Blackfriars Lecture: Fantastic Feasts

Join Dr Michael Huxtable and colleagues from Durham University for a tour of medieval literature and other sources on the theme of Fantastic Feasts and where to find them. We'll cover the feast of foreboding in the Old English poem Beowulf, before the terror inflicted by the beast Grendel; the dialogue between the God Apollo and the cook in Henry of Huntingdon's Garden of England, feasting and food in the poetry of Marie de France, an English poet of the 12th century, the curious story of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and some of the famous and infamous incidents that happened at real feasts - did Henry I really die from a surfeit of lampreys? And what went wrong with the dance for Charles VI of France in 1393? And finally words of wisdom from Chaucer and contemporaries. A culinary journey not to be missed!