Our regional partners

We are currently forging (or reforging) links with organisations, societies, and institutions connected to regional museums, archaeological societies, record societies, church trusts and other regional studies. We welcome connections and involvement from interested parties across East Anglia (Norfolk, Suffolk, and the adjacent counties of Essex, Lincolnshire, and Cambridgeshire).

This will build on our historic links with various important partners, including the local branch of the Historical Association, the Norfolk Record Society, the Norfolk Archaeological & Historical Research Group (NAHRG), Walpole Old Chapel, and the Excelsior Trust. We have strong connections with other UEA centres and projects, including ‘Paston Footprints’, a research impact project, and the Eighteenth & Nineteenth Century Seminar Group. Planned events from linked networks and organisations will be advertised on the CEAS website.

Raphael Samuel argued that ‘History is or ought to be a collaborative enterprise, one in which the researcher, the archivist, the curator and the teacher, the ‘do-it-yourself’ enthusiast and the local historian, the family history societies and the individual archaeologist, should all be regarded as equally engaged.’ [History Workshop: A Collectanea, 1967-1991 (1991), p. iv]. CEAS is committed to the founding principle of engaging with active local people beyond the boundaries of the university.

Accordingly, we also aim reach out to more creative networks, including local early music groups and artists who use historical research in their work. This way CEAS will function as a hub for various local people and groups with an interest in the region.

Founded in 2008, the East Anglian Book Awards recognise and celebrate the books and writers who have been shaped by, and have helped shape, the literary culture of our region. The annual awards are a partnership between the Eastern Daily Press and the National Centre for Writing, in association with the University of East Anglia.

National Centre for Writing is proud to have been a partner of the East Anglian Book Awards for over fifteen years. From our home in Norwich, England’s first UNESCO City of Literature, these awards showcase the strength of publishing, writing and reading across the whole of the East of England. We are constantly impressed by the talent that our region cultivates and inspires.

The awards are a partnership between the Eastern Daily Press and the National Centre for Writing, in association with the University of East Anglia. Since the awards began, they have highlighted the work of more than 150 authors, 200 titles and 100 publishers.

CEAS Director Dr Richard Mills served as the judge for the History and Tradition category of the 2025 awards. You can find out more on the EABA website here.

The Walpole Old Chapel Discovery Project is operated by a team of volunteers with the Friends of Walpole Old Chapel, and Halesworth and District Museum. The project has been assisted by the Suffolk Archives who have provided training and support as part of their lottery funded outreach programme and Halesworth and District U3A Genealogy Group have undertaken a significant piece of research transcribing and analysing the Chapel Baptism Records 1706-1837.

They have also established a working relationship with the Centre for East Anglian Studies and the History Department of the University of East Anglia with Dr. Joel Halcomb, an expert on religious practice, culture, and politics in Britain and Ireland during the British Civil Wars. He is a founding member of the Dissenting Experience project, promoting scholarship on the history, literature, and culture of early modern religious nonconformity.  Dr Halcomb suggested that we put forward the Chapel and Discovery Project as a possible placement for UEA Master’s students, one student researched the sad life of Methuselah Spalding.

The Walpole Old Chapel website.

Above: Walpole Old Chapel interior and exterior as it is today. (CEAS)

Jurnet’s House exists to safeguard and interpret the heritage and promote the study of the history and culture of the Jewish people. It represents Jewish Studies at UEA and aims to develop the oldest extant Jewish dwelling in England – the medieval house of Isaac Jurnet in Norwich’s King Street – into a centre for Jewish heritage, study, and culture.

The exceptional nature of the building, the profound roots and contributions of the city’s medieval Jewish community, the baleful legacy of the blood libel and expulsion, and the subsequent evolutions of Jewish life, art, and culture around the world that continue to shape this region in important ways make the story of Jurnet’s House one of equally local and international significance.

Jurnet’s House is a partnership between UEA, Norwich City Council, and the Jewish community.

