Academic
After studying for a BA, MA and PhD in History at King’s College London, I worked as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Society for Renaissance Studies, and as a Wellcome Trust Medical Humanities Research Fellow at Birkbeck, University of London. I have taught at KCL, Birkbeck and the Open University. I am currently at Honorary Research Fellow at Birkbeck, and am working on a book on The Episcopal Body in Medieval England for Oxford University Press.
My monograph, Episcopal Appointments in England, c. 1214-1344: From Episcopal Election to Papal Provision, was published by Ashgate in 2014.
‘Exceptionally well ordered, and written with graceful clarity…an exemplary study of an important subject.’ (John Maddicott, English Historical Review)
‘This is an excellent book, henceforth the leading authority in its field.’ (Nicholas Vincent, Journal of Ecclesiastical History)
‘An exemplary work of church history written with a mastery of a wide range of primary sources (from canon law to chronicles) in highly engaging and accessible style. It reminded me of the early work of Robert Brentano.’ (Patrick Nold, Church History)
Selected papers:
· ‘Blood, Sex and Holy Water: Reconciling Churches and Churchyards in the Medieval Diocese of York’ in P. Dryburgh and S. Rees Jones (ed.), The Church and Northern English Society in the Fourteenth Century (Boydell & Brewer, 2024), 191-207
. ‘Although He Was a Courtier: Understanding the Appeal of the Courtier Bishop in Thirteenth Century England’ in S. Thomas (ed.), Bishops’ Identities, Careers and Networks in Medieval Europe (Brepols, 2021), 15-36
· ‘Episcopal Virginity in Medieval England’, Journal of the History of Sexuality 26.2 (2017), 273-93
· ‘The Perils of Episcopacy: Health Hazards and the Medieval Episcopate’, History Today 67.1 (2017), 11-16
· ‘Food, Drink and the Bishop in Medieval England, c. 1100-c. 1300’, Viator 46.2 (2015), 155-76
· ‘Episcopal Emotions: Tears in the Life of the Medieval Bishop’, Historical Research 87 (2014), 591-610
· ‘The First Entry of the Bishop: Episcopal Adventus in Late Medieval England’ in J. S. Hamilton (ed.), Fourteenth Century England VIII (Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2014), 43-58
· ‘Perfect Bishop, Perfect Man? Masculinity, Restraint and the Episcopal Body in the Life of St Richard of Chichester’, Southern History 35 (2013), 1-22
· ‘Objections to Episcopal Elections in England, 1216-1272’, Nottingham Medieval Studies 55 (2011), 125-48
Some recent talks:
· ‘The Angry Bishop in Late Medieval England’, at The Hegemony of Medieval Men Workshop, Aalborg University (July 2021)
· ‘Blood, Sex and Holy Water: Reconciling Churches and Churchyards in the Medieval Diocese of York’, IMC Leeds (July 2021)
· Participant in roundtable on ‘Aelred of Rievaulx and Monastic Sexuality’, ‘Our Aelred’ Conference organised by English Heritage (January 2021)
· ‘A Question of Balance? Thinking about Sexual Health in Medieval Europe’, Generation to Reproduction Seminar, University of Cambridge (October 2019)
· ‘Parasites in Medieval Europe’, Exploring Research at the Wellcome Library (November 2018)
· ‘Death by Celibacy’, Humanities Society, Wolfson College Cambridge (May 2018)
· ‘Understanding the Medieval Episcopal Corpse’, Exeter Cathedral/ Exeter University workshop (May 2018)