What are the fellowships?

The Barker Visiting Fellowship allowed me to become a temporary member of the vibrant community of Durham University and to extend my network with UK scholars that I am sure will bring fruitful cooperation in the future. From the scientific perspective, it permitted me to boost my progress on my project provisionally titled Uranian Poetics: Girolamo Fracastoro and the Tradition of Medical Scientific Poetry. The core of my activity consisted of the consultation of manuscripts and old printed editions preserved by the Palace Green Library, particularly the texts from the Kellet Collection and the Magby Library. Among the material that turned out to be particularly relevant and inspirational, I refer only to the De arte poetica and the didactic poems of Girolamo Vida (1485-1566), the carmina of Théodore de Bèze (1519-1605), the Paedotrophiae, sive De puerorum educatione by Scévole de Sainte-Marthe (1536-1623), and ten volumes of the Carmina illustrium poetarum italorum. This scholarly material allowed me to study in detail numerous precedents, contemporaries, and successors of Fracastoro. The study, in turn, contributed to placing his theory of poetry and his medical-poetic works into a clearer historical, scientific, and literary context. In conclusion, the Fellowship was extremely beneficial, both in heuristic terms and for concrete research activities. I am very grateful to the committee and the philanthropic funders, and I hope to continue my collaboration with them in the future.

My time at Ushaw enriched my understanding of recusancy in the eighteenth century generally, and more specifically of recusants as a dynamic diasporic readership

I am very grateful for the opportunity this fellowship has afforded me to focus on the rich materials available at Palace Green Library. Durham has been a wonderful place to work, and the fellowship scheme is very welcoming and helps you connect with other fellows while giving you plenty of time to get your work done. I have been able to work with materials I couldn’t have found anywhere else and would encourage others to look into what’s available in the amazing collections here.

I express my gratitude to Durham University for offering me the Residential Research Library fellowship. My experience at Durham was very enriching. Along with the great academic exposure, I got the chance to explore the rich cultural heritage of a beautiful Romanesque city. It is substantially important to mention that the visiting fellows are given access to all the resources. From navigating through the rich archives and rare collections to exploring the latest research in the Bill Bryson library, everything was hassle-free. The functionaries at all the places are very welcoming. Overall, my stay at Durham has been very fruitful in terms of my studies, learning and cultural exploration. I returned home with beautiful memories and building lovely relationships.

At Durham, Vanessa consulted Seventeenth and Eighteenth-century oeuvres from the Ushaw and Palace Green libraries on mystical theology and instructions for religious rituals to explore the understanding and rationalization of occult practices at a time of global Counter–reformation. Two of the most influential works in her search were Martín Antoine Del Rio, Disquisitionum magicarum libri sex, quibus continentur accurata curiosarum artium, et vanarum superstitionum confutatio, vtilis theologis, iurisconsultis, medicis, philologis (Moguntiae: Sumptibus Petri Henningii, 1624); and Giovanni Bonna's Rerum liturgicarum libri duo (Augustae Taurinorum: Ex Typographia Regia, 1747). Some of the findings of this research were presented at the ‘Conferencia Internacional de Historia del Arte, UNAM, 2021’ and at the Renaissance Society of America annual meeting in Dublin, 2022.

First of all,i would like to thank Durham University for the hospitality and warm welcoming. I was so lucky and delighted to be one of the Durham Residencial Research Library Fellows, Visiting Barker Fellowship.lam working on a research entitled:The Role of Slatin Pasha in the Modern History of the Sudan 1879_1914. Slatin Pasha was an Austrian soldier who served under the British Crown during the Colonial Era in the Sudan. The Sudan Archive, part of Durham University Library and Collections, represents an essential resource for my topic. The primary Archival documents related to Slatin Pasha are only available at Durham University, kept in amazing condition and easily accessible for the researchers. I was able to find great rich informations about my research. I have collected data from Slatin's papers which included his diaries, official letters, Telegraphs, official invitations cards, congratulations letters of promotion, Slatin's correspondence with Ali Dinar(Fur Sultnate),the papers of Sir Reginald Wingate to Slatin. Descriptions of Battles of Atbarah and Omdurman.I found some informations in the Sudan obituaries files . Without Barker Fellowship, this research can not have been done. Thank Barker Fellowship for the great job you have done in assisting me. I wish a Lifelong prosperity to Barker Fellowship. Thank you so much DRRL.Thank you again to Durham University.

My time in Durham as a researcher under the Research Fellowship scheme was both congenial and very fruitful. It provided me with access to significant and essential materials that facilitated my project in transformative ways. The library and archives staff were exemplary in their welcome and generous assistance. Living in Durham for one month was also a most pleasant experience. My thanks to all who support the scheme and I commend it to any who are considering making an application.

My Durham Research Library Fellowship was a fantastic experience. I collaborated with Durham faculty and other visiting researchers, and made great headway on my research projects in early modern British and Catholic history. In the Ushaw College library, I was able to trace how English Catholics were interpreting and responding to the political and religious conflicts that rent the European continent in the late eighteenth century. I now have invaluable epistolary and other evidence of the English Catholic communities divisions during this exciting time in history.

I was pleased to be awarded a DRRL Visiting Fellowship to undertake research on Sir John Marshall ‘s one-hundred-year-old photographic collection now preserved at the Oriental Museum. The Fellowship provided me with an excellent opportunity to understand the provenance of Buddhist sculptures preserved in Peshawar Museum Collection (Pakistan) and to compare the sculptures with others at important Buddhist sites in the Gandhara region and across the Indus in Taxila Valley. I was also able to study the present state of conservation of some of the objects now preserved in the different museums of Pakistan thanks to this photographic collection, as well as those held at Palace Green Library and at Ushaw. The Fellowship provided me with an excellent opportunity to discuss a number of new research initiatives for the protection of cultural heritage with several researchers at Durham University. Throughout, my research was actively supported by museum staff, librarians and archivists, and I am grateful for this support.

The nature of my research required that I call up a very large number of rare books, which the staff of the library was extremely helpful with throughout my time in Durham. Lord William Howard’s personal library is a treasure trove for anyone interested to study Elizabethan and Caroline Catholic culture in England