Excelsior is one of the last surviving Lowestoft fishing smacks. Built in 1921 by John Chambers & Co of Lowestoft to trawl the southern North Sea. During the Depression of the 1930s she was sold to Norway, converted her to a motor coaster and used to transport general cargo around the Scandinavian coasts. She narrowly escaped being sunk during the Second World War while being used for evacuation.

In 1954 she was renamed SVINØR, by the 1970s the construction of new roads linking the Scandinavian coastal communities meant that the old coasters were no longer needed.

John Wylson, then an architectural student, was looking for a vessel to re-rig back to sail. Having worked up to relief skipper in the Home Trade he was helping a fellow student bring a fishing vessel back from Norway when he heard that the owners of the SVINØR were retiring. He sailed her back to Lowestoft just over 50 years after she had been built there as EXCELSIOR LT472 in 1921.

The Centre for East Anglian Studies has hosted a seminar at the Julian Centre at UEA and visited the Excelsior.

Meetings take place in the Thomas Paine Lecture Theatre at the UEA at 2.30 pm (except for the 5 December joint meeting with the NNAS at 2.15 pm in Norwich Castle).

There is a hearing loop in the lecture theatre. Refreshments will be available afterwards. Non-members are welcome to try one or two lectures before joining. Directions are below.

2026

October 17 A Danish Knight in Fifteenth Century Norfolk: Sir Andrew Ogard of Buckenham and Emneth, John Alban (retired Norfolk County Archivist)

November 21 South Norfolk ‘Homestead’ Moats, Owen Warnock (Emeritus Professor of Employment Law, UEA)

December 5 NB 2.15 start. Joint meeting with the NNAS in Norwich Castle (also on Zoom): Baconsthorpe Castle: Conservation of a Ruined Fifteenth Century Norfolk Manor House, Ruth Brennan (Accredited Conservation Architect)

December 12 Rejoice and Be Merry: Seasonal music across the centuries, featuring early instruments. A presentation by Chanter’s Jigge (an early music duo), followed by festive refreshments.

2027

January 16 Global Climate Change and the Transformation of the Suffolk Coast 1100-1700, Mark Bailey (Professor of Late Medieval History, UEA)

February 20 Guton and Beyond: Landscape, Life and Loss in Norfolk’s Deserted Medieval Settlements, Jakob Reid (Independent Researcher)

March 20 From Celtic to English: Language and Place-Names in Early Norfolk, Nigel Stanley (Freelance Historian and Retired History Teacher)

April 17 AGM followed by lecture Norfolk Archaeology: A View from the West, Clive Bond (Visiting Research Fellow in Archaeology, University of Winchester)

July 24 NAHRG Local History Day: Norwich: ‘A Fine Old City’ A conference-style all-day event with a range of talks on Norwich history.

The Thomas Paine Centre is on the right towards the end of Chancellor’s Drive from the Security Lodge. It is signed as such over the side entrance but the main entrance is styled ‘Norwich Business School’. There is a convenient bus stop right outside the Thomas Paine Centre building. The West Car Park is right beside it and is open on a pay-by-phone basis at weekends (£1.00 flat fee). The entrance to it is on the right off Chancellor’s Drive, just after the bus shelters (ignore the ‘staff only’ sign). The nearby Central Car Park (turn left just past Thomas Paine) accepts payment by card or coin. The Thomas Paine Centre is marked 52 on the maps on the campus. West Car Park P3. Central Car Park P5. A downloadable version of the campus map is available on request.

www.nahrg.org.uk enquiries@nahrg.org.uk

The Norfolk Record Society was founded in 1930, to publish and make accessible scholarly editions of documents relating to the County of Norfolk and the City of Norwich, to promote the preservation of such documents and records, to assist educationally by lectures or otherwise in record research and generally to stimulate interest in archives relating to Norfolk.

NRS have published over 80 volumes since 1930, and have over 30 still available to purchase via our website. It has a programme of events and lectures (in-person and Online) throughout the year for our Members and Non-Members. It has a range of membership options available for individuals and organisations based in the UK or Overseas, Membership fees start from £15.00.

https://www.norfolkrecordsociety.org.uk/