MA (Medieval Studies)
College of Arts, Social Sciences, & Celtic Studies
Course overview
Key facts
Entry requirements
Either a Second Class Honours Grade 1 BA, or a GPA of 3.5 or equivalent international undergraduate degree (at NFQ level 8), in a relevant subject. Selection is based on an applicant’s academic record, academic references stating her or his potential for completing a research project, as well as on samples of the applicant’s written work.
Duration:
2 years, full-time
Next start date: September 2013
ECTS weighting: 120
Average intake: 15
Closing date: You are advised to apply early, which may result in an early offer; see the offer round dates
Course outline
In the first year, students take a year-long seminar (Sources and Resources), focusing on palaeography and manuscript studies, but also taking in auxiliary sciences such as diplomatic, heraldry and philology and including a teamwork, Internet-based project on a medieval library. All students also take Latin and one other language (no prior knowledge of these languages is required). Modules in Archaeology, History, and Literature complete Year One.
In Year Two, students work with their thesis supervisors to define a thesis topic through extensive bibliographical investigation, before completing their research and writing in Semester Two. In Semester One all students continue with Latin and Sources and Resources, as well as taking a module in Archaeology, History or Literature.
Applications and selections
Who teaches this course?
Archaeology
Dr Elizabeth FitzPatrick
Gaelic and Colonial Ireland 1300–1650, royal assembly culture in medieval Europe, urban settlement in traditional societies, and churches and their landscapes.
Mr Conor Newman
Ireland and the Roman world, Irish 'royal' landscapes from prehistory to the early middle ages, Irish art and iconography c. AD 300–700 and the Life and Legacy of Columbanus.
Dr Kieran O'Conor
Gaelic and Anglo-Norman Ireland 1100–1350, castles in their landscape and rural settlement across medieval Europe.
Classics
Dr Jacopo Bisagni
Indo-European, Celtic and Latin linguistics; early medieval Irish monastic literature.
Prof. Michael Clarke
Historical linguistics; epic poetry; medieval Irish heroic literature.
Dr Pádraic Moran
Didactic literature (in Latin and Irish), classroom texts and scholia; the study of Greek and Hebrew in the early medieval West; historical linguistics, manuscript studies.
Dr Mark Stansbury
Manuscript studies; Medieval Latin; Insular Christian culture; transmission of Classical texts.
English
Dr Dermot Burns
Middle English, Arthurian Literature, Medieval Epic and Romance Literature, Religious Writing, Robert Henryson, Medieval Aesthetics, Chivalric Literature.
Dr Clíodhna Carney
Old and Middle English; Chaucer; medieval poetics; medieval literary theory; Spenser; rhetoric, poetics.
Dr Frances McCormack
Old and Middle English Literature; in particular the works of Chaucer, religious and devotinal literature, and heresy.
French
Dr Catherine Emerson
Teaching: French language and literature, medieval literature (Romance, historiography), Historiographical literature, Islam in medieval French literature, Enlightment thought. Research: Fifteenth-century Burgundian literature, particularly historical literature; Memoires; Olivier de La March; Manneken Pis as regional symbol.
German
Mr Michael Shields
Medieval music; Old- and Middle-High German literature.
History
Dr Kimberly LoPrete
Social, political, and cultural history of medieval Europe, in particular, the 11th - 12th centuries and France; women in medieval society, notably, aristocratic women; gender and lordship; the first crusade and the history of crusading; medieval historical writing and the uses of the past in the Middle Ages; charters and chronicles, with special emphasis on diplomatic and the rhetoric of Latin narrative; manuscript studies, including palaeography, codicology, and the transmission of texts.
Prof. Dáibhí Ó Cróinín
Ireland, Britain and Europe during the Early Middle Ages; computistics; medieval latin palaeography; Irish traditional music and song.
Irish/Old and Middle Irish and Celtic Studies
Dr Clodagh Downey
Celtic Studies, Old and Middle Irish language and literature, culture and society of early medieval Ireland.
Dr Graham Isaac
The contemporary linguistics of the Celtic and Indo-European languages, the ancient Celtic languages of Europe, literature of the Old- and Middle-Welsh.
An tOllamh Máirín Ní Dhonnchadha
Medieval and Early Modern Irish language and literature early Irish law; aspects of early Irish history.
Requirements and assessment
Find out more
Dr Kimberly LoPrete
T: +353 91 493 547
E: kim.loprete@nuigalway.ie
PAC code
GYA32
Fees for this course
EU (Total): €4,710
- Student levy: €224
Non-EU (Total): €13,250
Current Student
Julia Warnes
MA in Medieval Studies
"Medieval Studies is ideal because of its interdisciplinary nature...One of it's most encouraging aspects is that the faculty have been so supportive and they really take an interest in the students. Galway is a great city to meet new people and make lifelong friends. Probably the number one word I would use to describe the place is "welcoming". NUI Galway is a great place to study, with it's high academic standards and supportive student environment".
Download taught and research
Past students
Kenneth Coyne
Hardiman PhD Fellow in History, NUIG
‘It is a wonderful course because one can study a wide range of disciplines on an introductory level and proceed quickly onto a higher level. . . . [Although] my main focus was History and Latin . . . I learned so much from the modules I took in Palaeography, Old French and Archaeology [that] is a constant benefit to me in the course of my current research’.