Dr Sophie Oosterwijk
Research Areas
Death imagery and the danse macabre in medieval and renaissance culture
The history of childhood and its presentation in art
Medieval iconography, sculpture and tomb monuments
Manuscripts and early printing
Publications
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With Stefanie Knöll (ed.), Mixed metaphors. The Danse Macabre in medieval and early modern Europe (Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 2011). |
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With Sally Badham (ed.), Monumental industry. The production of tomb monuments in England and Wales in the long fourteenth century (Donington, Shaun Tyas, 2010). |
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Church Monuments Journal of the Church Monuments Society, 24, 2009 |
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Church Monuments Journal of the Church Monuments Society, 23, 2008 |
Books
With Stefanie Knöll (ed.), Mixed metaphors. The Danse Macabre in medieval and early modern Europe (Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 2011).
With Sally Badham (ed.), Monumental industry. The production of tomb monuments in
England and Wales in the long fourteenth century (Donington, 2010).
Selected recent articles in exhibition catalogues, books and refereed journals:
Introduction and ‘Dance, dialogue and duality. Fatal encounters in the medieval Danse Macabre’, in S. Oosterwijk and S. Knöll (eds), Mixed metaphors. The Danse Macabre in medieval and early modern Europe (Newcastle upon Tyne, 2011), 1-5, 9-42.
‘Vive l’amour? Lovers and Death in the medieval Danse Macabre’, in S. Knöll (ed.), Frauen – Sünde – Tod (Düsseldorf, 2010), 9-26.
'Deceptive appearances: the presentation of children on medieval tombs', Ecclesiology Today, 42 (2010), 43-58.
‘Death, memory and commemoration: John Lydgate and “Macabrees daunce” at Old St Paul’s Cathedral, London’, in C. Barron and C. Burgess (eds), Memory and commemoration in medieval England, 2008 Harlaxton Symposium Proceedings (Donington, 2010), 185-201.
‘Graven in het verleden: middeleeuwse grafmonumenten in Engeland’, Madoc (Tijdschrift over de Middeleeuwen), 24:2 (2010), 99-111.
‘“Alas, poor Yorick”: Death, the fool, the mirror and the danse macabre’, in S. Knöll (ed.), Narren – Masken – Karneval. Meisterwerke von Dürer bis Kubin aus der Düsseldorfer Graphiksammlung
‘Mensch und Tod’, exhibition catalogue (Regensburg, 2009), 20-32 (essay) and 134-36 (catalogue entries).
‘“For no man mai fro dethes stroke fle”: Death and danse macabre iconography in memorial art’,
Church Monuments, 23 (2008), 62-87 and 166-68 (plates).
‘Geen plaats in de hemel? Het lot van de Onnozele Kindertjes van Bethlehem’, Madoc (Tijdschrift
voor de Middeleeuwen), 18:3 (2008), 130-43.
‘Of dead kings and dukes: the historical context of the danse macabre in late-medieval Paris’,
Journal of the British Archaeological Association, 161 (2008), 131-62.
‘The medieval child: an unknown phenomenon?’, in S.J. Harris and B. Grigsby (eds), Misconceptions about the Middle Ages (New York/London, 2008), 230-35.
‘Children: Europe’, in P.J. Crabtree (ed.), Encyclopedia of society and culture in the medieval world,
Facts on File, vol. 1 (New York, 2008), 175-77.
‘“I cam but now, and now I go my wai”: the presentation of the infant in the medieval danse macabre’, in J.T. Rosenthal (ed.), Essays on medieval childhood. Responses to recent debates
(Donington, 2007), 124-50.
‘Money, morality, mortality: the migration of the danse macabre from murals to misericords’,
in P. Horden (ed.), Freedom of movement in the Middle Ages (2003 Harlaxton Symposium Proceedings) Harlaxton Medieval Studies, 15 (Donington, 2007), 37-56.
‘Swaddled or shrouded? The interpretation of “chrysom” effigies’, in B. Baert and K. Rudy (eds),
Weaving, veiling, and dressing: textile in medieval culture (Turnhout, 2007), 307-48.
‘Danse macabre imagery in late-medieval sculpture’, in A. von Hülsen-Esch, H.
Westermann-Angerhausen and S. Knöll (eds), ‘Zum Sterben schön!’ Alter, Totentanz und Sterbekunst
von 1500 bis heute, exhibition catalogue, vol. 1 (Regensburg, 2006), 167-77.
‘Muoz ich tanzen und kan nit gân?” Death and the infant in the medieval danse macabre’,
Word & Image, 22:2 (2006), 146-64.
‘“Long lullynge haue I lorn!”: the Massacre of the Innocents in word and image’,
Medieval English Theatre, 25 (2006), 3-53.
