The Basic Research Funding will be allocated to doctoral research on documentary writing practices and the relationship between power and the written word in the Southern Low Countries during the High and Late Middle Ages.

Several topics will be addressed:
(1) the (institutional) development of administrations and writing centres, as well as the organisation of archival memory in ecclesiastical, monastic, and secular areas within the context of processes of Verschriftlichung, bureaucratisation, and the building of corporate identities;
(2) the relationship between rulers and subjects, along with representations and perceptions of princely power and seigneurial or urban elites in documentary sources (charters and documents), narrative sources, and material sources (seals);
(3) the public roles and social-political networking of noblewomen, as well as the perception of their power, agency and influence.

Within this project, collaboration with UGent colleagues will be sought around overarching or related topics.