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URL: https://torun-pl.academia.edu/AnnaM

⇱ Anna Maleszka - Nicolaus Copernicus University

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I hold degrees in History (PhD) and English Studies (MA) from Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, Poland.

I specialize in medieval history of Europe, particularly the urban history, the Crusades and the Crusader states, the history of England and Ireland, as well as medieval Prussia and Livonia and their towns.

I am currently working on a research project titled "Circumspecti cives – Citizenship in Baltic Hanseatic Towns. A Comparative Study".

Historical and historiographical narratives are my pet project at the moment. I collaborate on several other topics, such as the social responses to historical heritage in Polish towns.

My other special interests that I eagerly incorporate into relevant research include critical discourse analysis, media studies, New Historicism, cultural and linguistic (pragmatic) analyses of media and cultural texts.

Outside of academia, I am an avid football spectator and a passionate home cook.
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Books (authored and edited) by Anna Maleszka

Urbanizacja na obrzeżach łacińskiej Europy: studium komparatystyczne rozwoju miast i krajobrazów miejskich w Irlandii, Prusach i Inflantach w XII–XIV wieku
The book is based on a doctoral dissertation defended in 2022. It addresses urbanization processe... more The book is based on a doctoral dissertation defended in 2022. It addresses urbanization processes from a comparative perspective in three countries where these processes occurred within the framework of conquest and colonization. Preparing the book required extensive source research, supplementing the existing state of research on urbanization in the regions under study, and incorporating the latest literature on the development of municipal law within the German and English legal zones. It also involved conducting comparative analyses of potential factors influencing the choice of locations for town foundations and the strategies of town founders, urban spaces and their elements, sources of municipal law, and the impact of law on social life. The book presents an in-depth, complementary view of the development of locational urbanity.

