This project seeks to analyse the devotional works which circulated within, to and from the British Isles from the early modern era to the end of the 18th century. It focuses on a better understanding of how devotion lies at the intersection between expression, externalization and internalization. It can be mediated through physical actions, but also through the work of the soul, thus placing it at once in the spheres of the visible and the invisible. One is also led to think about how devotion can be displayed and grasped in texts, since verbal communication or silent worship can be echoed by gestures or visual representations through emblems or illuminations.
A one-day preparatory seminar will take place on April, 5th 2024 at the Maison des Sciences et de l’Homme in Clermont-Ferrand to enable scholars to present their research.
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The conference “‘Nor thou nor thy religion dost controule, The amorousnesse of an harmonious Soule’: Rethinking Devotional Works and Practices in the British Isles (16th-18th c.)” will then take place at Université Paris Nanterre on 3-4 April, 2025.
This conference is organized jointly by Nicolas Bourgès – Université Paris Nanterre (CREA EA 370) and Julie VanParys-Rotondi – Université Clermont Auvergne (Institut d’Histoire des Représentations et des Idées dans les Modernités, UMR 5317).
This blog will archive the exchanges which will take place during the preparatory seminar as well as the subsequent conference. It will also serve as a database to prepare for the publication of the conference proceedings intended for both an informed scholarly public as well as a wider readership, the objective of the project being to offer an inventory of current research concerning devotional activities in the British Isles between the 16th and 18th centuries.
Finally, this project also endeavors to offer an online dynamic bibliography dedicated to the various devotional currents of the period and the geographical area considered.
Scientific Committee:
Paula Barros (Université Paul-Valéry Montpellier 3)
Nicolas Bourgès (Université Paris Nanterre)
Yan Brailowsky (Université Paris Nanterre)
Myriam-Isabelle Ducrocq (Université Paris Nanterre)
Clotilde Prunier (Université Paris Nanterre)
Laurence Sterritt (Aix-Marseille Université)
Julie VanParys-Rotondi (Université Clermont Auvergne)




