News
New member: Hans Jacob Orning, professor in medieval history, is joining the research group from May 2. He has been instrumental in several projects related to medieval numismatics: Exhibition "Mirror Kingdoms: Poland-Norway c.1000-1300", as co-supervicor for Mika Boros' phd-project "Monetisation at the frontiers of medieval Europe", and as co-author of the recent book "En reise til Roma i sporene til pilegrimen Nikolas Bergsson året 1152" (Dreyer 2024).
New book: Hans Jacob Orning and Svein H Gullbekk, "En reise til Roma i sporene til pilegrimen Nikolas Bergsson året 1152", Dreyer forlag 2024. The book has received recommendable reviews in Klassekampen by Thor Erik Hverven and Stavanger Aftenblad by Per Egil Omdal. The Arts and Culture Norway has awarded it with a national distribution to all Norwegian public libraries.
Project New Viking Museum at Bygdøy: Ongoing work on numismatic and monetary contributions provide new insights into the nature of Viking Ages society and economy. Coins will be found in different parts of the exhibtion and with dedicated space for material narratives on Viking Man, money and resources. Projected date for opening: Summer 2027. To be continued.
Ben Allport has signed up for a four month project position working on the upcoming Viking exhibtions, from April to July 2024.
Murray Andrews leaves Oslo and the position as Assistence Professor at the Coin Room and returns to England for further academic challenges. We wish him all the best and hope to continue the cooperations.
New book: Human Sacrifice and Value: Revisiting the Limits of Sacred Violence from an Anthropological and Archaeological Perspective, edited by Matthew Walsh, Sean O’Neill, Marianne Moen, Svein Harald Gullbekk, Oxford and New York, 2023, 472 pp including articles on CEO dismissal as an act of human sacrifice by Jan Ketil Arnulf, Janicke Rasmussen, Sandra Hjersing and Thea Berner; The Economy of Sacrifice. Christ, coins and the Eucharist in the Middle Ages by Svein H. Gullbekk and Martin Wansgaard Jürgensen, and Some human Sacrifices in Mongolia and their rationales, by Caroline Humphrey.
Date for publication of collected volume: "Standardization in the Middle Ages, vol. 1: The North," edited by: Line Cecilie Engh, Svein Harald Gullbekk and Hans Jacob Orning, Berlin: De Gruyter, September 23, 2024
The book produced under the auspice of the research group https://www.hf.uio.no/iakh/english/research/groups/standardization-in-the-middle-ages/index.html
Upcoming exhibition in Museum of Cultural History: "NORVEGR: Nye fortellinger: MiddelaldEren 1000-1500" with a special exhibition in hall 3 (of 3) on The Monetary System and Monetary Reform in the Reign of Magnus Lawmender (1263-1280).
Open: February 1, 2024.
Upcoming exhibition in Museum of Cultural History: Mirror Kingdoms: Norway-Poland c.1000-1300. The project group: Ben Allport, Anna Dryblak, Martin Hager-Saltnes, Eili Lindøe and Svein H Gullbekk. Project leadership Grzegor Pac, Wojtek Jezierski and Hans Jacob Orning. Opening: Marz 21, 2024
The research leading to these results has received funding from the Norwegian Financial Mechanism 2014-2021 (2019/34/H/HS3/00500)
New Member of the research group: Ben Allport, IAKH, 
embarking on a new project extending ideas from his PhD as part of the ELITES-project, with focus on the construction of collective identity, and particularly collective affiliation to the crown, at the boundary between the Viking Age and the early medieval period (c. 995–1130). Interdisciplinary approach comparing literary sources to evidence from the material record, particularly coinage: the emergence of a native, and later national coinage in Norway, particularly during the reign of Harald Hardrada as part of a drive to establish a collective awareness of, and affiliation, to the crown.
Numismatic symposium in Stavanger 1-2 June 2023: 'Monetary boundries and frontiers'. Open call for papers. Deadline 1 Marz. Contact: Linn Eikje Ramberg linn.l.ramberg@uis.no or Jon Anders Risvaag jon.risvaag@ntnu.no
Our research group has been granted status as interdisciplinary and interdepartemental within the Museum of Cultural History-structures.
Svein H Gullbekk this years Robinson-fellow at The British Museum, London.
Murray Andrews has joined the research group as Associate Professor at The Coin Cabinet in the Museum of Cultural History from 12 October 2022. He will embark on a project studying the coinage of Eirik Magnusson, Duke Håkon and Håkon V, 1280-1319.
New paperback edition available: S.H. Gullbekk, C.
Kilger, H. Roland and S. Kristensen, (eds.), Coins in Churches. Archaeology, Money and Religious Devotion in Medieval Northern Europe
Projects and ongoing activities
WP1: Under developement
WP2: Monetisation in medieval Northern Europe
Stipendiat Mika Boros' Phd-project: Monetisation at the frontiers of medieval Europe. The introduction of local coinage outside the borders of the Holy Roman Empire, Supervisors S.H. Gullbekk, Hans Jacob Orning and Mateusz Bogucki, from 1 September 2021.
WP3: Comparative studies of numismatics and monetary history
Project: 'Symbolic Resources and Political Structures on the Periphery: Legitimization of the Elites in Poland and Norway, c. 1000-1300 <https://www.hf.uio.no/iakh/english/research/projects/legitimization-of-the-elites-in-medieval-poland-and-norway/index.html> ' joint authorship S.H.Gullbekk and M.Bogucki: "Language of Power through Coinage in 11th-12th century Poland and Norway", a comparative approach.
Exhibition: Poland-Norway c.1000-1300: Comparative perspectives, Museum of Cultural History, January 2024.
Religion and Money in the Middle Ages – Routledge series
The series explores the connections between two of the most dominant aspects of medieval society and culture: religion and money. Both are ubiquitous throughout the Middle Ages, and both are expressed through a wide variety of media, from the textual to the material. In this light, the series recognises the importance of multi-disciplinary perspectives, and welcomes joint as well as individual authorship and editorship.
- Vol. 1: G.E.M. Gasper and S.H. Gullbekk, Money and the Church in Northern Europe 1000-1200: Practice, Morality and Thought, Farnham: Ashgate 2015.
- Vol. 2: Nanouschka Myrberg Burström and Gitte Tarnow Ingvardson (eds.), Divina Moneta: coin finds in religious contexts, New York – Oxford; Routledge 2017 (eds.) Coins in Churches. Archaeology, Money and Religious Devotion in Medieval Northern Europe, London and New York: Routledge 2021 ISBN 9780367557065
- Vol. 3: Coins in Churches, edited by Gullbekk, Kilger, Kristensen and Roland, Routledge 2021
- Vol. 4: Lucia Travaini, The Thirty Pieces of Silver. Coin-relics in medieval and modern Europe, Routledge 2022, 308 pp. ISBN 9780367688028
Series editor: S.H. Gullbekk
Go to Routledge.com to read more about our research on Religion and Money in the Middle Ages
Avsluttete prosjekter
NFR FRIPRO: ‘Religion and Money: Economy of Salvation in the Middle Ages’ PI: S.H.Gullbekk (2013-2017)
NFR FRIPRO: ‘Human Sacrifice and Values. The Limits of Sacred Violence’ PI Rane Willerslev and S.H. Gullbekk (2018-2022)