Coronavirus: advice from the Middle Ages for how to cope with self-isolation

The pandemic of COVID-19 is often called “unprecedented” – and for many people cooped up in their homes in different countries, the experience is both unparalleled and challenging. But in late-medieval Europe, individuals self-isolated professionally. Some people – women particularly – permanently withdrew from society to live walled in, alone in a room attached to a church.  Click here to read more, and see a lovely medieval illustration of a woman 'enclosed'. 

In May 2017, Godelinde Gertrude Perk travelled over from the Netherlands to give the Julian Festival Lecture in Norwich. She is now a postdoctoral researcher in Medieval Literature, University of Oxford.

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