Professor Chris Wickham DPhil

Department of History
Emeritus Professor of Medieval History

Contact details

Email: c.j.wickham@bham.ac.uk

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