Patrick Cowley
I read History at the University of York (BA, 2018) before completing my MPhil in Medieval History at Cambridge (2019). My current research explores literary representations of Christ's passion written and circulated in the Anglo-Norman World c.1070 to c.1200, with a particular interest in sermons. I intend to contribute to the scholarship on the Anselmian turn and the emergence of affective forms of piety during the twelfth century through engagement with texts treating on the imagery of the crucifixion beyond the traditional 'affective' body of literature and art that has received sustained analysis. The work I am undertaking explores the influence and intention of authors in representing and discussing the crucifixion in particular ways, whilst also seeking to understand the reception of texts through engagement with surviving manuscripts and the recreation of the contexts in which they were read.
Religious history, affective piety, theories of atonement, medieval sermons, genre, reception, manuscripts, the materiality of texts.
I supervise for Part II Paper 13 'Man, Nature and the Supernatural c.1000 to c.1600'
'Wondrous Crucifixes in Thirteenth-Century Exempla as Sites of Spiritual Renewal and Markers of Spiritual Rot'. Thirteenth Century Conference. Selwyn College, Cambridge. 12th September 2022.
'Patristic sermons in twelfth-century Lincoln'. Patristic Sermons in the Middle Ages: Collections, Mediators, and the Practice of Compiling. PASSIM Project International Conference. Royal Netherlands Institute, Rome. 17th October 2023.