‘Food for worms – food for thought: the appearance and interpretation of the “verminous” cadaver in Britain and Europe’, Church Monuments, 20 (2005), 40-80, 133-40.
‘Of corpses, constables and kings: the danse macabre in late-medieval and renaissance culture’,
The Journal of the British Archaeological Association, 157 (2004), 61-90.
Forthcoming Publications
Articles:
'Sensing death: the danse macabre in early modern Europe', in A.E. Sanger & S. Tove Kulbrandstad Walker (eds), Sense & the senses in early modern art and cultural practice (Aldershot, forthcoming).
With Sally Badham: ‘Keeping up with the neighbours. The lost tomb monument of Princess Katharine (1253-1257) in Westminster Abbey’, The Antiquaries Journal, submitted (2011).
Books:
With Clifford Davidson (ed.), John Lydgate’s Dance of Death (Brooklyn, NY, in progress).
Morality, mortality, memorialisation. The Danse Macabre in fifteenth-century Europe (Donington, in progress).
Activities
Recent and Forthcoming Conference Papers
‘“une ymage conterfait le corps”? Self-image and personhood on medieval monuments’,
Monuments & Monumentality Conference, University of Stirling, 13-14 August 2011.
‘”This worlde is but a pilgrimage”: mental attitudes in/to the medieval Danse Macabre, invited paper, symposium on ‘Mental wellbeing in European culture, c.1100-1450’, Visby (Sweden), 2-4 August 2011.
‘“Ye folke that loken vpon this purtrature ...” Self-image and portraiture on medieval monuments’, paper in a MeMO session entitled Medieval commemoration II: Tomb monuments, identity and memoria, Leeds International Medieval Congress, 11-14 July 2011.
‘Elusive or illusory? Images of childhood in medieval art’, invited lecture, colloquium on ‘Representations of Childhood’, Centre for the History of Childhood, University of Oxford, 9 July 2011.
‘“When thei schyne moste in felicite ...”: the fame and fall of Henry V in Lydgate’s Dance of Death’, Third London Chaucer Conference ‘Chaucer and Celebrity’, University of London, 7-8 April 2011.
‘“My wretched body”. Wills, burial and commemoration in medieval England’, Seventh Symposium on Memoria Research, Xanten (Germany), 18 March 2010.
‘Vive l’amour? Youth and Death in the medieval Danse Macabre’, invited lecture, ‘Frau – Sünde – Tod’ symposium, Graphiksammlung ‘Mensch und Tod’, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (Germany), 2 July 2010.
'Dead kings and dancing corpses: commemoration and morality combined?',
Death, Commemoration and Memory: An Exploration of Representation, Concept and Change, conference, University of Edinburgh, 24-25 June 2010.
‘Portraiture, representation and commemoration – bodies of evidence’, invited lecture, ‘Researching medieval memoria: prospects and possibilities’ symposium, Utrecht University (Netherlands), 27 May 2010.
'Deceptive appearances: the presentation of children on medieval monuments', 45th International Congress on Medieval Studies Kalamazoo (Michigan, USA), 14 May 2010 (session 375).
‘“Macabrees daunce”: John Lydgate and the Dance of Death at Old St Paul’s Cathedral, London’, Fifteenth Century Conference, University of St Andrews, 4 September 2009.
‘Cleansing power: Baptism and the medieval child’, invited lecture at a one-day conference on ‘Becoming a Person’, Centre for the History of Childhood, University of Oxford, 4 July 2009.
‘Heaven, hell or limbo? The Holy Innocents and the fate of unbaptised children’, keynote lecture, New research on medieval childhood: an interdisciplinary workshop organised by the Society for the Study of Childhood in the Past and the Society for Medieval Archaeology, University of Sheffield, 12 March 2009.
Recent and Current Positions of Responsibility
Member of the Editorial Board and Coordinator of Tomb Monuments for the Medieval Memoria Online Project (MeMO project), Utrecht University (Netherlands).
Editor of the annual refereed journal Church Monuments (2004-2011).
Acting Director (2006-07) and Steering Committee member (2005-08) of the Centre for the Study of the Country House, University of Leicester.
Council member of the Church Monuments Society (2000-2011; Hon. Secretary 2000-04) and of the Monumental Brass Society (2002-05).
Current Activities
I am currently preparing (with Clifford Davidson) a text edition of John Lydgate’s Dance of Death (contract with AMS Press Inc.) and a monograph on the origins and development of the danse macabre in fifteenth-century France and England. This monograph explores the genesis of the danse macabre theme and the political circumstances that led to creation of the famous mural in the cemetery of Les Saints Innocents in Paris in 1424-25, the translation of the poem into Middle English by John Lydgate, and the subsequent dissemination of the theme across Britain.