Kenneth F. Duggan 🇨🇦
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kfduggan.bsky.social
Kenneth F. Duggan 🇨🇦
@kfduggan.bsky.social
4.9K followers 530 following 1.2K posts
Professor | Historian of crime, law, living standards, & social control in Western Europe, 7th-13th centuries | Dog lover | Pasta addict.

Background picture is of Nanaimo.
Portrait is from the 14th-century Luttrell Psalter.
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kfduggan.bsky.social
Here are the first two pages and the last two pages of the article for those interested.
The first page of the article. It can be accessed through the link in the first post of this thread. The second page of the article. It can be accessed through the link in the first post of this thread. The second last page of the article. It can be accessed through the link in the first post of this thread. The last page of the article. It can be accessed through the link in the first post of this thread.
November 24, 2025 at 3:53 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Two-year postdoc at Queen’s University for historians of Classical &/or Medieval Europe.

~$70,000/year (CDN); requirement to teach 2 semester-long courses per year; teaching experience & scholarly publications are an asset.

Per donor’s bequest, “only candidates who identify as women are eligible”.
An image of the first page of the call for applications to the postdoc. An image of the second page for a call for applications to the postdoc.
November 20, 2025 at 7:05 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Some high school students attended my “Living standards before the Black Death” lecture at @viuniversity.bsky.social yesterday. The lecture included a bit about coins, so I had an opportunity to show off some medieval silver pennies, including this one from King John’s reign (1199–1216).
On the left is a silver penny from King John’s reign, and on the right is the image of John from Disney’s 1973 Robin Hood movie. The Disney image is of a thin lion seated and wearing a crown, with wide eyes that show he is being hypnotized (by a snake which is out of view). John’s effigy on the 13th-century coin looks strikingly similar to the John in Disney’s “Robin Hood”.
November 19, 2025 at 2:28 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Me trying to explain to my wife that I need to buy more books.
A man in a red robe is saying something to a women in a blue tunic. She is seemingly not impressed because she is holding up her hand, as if to say “No” or “Stop talking about it”. There are green and red floral designs around them. Reference: Macclesfield Psalter from England, c. 1330 (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge).
November 16, 2025 at 12:19 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
My little emerald got some shots today. It was tough for a brief moment but we all got through it.
An infant in a person's arms. The infant has a striped outfit, which has stripes of different colours (such as red, blue, yellow and green) separated by a thinner white strip. The adult is wearing a blue housecoat with a panda face on it. Over the infant's face is a large, yellow smiling face (because our little emerald is shy).
November 10, 2025 at 10:29 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Made a comment about Tennyson today. My wife's response:
"Come on; you know no Tennyson. You only know Sendak: I told you once, I told you twice are seasons of the year are nice for eating chicken soup with rice".
The cover of Maurice Sendak's book "Chicken Soup with Rice: A Book of Months". It has the title at the top and the author's name at the bottom. There is a blue and yellow rectangular border around the outer edges of the book cover, within which appears a boys dressed in a blue suit eating what we assume is chicken soup with rice. He's eating it out of a yellow bowl and with a yellow spoon.
November 4, 2025 at 7:48 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Marginalia can be depressing. The marginalia next to this case from Nottinghamshire in 1280-81 has five esses, each of which has an abbreviation mark that looks like a nine. This is abbreviated Latin for "suspensus". In other words, five people were hanged.
