Seminars, News and Events
Seminars
A Curiosity of Wonders: The Rūs and Scandinavia in an Undiscussed Arabic ʿAjāʾib Text
A Curiosity of Wonders: The Rūs and Scandinavia in an Undiscussed Arabic ʿAjāʾib Text
Date: 28th of May 2025
Time: 10.15 – 12.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/2-2033 and on Zoom
Our speaker:
Tonicha Upham
WIVA Postdoc- specialist in islamicate sources on the Rus'.
Museum in Wartime: Lessons from Ukraine
Museum in Wartime: Lessons from Ukraine
Date: 21st of May 2025
Time: 10.15 – 12.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/22-0031 and on Zoom
Our speaker:
Fedir Androshchuk
Director of the National Museum of the History of Ukraine in Kyiv.
Almandines from India: Late Antique workshops in Alexandria, Egypt
Almandines from India: Late Antique workshops in Alexandria, Egypt
Date: 24th of April 2025
Time: 10.15 – 12.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/22-0031 and on Zoom
Our speaker:
Patricia Rifa - Abou El Nil
Centre d’Études Alexandrines
Vínland, or Berryland? Exploring the possibilities of the Strait of Belle Isle in the late Viking Age
Vínland, or Berryland? Exploring the possibilities of the Strait of Belle Isle in the late Viking Age
Date: 23rd of April 2025
Time: 10.15 – 12.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/2-2033 and on Zoom
Our speakers:
Environmental archaeologists: Drs Véronique Forbes and Paul Ledger, the excavators of L’Anse aux Meadows.
Listening to things
Listening to things
Date: 8th of April 2025
Time: 13.15 – 15.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/16-0042
Our speaker:
James Webb:
South African artist whose work has been showcased in solo exhibitions at, amongst others, Liljevalchs Konsthall, Sweden, 2024; the Art Institute of Chicago, USA, 2018; Yorkshire Sculpture Park, United Kingdom, 2016. Major group exhibitions include the inaugural Islamic Arts Biennale (2023), 8th and 16th Biennale d’Art Contemporain de Lyon (2007 & 2022), 13th Biennial of Dakar (2018), 13th Biennial of Sharjah (2017), 12th Bienal de la Habana (2015), and the 55th Biennale di Venezia (2013).
Paying with small change in the Viking Age? The identification of non-silver currencies in the Birka grave material.
Paying with small change in the Viking Age? The identification of non-silver currencies in the Birka grave material.
Date: 21st of March 2025
Time: 10.15 – 12.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/2-2033 and on Zoom
Our speaker:
Florent Audy:
Antiquarian at the Economy Museum and Royal Coin Cabinet
Vikings across Eurasia: Early Indian Ocean networks in the growth of trans – continental ‘supply lines’ to Scandinavian lands (1st – 10th century CE)
Vikings across Eurasia: Early Indian Ocean networks in the growth of trans – continental ‘supply lines’ to Scandinavian lands (1st – 10th century CE)
Date: 14th of March 2025
Time: 10.15 – 12.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/2-2033 and on Zoom
Our speaker:
Dr. Sunil Gupta:
Specialist on the Indian Ocean world of trade and maritime connections, with a long-term focus on cultural interactions
Eurasian Interactions Through the Silk Roads Seen From the Eastern Territories
Eurasian Interactions Through the Silk Roads Seen From the Eastern Territories
Date: 4th of February 2025
Time: 10.15 – 12.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/2-2033 and on Zoom
Our speaker:
Dr. Rocco Rante:
Archaeologist in the Department of Islamic Art at the Musée du Louvre.
He headed the Franco-Uzbek Archaeological Mission in the Bukhara Oasis and the Franco-Iranian Archaeological Mission in Khorasan.
The Caliph and the Falcons: a Ninth-Century History from Iceland to Iraq
The caliph and the falcons: a ninth-century history from Iceland to Iraq
Date: 21st of January 2025
Time: 10.00 – 12.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/2-K1023
Our speaker:
SAMUEL OTTEWILL-SOULSBYWIVA:
Visiting Researcher- Historian of late antiquity and the middle ages,with special interests in manuscripts, diplomacy,and urbanism- Oslo University
Cultural Contact Zones in Viking Age and Medieval Fennoscandia
Cultural Contact Zones in Viking Age and Medieval Fennoscandia
Date: 17th of December 2024
Time: 13.15 – 15.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/ 2-2033 and on zoom
Our speaker:
Dr. Gwendolyne Knight
Secretary, Societas Magica. Centre for Medieval Studies, Department of History, Stockholm University.
