The British Academy’s 2025 APEX Awards will support the work of three researchers from the College of Arts and Law.
Professor Aengus Ward, Professor of Medieval Iberian Studies in the Department of Modern Languages is one of ten academics named as recipients of the British Academy’s 2025 Apex Awards, receiving up to £200,000 in funding. The awards are supported by the Leverhulme Trust and delivered in partnership with the Royal Academy of Engineering and the Royal Society.
Professor Ward’s research project ‘PPROTEX: Philological and Proteomic Analysis of Texts from the Reign of Alfonso X’ combines philological with genomic and proteomic study of royal manuscripts from the Court of Alfonso X of Castile and Leon. Through collaboration with biocodicologists from the University of Cambridge, experts in the study of DNA found in manuscripts, the project will also undertake non-invasive techniques of DNA and protein extraction from these manuscripts. Studying these extracts alongside the material culture of the manuscripts will advance understanding of cultural and genetic diversity in late medieval Iberia and, more broadly, across Europe.
Professor Ward said of the project: "Biocodicology is an exciting new technique which unlocks knowledge about the animals from which medieval parchment books were made. Our collaboration will study manuscripts from the 13th century royal scriptorium of Castile and Leon in Spain. The results will reveal previously unknown detail about the composition of the manuscripts but also about animal husbandry and diseases in late medieval Iberia."
Professor Henry Chapman and Dr David Smith from the Department of Classics, Ancient History and Archaeology will lend their archaeological expertise to another of the APEX awarded research projects: 'Bog biographies – combining high spatial and chronological resolution ecological modelling for understanding societal and cultural resilience'. The project, led by Coventry University’s Dr Michelle Farrell, will be a wider analysis of the landscape and environmental context of 'bog bodies'. The analysis will help to further our understanding of these Iron Age killings, the nature and motivation for which remains a mystery in many cases.
Reacting to the funding announcement, Professor Fiona de Londras, Director of Research in the College of Arts and Law said “These projects exemplify how humanities scholars at the University of Birmingham are working at the arts/science frontier, building collaborations with colleagues across disciplines and deepening our understanding of human culture and experience.”
Professor in Medieval Iberian Studies
Biographical and contact information for Dr Aengus Ward, Professor in Medieval Iberian Studies, in the Department of Hispanic Studies at the University of Birmingham
Professor of Archaeology
Biographical and contact details for Dr Henry Chapman, Professor of Archaeology at the University of Birmingham.
Senior Lecturer in Environmental Archaeology
Biographical and contact information for Dr David Smith in the Department of Classics, Ancient History and Archaeology at the University of Birmingham.
Director of Research, College of Arts and Law
Academic profile of Professor Fiona de Londras, Chair in Global Legal Studies at Birmingham Law School, University of Birmingham.
