Professor Chris Wickham DPhil

Department of History
Emeritus Professor of Medieval History

Contact details

Address
Department of History
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

I study Medieval history, 400-1250, especially Italy and comparative history

Qualifications

  • DPhil Oxford 1975

Biography

  • Lecturer, SL, Reader, Professor at University of Birmingham, 1977-2005 and from 2016.
  • Chichele Professor of Medieval History, University of Oxford, 2005-16.

Research

My current research is a comparative study of economic structures and relationships in the Mediterranean in a long eleventh century.

Publications

  • Legge, pratiche e conflitti.  La risoluzione delle dispute nella Toscana del XII secolo (Rome, 2000), 521 pp. (Translated and updated as Courts and conflict in twelfth-century Tuscany, Oxford, 2003.)
  • Framing the early middle ages (Oxford, 2005), 990 pp. (Translated into Italian and Spanish.)
  • The inheritance of Rome (London, 2009), 624 pp. (Translated into Italian and Spanish.)
  • Roma medievale: stabilità e crisi di una città, 900-1150 (Viella, Rome, 2013, then in English as Medieval Rome, Oxford, 2014), 578 pages
  • Open access journals in Humanities and Social Science, with R. Darley and D. Reynolds (London, 2014), 106 pages
  •  Sleepwalking into a new world (Princeton, 2015), 305 pages. (Translated into Italian as Sonnambuli verso un nuovo mondo, Rome, 2017.)
  • Medieval Europe (London and New Haven, 2016), 335 pages
  • 'Conclusion', in P. Coss (ed.), The moral world of the law (Cambridge, 2000), 240-9.
  • 'The Romans according to their malign custom: Rome in Italy in the late ninth and tenth centuries', in J.M. H. Smith (ed.), Early medieval Rome and the Christian West (Leiden, 2000), 151-66 .
  • ‘Overview: production, distribution and demand II’, in I.L. Hansen and C. Wickham (eds.), The long eighth century (Leiden, 2000), 345-76.
  • ‘Italy at the end of the Mediterranean world system’, in Journal of Roman archaeology xiii (2000), 818-24.
  • 'Comunidades rurales y señorio debil: el caso del norte de Italia, 1050-1250', in I. Álvarez (ed.), Comunidades locales y poderes feudales en la Edad media (Logroño, 2001), 395-415.
  • 'Una valutazione sull'archeologia medievale italiana', in Quaderni storici cvi (2001), 295-301.
  • 'Society', in R. McKitterick (ed.), The early middle ages (Oxford, 2001), 59-94.
  • 'Rural economy and society', in C. La Rocca (ed.), Italy in the early middle ages (Oxford, 2001), 118-43.
  • 'La valle dell'Albegna fra i secoli VII e XIV', in M. Ascheri (ed.), Siena e Maremma nel Medioevo (Siena, 2001), 59-82 (with E. Fentress).
  • 'Paludi e miniere nella Maremma toscana, XI-XIII secoli', in J.-M. Martin (ed.), Castrum 7 (Rome, 2001), 451-66.
  • 'Medieval studies and the British School at Rome', in Papers of the British School at Rome lxix (2001), 35-48.
  • 'Un pas vers le moyen âge', in P. Ouzoulias et al. (eds), Les campagnes de la Gaule à la fin de l'Antiquité (Antibes, 2001), 555-567.
  • 'Topographies of power: an introduction', in M. De Jong (ed.), Topographies of power in the early middle ages (Leiden, 2001), 1-8.
  • 'Edoardo Grendi e la material culture', Quaderni storici cx (2002), pp. 323-31.
  • 'Asentamentos rurales en el Mediterráneo occidental en la alta edad media', in C. Trillo (ed.), Asentamentos rurales y territorio en el Mediterráneo medieval (Granada, 2002), pp. 11-29.
  • 'Past and Present' after 50 years' (with L. Roper), Past and present clxxvi (2002), pp. 3-6.
