Richard Abels

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Richard Abels (born 1951) is an American educator, historian, and professor emeritus at the United States Naval Academy. [1] Abels is a specialist in the military and political institutions of Anglo-Saxon England. [2] He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (elected 1990) and a Fellow of the Medieval Academy of America (2024). [3] [4] Abels' approach to medieval military history focuses upon the influence of culture upon the practice and representation of warfare. [5] With his wife Ellen Harrison, Abels is also the co-author of an article examining the role played by women in the Cathar heresy based upon a statistical analysis of Inquisitiorial registers.

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Richard Philip Abels was born on October 31, 1951 in Brooklyn, New York, United States, the son of Milton and Blanche Abels. Abels received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Columbia College in 1973. Two years later, he earned a Master of Arts from Columbia University, and in 1982 was awarded a Doctor of Philosophy degree by the same university. Abels’ dissertation, written under the direction of J.M.W. Bean, became the basis for his first book, Lordship and Military Obligation in Anglo-Saxon England.

Richard Abels began his teaching career as a preceptor at Columbia University in 1977. He held this position until 1980, becoming an instructor there in 1981. From 1981 to 1982, he served as a visiting assistant professor at Cornell College. In 1982, Abels was hired by the United States Naval Academy as an assistant professor of history. He was promoted to associate professor in 1986, and to full professor in 1991. From 2008 to 2014, he served as Chair of the Naval Academy’s History Department. He retired in 2017 and was awarded the title of Professor Emeritus in the following year.

Selected publications

In 2022, Abels began the podcast "'Tis But A Scratch: Fact & Fiction About the Middle Ages," which compares popular conceptions of the Middle Ages to their underlying historical reality.

Related Research Articles

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Alfred the Great was King of the West Saxons from 871 to 886, and King of the Anglo-Saxons from 886 until his death in 899. He was the youngest son of King Æthelwulf and his first wife Osburh, who both died when Alfred was young. Three of Alfred's brothers, Æthelbald, Æthelberht and Æthelred, reigned in turn before him. Under Alfred's rule, considerable administrative and military reforms were introduced, prompting lasting change in England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anglo-Saxons</span> Early medieval Old-English-speaking cultural group in Britain

The Anglo-Saxons, in some contexts simply called Saxons or the English, were a cultural group who spoke Old English and inhabited much of what is now England and south-eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to Germanic settlers who became one of the most important cultural groups in Britain by the 5th century. The Anglo-Saxon period in Britain is considered to have started by about 450 and ended in 1066, with the Norman Conquest. Although the details of their early settlement and political development are not clear, by the 8th century a single Anglo-Saxon cultural identity which was generally called Englisc had developed out of the interaction of these settlers with the pre-existing Romano-British culture. By 1066, most of the people of what is now England spoke Old English, and were considered English. Viking and Norman invasions changed the politics and culture of England significantly, but the overarching Anglo-Saxon identity evolved and remained dominant even after the Norman Conquest. Late Anglo-Saxon political structures and language are the direct predecessors of the high medieval Kingdom of England and the Middle English language. Although the modern English language owes less than 26% of its words to Old English, this includes the vast majority of everyday words.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Æthelwulf, King of Wessex</span> 9th-century King of Wessex

Æthelwulf was King of Wessex from 839 to 858. In 825, his father, King Ecgberht, defeated King Beornwulf of Mercia, ending a long Mercian dominance over Anglo-Saxon England south of the Humber. Ecgberht sent Æthelwulf with an army to Kent, where he expelled the Mercian sub-king and was himself appointed sub-king. After 830, Ecgberht maintained good relations with Mercia, and this was continued by Æthelwulf when he became king in 839, the first son to succeed his father as West Saxon king since 641.

A fyrd was a type of early Anglo-Saxon army that was mobilised from freemen or paid men to defend their Shire's lords estate, or from selected representatives to join a royal expedition. Service in the fyrd was usually of short duration and participants were expected to provide their own arms and provisions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Bates (historian)</span> 20th and 21st-century British historian of the Middle Ages

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ætheling</span> Anglo-Saxon term for a royal prince

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Martin Oswald Hugh Carver, FSA, Hon FSA Scot, is Emeritus Professor of Archaeology at the University of York, England, director of the Sutton Hoo Research Project and a leading exponent of new methods in excavation and survey. He specialises in the archaeology of early Medieval Europe. He has an international reputation for his excavations at Sutton Hoo, on behalf of the British Museum and the Society of Antiquaries and at the Pictish monastery at Portmahomack Tarbat, Easter Ross, Scotland. He has undertaken archaeological research in England, Scotland, France, Italy and Algeria.

