Salvatore Liccardo

May 15, 2019 | Salvatore Liccardo | HI Research Blog |

Neglected for centuries, the Expositio totius mundi et gentium was rediscovered in the 17^th century and has been edited several times during the last 150 years. According to current scholarly consensus the author of the Expositio came from the eastern part of the Empire, and his mother tongue was Greek. Although much of...

Peter Fraundorfer

May 1, 2019 | Peter Fraundorfer | HI Research Blog |

Almost all the information we have about the famous holy bishop of Salzburg, Saint Rupert, can be and has been questioned. Where did the holy man originate? When did he live? When did he arrive in Salzburg? What exactly did he build or rebuild there? Where and when did he die? Generations of historians have tried to answer...

Rutger Kramer

April 15, 2019 | Rutger Kramer | HI Research Blog |

This is a book about religious reforms. Or rather, it is a book about expressing the will and the need for reforms. But it is also a book about the way people discussed such reforms, and how that discussion shaped the way these reforms were interpreted and applied.

So why does the word "reform" not occur in the title?

Picking a...

Jasid Abdulkader, Sophie Gruber, Lena Kornprobst and Natalie C. Sandner

April 1, 2019 | Jasid Abdulkader, Sophie Gruber, Lena Kornprobst, Natalie C. Sandner | HI Research Blog |

Vienna, 21–22 February 2019,
Conference Report

On February 21 and 22, 2019 the Special Research Programme Visions of Community: Comparative Approaches to Ethnicity, Region and Empire in Christianity, Islam and Buddhism...

Jan Odstrčilík

March 15, 2019 | Jan Odstrčilík | HI Research Blog |

Jan Hus (*c. 1370 – 6 July 1415) is rightfully numbered among the most influential people of Czech origin. He is mainly remembered for his efforts to reform the Catholic Church resulting in his execution as a heretic at the Council of Constance in 1415. His life and especially his cruel death led to the creation of the Hussite...

Veronika Wieser

March 1, 2019 | Veronika Wieser | HI Research Blog |

In late antique and early medieval societies, reflections on the present and future development of the Christian community were situated within an ongoing dialogue with the text of the Bible. In particular, the prophetical books of the Old and New Testaments, most prominently the Books of Ezekiel and Daniel, and the Revelation...

Maria Nezbeda

February 15, 2019 | Maria Nezbeda | HI Research Blog |

The background to Jordanes' Getica, which was written in the middle of the 6^th century in Constantinopel, is quite complex. There have been discussions about it for decades or even centuries, because solid and confirmed information about the author, who was likely of Gothic origin himself, and his text is scarce. We know that...

David Kalhous

February 1, 2019 | David Kalhous | HI Research Blog |

Traditionally, authors of older national(istic) historiography often sought the origins of nations in medieval ethnic groups. In Czech historiography, the problem of the identity of the inhabitants of Bohemia before 1200 was neither questioned nor properly discussed, and the origins of a “Czech gens” were sought in the ninth or...

Cinzia Grifoni

January 15, 2019 | Cinzia Grifoni | HI Research Blog |

The actual meaning and every-day implications of words like "people", "nation" and "democracy" have increasingly become the subject of general reflection. Indeed, it is a common experience to participate in or come across debates about the nature, purpose and cohesiveness of present-day political communities, be they local,...

Lena Kornprobst

January 1, 2019 | Lena Kornprobst | HI Research Blog |

It is not true what their brother Piero is saying. They, Antonio and Simone, are not obliged to support him in his financial hardships caused by the high rents due for a tax farm, which he purchased by action alone and was thus the only person responsible for. Contrary to Piero’s claims, his brothers deny the existence of a f...