Michael Lapidge, FBA (born 8 February 1942[1]) is a scholar in the field of Medieval Latin literature, particularly that composed in Anglo-Saxon England during the period 600–1100 AD; he is an emeritus Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge, a Fellow of the British Academy,[2] and winner of the 2009 Sir Israel Gollancz Prize.
His doctoral dissertation, supervised by Brian Stock, studied the transmission of a nexus of cosmological metaphors, first articulated by Greek Stoic philosophers, to classical and late antique Latin poets, and ultimately to Medieval Latin philosophers and poets of the twelfth century.
Following a period as a Research Fellow in Cambridge supported by a Killam Senior Research Fellowship, he was appointed Lecturer in the Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic, University of Cambridge in 1974, thereafter progressing to be Reader in Insular Latin Literature (1988) and then, in 1991, Elrington and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon, a chair which he held until 1998.
[5] Lapidge was awarded the 2009 Sir Israel Gollancz Prize from the British Academy for his work as "a world authority on Anglo-Saxon literature."
[6] He is a corresponding fellow both of the Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften (Munich) and the Accademia dei Lincei (Rome) and is vice-president of the International Society for the Study of Medieval Latin Culture (SISMEL).