Papers and chapters by Anna Maleszka

Merchants and Law in Anglo-Norman Towns in Plantagenet Ireland
How to ensure predictability in legal pluralism: merchants and their interaction in late medieval Europe, Rohmann Gregor, Kypta Ulla (eds.), 2025
This article was produced within the collaborative project “BARMER. From the ship to the market. ... more This article was produced within the collaborative project “BARMER. From the ship to the market. Economic activity, social relations and armed conflicts in the cities and port towns of late medieval Atlantic Europe” no. PID2020- 118105GBI00. The article was prepared as part of my research stay at the University of Cantabria (Santander) and financed by Nicolaus Copernicus University’s Research University – Initiative of Excellence, no. 90-SIDUB.6102.7.2022.MP5, dec. no. 13/2022/ Mobilności.
Towns on the Edge in Medieval Europe: the Social and Political Order of Peripheral Urban Communities from the Twelfth to Sixteenth Centuries, British Academy Proceedings no. 244 (Oxford University Press), ed. M.F. Stevens, R. Czaja, p. 208-235, 2022
Towns on the Edge in Medieval Europe: the Social and Political Order of Peripheral Urban Communities from the Twelfth to Sixteenth Centuries, British Academy Proceedings no. 244 (Oxford University Press), ed. M.F. Stevens, R. Czaja, p. 165-189, 2022
A. Maleszka, J. Możdżeń, Urban legislation as an instrument for the formation and regulation of socio-economic life in 14th-century Prussian and Irish towns
Stevens Matthew Frank, Czaja Roman (red.): Towns on the edge in medieval Europe: the social and political order of peripheral urban communities from the twelfth to sixteenth centuries, Proceedings of the British Academy, nr 244, Oxford University Press, s. 93-119 , 2022
This chapter compares key ordinances and statutes issued in selected Irish (Dublin and Waterford)... more This chapter compares key ordinances and statutes issued in selected Irish (Dublin and Waterford) and Prussian (Thorn and Königsberg) cities in the fourteenth century. The authors treat these sources as ‘program texts’, that is, texts conveying the intentions of legislators who wanted to socially discipline residents in various spheres of life, that is to reinforce their own
authority while shaping social attitudes towards certain matters. An analysis of parallel sources indicates that in both Prussian and Irish cities of the fourteenth century regulations concerned a wide spectrum of issues related to civic security, broadly conceived. Clusters of regulations were designed, for example, to ensuring an adequate quality of basic foodstuffs, city hygiene and fire prevention. The authors identify, within this spectrum of regulation, a number of very similar disciplinary ordinances adopted independently of each other in the two regions under study, including those controlling producers and places of sale, opposition to speculation, the labelling of products, control of weights and measures, and the regulation of animal husbandry. Regional differences mainly refer to the type of goods regulated. These close parallels are shown to demonstrate intersections between the solutions they adopted to similarly perceived problems, given both universal elements of developing fourteenth-century urban life and their parallel peripheral, colonial positions. Statutes and ordinances adopted by municipal governments expressed an intent to shape specific social attitudes mainly by means of disciplinary entries, that is, items of regulation dictating punishments for misbehaviour within the urban space. It is argued that by referring to the linked ideas of the ‘common good’ and the consent of the residents, statutes and ordinances were made a tool for legitimizing the social and political order (as defined in Section 6, above) of the community, or changes introduced to it. Therefore, tendencies to control production and trade, to discipline social behavior and to legitimize the decisions of narrow ruling groups appeared near contemporaneously in these unrelated parts of Europe. Primary sources: The main sources for Ireland shall be Dublin town books and borough customs, containing more than 130
ordinances from the fourteenth century, supplemented by similar, though less extensive, records of Waterford ‘laws and usages’. Additionally, recorded ‘acts’ by the mayor, bailiff’s and commons of Dublin (as published in CARD) shall be consulted. The main sources for Prussia shall be the surviving Koenigsberg bylaws of 1385 and 1394, and the surviving
bylaws of Toruń (newtown) 1300–1350 and (oldtown) 1345–1547.
The urban networks of Anglo-Norman Meath and the Teutonic Order's Kulmerland: a comparative analysis
Urban History, 2021
This article presents comparative research on the role of towns and urban networks in the process... more This article presents comparative research on the role of towns and urban networks in the process of constructing space during conquest and colonization in selected ‘non-Roman’ regions of Europe in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. It focuses on Kulmerland in Prussia and Meath in Ireland. In both regions, the creation of urban networks and new regional spaces entailed the use of pre-existing settlement. However, reception intensity was determined by both the state of preservation of the earlier settlement and the needs of territorial authorities. This comparison shows ways of using symbolic potential (names, central places) and former settlement points for the construction of cities. In both territories, the functions of central places were particularized due to subinfeudation.
Studies of the Military Orders, Prussia, and Urban History: Essays in Honour of Roman Czaja on the Occasion of His Sixtieth Birthday / Beiträge zur Ritterordens-, Preußen- und Städteforschung. Festschrift für Roman Czaja zum 60. Geburtstag, ed. J.Sarnowsky, K.Kwiatkowski, H.Houben, L.Pósán, 2020
The horror story writers of the early 20th century presented various views on the surrounding rea... more The horror story writers of the early 20th century presented various views on the surrounding reality. Howard P. Lovecraft and Montague R. James, for their part, rejected the mere possibility of phenomena regarded as supernatural, contrary to other writers, such as Arthur C. Doyle, Arthur Machen or Algernon Blackwood, who were members of theosophical or occultist societies. The writers differed also in the level of their education. Lovecraft was an erudite interested in science, notwithstanding the fact that he did not receive formal education. James was a respected medievalist, a specialist in the history of Christianity. Blackwood, educated abroad (in Germany), explicitly differed in his artistic output from Machen, a Welshman, who left the United Kingdom only to pursue his journalistic career. The aim of the article is to present the haunted places in the literary works of the chosen authors and to juxtapose their narratives with their scholarly achievements and their views on the surrounding reality. Based on the New Historicist approach, the study shows that the roots of horror in the haunted places presented by the authors in their works were more “material” than “supernatural”—what accounted for their choices of haunted places, story characters and haunting horrors were personal attitudes and life experience of each of the writers.
Jerusalem as the Text of Culture, Peter Lang , 2018
The paper discusses the image of Jerusalem and Holy Land as presented in the texts of pilgrims an... more The paper discusses the image of Jerusalem and Holy Land as presented in the texts of pilgrims and crusaders of the 12th and 14th. The context of the analysis is the history of struggles over Jerusalem.
Bohaterowie sagi Pieśń Lodu i Ognia George'a R.R. Martina w miastach i o miastach, w: Literackie obrazy świata 1, red. A. Luboń, Rzeszów 2016
The article analyzes the way of presenting and referring to emotions of the Muslim opponents of t... more The article analyzes the way of presenting and referring to emotions of the Muslim opponents of the crusaders as depicted in the three selected chronicles of the crusades: Gesta Francorum, Guibert of Nogent's chronicle and William of Tyre's chronicle. The author argues that the way of presenting emotions of the Muslim enemies in the chronicles was dependent on several factors, e.g. the time and circumstances of the creation of the chronicle, or the personality of the chronicler.
Livonia ab urbe condita – o średniowiecznej urbanizacji Inflant, "Wiadomości historyczne 3/2016"
Livonia ab urbe condita - the medieval urbanization of Livonia. Issues examined in the article c... more Livonia ab urbe condita - the medieval urbanization of Livonia.

Issues examined in the article concern the beginnings of urbanization in medieval Livonia. From the early 13th century Livonia was being gradually conquered by the three competing forces: the Bishop of Riga, initially supported by the Livonian Brothers of the Sword, the Kingdom of Denmark and, since 1238, the Teutonic Order. In order to strengthen control over vast areas, they established towns and fortresses, thus introducing a new type of social phenomenon in Livonia. The article attempts to characterize the medieval urban network of Livonia, present the reasons for establishing towns in the region, and indicate the most important implications of granting municipal charters to Livonian towns. Some features of town rights are illustrated on the example of fragments of historical sources.

Contributions by Anna Maleszka

Exclusion and social discipline in the European medieval city, 2018
Esta monografía tiene por objetivo común el análisis de las intersecciones entre el individuo y s... more Esta monografía tiene por objetivo común el análisis de las intersecciones entre el individuo y sus comunidades, y cómo la inclusión y la exclusión se manifestó en las ciudades bajomedievales europeas. En la Baja Edad Media, los discursos de exclusión/ inclusión social se convirtieron en un instrumento básico para el
gobierno urbano, ya que permitió a los líderes laicos y eclesiásticos mantener el control de los habitantes de los centros urbanos sobre la base del mantenimiento
de una determinada disciplina social y de una sociedad “ordenada”. Así, se definió la sociedad urbana medieval como una comunidad de valores acorde a la legislación
eclesiástica y secular, y se articuló un discurso político, que se incorporó a la esfera de lo público. La comunidad urbana se tuvo que acomodar a un marco legal e ideológico y a unos parámetros de comportamiento, en el que la exclusión y la inclusión de la comunidad fueron una poderosa herramienta de comunicación de la disciplina social.

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