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Welcome to the Haskins Society
An Introduction


The Haskins Society, founded in 1982, is an international scholarly organization dedicated to studying the history and cultures of peoples in northwest Europe in the early and central Middle Ages, and their encounters with societies in the Mediterranean, the Baltic and the larger medieval world. The society holds its annual conference in the late Fall at institutions throughout the US. Starting in Fall 2022, our new conference home will be at the University of Richmond (Virginia).


The Haskins Society is named for Charles Homer Haskins (1870–1937), a foundational figure in the study of the Middle Ages in North America. Haskins was also a leader and proponent of crucial institutions of learning in his own day: he was the first Chair of the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) in 1919 and served as president of the American Historical Association in 1922.


As an Affiliated Society of the American Historical Association, the Haskins Society organizes sessions at AHA annual meetings. The Society sponsors scholarly sessions at the International Congress of Medieval Studies at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan in early May of each year. The Haskins Society also cooperates closely with the Battle Conference on Anglo-Norman Studies in the United Kingdom and co-sponsors panels at the Leeds International Medieval Congress each summer.


The Society publishes an annual journal, The Haskins Society Journal, with Boydell & Brewer, Ltd. and sponsors the Bethell Prize, an annual essay prize for the best submission during the calendar year by a junior scholar. The prize was created in memory of Denis Bethell, an accomplished scholar whose untimely death deprived us of an important colleague.


The Society is particularly committed to supporting young scholars and, to this end, welcomes graduate student contributors to its conferences and journal and also supports their attendance through subventions of the Keefe Fund, which was created in honor and memory of Thomas Keefe, a scholar of the Anglo-Norman world who died much too young.

Upcoming events

June 26, 2024 • University of Lincoln

Recent News Items

 The Haskins Society Conference & COVID-19 
  In keeping with the Conference's peripatetic traditions, we moved to Richmond, VA, for 2022 and offered a hybrid conference (fully in-person but with Zoom options for everyone). Our success means that we plan again to be in person (3-5 Nov 2023) at the University of Richmond, but health concerns and care for one another will decide the matter. We will offer online participation again, for both safety's sake and globalized access, at a steeply reduced registration rate. Watch for details later in Summer 2023.


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