Orthodox Vespers

in the church of St Dunstan in the West, 184 Fleet Street, London EC4A 2HR,

served by Metropolitan Kallistos.

After the service there will be a glass of wine at the St Bride’s Institute in Bride Lane,

off Fleet Street, London EC4Y 8EQ

At about 7.15 pm, also in the St Bride’s Institute,

Professor Michael Jeffreys

will give an illustrated talk entitled

Negotiating Real Estate in Heaven:

Reading the Athos Archives, 1000–1204

Professor Jeffreys writes that for professional reasons he has read much of the material contained in the 15 volumes of Athos archives that cover the period 1000–1204. The talk will seek answers to the following questions, among others:

• Why do Athos monasteries keep archives, and what do they contain?

• Was Athos as unique then as it is now?

• Many items document monastic landholdings: what does this tell us about the area round Thessaloniki at the time?

• Many documents deal with disputes over real estate between the monasteries: how were these solved when both sides had the assurance of divine support?

We shall follow one of the long quarrels to see how inspired the solutions could be, while we shall also look at several different kinds of document to show their variety.

Michael Jeffreys was born and raised in London and studied Classics at Cambridge. He became a schoolteacher, but took a part-time PhD at London University, on a subject on the borders between Byzantium and Modern Greek. After fellowships in Washington DC and Greece, he got a job as a lecturer in Modern Greek in Sydney, Australia, teaching the children of Greek migrants their parents’ language. There were large numbers of students. After a dozen years he became the Sir Nicholas Laurantus Professor of Modern Greek, and for another dozen years he was the only professor of Modern Greek in a continent with half a million people of Greek descent. He has now retired.