Staff profile

Giles Gasper is Professor in High Medieval History at Durham University. He specializes in the intellectual history of the high middle ages (11th-13th centuries), particularly in the development of theology. He also has interests in Patristic and early medieval thought, and in the history of science. He is principal investigator on the inter-disciplinary Ordered Universe project to edit, translate and contextualise the scientific works of Robert Grosseteste (c.1170-1253), working with an international team of scientists, educationalists and medievalists. The Dimensions of Colour: Robert Grosseteste's De colore (2013) emerged from the pilot project for Ordered Universe. Subsequent volumes will be published by Oxford University Press in a seven volume series The Scientific Works of Robert Grosseteste. The Ordered Universe has active collaborations with a variety of creative artists, namely Cate Watkinson, Colin Rennie and other glass artists at the UK National Glass Centre, University of Sunderland, Sculptor Alexandra Carr, Filmmaker Alan Fentiman and Projection Artists Ross Ashton and Karen Monid. Carr and Gasper directed a Leverhulme Trust funded Artist in Residence placement Sculpting with Light, with principal activities in Durham in 2017. Gasper is a regular participant in the UK National Festival of Humanities, represented the Arts and Humanities Research Council at the Cheltenham Science Festival in 2015 (with Hannah Smithson and Tom McLeish), and featured on BBC Radios 4’s In Our Time. Gasper, together with Smithson and McLeish, was awarded a Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Research Engagement at the University of Oxford (2016). A second strand of research focuses on notions of ‘economy’ and order in the High Middle Ages. This has focal points on medieval monastic thought, the theology of Creation and hexaemeronic commentary, Salvation theology and medieval food culture. Recent work in this area includes a study of twelfth century culinary recipes for the English Historical Review co-authored with Faith Wallis (McGill), and forthcoming edited volumes on Biblical Exegesis in the Middle Ages, and Spiritual and Material Economies in Northern Europe. Gasper was an international partner in a major inter-disciplinary research project, funded by the Norwegian Research Council, running from the Cultural Historical Museum, University of Oslo, on 'Economies of Salvation in the Middle Ages', 2013-2016 working particularly with numismatists, liturgists and archaeologists. Money and the Church in Medieval Europe, 1000-1200 (co-ed. with S. Gullbekk, 2015) was produced from this project. Gasper has written extensively on Anselm of Canterbury, including St Anselm of Canterbury and His Legacy (2012) and his earlier Anselm of Canterbury and His Theological Inheritance (2004) and papers on various aspects of Anselm’s thought, career and posthumous reputation.

Giles Gasper welcomes inquiries from postgraduates in any aspect of intellectual or cultural history of the 11th-13th centuries, especially the development of theology, monastic life, spiritual and material culture, and the history of science.

Giles has sponsored a number of Visiting Fellows to Durham:

2017 Department of History: Professor Nader El-Bizri, American University of Beirut

2017 Institute of Advanced Study Fellowship: Professor Hannah Smithson, Department of Experimental Psychology and Pembroke College, University of Oxford

2015 Institute of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, Slater Fellowship: Professor Faith Wallis, Departments of History and Social Studies of Medicine, McGill Univesity, Montreal, Canada

2012 Institute of Advanaced Study, Senior Research Fellowship: Professor Greti Dinkova-Bruun, Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Toronto, Canada.

• History of Theology
• Medieval intellectual history
• Monastic Life
• Spiritual and Material Culture of the High Middle Ages
• Medieval Science

• 2018: University Impact and Engagement Award: Arts and Humanites Faculty:
• 2017: Doctor of the University, Honoris causa, Bishop Grosseteste University: For services to medieval history and leadership of the Ordered Universe project
• 2016: Associate Fellow, Pembroke College, University of Oxford (until 2019):
• 2016: University of Oxford Vice-Chancellor's Award for Engagement with Research:
• 2014: Times Higher Education Awards: Research Project of the Year (Shortlisted): The Ordered Universe
• 2013: University Award for Excellence in Doctoral Supervision:
• 2012: University Award for Excellence in Learning and Teaching:
• 2009: University Award for Enhancing the Student Learning Experience:

