Principal Investigator: Estelle Ingrand-Varenne
I am a CNRS researcher at the CESCM in Poitiers (France), specialized in medieval epigraphy. After having studied the inscriptions’ shift from Latin to French in my doctoral thesis (Langues de bois, de pierre et de verre. Latin et français dans les inscriptions médiévales, Classiques Garnier, 2018), my research focus has now turned to the Outremer. I am currently working on the inscriptions of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem, my goal is to make a new corpus with an electronic edition on TITULUS (digital epigraphy project I have created for the Corpus des inscriptions de la France médiévale. I published two volumes of the CIFM) and to study this specific epigraphy.
Contact: estelle.ingrand.varenne@univ-poitiers.fr
Project Administrator: Marie Evina
I am Assistant engineer for the ERC Graph-East, in constant collaboration with the principal investigator and all members of the team. After having spent a decade in the field of antique archaeology in Sudan and Egypt, with a specialization in Ceramology, I have worked for several years in the private sector as an administrator and project manager. I am now responsible for the operational, administrative, financial and human resources management of the project, following the rules of the ERC, as well as for internal and external communication activities.
Contact: marie.evina@univ-poitiers.fr
Post-doc Researcher: Maria Aimé Villano
I am an art historian, specialised in Italian and Byzantine middle ages. I obtained my MA degree at the Università degli Studi di Firenze with a dissertation on the sculpted columns of the ciborium of San Marco at Venice, under the direction of Guido Tigler. I continued the study of these columns as a PhD candidate, focusing on epigraphic and iconographic aspects, especially on the relationship between text and image. I received my doctoral degree in 2020 in cotutelle between the Università Ca’ Foscari of Venice and the Université de Poitiers, under the direction of Stefano Riccioni, Fabio Coden and Vincent Debiais. At the end of 2020 I was granted a post-doc position at the Università di Verona with a project on the liturgical furniture of San Marco. For the Graph-East project, I am currently working on the medieval Latin inscriptions of Cyprus.
Contact: mariaaime.villano@univr.it
Expert: Clément Dussart
I graduated from Ecole nationale des Chartes in 2019 (thesis dealing with medieval alphabetical graffiti in the castle of Selles in Cambrai ) and began to work, as a PhD student funded by the CNRS, on the marks and writings left by pilgrims and travellers in Holy Land (11th-16th century). This project, under the direction of Pr. Cécile Treffort (University of Poitiers) and Estelle Ingrand-Varenne (CNRS/CESCM) was made possible by the collaboration between CESCM (Poitiers) and CRFJ (Jerusalem). I am mostly interested in studying and reassessing the importance of ‘ordinary writings’ during medieval and early modern period.
Contact: clement.dussart@univ-poitiers.fr
PhD Student: Yaroslav Stadnichenko
The youngest member of the team, I am a PhD student funded by the CNRS and working under the direction of Estelle Ingrand-Varenne (CNRS/CESCM), Martin Aurell (CESCM), and Dominique Valérian (Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne). My project focuses on the epigraphic monuments of the Italian maritime republics (mostly Venice and Genoa, but also Pisa, Amalfi, maybe even Ancona and Ragusa) in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea region. More specifically, it deals with their role as signs of authority and power, but also with their place among other local inscriptions – Latin, Greek, Arabic ones. Having written my MA thesis on the miracle stories in the 14th century chronicles of the Latin East, I am also interested in spirituality and processes of intercultural dialogue and cultural transfer.
Contact: yaroslav.stadnichenko@univ-poitiers.fr
Collaborator: Savvas Mavromatidis
I am a PhD student funded by the UCY and I work on the funerary sculpture of Lusignan Cyprus (1192-1474/89). The aim of my research is to interpret the Cypriot artistic production and topics presented in the tombstones (iconography, epigraphy, dress, heraldry), placing Cyprus at the centre of an intercultural dialogue that took place in the eastern Mediterranean. I have presented papers at various conferences on gender and ethnic identities as “inscribed” on Cypriot burial slabs, and recently participated in the SOAS University of London/Getty Foundation programme on “Medieval Eastern Mediterranean Cities as Places of Artistic Interchange.” I am interested in studying the performative roles of funerary inscriptions in a multicultural/religious framework and their roles in the construction of memory.