A medieval record written in abbreviated Latin. The ink is brownish-red. The document shows five esses in the margin, each with a notation above them that looks like the number nine. This is actually an abbreviation for the Latin work "suspensus", which means "hanged". In other words, the legal case to which this margin refers includes five verdicts that resulted in hangings.
October 30, 2025 at 10:24 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Super excited about this new arrival!
A yellow book from the Oxford Medieval Texts series. The book is titled “The Warenne (Hyde) Chronicle”. It was edited by Elisabeth M.C. Van Houts and Rosalind C. Love.
October 28, 2025 at 7:37 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Update:
Otto came into campus with me yesterday for a bit. His paw is healing.
A small, black terrier mix dog is lying on an ugly greyish-blue carpet. He is in the corner of the room, against a wall and the door. He has his head down and is sleeping, even though he got carried everywhere on campus.
October 21, 2025 at 2:46 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Update:
Otto is very sleepy, but seems to be getting better.
A small, black terrier-mix dog is lying on his side in his bed.
October 18, 2025 at 10:18 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
New update (just before I have to wake up Otto so he can take more meds):
My dog, Otto, is lying on an ugly duvet. Otto is a black terrier mix. The duvet, as mentioned in the other descriptive texts in this thread, is pastoral in nature, but the background is an ugly blue and green. The images are of scenes from around streams and fields.
October 16, 2025 at 4:52 AM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Update:
Otto has moved from lying on his right side to lying on his left side. He is a small, black terrier-mix dog. As noted in the first descriptive text, he’s on an absolutely dreadful duvet cover that shows a variety of scenes near streams and fields. It’s green and blue mostly.
October 15, 2025 at 10:33 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Spare a thought for my poor, little Otto, who has hurt his paw badly (we don’t know how) and is now high on medication.
A small, black terrier mix dog is laying on a bed with a ridiculous blueish-green duvet cover depicting scenes of people in meadows and around rivers. The dog, named Otto, is not feeling well, but the medication is helping. Unfortunately he has a bad liver, which limits the type and amount of medication he can have. He’s still happy and eating when he’s awake; but right now he’s stoned. Poor little guy.
October 15, 2025 at 8:36 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Excited to read this recent publication by @jennisifire.bsky.social (Dr. Jennifer Barry), “Gender Violence in Late Antiquity”.
@ucpress.bsky.social
The cover of a book with the title, author’s name, and an image. The title is “Gender violence in late antiquity: male fantasies and the Christian imagination”. The author is Jennifer Barry. The cover image is Henry Fuseli’s painting “The Nightmare” from 1781. Wikipedia describes the painting thusly: “The Nightmare is a 1781 oil painting by the Swiss artist Henry Fuseli. It shows a woman with her arms thrown below her, in deep sleep as she undergoes a nightmare as an almost hidden horse ([that is,] the "night-mare") looks on as a demonic and ape-like incubus crouches on her chest.” The table of contents for the book. There is a prologue, and acknowledgements section, and a wonderful 27-page introduction. Chapter 1 is titled “bodies in conflict”. Chapter 2 is titled “Forgotten Bodies”. Chapter 3 is titled “Impossible Bodies”. Chapter 4 is titled “Revenge Fantasies”. Chapter 5 is titled “(Bad) Romantic Fantasies”. Chapter 6 is titled “Dreams of Mothers”. Chapter 7 is titled “Nightmares of Fathers”. Then there’s an Epilogue before the bibliography and index.
October 14, 2025 at 11:45 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Sang Hollister's 'Popes in Rome & Avignon' song today in my medieval class. When I finished I looked up to see a student recording my butchering of the ditty. Can't wait for that to get out.

