Medieval and Renaissance Studies

Medieval & Renaissance Studies

The Medieval and Renaissance Studies Programs offer the opportunity to study societies that evolved between the 5th and 17th centuries, particularly in Europe, from the perspective of various disciplines such as language and literature, history, music, theatre, or philosophy.
Middle Age And Renaissance Studies
Thomas Becket’s Murder in Canterbury Cathedral (London, British Library, Harley MS. 5102, fol. 32)

The courses focus on specific themes such as body and gender, heroes and narratives, travel and travelers, the perception of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance between the 19th and 21st centuries. In addition, the specific requirements of these programs include courses on this period in a variety of departments in the Faculty of Arts.

Latin, the dominant language of learning in this period, is required for the major that gives access to graduate studies.

One of the strengths of these programs is that they lead you to think differently, to open up to social practices that now seem hard to comprehend or mysterious, or to understand that these ancient societies offer alternative models to our own.

By taking courses such as those on the myths of King Arthur, long-distance travel, knights, witchcraft, or the case of Joan of Arc, you will gain access to a deep past that seems very strange today.

Study programs

Medieval and Renaissance Studies
The Tiger in Medieval Bestiaries (Oxford, Bodleian, MS. 764, fol. 6v)

Undergraduate studies: Major & Minor

Graduate studies: Collaborative Master’s

The specialization in Medieval and Renaissance Studies is intended for students who wish to enrich their training by including to their main program an interdisciplinary component in Medieval and Renaissance Studies. Besides a thesis or a major research paper on a topic related to the medieval and Renaissance period, the specific requirements of the collaborative program include two core courses in Medieval Studies, one of which will count as a partial requirement in the main discipline.

Professors

Part time professors

  • Geneviève Bazinet, PhD, Adjunct Professor, Department of Music
  • Pascale Duhamel, PhD, Adjunct Professor, Department of Music
  • Caroline Prud’homme, PhD, Département de français

Areas of Research

  • Manuscript culture
  • Women’s writing
  • Gender and sexuality
  • History of reading
  • History of literary, religious and universitary institutions
  • History of the book and of booktrades in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance
  • Renaissance Italy
  • Jews and Christians in the Renaissance
  • French literature of the Middle Ages
  • Literature, religion, and philosophy from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance
  • Literature and historiography in Late Antiquity
  • Production and social use of writing
  • Rhetoric and education in Late Antiquity
  • Theatre in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance

Variable topics courses 2025-2026

Automne / Fall 2025

MDV 2100 Heroes and Great Epic Texts of the Middle Ages and Renaissance

  • Prof. Andrew Taylor (ENG)

  • Tuesday and Thursday, 17:30-18:50

    This course explores the figure of the hero in some of the major narratives of the Middle Ages and Renaissance. We will examine the shifting reputations of warriors such as Beowulf, knights such as Roland, Lancelot, and Gawain, and the Sultans Saladin and Baybars, as well as the critique of heroism by writers such as Jean Froissart, Christine de Pisan, and Miguel de Cervantes.

Artifact

MDV 2500  Initiation à la civilisation médiévale et de la Renaissance :Société, Corps et Culture

  • Prof. James Nelson Novoa (LLM)
  • Lundi 14:30-15:50, Jeudi 16:00-17:20

Ce cours propose une approche interdisciplinaire des arts, de l’histoire, de la littérature, de la musique, de la philosophie et de la théologie du Moyen Âge et de la Renaissance. L’étude de ces périodes permet de mieux comprendre les racines de la civilisation occidentale, en lien avec d’autres cultures, dont l’influence demeure toujours présente dans notre vie contemporaine. Vous aurez l’occasion d’identifier les éléments essentiels de ces époques à travers une diversité de thèmes, en abordant de manière critique le corps, la société, la culture et l’art. Le cours comprend également cinq conférences données par des experts invités, qui enrichiront nos réflexions par leurs spécialités. Par ailleurs, vous serez amenés à lire des sources historiques traduites, à consulter une bibliographie critique, à analyser des œuvres d’art, de musique et d’architecture emblématiques.

