Corpus Christi College Fellow & Director of Studies FRHistS

Prof Rory Naismith

Professor of Early Medieval English History • Head of Department

Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic • Faculty of English • University of Cambridge

Specialist in the history of early medieval Britain and its continental neighbours, with primary research focuses on monetary and economic developments, coinage and numismatics, Anglo-Saxon charters, documentary culture, and urban history. General Editor of the British Academy’s Sylloge of Coins of the British Isles and Brepols’ Medieval Texts and Cultures of Northern Europe.

Areas of Specialism & Research
Monetary & Economic History Early Medieval Britain c. 500–1100 Numismatics & Die Studies Anglo-Saxon Charters & Diplomatics History of Early London Comparative European History
Room FR26, Faculty of English, 9 West Road
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Forthcoming Monograph 2026

Offa, King of the Mercians

Publisher: Yale University Press • 2026

Major biography of King Offa of Mercia (757–796), builder of Offa's Dyke and architect of Mercian supremacy, examining royal governance, coinage, and cross-Channel diplomacy.

PUP Hardcover 2023

Making Money in the Early Middle Ages

Publisher: Princeton University Press • 2023

A comprehensive re-evaluation of early medieval currency and society across northern Europe and the Mediterranean from the end of Rome to the central Middle Ages (c. 450–1100).

Cambridge History 2021

Early Medieval Britain, c. 500–1000

Publisher: Cambridge University Press • 2021

Cambridge History of Britain series. An expansive, multi-disciplinary synthesis integrating history, archaeology, place-names, and literature across Anglo-Saxon, Celtic, and Scandinavian Britain.

Bloomsbury Academic 2018

Citadel of the Saxons: The Rise of Early London

Publisher: I.B. Tauris / Bloomsbury • 2018

The transformative evolution of London from the abandonment of Londinium, through Lundenwic on the Strand, to Alfred's fortified re-foundation of the City in 886.

CUP Major Reference 2017

Medieval European Coinage, vol. 8: Britain and Ireland c. 400–1066

Publisher: Cambridge University Press • 2017

With a Catalogue of the Coins in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. The definitive reference corpus and handbook for early British and Irish monetary history.

Numismatica Monograph 2016

The Forum Hoard of Anglo-Saxon Coins / Il ripostiglio dell’Atrium Vestae nel Foro Romano

Publisher: Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato • 2016

Co-authored with F. Tinti. Bollettino di numismatica 55–6. Publication and metallurgical analysis of the 9th-century hoard of English coins buried at the House of the Vestals in Rome.

British Museum / British Academy 2016

Sylloge of Coins of the British Isles, vol. 67. British Museum: Anglo-Saxon Coins II

Publisher: British Museum Press • 2016

Southern English Coinage from Offa to Alfred, c. 760–c. 880. Detailed cataloguing and numismatic analysis of the national collection of southern Anglo-Saxon silver pennies.

Cambridge Studies 2012

Money and Power in Anglo-Saxon England: The Southern English Kingdoms 757–865

Publisher: Cambridge University Press • 2012

Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought, 4th series, vol. 80. Groundbreaking study of how coinage, taxation, royal diplomacy, and lordship intersected in Mercia, Wessex, and Kent.

BNS Special Publication 2011

The Coinage of Southern England 796–865 (2 vols.)

Publisher: British Numismatic Society / Spink • 2011

BNS Special Publication 8. Exhaustive corpus, die-study, and monetary history of southern English mints during the Viking invasions and rise of Wessex.

Brepols 2025 2025

Small Change: New Perspectives on Money in the Early Middle Ages

Publisher: Brepols • 2025

Edited by Rory Naismith. Studies in early medieval low-denomination currency, fractional coinage, and everyday marketplace exchange across Western Europe.

BNS 2022 2022

Interpreting Early Medieval Coinage: Studies in Memory of Stewart Lyon

Publisher: British Numismatic Society / Spink • 2022

Edited with M. Allen and H. Pagan. BNS Special Publication 15. New perspectives on Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Scandinavian mint production, die estimation, and chronology.