  • 'Studying long-term change in the West, 400-800', in W. Bowden and L. Lavan (eds.), Theory and practice in late Antique archaeology (Leiden, 2003), pp. 385-403, in Italian as 'Sul mutamento sociale ed economico di lungo periodo in Occidente (400-800), Storica, 23 (2003), pp. 7-27.
  • 'Fama and the law in twelfth-century Tuscany', in T. Fenster and D. L. Smail (eds.), Fama (Ithaca, NY, 2003), pp. 15-26.
  • 'Space and society in early medieval peasant conflicts’, Settimane di studio xlix (2003), pp. 551-85; translated into Spanish as ‘Espacio y sociedad en los conflictos campesinos en la Alta Edad Media’, in A. M. Rodríguez López (ed.), El lugar del campesino. En torno a la obra de Reyna Pastor (Madrid-València, 2007), pp. 33-60
  • ‘Altomedioevo e identità nazionale’, Storica, xxvii (2003), pp. 7-26; in English as ‘The early middle ages and national identity’, in N. Fryde et al. (eds.), Die Deutung der mittelalterlichen Gesellschaft in der Moderne (Göttingen, 2006), pp. 107-22
  • ‘Defining the seigneurie since the war’, in M. Bourin and P. Martínez Sopena (eds.), Pour une anthropologie du prélèvement seigneurial, i (Paris, 2004), pp. 19-35
  • ‘City society in twelfth-century Italy and the example of Salerno’, in P. Delogu and P. Peduto (eds.), Salerno nel XII secolo (Salerno, 2004), pp. 12-26.
  • ‘Introduzione’, in S. Gelichi and C. La Rocca (eds.), Tesori (Rome, 2004), pp. 9-18
  • ‘The Mediterranean around 800’, Dumbarton Oaks papers, lviii (2004), pp. 161-74
  • ‘Literary perceptions and social change. Watching the fall of the Roman empire’, The South African journal of medieval and Renaissance studies, xiv (2004), pp. 1-22
  • ‘Figline: nobili, milites e masnadieri’, in G. Pinto and P. Pirillo (eds.), Lontano dalle città (Rome, 2005), pp. 379-94
  • ‘Conclusioni’, in G. P. Brogiolo et al. (eds.), Dopo la fine delle ville (Mantua, 2005), pp. 351-7
  • Problems in doing comparative history, University of Southampton, 2005, reprinted in P. Skinner (ed.), Challenging the boundaries of medieval history (Turnhout, 2009), pp. 5-28
  • ‘Conclusions’, in G. P. Brogiolo and P. Delogu (eds.), L’Adriatico dalla tarda antichità all’età carolingia (Florence, 2005), pp. 321-30
  • ‘Nobiltà romana e nobiltà italiana prima del Mille’, in S. Carocci (ed.), La nobiltà romana nel medioevo (Rome, 2006), pp. 5-14
  • ‘Conclusions’, in L. Feller and C. Wickham (eds.), Le marché de la terre au moyen âge (Rome, 2006), pp. 625-41
  • ‘Replica’, Storica, xxxiv (2006), p. 164-72
  • ‘Conclusions’, in C. C. Dyer et al. (eds.), Rodney Hilton’s middle ages, Past and present, supplement, ii (Oxford, 2007), pp. 304-16
  • ‘Fonti archeologiche e fonti storiche: un dialogo complesso’, in A. Barbero (ed.), Storia d’Europa e del Mediterraneo, ix (Rome, 2007), pp. 15-49
  • ‘Public court practice: the eighth and twelfth centuries compared’, in S. Esders (ed.), Rechtsverständnis und Konfliktbewältigung (Cologne, 2007), pp. 17-30
  • ‘Conclusions. Perspectives’ in M. Bourin and P. Martínez Sopena (eds.), Pour une anthropologie du prélèvement seigneurial dans les campagnes médiévales (XIe-XIVe siècles), ii (Paris, 2007), pp. 497-510
  • ‘La cristalización de la aldea’, in XXXIV semana de estudios medievales (Pamplona, 2008), pp. 33-51
  • ‘Rethinking the structure of the early medieval economy’, in J. R. Davis and M. McCormick (eds.), The long morning of early medieval Europe (Aldershot, 2008),  pp. 19-31
  • 'Productive forces and the economic logic of the feudal mode of
