.00–17.30: Session 8: Saints and Sinners
- Claudia Di Sciacca (University of Udine), ‘Gūþ-Lāc vs Se Ealda Fēond? New Directions in the Demonology and Angelology of Gulthlac’s Old English Prose Tradition’
- Susan Irvine (University College London), ‘The Bridge as a Penitential Motif in Old English Prose’
- Corinne Clark (University of Oxford), ‘Fashioning fragmentation in the Corpus Christi MS 303 Life of St. Margaret’
17.30: Close
Organising committee: Helen Appleton (Oxford), Rachel A. Burns (Oxford), Amy Faulkner (UCL), Niamh Kehoe (Oxford), Francis Leneghan (Oxford)
Details of registration will be updated soon.
Contact: francis.leneghan@ell.ox.ac.uk