Contact: mavromatidis.savvas@ucy.ac.cy
Expert : Thierry Gregor
I am a masonry teacher at the EREA in Saintes (Charente-Maritime), with a master’s degree in stone cutting and masonry. I am finishing my thesis under the supervision of Cécile Treffort (University of Poitiers) on the technical aspects of the lapidary inscriptions in the Antiquity and the Middle Ages, particularly in the Western France (the current Poitou-Charentes). I track down all the tool marks on the stone, and try to understand the history of cutting stone and engraving through these marks. I am a member of the epigraphy team of the CESCM and I participate in several archaeological projects in the Near and Middle East.
Contact: thierry.gregor@univ-poitiers.fr
Post-doc Researcher (2021-2023): Hasan Sercan Sağlam
As a researcher specialized in heritage studies, I am in charge of the inscriptions in Greece, islands, Turkey and Crimea for the project. As a part of my doctoral thesis, entitled Urban Palimpsest at Galata & An Architectural Inventory Study for the Genoese Colonial Territories in Asia Minor (Politecnico di Milano, 2018), I have compiled the Genoese mural slabs in the Eastern Mediterranean with a particular focus on Galata (Pera) and reinterpreted their inscriptions in Latin from an interdisciplinary perspective. I have continued my research on the same subject also in the postdoctoral level and published several articles, which include significant contributions in the context of epigraphy. My research interests are urban history, architectural heritage and archaeology.
Contact: saglam.h.sercan@gmail.com
Researcher: Martin Aurell
Professor of medieval history at the University of Poitiers and director of the Centre d’Études Supérieures de Civilisation Médiévale, where Latin epigraphy is one of the outstanding sectors, I am a specialist on aristocracy and on literary culture around the Mediterranean and in Angevin Empire. I am recently working on transfers between France and the Middle East. My two last books: Des Chrétiens contre les croisades (XIIe-XIIIesiècles) (Paris, Fayard, 2013), on Western contestation against crusade, and Excalibur, Durendal, Joyeuse : la force de l’épée (Paris, PUF, 2021) on mentalities and ideologies related to swords.
Contact: martin.aurell@univ-poitiers.fr
Researcher: Dominique Valérian
Professor of medieval history at the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, I am a specialist of Islam and the Mediterranean. More specifically I am interested in the interactions between Christians and Muslims, trade networks and intercultural relations, through the production of shared norms in the Mediterranean. I recently published Ports et réseaux d’échanges dans le Maghreb médiéval (Madrid, 2019) and edited Les Berbères, entre Maghreb et Mashreq (Madrid, 2021).
Contact: dominique.valerian@univ-paris1.fr
Researcher: Vladimir Agrigoroaei
I am a researcher of the CNRS working on early vernacular translations of the Bible and cultural transfers between East and West during the Late Middle Ages. My BA in Latin and Old Greek (2002) provides a stable basis for my approach of Byzantine and Western sources after the Fourth Crusade. Two PhD dissertations (2011, 2016) in medieval French literature and Romance languages help me deal with language variation, while an MA in art history (2004) covers the common ground between art and literature as neighbouring categories of medieval culture. It is therefore no surprise that my primary role in the GRAPH-EAST project is the analysis of Greece and the Aegean Islands during the Latin occupation (after 1204/1205).
Contact: vladimir.agrigoroaei@gmail.com
Researcher: Cécile Treffort
I am full professor of medieval history at the University of Poitiers and my research focuses on the cultural, religious and funerary history of the 7th-12th centuries, and more particularly of the Carolingian period. I am specialist of the Western epigraphy in the early Middle Ages: Mémoires carolingiennes, 2007; Paroles inscrites, 2008; Epitaphes carolingiennes du Centre-Ouest, 2020) and the director of the collection of the Corpus des inscriptions de la France médiévale. I will co-direct the edition the epigraphic texts for the project.
Contact: cecile.treffort@univ-poitiers.fr
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Research Engineer (2021-2023): Manon Durier
Project Administrator (2022-2023): Livie Candusso
After a long secretarial and management experience in the private sector, I am now responsible for the operational, administrative, financial and human resources management of the project, following the rules of the ERC, as well as for internal and external communication activities, in constant collaboration with the principal investigator and all members of the GRAPH-EAST team.