Norse in the North 2026 (Mind and Body) was held on 15th May 2026 at the University of Leeds and organized by Natalie Hopwood, Daniel Coultas, Sif Brookes, and Chris Latham. This conference is an Old Norse and Viking Studies postgraduate student conference that happens annually, alternating between being hosted at Durham University, University of York, and University of Leeds.
There were a total of eight postgraduate speakers across three panels. The first panel, ‘Othered Bodies and Body Modification’, had papers on Kæi in Old Norse Arthurian material, and the historical evidence of Viking Age tattoos and tattooing. The second panel, ‘Gendered Mentalities and Emotions’, had papers on gender in Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks, female voice in letter writing, and the role of male inciters during conflicts. The final panel of the day, ‘Thought, Memory, and Neurodivergence’, had papers on ravens and thought, moral injury in Old Norse Eddic poetry, and trauma as memory in Egils saga and Grettis saga. The conference concluded with a keynote paper from Dr. Rebecca Merkelbach (University of Tübingen) titled ‘The Inner Lives of Trolls: Interiority, Trauma, and the Paranormal in the Sagas.’
Attendance was free and hybrid, with about twenty-five in-person attendees and around forty online attendees throughout the day. Over the course of the conference, connections were being made between papers, with many speakers and audience members exchanging contact information to discuss their research in further detail later. Several students spoke to the committee about how much they enjoyed the conference and how much they learned, and there were plenty of thought-provoking and conversation-starting questions about everyone’s research topics.
We would like very much to thank SSNS for helping to fund the conference and to allow us to continue to provide a welcoming space for up-and-coming researchers in the field of Old Norse and Viking Studies. Norse in the North aims to provide a platform for postgraduate students and ensure that Old Norse studies continue to flourish in Northern England (and beyond) for years to come. Thanks to the SSNS, we were able to continue that tradition and pass on the torch for another year, and we are very grateful for the support. The funding from SSNS helped up to cover catering costs for our tea/coffee breaks and our pizza lunch, for which we received many complements!