A Medieval Summer: Report by Kurt Villads Jensen

It has been a great summer with a lot of medieval fun. It began with an excursion for Swedish medievalists to Denmark 29-31 May. 3-5 June I attended the XIV International Medieval Meeting in Lleida and talked about “Jerusalem – sacralisation of Danish crusader landscape,” including baptismal fonts and golden altars. There was also time for a couple of days in Barcelona.

On 19th June, I was at Aarhus University Moesgaard and talked about the battle at Visby 1361, and saw the fascinating demonstration of medieval fighting by Aarhus Buhurt Club. Later in the month, I attended the Society for the Study of the Crusades and Latin East’s 11th quadrennial conference in Porto 29 June – 3 July for which I had been one of the four organisers. I talked about “Mental phases of crusading in the Baltic, c. 1100–1300.”

Then followed a week with wife and very good friends, driving from Lübeck to Stettin and looking at Gothic brick stone churches, ending with five days in Krakow with museums, churches, culture. After a good two weeks holiday in Denmark, to the Medieval week in Visby on Gotland, 4-8 August where the Medieval centre in Stockholm had arranged 11 public talks on recent research on love in the the Middle Ages. After a few days in Stockholm, back to Denmark to medieval festival in Ringsted 14-16 August, where Knight Aske again fought against Knight Farfar (grandpa).

- Kurt Villads Jensen