Authored book

• Gasper, G. (2023). Mapping the Universe: Robert Grosseteste's De sphera 'On the Sphere'. Oxford University Press
• Gasper, G. E., Panti, C., Smithson, H. E., McLeish, T. C., Lewis, N., Sonnesyn, S., & Thomson, D. (2019). Knowing and Speaking: Robert Grosseteste's De artibus liberalibus 'On the Liberal Arts' and De generatione sonorum 'On the Generation of Sounds'. Oxford University Press
• Dinkova-Bruun, G., Gasper, G. E., Huxtable, M., McLeish, T. C., Panti, C., & Smithson, H. (2013). The Dimensions of Colour: Robert Grosseteste's De colore Edition, Translation and Interdisciplinary analysis. PIMS
• Gasper, G. (2004). Anselm of Canterbury and his Theological Inheritance. Ashgate Publishing

Chapter in book

• Gasper, G. Anselm of Canterbury and Christology. In J. Barter (Ed.), Christology. Bloomsbury
• Gasper, G. E. On the Six Days of Creation: the Hexaemeral Tradition. In J. Goroncy (Ed.), T&T Clark Handbook of the Doctrine of Creation. Bloomsbury
• Gasper, G. (2024). 'The Face of the World was Wretched, Horrifying, Black, Remarkable': Solar Eclipses in the Middle Ages. In H. Lange, & T. McLeish (Eds.), Eclipse and Revelation: Total Solar Eclipses in Science, History, Literature, and the Arts (103-126). Oxford University Press
• Gasper, G. E. (2023). Damascien (Johannes Damascenus). In R. Newhauser, V. Gillespie, J. Rosenfeld, & K. Walter (Eds.), The Chaucer Encyclopedia. Wiley
• Gasper, G. E. (2022). Professor Sir Richard W. Southern (1912-2001). In S. Niskanen, & J. Willoughby (Eds.), Routledge Medieval Encyclopedia Online. Routledge
• Gasper, G. E. (2021). Anselm of Canterbury’s De concordia. In M. Healy-Varley, G. E. Gasper, & G. Younge (Eds.), Anselm of Canterbury: Communities, Contemporaries and Criticism (13-37). https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004468238_003
• Healy-Varley, M., Gasper, G. E., & Younge, G. (2021). Introduction. In M. Healy-Varley, G. E. Gasper, & G. Younge (Eds.), Anselm of Canterbury: Communities, Contemporaries and Criticism (1-9). https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004468238_002
• Gasper, G. E., Tanner, B. K., Sønnesyn, S. O., & El-Bizri, N. (2021). ‘Travelling Optics: Robert Grosseteste and the Optics behind the Rainbow’. In C. Etheridge, & M. Campopiano (Eds.), Medieval Science in the North: Travelling Wisdom, 1000-1500 (45-75). Brepols Publishers
• Gasper, G. E. (2021). How to Teach the Franciscans: Robert Grosseteste and the Oxford Community of Franciscans c.1229–35. In L. Schumacher (Ed.), Early Thirteenth-Century English Franciscan Thought (57-75). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110684834-003
• Gasper, G. E. (2020). Creation, Light, and Redemption: Hexaemeral Thinking, Robert Grosseteste, and the Summa Halensis. In L. Schumacher (Ed.), The Summa Halensis: Sources and Context (295-316). De Gruyter
• Claus, P., & Gasper, G. E. (2019). Rejecting the Market-Place: Using the Past to Inspire Access to University Education. In J. P. Cunningham, & S. Puttick (Eds.), Robert Grosseteste and Theories of Education. Routledge
• Gasper, G. E., & Gasper, M. E. (2019). 'Gentleness and Discretion’: Medieval Perspectives on Childhood Learning and Guiding Adult Education. In J. P. Cunningham, & S. Puttick (Eds.), Robert Grosseteste and Theories of Education. Routledge
• Gasper, G. E. (2017). Anselm of Canterbury: Theology of Salvation. In J. S. Holcomb (Ed.), Christian Theologies of Salvation: A Comparative Introduction (124-142). New York University Press
• Gasper, G. E. (2017). Theology at Le Bec. In B. Pohl, & L. L. Gathagan (Eds.), A companion to the Abbey of Le Bec in the central Middle Ages (11th-13th centuries) (206-227). Brill Academic Publishers. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004351905_010
