Matthías Aron Ólafsson
@matthiasaolafsson
Historian & more. PhD Candidate, Department of History, Trinity College Dublin—State building with early modern investigative commissions; governing the Danish Oldenburg Empire across the Atlantic World and Asia
At Jhonny Paranza’s kiosk by the harbour in Livorno you get the world’s best fritto di paranza. This place only opens when the catch comes in, and then it’s fried and sold while supplies last. First come, first served. Sapori di mare!
A hidden gem in Pisa. On display inside the Church of San Sisto is the Kufic Epitaph of Emir Ibn Aglab al-Murtaḍā of the Balearic Islands, from 1094. It ended up here as plunder from an 1114 Catalan-Pisan crusade waged against the islands but was only discovered in 1937. Anyone here know Kufic?
What a privilege it is to jump in the Ligurian Sea and watch the sunset after a hard day’s work in the sweltering heat here in Toskana.
This is such a beautiful cover for a history book. Forest and Brännvin! We need more covers like this.
A pleasure to attend the COMLAWEU Conference “Proclaiming, Affixing, Distributing: Disseminating the Law in Early Modern Europe” in St Andrews this week. Brilliant papers and great discussions left me with much to reflect on during my journey home through Scotland and over the Irish Sea. Thank you!
I guess it was here that they swung and hit that first ball.
@ St Andrews for the week! Attending and presenting at the 2nd COMLAWEU Conference titled "Proclaiming, Affixing, Distributing: Disseminating the Law in Early Modern Europe”. Really looking forward to this.
Finally got round to reading this and it was a bit underwhelming tbh—I feel that not only is its sum greater than its parts, but that the whole theoretical concept of “imagined communities” was hatched in the continuous discursive afterlife of the essay itself somehow. Hard to explain.
When you were only going for one pint but... On 25 July 1765, a commission investigating a revolt in Bergen questioned one instigator, Jochum de Lange, who stated that "he was drunk and therefore rioted along with the others," and that he remembered neither what he did nor said "due to drunkenness".
The Roman theatre at Volterra, built at the end of the first century BC (further away is a public bath constructed in the third century). It looks as if the earth is gradually reclaiming this archaeological find of the 1950s.
Beautiful afternoon in Volterra. La bella primavera è qui!
Sadly, since Immanuel Wallerstein wrote this in 1974, we have lost roughly half of the world's coral reefs. What does that tell us about our present structures of human relations?
My favourite non-fiction reads of 2025. Happy New Year!
After seven weeks at my residency here in Jónshús, Copenhagen and numerous hours spent at the Danish National Archives and Saxo Institute, I head back to Dublin. This stay has been a privilege, enriching my research and allowing me to meet new people and spend time with dear friends and family here.
Surgeon Christian Løvendahl’s 1768 letter of certification from Flensburg. A beautiful piece of work, produced on official, stamped paper (RA 232 F77).
When I order documents from various #c18th investigative commissions at the archives, I most often receive a modest assortment of protocols, petitions, and numerous letters. But occasionally, I get something like this. It’s only about 2300 pages (RA 236 F4-17).
Within the same documents I also found this map of the Holy Roman Empire. Details!
A pleasant surprise to discover this stunning #c18th map of the Duchy of Holstein (then part of the Danish Oldenburg Empire) among the documents of an 1781 investigative commission which was to determine whether the surgeon Christian Løvendahl was indeed entitled to use his own name. (RA 232 F77).
Juat arrived at my academic residency in Jónshús, Copenhagen. I’m really looking forward to spending the next seven weeks here doing research and digging in the Danish National Archives and the Royal Library. If you’re around, hit me up, and we can grab coffee!