Distinguished Lecture Series 26-27: Workshop by Prof. Andrew Rabin

Public Lecture: Sacred Skins: The Making of a Medieval Manuscript

Speaker: Andrew Rabin, Professor, University of Louisville

4:00PM October 7, 2026 (Wed)

Abstract

This workshop will take us into the world of the medieval manuscript. Working with the University of Hong Kong’s newly acquired collection of manuscript fragments, we will see what evidence these miraculous survivals can provide for the ways in which manuscripts were made, circulated, and used. In doing so, we will come to recognize the profound symbolic role manuscripts played in the medieval worldview as sources of knowledge, signs of wealth, and models of faith.

Biography

Andrew Rabin is a professor of English at the University of Louisville, his research examines the law and literature of early medieval England. His books include Crime and Punishment in Anglo-Saxon England (2020), Wulfstan: Old English Legal Writings (2020), The Disputatio Puerorum: A Ninth-Century Monastic Instructional Text (2017), and The Political Writings of Archbishop Wulfstan of York (2015). His most recent book is pseudo-Arnald of Villanova: Alchemical Tracts (2026), the first in a three-volume set on alchemy in the Middle Ages. In addition, he has edited multiple essay collections and published more than seventy scholarly articles. Professor Rabin is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society and the Society of Antiquaries.

This is an in-person only event. We welcome you to sign up.

If quota via Enventbrite is full, please sign up through the link below.

https://english.hku.hk/event/612/Professor_Andrew_Rabin_-_Public_Lecture_&_Workshop