• Gasper, G. E. (2017). Scripture and the changing culture of theology in the High Middle Ages. In G. E. Gasper, F. Watson, & M. Crawford (Eds.), Producing Christian culture : medieval exegesis and its interpretative genres (117-144). Routledge
• Gasper, G. E. (2016). Orderic Vitalis, Historical Writing and a Theology of Reckoning. In C. C. Rozier, D. Roach, G. E. Gasper, & E. van Houts (Eds.), Orderic Vitalis: Life, Works and Interpretations (247-259). Boydell & Brewer
• Gasper, G. E. (2016). The Fulfillment of Science: Nature, Creation and Man in the Hexaemeron of Robert Grosseteste. In J. P. Cunningham, & M. Hocknull (Eds.), Robert Grosseteste and the pursuit of religious and scientific learning in the Middle-Ages (221-242). Springer Verlag. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-33468-4_12
• Gasper, G. E., & Rozier, C. C. (2016). Archaeological Investigations at the Abbey of Saint-Evroult-Notre-Dame-des-Bois by Anne-Sophie Vigot. In D. Roach, C. C. Rozier, G. E. Gasper, & E. van Houts (Eds.), Orderic Vitalis: Life, Works and Interpretations (375-384). Boydell & Brewer
• Tanner, B., Bower, R., McLeish, T., & Gasper, G. E. (2016). Unity and Symmetry in the De Luce of Robert Grosseteste. In J. P. Cunningham, & M. Hocknull (Eds.), Robert Grosseteste and the Pursuit of Religious and Scientific learning in the Middle-Ages (3-20). Springer Verlag. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-33468-4_1
• Gasper, G. E. (2015). Contemplating Money and Wealth in Monastic Writing c.1060-c.1160. In G. E. Gasper, & S. H. Gullbekk (Eds.), Money and the church in medieval Europe, 1000-1200 : practice, morality and thought (39-76). Ashgate Publishing
• Gasper, G. E. (2015). Money and the Church: Definitions, Disciplines and Directions. In G. E. Gasper, & S. H. Gullbekk (Eds.), Money and the church in medieval Europe, 1000-1200 : practice, morality and thought (3-16). Ashgate Publishing
• Gasper, G. E., & McKinnell, J. S. (2014). Introduction. In G. E. Gasper, & J. S. McKinnell (Eds.), Ambition and anxiety : courts and courtly discourse, c. 700-1600 (1-16). Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, [Durham, England]: Institute of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Durham University
• Gasper, G. E. (2014). Between Dialectic and the Sacred Scripture: Anselm of Canterbury and the Bible. In S. Bhattacharji, R. Williams, & D. Mattos (Eds.), Prayer and thought in monastic tradition : essays in honour of Benedicta Ward SLG (181-195). Bloomsbury T&T Clark
• Gasper, G. E. (2014). The Beauty of Creation. In G. Cipollone, & M. Boari (Eds.), Anselmo e la ‘nuova’ Europa (41-56). Gregorian and Biblical Press
• Gasper, G. E. (2012). Tractarian Echoes: Michael Ramsey and the Anglican Responses to Anselm of Canterbury. In G. Gasper, & I. Logan (Eds.), Saint Anselm of Canterbury and His Legacy (341-359). Pontifical Institute for Medieval Studies, Toronto ; Institute of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Durham University
• Gasper, G. E., & Logan, I. (2012). Anselm: A Portrait in Refraction. In Saint Anselm of Canterbury and His Legacy (1-25)
• Gasper, G. E. (2007). A northern monastic sermon collection. In R. Gameson (Ed.), Treasures of Durham University Library (42-43). Third Millenium
• Gasper, G. E. (2006). An Anglican Anselm. In G. E. Gasper, & H. Kohlenberger (Eds.), Anselm and Abelard : investigations and juxtapositions (103-117). Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies
• Gasper, G. (2001). Towards a theology of light in the twelfth-century renaissance. In M. Henig, & C. Finn (Eds.), Outside Archaeology: Material Culture and Poetic Imagination (21-27). Oxford
• Gasper, G. (2000). The Norman arrow finds a ready target. In H. Chadwick (Ed.), Not Angels But Anglicans: The Story of Christianity in the British Isles. Canterbury Press

