UF professor speaks on medieval history of Eastern Europe

March 9, 2011

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — University of Florida history professor Florin Curta will present a lecture at 8 p.m. March 14 in Rinker Hall Room 110.

The title is “Distant Elites: the Archaeology of the Contacts Between Eastern Lithuania and the Carpathian Basin (ca. 380 to ca. 630 CE).”

The early medieval history and ethnicity of Eastern Europe are major themes of Professor Curta’s research, as shown in his first book, “The Making of the Slavs: History and Archaeology of the Lower Danube Region, A.D. 500-700,” which was named a 2002 Choice Outstanding Academic Title and won the Herbert Baxter Adams Award of the American Historical Association in 2003. The book was translated into Romanian and Bulgarian.

Curta’s second book, “Southeastern Europe in the Middle Ages, 500-1250,” addresses important themes such as the rise of medieval states, the conversion to Christianity, the monastic movement inspired by developments in Western Europe, and in Byzantium, and the role of material culture (architecture, the arts, and objects of daily life) in the representation of power.

The free lecture is open to the public.