Centre for Arthurian Studies

‘EUARTHURS: European Arthurs, Medieval to Modern’ Ref: 101226326 (2026-30) is a Marie Sklodowska Curie Doctoral Network (MSCA DN) project (c. 3 million euros) led by Prof. Raluca Radulescu (Bangor University, Wales, United Kingdom), PI, with a team of Co-PIs from 6 countries: United Kingdom - Wales (Bangor University: Prof. Raluca Radulescu and Dr Aled Llion Jones); Iceland (University of Iceland, Reykjavik: Prof. Sif Rikhardsdottir); Italy (Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa: Prof. Lino Leonardi and Prof. Fabrizio Cigni); The Netherlands (University of Amsterdam: Dr Marjolein Hogenbirk and Prof. Irene van Renswoude, and University of Utrecht: Dr Martine Meuwese); France (University of Clermont Auvergne: Prof. Sébastien Douchet). Two additional doctoral students are part of the network, funded separately by SERI (the Swiss government) at the University of Zürich and supervised by Prof. Richard Trachsler. The project is hosted by the Centre for Arthurian Studies at Bangor University, where the network Project Manager, who assists Prof. Radulescu in the network coordination is also located.

The project includes c. 14 other associated/external partners involved in supervision and training and benefits from additional expertise from its external board, comprised of Prof. Keith Busby, Emeritus, University of Wisconsin at Madison (Old French), former President of the International Arthurian Society; Prof. Helen Fulton, Bristol University (Welsh and Middle English), Prof. Ad Putter, FBA, Bristol University (Middle English and Middle Dutch), and Dr Frank Brandsma, Emeritus, University of Utrecht (Middle Dutch, Old French).

The project will employ 11 doctoral candidates (2 in each host university, and only 1 for Amsterdam), who will start their programmes in autumn 2026. Each doctoral candidate will be employed for 36 months (some candidates will be funded for a 4th year – see the project specifications below) with a salary calculated at the country level according to the MSCA DN (and SERI, respectively) funding levels, to include a mobility allowance and, if applicable (if eligible) a family allowance.

Doctoral co-supervision will be standard across all the different projects, with two supervisors (one in the host university, and one from the network, assisted by a third external expert). All doctoral teams will be supported by the network through the various committee structures, as well as by the supervisory board, whose overall responsibility is to oversee all implementation aspects of the project.

The doctoral projects are pre-defined (see outlines below) and respond to 2 main methodological strands – materiality (manuscripts, early printed books, monumental art) and mediality (post-medieval critical approaches including history of scholarship and editions, as well as manifestations in theatre and opera).

Added advantages of this scheme:

- Secondments (2 weeks to max. 2 months) across Europe in the publishing industry, museums and galleries;
- Training events ranging from specialist manuscript and early print in location and at specialist repository archives/libraries (Bangor, Amsterdam, Pisa, Zürich); working with specialist and general collections, artefacts; working with the public in institutions ranging from schools to the charities, etc.
- Training in non-academic environments, such as utilising local legend/monumental art/media/creative industries to improve well-being and belonging to the local community; contributing to the link between place and culture in specific locations, and producing models of engagement with these themes elsewhere.

STRAND I: MATERIALITY (subprojects 1-6)

The transmission of Arthurian legend through the medium of chronicles/prophecy outwards from Wales into England, Scotland, and Ireland, then into Francophonia and beyond was predicated on both socio-cultural and political networks as well as economic conditions that favoured the spread of specific types of written forms and art. In this strand EUARTHURS focuses on the material transmission of Arthurian narrative and art through multi-text manuscripts such as anthologies and miscellanies, alongside other literary and historical genres, including prophecy. In this strand the projects aim to examine, comparatively, the transmission and reception of Geoffrey of Monmouth-derived and romance narratives. The process of accretion of existing texts, as well as of creation of new stories, characters, and literary tropes in conversation, or opposition, with the 'centre' represented by Geoffrey of Monmouth’s accounts, both in chronicle and prophetic material, and with Chrétien-derived, or developments following the writing of the Old French Vulgate and Post-Vulgate prose cycles, as well as another area, often seen as 'peripheral' in Arthurian studies, that of the Tristan corpus, are examined as a new narrative response to the growth of Arthur's European fellowship of knights. The material representations of Arthurian matter in object form and monumental art also play a key role in the contextualisation of the overall centre-peripheries topic.

This strand's objectives are:
1. establish a typology of forms of translation and adaptation in both the chronicle and the romance tradition;
2. uncover patterns in the dissemination formats (multi-text manuscripts) in which 'peripheral' textual and art forms survive;
3. reveal new interpretations arising from the multi-text and cultural-political contexts in which these manuscripts were initially read.

STRAND II: MEDIATION (subprojects 7-11)

In this strand EUARTHURS approaches the corpus from the interconnected points of view of (academic) modern theoretical approaches that have the potential to reveal the mechanisms by which this subject matter has not only endured since the medieval period, but has the potential to mediate and transform future generations' experience of the past. This strand of EUARTHURS thus focuses on the importance of recent critical approaches, such as history of emotions, gender studies, and spatial humanities, in mapping the potential of Arthurian traditions to shape the world of European culture for the global world of the twentieth and twenty-first century.

The strand's goal is to explore both the evidentiary nature of the Arthurian corpus as a legacy of the past and, more importantly, to explain its ongoing relevance and interest to audiences today. There are several theoretical strains that run through the project, connecting the doctoral projects and providing a critical foundation that cross-sects the overall project. One of these is emotion theory, which intersects with both gender studies and manuscript and sensory studies, and, finally, with Strand I in terms of material mediation and reception. Gender and sensory studies will simultaneously underlie several of the projects and inform their articulation in novel ways, exploring for instance the sensorial aspect of manuscript studies and their affective potential both in the past and today. And the corpus of materials brought to bear within the theoretically-oriented Strand II will in turn benefit from the expertise garnered in Strand I on the historiographical foundations of the traditions and its textual mediation and transmission patterns.

The projects in this strand will engage with the two major fiction-oriented corpora within the Arthurian tradition to facilitate collaboration between and across the doctoral projects within the strand: the Tristanian tradition and Chrétien de Troyes's Arthurian romances and associated translations and artefacts. Each project will deal with a particular aspect of either tradition across the multiple languages of the selected region, including the British Isles, Scandinavia, Flanders and the Netherlands, and Italy.

Objectives

Strand II, like Strand I, aims to map out the routes along which the Arthurian legends circulated along with the different manifestations, societal functions and processes of cultural adaptations of the material. But whereas Strand I aims to do this by studying the material elements in the political, cultural and linguistic contact zones, Strand II works in a complementary way. By drawing on modern theoretical frameworks, it functions as a laboratory where we will investigate, comparing a ‘peripheral’ text with its sources, what actually happens during the process of the reworking and circulation of the Arthurian material. These approaches also allow an opening of the field of investigation in the long term, as they take into account the rise of premodern and contemporary Arthurianism and show the vitality of Arthurian legend. This will also show how centres shift over time in Germany, for example, via Wagner, who becomes an important relay both for the Grail and the Tristan Legend. Finally, it will reveal how the material was adapted and/or shaped subsequent literary and cultural productions in terms of gender identities, social ideologies, behavioural patterns or values. EUARTHURS will provide the first example of a map showing the interwoven itineraries of the circulation of the Arthurian legends across time and space, beyond boundaries of language and textual genres.