Edited book

• Healy-Varley, M., Gasper, G. E., & Younge, G. (Eds.). (2021). Anselm of Canterbury: Communities, Contemporaries and Criticism. Brill Academic Publishers. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004468238
• Gasper, G. E., Watson, F., & Crawford, M. (Eds.). (2017). Producing Christian Culture: Medieval Exegesis and Its Interpretative Genres. Routledge
• Rozier, C. C., Roach, D., Gasper, G. E., & van Houts, E. (Eds.). (2016). Orderic Vitalis: Life, Works and Interpretations. Boydell & Brewer
• Gasper, G. E., & Gullbekk, S. H. (Eds.). (2015). Money and the Church in Medieval Europe, 1000-1200. Ashgate Publishing
• Gasper, G. E., & McKinnell, J. S. (Eds.). (2014). Ambition and Anxiety, Courts and Courtly Discourse, c.700-1600. Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies
• Gasper, G. E., & Logan, I. (Eds.). (2012). Saint Anselm of Canterbury and His Legacy. Pontifical Institue of Mediaeval Studies, Toronto
• Gasper, G. E., & Kohlenberger, H. (Eds.). (2006). Anselm and Abelard: Investigations and Juxtapositions. Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies

Journal Article

• Gasper, G. (2024). ‘The Service of Astronomy’: European star-gazing and its implications in the Middle Ages. Journal of Physics: Conference Series, 2877, Article 012029. https://doi.org/10.1088/1742-6596/2877/1/012029
• Gasper, G. E., & Tanner, B. K. (2023). “In the shape of a cooking pot over the fire”: Records of solar prominences in the 1180s. Endeavour, 47(3), Article 100875. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.endeavour.2023.100875
• Gasper, G. E. M., & Tanner, B. K. (2023). A cooking pot lit by fire. Astronomy and Geophysics, 64(1), 1.36-1.37. https://doi.org/10.1093/astrogeo/atac091
• Gasper, G. E., & Tanner, B. K. (2022). A Marvellous Sign and A Fiery Globe: A Medieval English Report of Ball Lightning. Weather, 77(7), 232-234. https://doi.org/10.1002/wea.4144
• White, R. C., Gasper, G. E., McLeish, T. C., Tanner, B. K., Harvey, J. S., Sønnesyn, S. O., Young, L. K., & Smithson, H. E. (2021). Magnifying Grains of Sand, Seeds, and Blades of Grass: Optical Effects in Robert Grosseteste’s De iride (On the Rainbow) (circa 1228–1230). Isis: A Journal of the History of Science Society, 112(1), 93-107. https://doi.org/10.1086/713724
• Gasper, G. E., & Tanner, B. K. (2020). ‘The Moon Quivered Like a Snake’: A Medieval Chronicler, Lunar Explosions, and a Puzzle for Modern Interpretation. Endeavour, 44(4), Article 100750. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.endeavour.2021.100750
• Harvey, J., Smithson, H., Siviour, C., Gasper, G., Sønnesyn, S., McLeish, T., & Howard, D. (2019). A thirteenth-century theory of speech. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 146(2), 937-947. https://doi.org/10.1121/1.5119126
• Gasper, G. E. (2019). Bernard of Clairvaux, Material and Spiritual Order, and the Economy of Salvation. Journal of Medieval History, 45(5), 580-596. https://doi.org/10.1080/03044181.2019.1658617
• Harvey, J., Smithson, H., Siviour, C., Gasper, G. E., Sonnesyn, S. O., Tanner, B. K., & McLeish, T. (2017). Bow-shaped Caustics from Conical Prisms: a 13th Century Account of Rainbow Formation from Robert Grosseteste’s De iride. Applied Optics, 56(19), G197-G204. https://doi.org/10.1364/ao.56.00g197
• Gasper, G. E., & Wallis, F. (2016). Salsamenta pictavensium: Gastronomy and Medicine in Twelfth-Century England. The English Historical Review, 131(553), 1353-1385. https://doi.org/10.1093/ehr/cex013
• Gasper, G., McLeish, T. C., & Smithson, H. E. (2016). Listening Between the Lines: Medieval and Modern Science. Palgrave communications, 2, Article 16062. https://doi.org/10.1057/palcomms.2016.62
