Lecture, Barnard's Inn Hall, Tuesday, 7 Nov 2023 - 18:00

Pilgrimages, Pandemics and the Past

Modern day pilgrim on the the Camino de Santiago holding walking stick topped with cross and  scallop shell

Between us and the medieval men and women who went on pilgrimage there stand many impediments to understanding: the Reformation, the Enlightenment, secularisation.

This lecture will explore how tracing ancient routes on foot, and experiencing travel as people did in an age before trains and cars, can offer insights into the past. But is the sense of being accompanied by ghosts a delusion?

Tom Holland will draw on experiences of reading Chaucer and undertaking pilgrimages during and after the pandemic.

Tom Holland

Tom Holland

Tom Holland is an award-winning historian, biographer and broadcaster. He is the author of Rubicon, which won the Hessell-Tiltman Prize for History and was...

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