  • production', Historical Materialism, XVI/2 (2008), pp. 3-22
  • ‘Iuris cui existens’, Archivio della società romana di storia patria, CXXXI (2008), pp. 5-38
  • ‘Conclusioni’, in Chiese e insediamenti nei secoli di formazione dei paesaggi medievali della Toscana (V-X secolo) (Florence, 2008), pp. 444-6
  • ‘La struttura della proprietà fondiaria nell’agro romano, 900-1150’, Archivio della società romana di storia patria, CXXXII (2009), pp. 181-238
  • ‘Bounding the city’, Settimane di studio, LVI (2009), pp. 61-80
  • ‘Social structures in Lombard Italy’, in G. Ausenda, P. Delogu and C. Wickham  (eds.), The Langobards before the Frankish conquest (Woodbridge, 2009), pp. 118-48
  • ‘Documents becoming narrative’, in S. Sato (ed.),Herméneutique du texte d’histoire (Nagoya, 2009), pp. 25-31
  • ‘Compulsory gift-exchange in Lombard Italy, 650-1150’, in W. Davies and P. Fouracre (eds.), The languages of gift in the early middle ages (Cambridge, 2010), pp. 193-216
  • ‘Conclusion’, in W. Davies and P. Fouracre (eds.), The languages of gift in the early middle ages (Cambridge, 2010), pp. 238-61
  • ‘Historical transitions: a comparative approach’, The medieval history journal, XIII (2010), pp. 1-21
  • ‘Medieval Wales and European history’, Welsh history review, XXV (2010), pp. 45-52
  • ‘L’identité villageoise entre Seine et Rhin, 500-800’, in J.-M. Yante and A.-M. Bultot-Verleysen (eds.), Autour du “village” (Louvain-la-Neuve, 2010), pp. 141-51
  • ‘Archeologia e mondi rurali’, Archeologia medievale, XXXVII (2010), pp. 277-81
  • ‘Le trasformazioni del V secolo’, in P. Delogu and S. Gasparri (eds.), Le trasformazioni del V secolo (Turnhout, 2010), pp. 731-9
  • ‘Social relations, property and power around the North sea, 500-1000’, in B. van Bavel and R. Hoyle (eds.), Social relations: property and power (Turnhout, 2010), pp. 25-47
  • ‘Aristocratic wealth in Tuscany and Rome, 700-1100’, in J.-P. Devroey et al. (eds.), Les élites et la richesse au haut moyen âge (Turnhout, 2010), pp. 251-63
  • ‘Le campagne altomedievali’, in Riccardo Francovich e i grandi temi del dibattito europeo (Florence, 2011), pp. 53-7
  • ‘Tributary empires: late Rome and the caliphate’, in P. Fibiger Bang and C. A. Bayly (eds.), Tributary empires in global history (Basingstoke, 2011), pp. 205-13
  • ‘The financing of Roman city politics, 1050-1150’, in P. Guglielmotti et al. (eds.), Europa e Italia. Studi in onore di Giorgio Chittolini (Florence, 2011), pp. 437-53
  • ‘Conclusiones’, in J. A. Quirós Castillo (ed.), Vasconia en la alta edad media (Zarautz, 2011), pp. 87-90
  • ‘Getting justice in twelfth-century Rome’, in C. Dartmann (ed.), Zwischen Pragmatik und Performanz (Turnhout, 2011), pp. 103-31
  • ‘The problems of comparison’, Historical Materialism, XIX/1 (2011), pp. 221-31
  • ‘Una discussione con Jean-Claude Maire Vigueur’, Storica, L (2011), pp. 126-37
  • ‘The changing composition of early élites’, in F. Bougard et al. (eds.), Théorie et pratiques des élites au haut Moyen Age (Turnhout, 2011), pp. 5-18
  • ‘Conclusions’, in A. Lymberopolou (ed.), Images of the Byzantine World (Farnham, 2011), pp. 231-40
  • ‘Conclusions’, in S. Gelichi and R. Hodges (eds.), From one sea to another (Turnhout, 2012), pp. 503-10
  • ‘The origins of the signoria in central Lazio’, in D. Balestracci et al. (eds.). Uomini paesaggi storie (Siena, 2012), pp. 481-92
  • ‘Conclusions’, in W. Pohl et al. (eds.), Visions of community in the post-Roman world (Farnham, 2012), pp. 551-8