• Gasper, G. E. (2016). Economy Distorted, Economy Restored: Order, Economy and Salvation in Anglo-Norman Monastic Writing. Anglo-Norman studies, 51-65. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781782046721-007
• Smithson, H. E., Gasper, G. E., & McLeish, T. C. (2014). All the colours of the rainbow. Nature Physics, 10(8), 540-542. https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys3052
• Bower, R., McLeish, T., Tanner, B., Smithson, H., Panti, C., Lewis, N., & Gasper, G. (2014). A medieval multiverse?: Mathematical modelling of the thirteenth century universe of Robert Grosseteste. Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 470(2167), Article 40025. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspa.2014.0025
• Smithson, H., Anderson, P., Dinkova-Bruun, G., Gasper, G., Laven, P., McLeish, T., Panti, C., & Tanner, B. (2014). Color-coordinate system from a 13th-century account of rainbows. Journal of the Optical Society of America A, 31(4), A341-A349. https://doi.org/10.1364/josaa.31.00a341
• McLeish, T. C., Bower, R. G., Tanner, B. K., Smithson, H. E., Panti, C., Lewis, N., & Gasper, G. E. (2014). History: A medieval multiverse. Nature, 507(7491), 161-163. https://doi.org/10.1038/507161a
• Gasper, G. E. (2014). Robert Grosseteste at Durham. Mediaeval studies, 76, 297-303
• Gasper, G. E., & Gullbekk, S. H. (2013). An intimate encounter with English coinage in the High Middle Ages: the case of Wulfric of Haselbury. British numismatic journal, 83, 112-119
• Gasper, G. E., & Wallis, F. (2013). Twelfth-Century Sauces from Poitou
• Gasper, G., & Gullbekk, S. (2012). Money and its use in the thought and experience of Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury (1093–1109). Journal of Medieval History, 38(2), 155-182. https://doi.org/10.1080/03044181.2012.676435
• Smithson, H. E., Dinkova-Bruun, G., Gasper, G. E., Huxtable, M., McLeish, T. C., & Panti, C. (2012). A three-dimensional color space from the 13th century. Journal of the Optical Society of America A, 29(2), A346-A352. https://doi.org/10.1364/josaa.29.00a346
• Gasper, G. (2011). Oil upon the waters: On the Creation of Light from Basil to Peter Lombard. Archa verbi, 8, 9-31
• Gasper, G. E. (2011). Anselm of Canterbury and His Legacy
• Gasper, G. E. (2010). Envy, Jealousy and the Boundaries of Orthodoxy: Anselm, Eadmer and the Genesis of the Proslogion. Viator, 41(2), 45-68. https://doi.org/10.1484/j.viator.1.100791
• Gasper, G. (2009). Thinking Afresh about Saint Anselm of Canterbury. Archa verbi, 6, 174-180
• Gasper, G. (2004). ‘A doctor in the house’? The context for Anselm of Canterbury’s interest in medicine with reference to a probable case of malaria. Journal of Medieval History, 30(3), 245-261. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmedhist.2004.06.003
• Gasper, G., & Wallis, F. (2004). Anselm and the Articella. Traditio, 59, 129-174
• Gasper, G. E. (2003). Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows and William Morris's Old Norse Translations. Notes & Queries, 50(3), 323-324. https://doi.org/10.1093/nq/50.3.323
• Gasper, G. (1999). Anselm of Canterbury's Cur deus homo and Athanasius of Alexandria's De incarnatione verbi dei: some questions of comparison

Report

• Taylor, S., Gasper, G., Uchacz, T., Smithson, H., McLeish, T., Kollandsrud, K., Horsfield, F., Donnelly, C., & Evans, I. (2022). Cultural Heritage 360: A Report for the AHRC Programme: Where Next? Scoping Future Arts and Humanities Led Research. Arts and Humanities Research Council