Bloomsbury 2020 2020

Writing Battles: New Perspectives on Warfare and Memory in Medieval Europe

Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic • 2020

Edited with Máire Ní Mhaonaigh and Elizabeth A. Rowe. Interdisciplinary investigation into how early medieval warfare and famous conflicts were recorded and remembered.

Bloomsbury 2019 2019

A Cultural History of Money in the Medieval Age

Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic • 2019

Edited by Rory Naismith. Volume 2 of Bloomsbury's Cultural History of Money, spanning money's philosophical, moral, ritual, technologies, and economic dimensions c. 800–1400.

Brill 2018 2018

Decoding Medieval Sources: Money and Coinage

Publisher: Brill • 2018

Edited by Rory Naismith. Brill's Decoding Medieval Sources series. A methodological guide for historians in exploiting numismatic, legal, and documentary records.

Cambridge Core 2017

Writing, Kingship and Power in Anglo-Saxon England

Publisher: Cambridge University Press • 2017

Edited with David Woodman. Essays exploring charters, legislation, narrative chronicles, and diplomatic documents in early medieval royal authority.

Routledge 2014

Early Medieval Monetary History: Studies in Memory of Mark Blackburn

Publisher: Ashgate / Routledge • 2014

Edited with Martin Allen and Elina Screen. Studies in Early Medieval Britain. Essential papers on Viking, Anglo-Saxon, Carolingian, and Insular coinages.

Showing 24 articles
Oxford Academic 2025

‘Economic Change, Silver, and the Plague of 664–687 in England’

Past & Present (2025)

Major investigation into the economic, demographic, and monetary impacts of the first pandemic in 7th-century Britain.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.1093/pastj/gtae048
Cambridge Open Access 2024

‘The Anglo-Saxons: Myth and History’

Early Medieval England and its Neighbours, vol. 1, pp. 1–43 (2024)

Historiographical analysis of the evolution, contestation, and modern understanding of the term 'Anglo-Saxon'.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.1017/eme.2024.1
Antiquity / Cambridge 2024

‘Byzantine Plate and Frankish Mines: The Provenance of Silver in North-West European Coinage during the Long Eighth Century (c. 660–820)’

Antiquity, vol. 98, pp. 502–517 (2024)

Co-authored with J. Kershaw, S. Merkel, and P. D'Imporzano. Scientific trace element analysis resolving the origin of early medieval silver pennies.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.15184/aqy.2024.37
BNS Journal 2023

‘Lancaut: An Early Eleventh-Century Mint-Place on the River Wye’

British Numismatic Journal, vol. 93, pp. 95–105 (2023)

Co-authored with Ben Guy. Identifying a new Welsh border mint operating under King Cnut.

Read Online / DOI https://www.britnumsoc.org/publications/british-numismatic-journal
BNS Journal 2023

‘The Late Anglo-Saxon Mint-Place Derne’

British Numismatic Journal, vol. 93, pp. 107–113 (2023)

Numismatic attribution and topography of an obscure southern English minting site.

Read Online / DOI https://www.britnumsoc.org/publications/british-numismatic-journal
Boydell & Brewer 2023

‘The Moneyers and Domesday Book’

Anglo-Norman Studies, vol. 45, pp. 181–274 (2023)

Comprehensive survey of the social standing, landed wealth, and administrative standing of eleventh-century royal moneyers.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.1017/9781805430858.010
Open Access 2022

‘Bige Habban: An Introduction to Money, Trade and Cross-Border Traffic’

Offa's Dyke Journal, vol. 4, pp. 16–35 (2022)

Early medieval frontier tolls, trader protection, and monetary conversion along the Anglo-Welsh border.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.23914/odj.v4i0.344
BNS Journal 2021

‘Lydford: A New Mint-Place for Æthelstan’

British Numismatic Journal, vol. 91, pp. 190–192 (2021)

Publication of a newly discovered Devon burh penny from the reign of King Æthelstan.

Read Online / DOI https://www.britnumsoc.org/publications/british-numismatic-journal
BNS Journal 2021

‘A New Moneyer for Cynethryth, Queen of the Mercians’

British Numismatic Journal, vol. 91, pp. 183–185 (2021)

Discovery of a new coin type struck in the name of the sole Anglo-Saxon queen to issue currency.

