If you follow the advice of Caterina Sforza, “you will see that thing become so narrow that you yourself will be in admiration.”The Lady of Forli was one of several writers in Renaissance Italy that dealt with matters of sex in their Books of Secrets. In her article, “Impotence and Corruption: Sexual Function and Dysfunction in Early Modern Italian Books of Secrets”, Meredith Ray examines these works to see what advice they were giving about sexual performance.

Over the last couple of weeks we have received a few requests to pass along Calls for Papers for upcoming conferences:The Ballad of the Lone Medievalist: Succeeding in Academic Life at Smaller Colleges and UniversitiesInternational Congress on Medieval Studies (2015)Once again, MassMedieval is organizing a roundtable for the International Congress.

On 30 November 1874 Winston Spencer Churchill was born in his family’s seat of Blenheim Palace. Widely regarded as one of the greatest statesmen in history, Churchill’s career was long, varied and extraordinary. Few men in history can claim to have lead a cavalry charge against mail-clad warriors and held the codes for a nuclear-age power.

By Andrew Latham and Rand Lee Brown IIAn aspect of the Hundred Years’ War that many scholars tend to overlook is the impact that English soldiers – those warriors, both noble and common, who collectively represented the “military revolution” of 14th Century England – had on the society and culture of late medieval Europe as a whole.

Lost but not yet Found: Medieval Foundlings and their Care in Northern France, 1200-1500By Anne E. LesterJournal of the Western Society for French History, Vol.35 (2007)Introduction: The High Middle Ages was an important period of transition in the care of France’s “miserable persons,” that is, the poor, sick, widows, orphans, aged, and infirm.

Although it was found about fifty years ago, archaeologists have just determined that a small stone container discovered on Baffin Island in Canada’s Arctic region was actually part of metallurgical equipment used by the Vikings around the year 1000 A.D.The findings were revealed in an article published in the journal Geoarchaeology, by archaeologist Patricia Sutherland.