MDV 3500 / HIS 3505 Jeanne d'Arc, de l'hérétique à la sainte


•    Prof. Kouky Fianu (HIS)
•    Automne 2025, Wednesday 16:00-17:20, Friday 14:30-15:50


Active sur la scène politique pendant deux ans seulement (1429-1431), Jeanne d’Arc est l’une des figures marquantes de l’histoire occidentale. Présentée tour à tour comme prophète, hérétique, sainte ou folle, son mythe a traversé les siècles, porté par différents mouvements religieux, culturels ou politiques. Ce cours a pour objectif de comprendre comment et pourquoi ont été créées ces différentes facettes de Jeanne (textes, images, représentations, films), quels usages on en a fait au cours des siècles et comment les analyser. Ensemble, nous étudierons la façon dont différentes périodes et divers lieux ont exploité la figure de Jeanne d’Arc, ou comment l’on est passé tout au long des siècles de la « source » au « texte ».
 

MDV 5100 / ENG  6320 Middle English Literature /Research Methods and Tools


•    Prof. Andrew Taylor (ENG)
•    Fall 2025, Friday, 8:30-11:20


How do you read an old manuscript? How do you find your way through an archive? This course will provide some preliminary answers, introducing you to the experience of working with a range of medieval and early modern books and documents. We will consider how works were composed, copied, and annotated, how they have been and can be transcribed and edited, the challenges they present, at a material level, to modern scholars, and their shifting institutional context, from the medieval monastery or college library to the renaissance library to the modern library to the internet. The focus this year, outside individual projects, will be on Harley 2253, a trilingual (French, English, and Latin) miscellany now in the British Library, and on William Shakespeare’s King Lear, in its various forms.

Winter 2026

MDV 3100 / ITA 3106 The Italian Renaissances 1300-1600


•    Prof. James Nelson Novoa (LLM)
•    Monday 8:30-11:20


This course is designed to critically consider the cultural life of the Italian Peninsula during the period that has come to be known as the Renaissance. It will present some of the representative works of literature, pictorial art, architecture, and music while at the same time considering the societies in which they were produced especially given that it was only a small elite that was involved in their creation and circulation during the period. It will also critically engage with the very notion of Renaissance which is increasingly subject to scrutiny in the academic world.
 

MDV 4500 / HIS 4720 La sorcellerie en Europe, 14e-17e siècle


•    Prof. Kouky Fianu (HIS)
•    Wednesday 14:30-17:20


Ce séminaire a pour objectif d’étudier le développement de la sorcellerie en Europe entre le XIVe et le XVIIe siècle. La figure du sorcier et de la sorcière se développe à partir de celle de l’hérétique, caractérisé par la désobéissance aux normes dictées par l’Église. La sorcellerie telle qu’elle se manifeste au XVe siècle associe des pratiques occultes, magiques, à la présence du Diable, pour élaborer un personnage menaçant la société tout entière et que les autorités laïques ou religieuses ont pourchassé. 
Le séminaire est fondé sur l’analyse de documents produits entre XIVe et XVIIe siècles (traités, procès, récits, images) pour comprendre la manière dont les sorciers et les sorcières ont été décrit.e.s et perçu.e.s, mais aussi comment leur description a évolué au cours des siècles. Nous tenterons de saisir qui étaient ces agents diaboliques qui terrorisèrent les Européens.


MDV 5900 Séminaire de recherche interdisciplinaire / Interdisciplinary Research Seminar


•    Prof. Kouky Fianu (HIS)
•    Tuesday, 8:30-11:20


Bilingual seminar using varying themes as a vehicle for exploring the meaning and value of interdisciplinary work in medieval and modern studies.
 

Coordination Committee

Contact us

Kouky Fianu

Office 9.121

Department of History

Desmarais Building
55 Laurier Avenue East, 9th Floor
Ottawa ON Canada K1N 6N5