Read Online / DOI https://www.britnumsoc.org/publications/british-numismatic-journal
BNS Journal 2020

‘Eadwold on Eastcheap, London: A Street-Name on a Late Anglo-Saxon Penny’

British Numismatic Journal, vol. 90, pp. 204–211 (2020)

Co-authored with R. Ambrose. Analysis of an extraordinary 11th-century coin bearing an early London street designation.

Read Online / DOI https://www.britnumsoc.org/publications/british-numismatic-journal
Brill Chapter 2020

‘Writing, Communication, and Currency: Dialogues between Coinage and Charters in Anglo-Saxon England’

The Languages of Early Medieval Charters (Brill), pp. 488–521 (2020)

Exploring the shared scribal culture, linguistic formulae, and symbolic authority of coins and parchment charters.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.1163/9789004428119_015
Oxbow Books 2020

‘Denarii mixti: Debasement and Rhetoric in the Early Middle Ages (5th–12th Centuries)’

Debasement: Manipulation of Coin Standards (Oxbow), pp. 195–207 (2020)

How chroniclers, churchmen, and law-codes reacted to the debasement of currency standards.

Read Online / DOI https://www.oxbowbooks.com/oxbow/debasement.html
British Academy / OUP 2019

‘Mints, Moneyers and the Geography of Power in the Early Medieval West’

Proceedings of the British Academy, vol. 224, pp. 414–435 (2019)

Spatial analysis of mint distribution, civic centralization, and regal authority across Europe.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.5871/bacad/9780197266588.003.0016
Bloomsbury Chapter 2019

‘Money and the Issues of the Age: The Plurality of Money’

A Cultural History of Money in the Medieval Age (Bloomsbury), pp. 125–150 (2019)

Commodity monies, non-coin currencies, and the multiple meanings of value in medieval thought.

Read Online / DOI https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/a-cultural-history-of-money-in-the-medieval-age-9781474237031/
Oxford Academic 2019

‘The Origins of the Husting and the Folkmoot’

Historical Research, vol. 92, pp. 243–261 (2019)

Investigation into the assembly institutions of medieval London and their Anglo-Scandinavian roots.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.1111/1468-229X.12816
Wiley Online 2019

‘The Currency of Power in Late Anglo-Saxon England’

History Compass, vol. 17, e12579 (2019)

Historiographical overview of how the late Anglo-Saxon state exerted monetary control.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.1111/hic3.12579
Taylor & Francis 2019

‘The Laws of London? IV Æthelred in Context’

London Journal, vol. 44, pp. 1–17 (2019)

Re-evaluation of the late 10th-century legal code governing Billingsgate tolls and foreign merchants.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.1080/03058034.2019.1569327
Routledge Chapter 2018

‘Pecuniary Profanities? Money, Christianity and Demonstrative Giving in the Early Middle Ages’

Divina Moneta: Coins in Religion and Ritual (Routledge), pp. 142–159 (2018)

Coins as religious offerings, grave goods, and instruments of liturgical display.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.4324/9781315578057-7
Cambridge Core 2017

‘The Historian and Anglo-Saxon Coinage: The Case of Late Anglo-Saxon England’

Writing, Kingship and Power in Anglo-Saxon England (CUP), pp. 162–180 (2017)

Methodological principles for integrating numismatic evidence into political narratives.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.1017/9781316676066.009
Brepols Chapter 2016

‘Currency, Conversion and the Landscape of Power in the Early Middle Ages’

The Introduction of Christianity into the Early Medieval Insular World (Brepols), pp. 281–304 (2016)

How ecclesiastical endowments, church mints, and episcopal power influenced Insular currency.

Read Online / DOI https://www.brepols.net/products/IS-9782503554624-1
Boydell Chapter 2016

‘The Economy of Beowulf’

Old English Philology: Studies in Honor of R. D. Fulk (Boydell & Brewer), pp. 371–391 (2016)

Treasure, gold-giving, torque-bestowal, and economic realities reflected in heroic Old English verse.

