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Hugo’s research uses administrative and legal sources to investigate how citizens in thirteenth century Italy thought about politics. He works across and aims to contribute to the fields of the history of political thought and Italian social and political history. His research will ask what it meant to act politically in a fragmented context with multiple overlapping temporal and spiritual powers. He is interested in how the visions of politics in practical sources contrast with the more frequently studied rhetorical and theoretical texts. In so doing, he aims to make a methodological intervention regarding both the kinds of sources which are studied in and the questions asked by the history of political thought. He also hopes to demonstrate what might be gained today from foregrounding the key political concerns of these sources – most notably the accountability of officials and the role of non-governmental actors – in tackling contemporary crises.
PhD
Supervisor: Professor John Sabapathy (primary) and Dr Patrick Lantschner (secondary)
Working title: Political Thinking in Communal Italy, 1250-c.1300
Conference Papers and Seminars
- Neighbourhood Networks in 13th-Century Central Italy, International Medieval Congress, July 2023.
- Inquisition and Popular Politics in Late 13th-Century Italy, Cambridge Medieval History Graduate Workshop, 5th May 2022.
Teaching
- Senior Postgraduate Teaching Assistant for Writing History
Awards
- 2021-2024: Graduate Research Scholarship, UCL
- 2020-2021: Frances Lannon Graduate Scholarship in History, Lady Margaret Hall, University of Oxford
Seminars
- Treasurer for IHR History Lab
Departmental roles
UCL History Department, Postgraduate Research Students’ Representative