Body-Politics of first Millennium Scandinavia: Tales from a large-scale research project
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Photo credit: Nagelstad/NRK
Body-Politics of first Millennium Scandinavia: Tales from a large-scale research project
Date: 26th of November 2024
Time: 13.15 – 15.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/ 2-2033 and on zoom
We welcome two speakers for this seminar:
- Dr. Marianne Hem Eriksen, Associate Professor of Archaeology at the School of Archaeology and Ancient History, University of Leicester, and PI of the ERC Starting Grant Body-Politics.
- Renate Larsson, PhD Researcher BODY-POLITICS | Future 100 funded, and Topic Coordinator for “Promoting the 3Fs (Freedom, Forage, and Friends) in Equine Welfare” in Frontiers of Veterinary Science. School of Archaeology and Ancient History, University of Leicester. Renate’s presentation is titled: “Living with Humans: Exploring Animal Lives and Relationships in Viking Age Scandinavia Through the Lens of 'Archaeoethology'”
Epic and Barbarism: The Representation of Viking Culture in Film and Television
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Epic and Barbarism:
The Representation of Viking Culture in Film and Television
Date: 19th of November 2024
Time: 10.15 – 12.00
Place: Uppsala Eng/ 2-2033 and on zoom
Our speaker:
Dr. Alberto Robles Delgado
Universidad de Alicante, Spain
Bernadotte Scholarship at the Department of History, Stockholm University
News, Events and Workshops
Paying with small change in the Viking Age?- Florent Audy
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Paying with small change in the Viking Age? The identification of non-silver currencies in the Birka grave material.
Date: 21th of March 2025
Time: 9:00 – 17.00
Place: Uppsala
Special Guests:
PhD Ingmar Jansson, Docent
PhD Viacheslav Kuleshov, Stockholm University and Stockholm Numismatic Institute
PhD Nanouschka Myrberg Burström, associate professor/docent and reader at Stockholm University
PhD Sven Kalmring, associate professor/docent, and senior curator at the Swedish History Museum
PhD Fedir Androshchuk, docent/associate professor, Swedish History Museum and part of IAB for WIVA
Vikings Across Eurasia- Sunil Gupta
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Vikings across Eurasia: Early Indian Ocean networks in the growth of trans – continental ‘supply lines’ to Scandinavian lands (1st – 10th century CE)
Date: 14th of March 2025
Time: 9:00 – 16.00
Place: Uppsala
Abstract:
The key theme of the workshop ‘Vikings across Eurasia’ alludes to the spread of Scandinavian exchange networks across a vast area from western Europe to Central Asia between 800 – 1000 CE, driven by the desire of Viking communities to acquire exotic goods from far lands. Among the trade artefacts recovered from excavated Viking settlements such as those in southern Sweden, are materials sourced from the Indian Ocean world, a maritime area stretching from the Red Sea to the South China Sea, incorporating the Arabian, Persian, Indic and Southeast Asian littoral regions. The artefacts from Late Iron Age and Viking sites comprise thousands of cowrie shells, wound and drawn glass beads, stone beads of carnelian, garnet and rock crystal among other items. It is argued that the movement of these materials, mainly through intermediaries in the Mediterranean, Black Sea and Caspian Sea regions, involved long established Indian Ocean maritime networks. I will emphasize the point that the Indian Ocean connections with Scandinavian lands in the Viking Age need to be understood in deep time, in terms of the expansion of sea-land ‘supply lines’ through the first millennium CE into Eurasia. In this context, I propose to give an illustrated talk, with my point of departure being the Roman sea trade with India and Indian Ocean lands in the first century CE.
Falcons- Sam Ottewill-Soulsby
Falcons, coins and the contacts between the Caliphate and Scandinavia during the Viking Age.
Date: 21st of January 2025
Time: 9:00 – 17.00
Place: Uppsala
Special guests
- Sam Ottewill-Soulsby: International visiting researcher at WIVA, historian of late antiquity and the middle ages, with special interests in manuscripts, diplomacy, and urbanism.
- Viacheslav Kuleshov: Senior researcher at Stockholm University, numismatist and archaeologist, with special interests in Oriental and Islamic numismatics.
- Ragnar Orten Lie: Archaeologist and project manager responsible for Viking veien Vestfold and Telemark, Scandinavia's leading expert on the relationship between birds of prey and humans in history.
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