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Professor Ole Grell

Head and shoulders picture of Ole Grell.

Profile summary

  • Emeritus Professor
  • Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
  • School of Arts & Humanities
  • History
  • ole.grell

Professional biography

Educated in Denmark I hold a doctorate from the European University Institute in Florence (1983). I joined the History Department of the Open University in 1999 after nearly 15 years at the University of Cambridge. I am Professor of Early Modern History and was Director of the Renaissance and Early Modern Research Group at the OU from 2001 to 2008.

Research interests

I am primarily interested in European social and cultural history in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. I work on early modern European Calvinism, Anglo-Dutch relations, and the Reformation of northern Europe. I retain a strong interest in early modern history of medicine, especially medicine and religion, health care, and the significance of natural philosophy for early modern medicine. I am a General Editor of the Series: History of Medicine in Context, published by Ashgate.

Select Publications:

The World of Worm: Physician, Professor, Antiquarian, and collector, 1588-1654, Routledge New York 2022.

Brethren in Christ. A Calvinist Network in reformation Europe, Cambridge University Press, August 2011.

Centres of Medical Excellence? Medical travel and medical education in Europe 1500-1789, eds. O.P.Grell et al., Ashgate, Aldershot 2010.

The Impact of the European Reformation: Princes, Clergy and People, eds. O. P. Grell and B. Heal, Ashgate, Aldershot 2008.

Medicine and Religion in Enlightenment Europe, eds. O P. Grell and A. Cunningham, Ashgate, Aldershot 2007.

Health Care and Poor Relief in 18th and 19th–century Southern Europe, eds. O. P. Grell et al., Ashgate, Aldershot 2005.

Health Care and Poor Relief in 18th and 19th–century Northern Europe, eds. O. P. Grell et al., Ashgate, Aldershot 2002.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse: Religion, War, Famine and Death in Reformation Europe, co-written with A. Cunningham, Cambridge University Press 2000, 2001, and 2002.

Toleration in Enlightenment Europe, eds. O. P. Grell and Roy Porter, Cambridge University Press 2000.

Paracelsus. The Man and his Reputation, his Ideas and their Transformations, ed. O P. Grell, Brill, Leiden 1998.

Publications

[Book Review] Northern European Reformations: Transnational Perspectives. Edited by James E. Kelly, Henning Laugerud, and Salvador Ryan. (2021-08-31)
Grell, Ole Peter
Church History, 90(2) (pp. 444-446)

From popular, evangelical movement to Lutheran Reformation in Denmark. A case of two reformations (2011)
Grell, O. P.
Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte, 102 (pp. 33-58)

The creation of a transnational, Calvinist network and it's significance for Calvinist identity and interaction in early modern Europe (2009-10)
Grell, Ole Peter
European Review of History, 16(5) (pp. 619-634)

The Reformation in Norway: a political and religious takeover (2005)
Grell, Ole
Nordost-Archiv. Zeitschrift fuer Regionalgeschichte, 8(2004) (pp. 121-134)

From God to Devil: self-presentation and performance by early modern physicians and surgeons (2001)
Grell, Ole Peter
Ludica, annali di storia e civilta del gioco, 5-6(2000) (pp. 127-143)

Brethren in Christ. A Calvinist Network in Reformation Europe (2011-08-22)
Grell, Ole Peter
ISBN : 978-1-107-00881-6 | Publisher : Cambridge University Press | Published : Cambridge

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse : Religion, War, Famine and Death in reformation Europe (2000-02)
Cunningham, Andrew and Grell, Ole
ISBN : 9780521467018 | Publisher : Cambridge University Press | Published : Cambridge

Martin Luther on the poison of sexual abstinence and the poison of the pox From Galen to Paracelsus (2018-05-11)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Grell, Ole Peter; Cunningham, Andrew and Arrizabalaga, Jon eds. It All Depends on the Dose: Poisons and Medicines in European History (pp. 103-116)
ISBN : 9781138697614 | Publisher : Routledge

Three seventeenth-century manuals on how and where to study medicine (2016-11-03)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Grell, Ole Peter and Cunningham, Andrew eds. Medicine, Natural Philosophy and Religion in Post-Reformation Scandinavia (pp. 136-152)
Publisher : Routledge | Published : London/ New York

Bibles in the Dutch and Scandinavian vernaculars to c. 1750 (2016-11)
den Hollander, A.A. and Grell, Ole Peter
In: Cameron, Euan ed. The New Cambridge History of the Bible from 1450 to 1750. The New Cambridge History of the Bible (pp. 239-262)
ISBN : 978-0-521-51342-5 | Publisher : Cambridge University Press | Published : Cambridge

The Reformation in Denmark, Norway and Iceland (2016-09)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Kouri, E.I. and Olesen, Jens E. eds. Cambridge History of Scandinavia (pp. 44-59)
ISBN : 978-0-521-47300-2 | Publisher : Cambridge University Press | Published : Cambridge

