Summer Talks

Professor Ryan Lavelle

Ryan Lavelle is Professor in Early Medieval History at Winchester University. He is co-convener of the Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Research at the University and was convener of the Wessex Centre for History and Archaeology between 2014-19.

He gained his first degree at Royal Holloway, University of London, and an MA in Medieval Studies at the University of York. He studied for a PhD at Winchester, which he was awarded in 2002.

An internationally recognised expert in Anglo-Saxon Winchester and King Alfred, he is the author of the award-winning book Alfred’s Wars: Sources and Interpretations of Anglo-Saxon Warfare in the Viking Age (Boydell, 2010) and Cnut: The North Sea King (Penguin, 2017). His latest book, Border Land: Frontiers of Early England, is released by Yale University Press in November 2026.

In October 2018, he chaired the event ‘Bernard Cornwell, in conversation on the making of England’ and presented ‘The Death of Cnut the Great and the End of the Viking Empire’, both part of the BBC History Weekend 2018.

He chaired and organised the 2017 conference ‘Winchester, a Medieval Royal City’, hosted by the University, and was historical advisor for The Last Kingdom, the hit BBC/Netflix series, based on the novels by Bernard Cornwell, that tells the story of King Alfred and the birth of England. He was also involved in the development of 878AD, the immersive visitor attraction bringing Anglo-Saxon Winchester to life, which opened in 2022.

Professor David Petts

David is an Associate Professor in the Department of Archaeology at Durham University.

His main research focus is on the social archaeology of the 1st millennium AD, with a particular interest in the development of Christianity. As part of this he is carrying out fieldwork on the Holy Island on the site of the early medieval monastery of Lindisfarne with his collaborators DigVentures, funded through crowdfunding and a series of other grants including one from National Geographic.

Whilst most of his current work is focused on the north of England, he has significant research interests in Wales and Scotland, as well as the wider North Sea world. He has written books on the early medieval church in Wales and a more theoretical consideration of the process of conversion in the early medieval world in Britain and elsewhere. Outside Britain and Ireland he has had a particular long-standing interest in the early church in Brittany and Western Normandy, and he is currently researching the early medieval sculpture in Southern Brittany (Morbihan).

Protected: Professor Fiona Edmonds

Fiona is Professor in Pre-modern Heritage Collections in the History department at Durham University. She was previously Professor in Regional History at Lancaster University, and prior to that Senior Lecturer in Celtic History at the University of Cambridge. She studied medieval Britain, Ireland and Brittany, with interests ranging from the sixth century to the twelfth. Her research focuses on maritime connections and now-lost kingdoms. Particular areas of interest are the Irish Sea region in the Viking Age; central Britain (northern England and southern Scotland) prior to the Anglo-Scottish border; and connections between northern Britain and Wales. Her monograph Gaelic Influence in the Northumbrian Kingdom: The Golden Age and the Viking Age won the Frank Watson Book Prize, 2021.

Fiona’s most recent research focuses on contacts between Britain and Brittany in the medieval period. She is interested in interdisciplinary work, for example combining historical and linguistic evidence through the study of placenames. From 2016-24 she was the Director of the Regional Heritage Centre at Lancaster University.