The Haskins Society Journal 28: Studies in Medieval History ed. by Laura Gathagan, and William North (review)

The twenty-eighth volume of the Haskins Society Journal, based largely on papers presented at the Society's 2015 conference, continues the sequence of offerings on topics concerned with Anglo-Saxon, Viking, Norman, and Angevin history. The society takes its name from the early twentieth-century American scholar Charles Homer Haskins, notable for his influential works Norman Institutions and The Renaissance of the Twelfth Century, among others. The current volume includes nine essays ranging in time from the ninth to thirteenth centuries and in location from York to North Africa. The eminent legal historian John Hudson delivered the keynote address at the 2015 conference, reproduced here as 'The Place of Henry I in English Legal History'. Hudson reviews a century of historiography on the periodization of developments in English law during the post-Conquest period, arguing that any assessment of the reign of Henry I (1100–35) 'must look both backwards and forwards' (p. 80), that is, both to Anglo-Saxon traditions and to innovations under Henry II.

Three essays deal with questions of sex and gender. Ruth Mazo Karras discusses the role of the biblical David as a model of royal masculinity in kingless societies, where concepts of kingship nonetheless remained important. Yvonne Seale uses a case study of a twelfth-century grandmother and granddaughter to demonstrate how aristocratic women could strategically promote and protect family power, despite (or perhaps because of) their apparent conformity to gendered norms. April Harper studies links between literary and legal representations of domestic violence to show (convincingly, but disturbingly) how physical punishments inflicted on adulterous wives may have reflected the lack of alternative outlets for aggrieved masculine honour.

Two essays expand the volume's horizons away from the core focus on the Anglo-Norman realm. Luigi Andrea Berto examines the position of Venice in the ninth century, caught between Carolingian and Byzantine spheres of influence. Matt King appraises contemporary perceptions of the brief period (1148–60) of Norman rule in Africa under the Sicilian monarchs Roger II and William I. Remaining contributions focus on aspects of written culture: Eadmer's intervention in the Canterbury–York primacy dispute (Bridget Riley), neglected features of the eleventh-century Novalesa Miscellany (Edward Schoolman), and imagery of the mirror in twelfth-century imago mundi texts (Jason Baxter).