Biography

Research interests

The Insular inheritance of late antique culture; early Ireland and Europe - culture contact; St Columbanus

Research and professional activity

Hon. Research Associate, Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse, and Celtic, University of Cambridge (2009)

Secretary, Academy Committee for Historical Sciences, Royal Irish Academy [click]

Visiting Associate Professor, Department of History, Boston University, Boston MA, USA (2006) [click]

Member, Post-Doctoral Review Committee, Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences [click]

Director, ArCH - Armarium codicum hibernensium [click]

Director, Summer School in Irish Studies, UCC [click]

Organiser, Insular Studies Seminar, UCC [click]

Publications

'"Whence the splendour of such light came to us": the account of Ireland in Ermenrich’s Life of St Gall', to be published in a forthcoming Festschrift

'Rome and the Isles: Ireland, England, and the rhetoric of orthodoxy', in J. Graham-Campbell and M. Ryan (ed), Irish/Anglo-Saxon relations before the Vikings (Oxford, forthcoming)

'Augustinus Hibernicus', in K. Pollmann (ed), Oxford guide to the historical reception of Augustine (Oxford, forthcoming)

The St Gall Gospels, i: Facsimile, Irish Manuscripts in Facsimile II (Cork, 2009), preface and introduction

The Schaffhausen Adomnán, i: Facsimile, Irish Manuscripts in Facsimile I (Cork 2008), preface and introduction

'Juniors teaching elders: Columbanus, Rome, and spiritual authority', in É. Ó Carragáin and C. Neumann de Vegvar (ed), Roma felix - formation and reflections of medieval Rome (Aldershot UK, 2007)

'Virgil the Grammarian and Bede: a preliminary study', Anglo-Saxon England 35 (2006) 7-21

Ireland and Europe in the twelfth century: reform and renewal (Dublin 2006), ed. with Dagmar Ó Riain-Raedel

'Feidlimid mac Crimthainn', Oxford dictionary of national biography (Oxford, 2004)

'Donnchadh mac Briain', Oxford dictionary of national biography (Oxford 2004)

'Muirchertach Ua Briain', Oxford dictionary of national biography (Oxford 2004)

'Toirdelbach Ua Briain', Oxford dictionary of national biography (Oxford 2004)

'Authority and duty: Columbanus and the primacy of Rome', Peritia 16 (2002) 168-213

'Virgilius Grammaticus and the earliest Hiberno-Latin literature', in J.-M. Picard and M. Richter (ed), Ogma: essays in Celtic studies in honour of Próinséas Ní Chatháin (Dublin 2002)

'The Fall and the law in early Ireland', in P. Ní Chatháin and M. Richter (ed), Ireland and Europe in the early middle ages. Text and transmission (Dublin 2002)

'Rationalism and the Bible in seventh-century Ireland', in A. M. Luiselli Fadda and É. Ó Carragáin (ed), Le isole brittaniche et Roma in eta Romanobarbarica, Biblioteca di Cultura Romanobarbarics 1 (Rome 1998)

'Latin passages in Irish vernacular law', Peritia 9 (1995)

'Immortality and capital punishment: patristic concepts in early Irish law', Peritia 9 (1995)

Founder-editor Chronicon: an electronic history journal

Reviews in English Historical Review, Peritia, etc.

Recent Invited Lectures

30 October - 1 November 2009, 'Ex occidente lux: Ermenrich of Ellwangen's Life of St Gall', and 'Books from the west: some new facsimiles of early Irish manuscripts', to Irish saints and the liturgy: the 45th Roscrea Conference, Mount St Joseph Abbey, Roscrea, Ireland

20 May 2009, 'Patrick - Gildas - Columbanus: the Irish and the People of the Lord', to Gildas Sapiens: New Perspectives, University of Manchester, UK

6 May 2009, 'Monks, manuscripts, and the making of Irish identity', to UCC Alumni, Princeton Club, New York, USA

16 December 2008, 'Peripheral concerns: Roman universalism, Ireland, and Columbanus', Medieval and Renaissance Forum Seminar Series, National University of Ireland, Maynooth

19 July 2008, ‘Rome, the Isles, and the rhetoric of orthodoxy’, to Second International Conference on the Science of Computus, Moore Institute, National University of Ireland, Galway

8 February 2008, ‘Columbanus and the nature of authority’, Moore Institute, National University of Ireland, Galway

22 January 2008, ‘Rome, the Isles, and the rhetoric of orthodoxy’, Trinity College Dublin

7 December 2007, ‘Columbanus, Ireland and the universal Church’, Pontifical Irish College, Rome

8 November 2007, ‘St Patrick – Rome – Columbanus’, Glenstal Abbey, Murroe, Co Limerick, Ireland

7 November 2007, ‘Ireland and Rome: images of authority’, Hunt Museum, Limerick, Ireland

13 October 2007, ‘St Augustine and early Irish identity’, The Early Irish Church and the Intellectual Tradition, Clonmacnois, Co Offaly, conference organised by NUI Maynooth and Irish Philosophical Society

17 May 2007, ‘The idea of the holy in the works of St Columbanus’, Christian Heritage Conference, Armagh, Ireland

12 April 2006, ‘The origins of the Irish – the earliest “scientific” account’, Department of History Seminar, Boston University, Boston MA

16 March 2006, ‘St Patrick and the conversion of Ireland’, Boston Housing Authority, Boston MA

2 November 2005, ‘Ireland and Rome in the seventh century’, Early Medieval Colloquium, Institute for Historical Research, Senate House, University of London

12 October 2005, ‘“Pimples on the face of the earth”: negative representations of the Irish in the Easter controversy’, Anglo-Saxon/Irish Relations before the Vikings, British Academy & Royal Irish Academy Symposium, The British Academy, London

5 September 2005, ‘Images of the body in the cult and Life of St Patrick’, Cult Fiction, Films and Happenings, 12th Olomouc Colloquium of American Studies, Palacky University, Olomouc, Czech Republic

13 April, 2005, ‘Ireland and Rome in the Lives of Patrick’, Pontifical Irish College, Rome

Courses Taught

HI 1001     East and West: the origins of Europe

Hi1001/1118    Pilgrims and Crusaders

HI 2002     Sources and Methods in History - A Case Study

Hi 2008     Project and research exercises

HI 2029     Heresy and the Control of Dissent

HI 3111     Ireland and Rome: History, Culture, and Contact

HI 3051     Ireland and the Beginnings of Europe

HI 3052     From Pagans to Christians

HI 3200     Monastic Ireland: from origins to dissolution

HI 6009     Ends of the earth [MA in medieval history, core]