Easter

… Hoorah for the Easter break. This year I will be spending a good part of it rewriting my research application to the AHRC, to reduce costs all round and bring the database section into the second decade of the 21st century. So far as costs go, including Full Economic Costing apparently makes the cost of the project too great for what the market will bear. I am not convinced that Full Economic Costing gives the best value to the taxpayer – who, after all, is paying for all this. However, I don’t get any choice on this. So I’ll just have to compensate by knocking costs down wherever possible.

I’ll also be checking the timings of the project and checking the milestones. I worked these out in enormous detail for the first application, but they’ll have to be checked again. All these calculations can’t go into the actual application, as there isn’t space, but they’re necessary to ensure that the various parts of the project fit together.

This is a project of enormous interest to the general person-in-the-street, and it could be done by any skilled amateur — in fact many skilled amateurs would be keen to do it for nothing, or expenses only. But how to get in touch with such skilled amateurs? That is the question.

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Research Update

My application to the AHRC to fund researchers on the project on the Knights Templars’ estates in England and Wales was not successful. The AHRC rated it ’4′, which means that I can reapply. The basic project needs some redrafting and (to judge from the AHRC referee’s report) the technical appendix needs a complete rewrite. It’s sad that the database side of the project, which is only a small part of the whole, is what brought it down. However, I can use the opportunity to make the whole thing more cohesive, and will try to get parts of it started, although the full project will need more than one person (me) to make it work.

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Radio interview

I’ve just been on ‘Talk Radio Europe’, a radio station based in Malaga, being interviewed by Lisa Grant for her evening show (from 6.15pm to 7pm GMT) on the Knights Templar. It was absolutely terrifying and I’m utterly exhausted. Give me a year one lecture (150–200 18 year olds) every time.

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Lost any post recently?

This may be of interest if some post you expected over Christmas failed to arrive: http://homepage.ntlworld.com/nigel.nicholson/gn/page%2043.htm

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Marking

I’ve been marking the first batch of assessed work for this year. Overall, it’s very good; some pieces are first class. The class has clearly put in a lot of work. Some have done their own research beyond the call of duty. A lot of careful thought has been put into the arguments. All the essays are literate, and care has been taken with referencing. Overall, I’m very pleased with them.

Alas, just a couple of students let themselves down in their efforts to find external support for their arguments. They’ve picked up secondary sources which discuss the relevant issues, which is good – but two of their secondary sources are the sort which don’t cite primary sources, don’t include a bibliography, and don’t necessarily include much actual history. In this brave new world of Amazon.co.uk and ‘Look Inside’, I’m now able to chase up books which appear in students’ footnotes but which I’ve never heard of, and find out what’s inside them.  When what’s inside includes a chapter on ‘The Primative Rule’ I reckon that this isn’t one of this planet’s top notch historians (that should be Primitive Rule, of course).  And that’s just for starters, but let’s keep this blog short.

Now I have to decide how many marks a student loses for ‘temporary failure to demonstrate academic judgement’. Sigh.

 

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New book

Templar fans will be interested to know about Jochen Schenk’s new book on the families who supported the order of the Temple in France. It’s due out at the end of March 2012. See it on Amazon.co.uk at:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Templar-Families-Landowning-c-1120-1307-Cambridge/dp/1107004470/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325687152&sr=8-1

and on amazon.com at:

http://www.amazon.com/Templar-Families-Landowning-c-1120-1307-Cambridge/dp/1107004470/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325687291&sr=8-1

But the main attraction for re-enactors will be the cover picture, which shows a medieval illustration of a Templar sergeant, in genuine Templar sergeant clothing! Note the brown tunic with black mantle, the red cross on the left breast, and the soft cap. Perfect!

The cover of Jochen Schenk's new book

 

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Linking

I’ve at last got round to linking this blog to my personal university webpage, which is up to date (unlike the university webpage controlled by the School, which isn’t). I’ve also put in some links to other blogs and pages of interest, which means –  I hope – that material from this blog may spread a little more widely.

Haven’t heard any more from the AHRC yet. I’m expecting an email at 6 minutes past midnight sometime.

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