Upcoming themes

Hello all

As MWCC.23 gets close to press, I thought I'd use this blog to look forward to our upcoming themes and give you a bit of a flavour. As always, if you have a proposal for one of these themes, please do get in touch here.

MWCC.24 Unseen Empires
The Middle Ages are named for their position between empires, that of ancient (Western) Rome and the European empires of the early modern period. That doesn't mean it was a period without empires, though – far from it, in fact. There were empires in Europe, across Afro-Eurasia, the Americas, and the Pacific. This issue will take a look at some less well-known medieval empires – those built on culture, diplomacy, and the economy rather than conquest and/or those outside Europe that readers may be less familiar with.

As any historian will tell you, "it's complicated" when trying to define or explain the past. But I've always thought part of the joy of history is in exploring that complexity and this issue aims to do just that.

MWCC.25 Harnessing Nature
Human societies have always shaped the natural world (and been shaped by it in turn) and the medieval period was no different. Over the course of roughly one thousand years, societies around the world experimented and evolved in their attempts to harness nature. We can see this in the three-field system of agriculture in Europe, and the irrigation works of West Asia, in the changing practices of nomadic peoples in Central Asia, and in the developments in botanical and pharmaceutical healing around the world.

This issue will take a look at the infrastructure and innovation across the medieval world as humans worked to harness nature.

A Mexica turquoise mosaic mask, AD 1400–1521, made from cedar wood, turquoise, pine resin, mother-of-pearl, and conch shell, 16.5 x 15.2 cm.
© Trustees of the British Museum

MWCC.26 Mesoamerica
We know that people were connected by goods, ideas, and traditions across Afro-Eurasia in the medieval period but, for the most part, the Americas were doing their own thing. If my inbox is anything to go by, however, what precisely the many societies of the medieval Americas were doing is of great interest. And I agree!

This fascinating historical epoch includes cultures such as the Maya, Mexica (Aztec), Mixtec, and Teotihuacan, to name just a few. Whether your interest in the Middle Ages centres on art, culture, politics, religon, warfare, or (more likely) a combination of them all, medieval Mesoamerica has something for you, as this issue will show.

That's all for now. I hope I've whetted your appetite while you wait for MWCC.23. As always, please get in touch with your ideas, feedback, and proposals – I'm always keen to see the magazine through your eyes.

Until next time,

Rhiannon