Eleanor Wallace

PhD thesis:

Working title: Translation, Adaptation, and Emendation: the use of sources in the compilation of the Liber Eliensis

My research will analyse how the extant manuscripts of the Liber Eliensis were compiled to advance the lands and rights of Ely Abbey. Assessment of the manuscripts' content, codicology, and palaeography will illuminate the compilers' strategic inclusion, arrangement, and manipulation of documents, hagiographical material, and narrative history. I will compare documents in the LE with Latin and Old English documents preserved in extant Ely cartularies and Ely's archive which were available to the compilers. This will contribute to debates about the evolution and regional variation of the use of written documents in disputes, and the nature and purpose of forgery. I will use my conclusions to reconstruct the resources available in Ely's archive, altering representations of Ely's archive based on extant Ely manuscripts and two inventories preserved in the LE listing Ely’s possessions, evidence considered to represent Ely's archive as limited in comparison with learning levels at the Abbey. 

Who or what inspired you to pursue your research interests?

I grew up in a village just outside Ely, and went to school in Ely, leading to a fascination in the history of the Norman building of Ely Cathedral and the Abbey before it. Several modules in my undergraduate degree at Oxford and MLitt degree at St Andrews, in particular the supervision of Professors George Garnett and John Hudson fostered an interest in the intersection of the history of legal ideas, historical writing, and language change. I am fortunate to have been able to blend these interests by researching the rich archival resources of Ely Abbey.