JEFFREY LOUIS FORGENG

Worcester Art Museum

55 Salisbury St.

Worcester MA 01609

Office: (508) 793-4481

jeffreyforgeng@worcesterart.org

Dr. Forgeng serves as Curator of Arms & Armor and Medieval Art at

the Worcester Art Museum Museum and as adjunct professor of

Humanities at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. He is the author of

multiple books on medieval and Renaissance history, with particular

expertise in arms and armor, sports and games, and daily life; he is one

of a handful of academics around the world with specialist knowledge

of the martial arts techniques of medieval and Renaissance Europe. He has curated three

nationally touring exhibitions of arms and armor, in addition to numerous temporary exhibitions

at the Higgins Armory. Dr. Forgeng has appeared on television several times, in addition to

numerous media and museum consultancies, public lectures and presentations, and articles

published in both scholarly and popular media.

Select Publications

The Art of Swordsmanship by Hans Lecküchner. Woodbury, Suffolk: Boydell and Brewer, 2015.

The Art of Combat. A German Martial Art Treatise of 1570 by Joachim Meyer. 2nd rev. printing London:

Frontline Books, 2014 (orig. printing London and New York: Greenhill Books and Palgrave

Macmillan, 2006).

The Illuminated Fightbook: Royal Armouries Manuscript I.33. London: Royal Armouries

Museum/Extraordinary Editions, 2013.

Daily Life in Elizabethan England. 2nd ed. Westport CT and London: Greenwood Press, 2009 [1st ed.

1995].

Daily Life in Chaucer's England. 2nd ed. Westport CT and London: Greenwood Press, 2009 [1st ed.

1995].

(with David Cram and Dorothy Johnston) Francis Willughby’s Book of Games: A Seventeenth-Century

Treatise on Sports, Games, and Pastimes. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003.

The Age of Armor (exhibition catalogue). Virginia Beach: Donning Company, 2002.

Daily Life in Medieval Europe. Westport CT and London: Greenwood Press: 1999.

Robin Hood: The Shaping of the Legend. Westport CT and London: Greenwood Press, 1998.

“Pietro Monte’s Exercises and the Medieval Science of Arms.” In The Armorer’s Art: Essays in

Honor of Stuart Pyhrr, ed. Donald J. La Rocca (Woonsocket, RI: Mowbray Publishing, 2014).

107-14.

“‘Owning the Art’: The German Fechtbuch Tradition.” In The Noble Art of the Sword: Fashion and

Fencing in Renaissance Europe. Ed. Tobias Capwell. London: The Wallace Collection, 2012.

164–75.

“Arms, Armor, and the Artist.” In Knights in Shining Armor: Myth and Reality 1450-1650. Ed. Ida

Sinkevic. Piermont NH: Bunker Hill Publishing for the Allentown Art Museum, 2006. 36-55.

“Mystery Writer” and “Child’s Play.” Muse 8:3 (March 2004): 34-43.

“The Lost History of the Sword.” Muse 7:2 (February 2003): 18-26.

“Joachim Meyer: Encyclopédiste du combat médiéval.” L’Art de la guerre 1:1 (Apr.-May 2002): 20-

27.

“Robin Hood: The Making of a Legend.” Muse 3:4 (April 1999): 39-44.

Jeffrey Louis Forgeng Page Two

Select Presentations

“The Medieval Art of Swordplay” and “Designer Steel: Function and Fashion in Medieval and

Renaissance Armor.” Detroit Institute of Arts, 17 May 2014.

“Pedro Monte and the Training of the Late Medieval Man-at-Arms.” International Congress of

Military and Arms Museums. National Museum of Ireland, Dublin, 16 June 2010.

“The Martial Arts Treatises of Paulus Hector Mair, c. 1550.” Round-Table-Gespräch “Ring- und

Fechtbücher des Mittelalters.” Zentrum Mittelalterforschung/Österreichische Akademie der

Wissenschaften, Krems-an-der-Donau, Austria, 23 Oct. 2009.

“Martial Arts of the Medieval Knight.” Carol P. Dorian ’79 Memorial Lecture in Art History.

Lafayette College, April 2007

“Designer Steel: Armor as Fashion in the Late Middle Ages and Renaissance.” Symposium for

Love and War: The Weaponized Woman, The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology,

New York, September 2006.

“‘Arms and the Man’: Evolution and Meanings in the Age of Armor.” Evansville Museum of Art,

History, and Science, March 2006; Mobile Museum of Art, Alabama, November 2004.

Select Museum Exhibitions

“Now thrive the armourers”: Arms and Armor in Shakespeare. Higgins Armory Museum, October

2004-September 2005. Subsequent tour to Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington D.C., June

5–September 9, 2008.

The Age of Armor. Higgins Armory Museum, February 2003-August 2003. Subsequent tour to 16

sites around the United States, March 2004-September 2008.

A Double-Edged Weapon: The Sword as Icon and Artifact. Higgins Armory Museum, January-

November 2000. Subsequent tour to 10 sites around the United States, 2009-10.

Select Consultancies, Media Appearances, etc.

2005-6. Allentown Art Museum/Professor Ida Sinkevic (Lafayette College). Arms and armor

consultant for exhibition Knights in Shining Armor: Myth and Reality, 1450-1650 (on exhibit

January 28-June 3, 2007).

2006. History Channel. The Holy Lance.

2005. History Channel. History vs. Hollywood: Kingdom of Heaven. (Also included on 20th Century

Fox DVD release of Kingdom of Heaven)

2003. WNET (PBS-New York). Warrior Challenge: Knights (Historical consultant).

2002. History Channel. Modern Marvels: Axes, Swords and Knives.

2001. History Channel. The Most (Kevlar, Mail, Armored Cars).

Select Work Experience

Worcester Art Museum/Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Curator of Arms & Armor and Medieval Art/Adjunct Professor of History 2014 – present

Higgins Armory Museum/Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Adjunct Associate Professor of History/Paul S. Morgan Curator 1999 – 2014

Middle English Dictionary (University of Michigan)

Editor 1991 – 1997

Education

Ph.D., M.A., Medieval Studies, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario 1984 – 1991

B. A., History, Brown University, Providence, R.I. 1980 – 1983