Read Online / DOI https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781843844303/old-english-philology/
Routledge Chapter 2015

‘Turpe lucrum? Wealth, Money and Coinage in the Millennial Church’

Money and the Church in Medieval Europe, 1000–1200 (Ashgate), pp. 17–37 (2015)

Theological debates on usury, simony, and coin circulation around the year 1000.

Read Online / DOI doi: 10.4324/9781315595993
Ashgate Chapter 2014

‘Prelude to Reform: Tenth-Century English Coinage in Perspective’

Early Medieval Monetary History (Ashgate), pp. 39–83 (2014)

The precursor developments leading to King Edgar's landmark monetary reform of c. 973.

Read Online / DOI https://www.routledge.com/Early-Medieval-Monetary-History-Studies-in-Memory-of-Mark-Blackburn/Allen-Naismith-Screen/p/book/9781409456681
Brepols Chapter 2014

‘Peter’s Pence and Before: Numismatic Links between Anglo-Saxon England and Rome’

England and Rome in the Early Middle Ages (Brepols), pp. 217–253 (2014)

The origins and archaeological traces of papal tributes and pilgrimage offerings sent to Rome.

Read Online / DOI https://www.brepols.net/products/IS-9782503543109-1
AHRC Leadership Fellow

Foundations of Gold and Silver

Principal Investigator & AHRC Leadership Fellow (2020–2021)

Major AHRC-funded project investigating the production, circulation, and metallurgical composition of precious metal coinage in early medieval Britain and Europe.

British Academy

Sylloge of Coins of the British Isles (SCBI)

General Editor & Secretary

A flagship British Academy Research Project dedicated to cataloguing and publishing all medieval and early modern British coins in public and private collections worldwide.

British Academy / RHS

Anglo-Saxon Charters (The Electronic Sawyer)

Committee Member (British Academy & Royal Historical Society)

The collaborative national committee overseeing the publication, critical editions, and digital humanities indexing of all surviving Anglo-Saxon charters.

Brepols Series

Medieval Texts and Cultures of Northern Europe

General Editor (Brepols Publishers)

International peer-reviewed book series publishing foundational monographs and edited volumes in early medieval literature, history, and manuscript studies.

CUP Journal

Early Medieval England and its Neighbours (EMEN)

Editorial Board Member (Cambridge University Press)

The premier international peer-reviewed journal dedicated to early medieval English history, culture, and archaeological science, published by Cambridge Core.

CUP Elements

Cambridge Elements: England in the Early Medieval World

Editorial Board Member (Cambridge University Press)

Innovative concise series providing authoritative, cutting-edge overviews of early medieval society, material culture, and religious change.

Learned Society

British Numismatic Society (BNS)

Director (2015–2018) & Council Member (2018–present)

Leading society for the promotion and study of British coinage and monetary history; publisher of the British Numismatic Journal and Special Publications.

Elected Fellowship

Royal Historical Society

Elected Fellow (FRHistS)

Fellow of the Royal Historical Society in recognition of scholarly contribution to early medieval British history.

ASNC Tripos, Part I (Paper 1)

England before the Norman Conquest

The political, intellectual, and religious history of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms from the Roman withdrawal in 410 to the Norman Conquest of 1066.

ASNC Tripos, Part II (Paper 1)

Saints and Farmers: Economy and Society c. 950–1050

Advanced thematic paper exploring land tenure, monastics, rural life, urban growth, and wealth accumulation in the tenth- and eleventh-century Insular world.

ASNC Tripos, Part II (Paper 4)

Islands of the Ocean: Britain, Ireland, Scandinavia and the Wider World

Comparative early medieval history examining maritime networks, Viking expansion, long-distance trade, and diplomatic contacts.

Postgraduate Degree Programmes

Postgraduate Supervision (MPhil & PhD)

Supervision of doctoral candidates and master's students in early medieval British history, numismatics, monetary economics, and charter diplomatics.

Corpus Christi, Clare, Peterhouse, Trinity Hall

College Director of Studies

Overseeing undergraduate academic admissions, small-group supervisions, and academic advising in ASNC across Cambridge Colleges.