Bellow is a copy of the November 2004 UCLA History newsletter that includes selections from his repertoire.
A page from the November 2004 UCLA History Newsletter, which includes a picture and write up of Hollister and some of his songs. The song I sang was to the tune of Old MacDonald. The lyrics are: Popes in Rome and Avignon, e-i-e-i-o, One named Clement, one named John, e-i-e-i-o. With one pope here and the other pope there, and Here a pope, there a pope, everywhere a pope, pope. At Pisa back in fourteen nine, e-i-e-i-o, A Council thought they'd fix things fine, e-i-e-i-o. With one pope here and another pope there, and Here a pope, there a pope, everywhere a pope, pope. The churchmen said, "It's too absurd," e-i-e-i-o, "We'll fire them both and pick a third," e-i-e-i-o. So with two popes here and a third pope there, and Here a pope, there a pope, is there any hope? Nope! Three's a crowd, or so I've heard, e-i-e-i-ooo!
October 7, 2025 at 6:46 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
The quickest way to finish an article is to start it. It also helps if you can stay away from social media, tv and the internet. And your cell phone. And other people. You should also fight urges to clean and organise spaces, and to cook big meals.

In other words, it’s difficult to finish articles.
A monk is seated, working on a manuscript. He is writing in a book and the writing appears to be horizontal lines.
September 28, 2025 at 4:53 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Next week, my ”Criminals, Crime Scenes & Punishment in Medieval England” class @viuniversity.bsky.social is discussing Bruce O’Brien’s article “From Morðor to Murdrum: The Preconquest Origin and Norman Revival of the Murder Fine”. I’m a big fan of O’Brien’s work, so am looking forward to it.
The first page of Bruce O’Brien’s article, showing the first paragraph and title: “From Morðor to Murdrum: The Preconquest Origin and Norman Revival of the Murder Fine”.
September 28, 2025 at 12:33 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Next week, students in my medieval survey course @viuniversity.bsky.social will be discussing Katherine Allen Smith’s fantastic article “Why did medieval monks sew?” If you haven’t read it yet, you should. It’s superb.
The image shows the first page of Katherine Allen Smith’s article called “why did medieval monks sew?”. Beneath the title is the abstract, which say this: Building upon numerous recent studies of medieval religious women’s textile production, this essay explores sewing practices among religious men. From Late Antiquity through the Central Middle Ages, monastic regulators, hagiographers, and homilists promoted stitching as a fitting activity for religious men and women alike, but ascribed different meanings to this work depending on the gender of practitioners. For religious men, sewing was a demonstration of humility, poverty, and simplicity which signalled their rejection of a lay masculinity that coded stitchery as feminine. More broadly, sewing-related metaphors, exempla and miracles evoked a monastic world in which the spiritual and domestic intermingled, so that needles and thread could be understood as both practical tools and symbols of virtue.”
September 20, 2025 at 7:35 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
This looks very interesting and useful. Here are the titles of the chapters in this edited collection.
Page 1 of the table of contents. The titles listed on this page are: 1- “The missing Romanian chapter in disability history”, 2- “Deafening Architectural Modernism: Reconsidering the Archive of Adolf Lois”, 3- “‘Brain of woman, at 30, half an idiot’: recovering disability histories from the ‘footnotes’ of the British Museum collection”. Page 2 of the table of contents. The titles listed on this page are: 4- “Cripping the convict archive”, 5- “The feverish saint: a queer encounter with the public universal friend” 6- “Disability, the modern state, and the archive in the United States”, 7- “ there are no invalids in the archive: hidden sources and ideological obscurations in the history of international blind activism”, 8- “silence and stigma: how archival restrictions threaten histories of the mentally ill in the United States”, 9- “recovering the past to understand the present: cropping school segregation in New York City”, 10- “settler ableism: Indigeneity, unsettling the archive, and accountability in history”, 11- “hall of miracles: Central American disability archives”. Page 3 of the table of contents. The titles listed on this page are: 12- “cripping the settler archive: disability in women’s memoirs of the Indian service”, 13- “deafness and silences in the archives”, 14- “the spoken word is not neutral: oral history, disability, and nonverbal communication”, 15- “ephemeral madness: the patient-theorists of psychiatric archives”, 16- “privileged, oppressed, and liberated: unearthing the archives of a multigenerational white deaf family”, 17- “‘It felt like everything’: disability, affect, and the creation of archival interdependence”, 18- “transnational disability praxis: archiving survival, resistance, and resilience amid ongoing emergencies”. Page 4 of the table of contents. The titles listed on this page are: 19- “accessibility widely defined: making the university of Massachusetts archives’ disability collections available to everyone”, 20- “file/life: remembering the Pennhurst Archive with community activists”.
September 19, 2025 at 4:03 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Said "Piss of Keace" instead of "Kiss of Peace" during a lecture today. How's your day going?
Two people are holding hands, leaning in to kiss each other, in an illuminated letter. One person is wearing a red robe and the other is wearing a blue robe. Both have their eyes open and are making the situation very weird. There are two people watching as this is happening. They appear to be looking at each other as if to say, "Maybe we should kiss, too".
September 16, 2025 at 9:52 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Talking about the Gregorian Reform in my medieval survey class today, which includes discussing this fantastic article by @pseudo-isidore.bsky.social (Charles West): ’The Simony Crisis of the Eleventh Centiry and the “Letter of Guido”’.
An image of the top of the first page of West’s article, showing the title and an abstract.
September 11, 2025 at 4:57 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
I have a new picture for my profile. I use it often in lectures – especially when I get to the "Why should you care?" slide.

Reference: Luttrell Psalter (14th century), British Library Add MS 42130, f. 201r.
A man in a blue tunic is raising his hands above his head. He is looking to his right. The gesture he is making with his hands appears to be one coming from a person saying "I don't know".
September 11, 2025 at 5:58 AM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Repost with a timeline cleanse.
September 10, 2025 at 8:56 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Got married 17 years ago today. Life has been getting grander and grander everyday since.
A scenic photo of a small table with two chairs behind which are rolling grassy hills and green trees. The sky is blue with a few white clouds.
September 6, 2025 at 7:04 PM
kfduggan.bsky.social
Rereading ”Tales of the Living Dead” by @lizpappkamali.bsky.social (Liz Papp Kamali) for my @viuniversity.bsky.social History course on “Criminals, Crime Scenes and Punishment in Medieval England”. The article is an outstanding piece of scholarship.
A print out of Liz Papp Kamala’s article titled “Tales of the Living Dead: Dealing with Doubt in Medieval English Law”. It is printed on white paper, which has bends and bumps because it’s been read before. The pages are stapled at the top left. There is a black pencil at the top of the article, resting horizontally at the edge of the pages. It’s a bit pretentious: who actually rests a pencil at the very top of a set of pages such that it could easily fall off?
September 6, 2025 at 1:32 PM