Anders Winroth, newly named as the inaugural Forst Family Professor of History, specializes in the history of medieval Europe.
His research is focused specifically on the cultural, intellectual, and legal history of the European High Middle Ages and on the economic and social history of early medieval Scandinavia.
Winroth, who received his Ph.D. from Columbia University, joined the Yale faculty as an assistant professor in 1998, rising through the ranks from associate professor in 2003 to full professor in 2004. He was the chair of the Medieval Studies Program 2005-2007.
The Yale professor is also director of graduate studies in the Department of History. He is the author of “The Conversion of Scandinavia: Vikings, Merchants, and Missionaries in the Remaking of Northern Europe,” and of “The Making of Gratian’s ‘Decretum,’” which was awarded the Samuel and Ronnie Heyman Prize for Outstanding Scholarly Publication by Yale, and the John Nicholas Brown Prize by the Medieval Academy of America. The “Decretum” was the first scholastic canon law textbook produced in the Middle Ages.
He is co-editor of “Canon Law, Religion, and Politics: Liber Amicorum Robert Somerville” and “Charters, Cartularies, and Archives: The Preservation and Transmission of Documents in the Medieval West.”
In 2003, Winroth was named a MacArthur Fellow by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, which honors individuals for the originality and creativity of their work and the potential to do more in the future.
The Forst Family Professorship was established by Edward C. and Susan R. Forst ’87.