Barbara Yorke FRHistS FSA is a historian of Anglo-Saxon England, specialising in many subtopics, including 19th-century Anglo-Saxonism. She is currently emeritus professor of early Medieval history at the University of Winchester, and is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society. She is an honorary professor of the Institute of Archaeology at University College London.

Richard Sharpe,, Hon. was a British historian and academic, who was Professor of Diplomatic at the University of Oxford and a fellow of Wadham College, Oxford. His broad interests were the history of medieval England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. He had a special concern with first-hand work on the primary sources of medieval history, including the practices of palaeography, diplomatic and the editorial process, as well as the historical and legal contexts of medieval documents. He was the general editor of the Corpus of British Medieval Library Catalogues, and editor of a forthcoming edition of the charters of King Henry I of England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain</span> Cultural and population changes in England c. 450 to 630 AD

The settlement of Great Britain by diverse Germanic peoples led to the development of a new Anglo-Saxon cultural identity and shared Germanic language, Old English, which was most closely related to Old Frisian on the other side of the North Sea. The first Germanic-speakers to settle permanently are likely to have been soldiers recruited by the Roman administration, possibly already in the fourth century or earlier. In the early fifth century, after the end of Roman rule in Britain and the breakdown of the Roman economy, larger numbers arrived and their impact upon local culture and politics increased.

Michael Lapidge, FBA is a scholar in the field of Medieval Latin literature, particularly that composed in Anglo-Saxon England during the period 600–1100 AD; he is an emeritus Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge, a Fellow of the British Academy, and winner of the 2009 Sir Israel Gollancz Prize.

Matter of England, romances of English heroes and romances derived from English legend are terms that 20th century scholars have given to a loose corpus of Medieval literature that in general deals with the locations, characters and themes concerning England, English history, or English cultural mores. It shows some continuity between the poetry and myths of the pre-Norman or "Anglo-Saxon" era of English history as well as themes motifs and plots deriving from English folklore. The term Matter of England was coined in reference to the earlier Three Matters as termed by the French author Jean Bodel; the Matter of Britain, of France and of Rome.

Nicholas Peter Brooks, FBA was an English medieval historian.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Blair (historian)</span> British historian, archaeologist, and academic

William John Blair, is an English historian, archaeologist, and academic, who specialises in Anglo-Saxon England. He is Emeritus Professor of Medieval History and Archaeology at the University of Oxford, and a Fellow of The Queen's College, Oxford. He gave the 2013 Ford Lectures at the University of Oxford.

Roberta Frank is an American philologist specializing in Old English and Old Norse language and literature. She is the Marie Borroff Professor Emeritus of English at Yale University.

Gale Owen-Crocker is a professor emerita of the University of Manchester, England. Before her retirement she was Professor of Anglo-Saxon Culture and Director of the Manchester Centre for Anglo-Saxon Studies.

Stephen David Baxter is a British historian. He has been Barron Fellow and Tutor in Medieval History at St Peter's College, Oxford, since 2014, and in 2020 he was awarded the title of Professor of Medieval History by the University of Oxford. He specialises in lordship in late Anglo-Saxon and early Norman England, and the Domesday Book.

The Battle of Sherston happened around Sherston, England, from 25 to 26 June, 1016. It was between the King of England Edmund Ironside and Danish invader Cnut as a part of Cnut's invasion of England. The West Saxons, fighting for Edmund, were victorious against the Danish and their Briton allies.

References

  1. "Chivalry is a Medieval Ethos that has evolved over time". nytimes.com. Retrieved August 11, 2017.
  2. Prof. Richard Abels. United States Naval Academy. Retrieved 15 October 2015.
  3. "Richard Abels". ias.edu. Retrieved August 11, 2017.
  4. Chris (2024-01-03). "MAA Fellows Class of 2024". The Medieval Academy Blog. Retrieved 2024-01-06.
  5. Hosler, John D.; Isaac, Steven (2020). Military Cultures and Martial Enterprises in the Middle Ages: Essays in Honour of Richard P. Abels. Woidbridge: Boydell. pp. 3–8. ISBN   9781783275335.