The essays in this volume focus on rings as small objects that have touched upon people, places, and events; rings have also featured in scholastic debates and form our modern museum collections. Contributors collectively argue that a closer look at these diminutive artifacts—both precious and mundane—alongside an assessment of their place within the visual, archaeological, and written record, and in museum contexts tells us more nuanced stories about how and why these small and sensory items were crafted and created connections between people and institutions. Their focus on the social aspects of medieval finger rings unites the contributions of nine scholars with backgrounds in art history, history, archaeology, museum studies, and collecting. Together their essays cover material roughly ranging from 1100 to 1500 in Iberia, France, England, Germany, Rus, and Byzantium.
Examination of medieval rings can tell nuanced stories about how and why these multisensory items were crafted and kept.
Arvustused
Although historic rings frequently served as a social currency and as personal expressions of status, research on these functions is often complicated by an absence of evidence identifying owners and makers as well as stylistic continuities across time and space. Yet recent scholarship has emphasised the potential of these precious objects to illuminate aspects of female agency, dynastic self-fashioning, global material networks and affective expression. This volume builds on and extends that scholarship, setting out to deepen our understanding of how, as intimate sartorial accessories and signs of authority, rings could operate as portable instruments of devotion, allegiance and power.
[ T]he collection as a whole is rich and stimulating. Jasperse and her contributors have assembled a treasure-trove of case-studies that whet the appetite for further consideration. It illuminates not only the multifaceted meanings of these diminutive objects but also the complex interplay between material culture, identity and meaning-making in the medieval world. -- Stella Wisgrill * The Burlington Magazine 168 (February 2026): 179-80 * In her introduction to the essay collection, The Social Lives of Medieval Rings, the editor, Jitske Jasperse, invites readers to take in the eight contributions individually (27). She also suggests that the book as a whole argues for more nuanced stories about how rings were crafted and forged connections among people. Given the geographical, chronological, and methodological disparities in the essays, the former way of engaging with the book (dipping into it to consult a specific case study) by specialists interested in (say) early modern Galician saints cults, or Depression-era American antiquity collections, or Islamic Anadalusi signets, will likely prevail. However, anyone who plows through all 250-odd pages of text will certainly emerge with a more sophisticated appreciation for the use of rings in western Eurasian cultures after Roman hegemony. And just the books abundant, well-labelled, and high-quality images would be enough to make the effort worthwhile. -- Paolo Squatriti * The Medieval Review (2026): 2026.03.09 *
List of Illustrations
Preface
Introduction. "Some Reflections on the Social Lives of Rings," by Jitske
Jasperse
Chapter
1. "Haptic Histories: The Social Life of Rings in French Late
Medieval Inventories and Testaments," by Mariah Proctor-Tiffany
Chapter
2. "Archaeological Evidence of Later Medieval and Early Modern
Finger-Rings in Britain: Rings, Experiences, and Emotions," by Eleanor R.
Standley
Chapter
3. "Changing Hands: On the Uses, Meaning, and Circulation of Rings
Amongst the Iberian Nobility from the Eleventh to the Thirteenth Century," by
Inés Calderón Medina
Chapter
4. "A Sign of Womens Power: Signet Rings in Medieval Rus," by
Christian Raffensperger
Chapter
5. "The Social Use of Rings Among the Muslims of al-Andalus," by Ana
Labarta
Chapter
6. "As a Seal or a Sign: Bishops Rings and their Metaphors," by
Juliette Calvarin
Chapter
7. "Authenticating the Rings of the 'Nine Holy Bishops': Santo Estevo
de Ribas de Sil, from Modern to Medieval Contexts," by Therese Martin
Chapter
8. 'Certainly a Very Fine Object': Mildred and Robert Woods Bliss,
Collectors of Jewellery and Wealth in the Twentieth Century," by Elizabeth
McCord
Epilogue. "Inside the Vitrine: Rings in Museums Today," by Sandra Hindman
Jitske Jasperse is Ramón y Cajal Researcher at the Spanish National Research Council, Madrid. She has written two books, including Medieval Women, Material Culture, and Power (2020) and edited a special issue of Das Mittelalter. Her articles have appeared widely.
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