  • ‘Conclusion’, Experts et expertise au moyen âge (Paris, 2012), pp. 329-36
  • ‘Observaciones finales’, in L. Caballero Zoreda et al. (eds.), Asturias entre visigodos y mozárabes (Madrid, 2012), 475-8
  • ‘Abordagens marxistas sobre a Idade média, algumas questões e exemplos’, Mare nostrum, III (2012), pp. 224-44
  • ‘Conclusion’, in M. Valenti and C. Wickham (eds.), Italia 888-962: una svolta (Turnhout, 2013), pp. 417-26
  • ‘Albano in the central middle ages’, in G. Barone et al. (eds.), Ricerca come incontro (Rome, 2013), pp. 209-26
  • ‘Open access in the UK and the international environment’, in N.Vincent and C. Wickham (eds.), Debating open access (London, 2013), 42-53
  • ‘Response’, in P. Armstrong (ed.), Authority in Byzantium (Farnham, 2013), pp. 109-12
  • ‘Reflections; forty years of Archeologia medievale’, in S. Gelichi (ed.), Quarant’anni di archeologia medievale in Italia. Archeologia medievale, numero speciale (Florence, 2014), pp.212-16
  • ‘The feudal revolution and the origins of Italian city communes’, Transactions of the Royal historical society, 6 ser. 24 (2014), 29-55
  •  ‘Administrators’ time: the social memory of the early medieval state, East and West’, in B. Sadeghi et al. (eds.), Islamic cultures, Islamic contexts (Leiden, 2015), 430-67
  • ‘Nations in the middle ages’, Nations and nationalism, 21 (2015), 385-9
  • ‘Notes on a pathbreaker’ in L. Jégou, S. Joye, T. Lienhard, J. Schneider (eds.), Splendor reginae (Paris, 2015), 23-5
  • ‘Passages to Feudalism in Medieval Scandinavia’, in L. da Graca and A. Zingarelli (ed.), Studies on Pre-Capitalist Modes of Production (Brill, 2015), 141-157
  • ‘The economy of Italy and Spain in the early middle ages’, in S. Gelichi (ed.), New directions in early medieval Euroean archaeology (Turnhout, 2015), 335-45
  • ‘Final observations’, in V. West-Harling (ed.), Three empires, three cities (Turnhout, 2015), 325-30
  • ‘Conclusioni’, in Monteriggioniottocento 1214-2014 (Siena, 2015), 121-5
  • ‘Gli artigiani nei documenti italiani dei secoli XI e XII’, in A. Molinari et al. (eds.), L’archeologia ella produzione a Roma (secoli V-XV) (Rome, 2015), 429-38
  • ‘Introduction: comparisons’ in J. Belich et al. (eds.), The prospect of global history (Oxford, 2016), 10-14
  • ‘Gian Pietro Brogiolo’, in M. Jurkovic, A. Chavarría (eds.), Alla ricerca di un passato complesso (Turnhout, 2016), 47-9
  • ‘The comparative method and early medieval religious conversion’, in R. Flechner and M. Ní Mhaonaigh (eds.), The introduction of Christianity into the early medieval insular world, I (Brepols, 2016), 13-37
  • ‘Looking forward’, in J. Firnhaber-Baker (ed.), The Routledge history handbook of medieval revolt (London, 2016), 155-67
  • ‘Sulle origini del comune di Bologna’, Bullettino dell’Istituto storico italiano per il medioevo, 119 (2016), 209-37
  • ‘Consensus and assemblies in the Romano-Germanic kingdoms’, Vorträge und Forschungen, 82 (2017), 387-424
  • ‘Economic history and microhistory’, in P. di Martino et al. (eds.), People, places and business cultures (Woodbridge, 2017), 193-200
  • ‘Conclusioni’, in J.-M. Martin et al (eds.), L’héritage byzantin en Italie (VIIIe-XIIe siècle), IV (Rome, 2017), 383-95
  • ‘Prima della crescita: quale società?’, in La crescita economica dell’Occidente medievale (Pistoia, 2017), 93-106
  •  ‘The Tivoli breve of 945’, in A. Dierkens et al. (eds.), Penser la paysannerie mediévale (Paris, 2017), 161-76
  • ‘Jiangnan style’, in J. H. Arnold et al. (eds.), History after Hobsbawm (Oxford, 2017), 121-39