The Humanities Council’s 2022-23 Old Dominion Lecture series continued on Wednesday, February 8, with a lecture from William Jordan (History).
Entitled “‘The Harvest Indeed is Great, but the Labourers are Few’: Strangers in the Medieval Countryside,” the talk explored the complex relationships between rural migrant workers in the high Middle Ages, and the lords and villagers who populated rural society.
Jordan, the Dayton-Stockton Professor of History, is a prolific author whose current research focuses on migrant labor in the 13th and early 14th century. He is a former director of the Humanities Council’s Program in Medieval Studies and previously served as director of the Shelby Cullom Davis Center for Historical Studies. As an Old Dominion Research Professor in 2022-23, Jordan is studying the economic and social experiences of migrant laborers in the High Middle Ages in the rural areas of northwestern continental Europe.
Old Dominion Research Professors are senior faculty of tenured rank who engage the campus community in sustained discussions around their research, and contribute to the Council’s programs and events. The yearlong program is designed to support additional research time for faculty and enhance the humanities community at Princeton more broadly.
