Dr Clarck Drieshen

Project Cataloguer, Curious Cures in Cambridge Libraries, and Medieval Manuscripts Specialist

Directorate: Research Collections

Department: Rare Books and Early Manuscripts

Division: Special Collections

Email: chd33@cam.ac.uk

Clarck is a cataloguer of medieval manuscripts in the Wellcome-funded project Curious Cures in Cambridge Libraries and Medieval Manuscripts Specialist (0.3 FTE) at Cambridge University Library's Special Collections.

Before joining Cambridge University Library, Clarck worked as a cataloguer and researcher of manuscripts at the British Library. He obtained a PhD from the Insitute for Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds with a dissertation on the transmission of visionary writings between English and Continental female religious communities in the Late Middle Ages.

Clarck was co-editor of the Newsletter of the Association for Manuscripts and Archives in Research Collections (AMARC) between 2019 and 2023.

Academic publications

• ‘English Nuns with a Continental Vision: The Adaptation of a Revelation of Six Psalms for Hampole Priory’, Journal of Medieval Religious Cultures, 48:2 (2022), 178-204 [https://doi.org/10.5325/jmedirelicult.48.2.0178]
  
• ‘English Nuns as “Anchoritic Intercessors” for Souls in Purgatory: The Employment of A Revelation of Purgatory by Late Medieval English Nunneries for Their Lay Communities’, in Medieval Anchorites in Their Communities, ed. by Cate Gunn and Liz Herbert McAvoy, Studies in the History of Medieval Religion, 45 (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2017), pp. 85-100
  
• with László Sándor Chardonnens, ‘A Middle English Version of Saint Ursula’s Prayer Instruction in Nijmegen, Universiteitsbibliotheek, HS 194’, Studies in Philology, 110:4 (2013), 714-30 [https://doi.org/10.1353/sip.2013.0027]

Blog posts (selection)

• 'A New Year’s Eve Ghost Story', Cambridge University Library Special Collections Blog, 31 December 2022
  [https://specialcollections-blog.lib.cam.ac.uk/?p=24166]
  
• ‘Deciphering an English exorcism manual’, Medieval Manuscripts Blog, The British Library, 30 March 2022 [https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2022/03/exorcism-manual.html]
  
• ‘A newly discovered manuscript from Byland Abbey’, Medieval Manuscripts Blog, The British Library, 15 April 2021 [https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2021/04/newly-discovered-ms-from-byland-abbey.html]
  
• ‘In search of the books of Richard Amadas’, Medieval Manuscripts Blog, The British Library, 9 May 2020 [https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2020/05/in-search-of-the-books-of-richard-amadas.html]
  
• ‘Medical recipes from Gilbertine nuns’, Medieval Manuscripts Blog, The British Library, 4 February 2020 [https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2020/02/medical-recipes-from-gilbertine-nuns.html]
  
• ‘Magical seals in an English Book of Hours’, Medieval manuscripts blog, The British Library, 18 July 2019 [https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2019/07/magical-seals-in-an-english-book-of-hours.html]
  
• 'Celebrating the spiritual life', Medieval Manuscripts Blog, The British Library, 9 March 2019
  [https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2019/03/celebrating-the-spiritual-life.html]