Dr. Paul Acker, currently a Visiting Professor of Viking Mythology at UNM, presented today on the Viking influence on the Pre-Raphaelites. His presentation considered the artwork of Elizabeth Siddal, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Edward Burne-Jones, William Morris, Frank Bernard Dicksee, and Frederick Sandys.

Here's an interesting image from F. Dicksee, called "Startled." Can you find the Viking ship?

This weekend, the University of New Mexico Institute for Medieval Studies hosted the Medieval Academy of the Pacific Conference.

The program can be found here: http://www.csun.edu/english/map09/conference09.php

Several UNM graduate students and faculty presented papers and presided over sessions.

The weekend culminated with a visit to the Acoma Pueblo.

Several UNM graduate students presented papers today informally in preparation for the upcoming Medieval Association of the Pacific conference, being held at UNM next week.

Here are the papers:

• Shelece Easterday on verbs associated with treasure in Beowulf.
  
• Douglas Ryan VanBenthuysen on the punctuation of line 1553b in the 4^th edition of Klaeber's Beowulf.
  
• David Lawrence on depictions of Chaucer's Wife of Bath
  
• Christine Kozikowski on Privacy in Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde
  

The event was held in the Leon Howard Memorial Library on the 3^rd floor of the Humanities building.

Today Dr. Justine Andrews presented at the UNM Institute for Medieval Studies' Medieval Works in Progress Series. Dr. Andrews is currently working on a book on Medieval Cyprian Architecture, the fruits of her recent Fulbright grants to visit the island. The presentation, titled "Gothic Cyprus: Sources and Functions of 14^th Century Latin Architecture" considered two Cyprian Gothic churches: Santa Sophia in the central city Nicosia and St. Nicolas in the port city Famagusta. Her presentation not only discussed the architectural style of these two churches, which she characterized as demonstrating "memory of the Holy Land finding purchase in 14^th century Cyprus," but also their political function, as both sites served both as religious centers and political ones: both had served as coronation sites.

St. Nicolas, Famagusta

Santa Sophia, Nicosia

The Journal of Anthropological Research, a UNM Publication, presented a seminar by its 2008 Distinguished Lecturer, Dr. E. Paul Durrenberger of Penn State University. His lecture, titled "Archaeology & Literature: the Political Ecology of Medieval Iceland during the Settlement Period, 870-1262," explained the progression in Iceland from a slave-based economy to a wage-worker based economy by looking at both archaeological evidence and evidence from Icelandic sagas. Dr. Durrenberger's fantastic PowerPoint slides illustrated the relationship between slave labor, acquisition of provisions, increased followers, and ultimate the need for wage labor. He then went to illustrate how this economic growth led to the need for more territory, and ultimate more bloodshed between Icelandic tribes.

Dr. Durrenberger also discussed the archaeological site in the Skagafjörður region of Iceland where the Icelandic home of Guðríður Þorbjarnardóttir, the first woman of European decent to give birth in the Americas, was discovered.

This well attended seminar was a joy to students of archaeology, anthropology, and us medievalists, and we are grateful to Dr. Durrenberger's for his visit.

Dr. Maria Panayotidi of the University of Athens, department of Byzantine Art and Archeology, visited the UNM campus today to give two lectures about Byzantine Art. She appeared as a part of the Institute for Medieval Study's Medieval Works in Progress Series. Dr. Panayotidi has been visiting the United States on a grant provided by the Alexander S. Onassis Foundation. UNM was lucky to have been chosen as one of three universities she will be visiting.

Her first lecture, held at noon in the Humanities building, was titled "The Problem of Local Artistic Production in the 13th Century at St. Catherine's Monastery on Mount Sinai." Dr. Panayotidi is an expert on the Monastery. This lecture focused on her assertion that, because the Monastery did not have its own workshop, it was something of a gathering place for the work of iconographers around the region in the 13th century.

Her second lecture of the day, held in the evening at the UNM Art Museum, was titled "The Apogee of Byzantine Monumental Art." This lecture discussed the spread of Byzantine monumental art throughout the Europe and North Africa.

We are very grateful to Dr. Panayotidi for her visit!

The Institute for Medieval Studies Medieval Works in Progress and the Medieval Students Student Association sponsored today a lecture by visiting scholar Dr. John McKinnell titled: Beware of Your Family! Murderous Relatives in the Legends of the Early Kings of Sweden.

Dr. McKinnell has been serving as a visiting scholar this semester, teaching a course in Viking mythology.