The Dutch and the English in the Baltic, the North Sea and Arctic (2016-09)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Kouri, E. I. and Olesen, Jens E. eds. The Cambridge History of Scandinavia (pp. 229-245)
ISBN : 978-0-521-47300-2 | Publisher : Cambridge University Press | Published : Cambridge

Religious and Social Regimentation (2016-09)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Kouri, E. I. and Olesen, Jens E. eds. The Cambridge History of Scandinavia (pp. 416-437)
ISBN : 978-0-521-47300-2 | Publisher : Cambridge University Press | Published : Cambridge

The Creation of a Calvinist identity in the Reformation Period (2016-02-18)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Ingesman, Per ed. Religion as an Agent of Change. Brill's Series in Church History and Religious Culture (72) (pp. 149-165)
ISBN : 9789004303720 | Publisher : Brill | Published : Leiden

The significance of the Reformation for natural philosophy, medicine and astronomy (2014-02-18)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Waschke, E. J. ed. Spurenlese. Wirkungen der Reformation auf Wissenschaft und Bildung, Universität und Schule. Leucorea-Studien zur Geschichte der Reformation und der Lutherischen Orthodoxie (22) (pp. 193-210)
ISBN : 978-3-374-03623-3 | Publisher : Evangelische Verlagsanstalt GmbH | Published : Leipzig

"Like the bees, who neither suck nor generate their honey from one flower": the significance of the peregrinatio academica for Danish medical students of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries (2010)
Grell, Ole
In: Grell, Ole Peter; Cunningham, Andrew and Arrizabalaga, Jon eds. Centres of Medical Excellence? Medical Travel and Education in Europe 1500-1789. History of Medicine in Context (pp. 171-189)
ISBN : 978-0-7546-66-99-8 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot

Social crisis and spiritual renewal: The reformation and attempts to solve the growing problems of poverty, migration and vagrancy in the Sixteenth Century (2009)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Dahlerup, Troels and Ingesman, Per eds. New Approaches to the History of late medieval and early modern history. Historisk-Filosofiske Meddelelser (104) (pp. 416-444)
ISBN : 978-87-7304-338-7 | Publisher : The Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters | Published : Copenhagen

In search of true knowledge: Ole Worm (1588-1654) and the New Philosophy (2008-05-23)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Smith, Pamela H. and Schmidt, Benjamin eds. Making Knowledge in Early Modern Europe: Practices, Objects and Texts 1400-1800 (pp. 214-232)
ISBN : 9780226763286 | Publisher : Chicago University Press | Published : Chicago, USA

Peder Palladius og eskatologien (2008)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Jensen, Carsten Selch and Nielsen, Lauge O. eds. Kirkehistorier (pp. 159-174)
ISBN : 978-87-7457-432-3 | Publisher : Anis | Published : Copenhagen

Between anatomy and religion: The conversions to Catholicism of the two Danish anatomists Nicolaus Steno and Jacob Winslow (2007-09)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Grell, Ole Peter and Cunningham, Andrew eds. Medicine and religion in Enlightenment Europe. The history of medicine in context (pp. 205-222)
ISBN : 978 0 7546 5638 8 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot

Faith and early modern ways of making sense of natural disasters (2007)
Grell, Ole
In: Stock, Angela and Stott, Cornelia eds. Representing the unimaginable: narratives of disaster (pp. 25-42)
ISBN : 978-3-631-55673-3 | Publisher : Peter Lang | Published : New York, USA

A journey of body and soul: the significance of the hospitals in southern, Catholic Europe for John Howard's views of health care and the creation of the utopian hospital (2005-06-22)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Grell, Ole Peter; Cunningham, Andrew and Roeck, Bernd eds. Health care and poor relief in 18th and 19th Century Southern Europe. History of medicine in context (pp. 289-318)
ISBN : 754651568 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot, UK

Raphael Thorius (2004-09-30)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Matthew, H.C.G. and Harrison, Brian eds. Oxford Dictionary of Biography
ISBN : 019861411X | Publisher : Oxford University Press in association with the British Academy | Published : Oxford, UK

Cesar Calandrini (2004-09-23)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Matthew, H.C.G. and Harrison, Brian eds. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
ISBN : 019861411X | Publisher : Oxford University Press in association with the British Academy | Published : Oxford, UK

Dirick Hoste (2004-09-23)
Grell, Ole
In: Matthew, H.C.G. and Harrison, Brian eds. Dictionary of National Biography
ISBN : 019861411X | Publisher : Oxford University Press in association with the British Academy | Published : Oxford, UK

Jacob Cool (Ortelianus) (2004-09-23)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Matthew, H.C.G. and Harrison, Brian eds. Oxford Dictionary of Biography
ISBN : 019861411X | Publisher : Oxford University Press in association with the British Academy | Published : Oxford, UK

John La Motte (2003-10-23)
Grell, Ole
In: Matthew, H.C.G. and Harrison, Brian eds. Dictionary of National Biography
ISBN : 019861411X | Publisher : Oxford University Press in association with the British Academy | Published : Oxford, UK

John Cruso (2003-09-23)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Matthew, H.C.G. and Harrison, Brian eds. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
ISBN : 019861411X | Publisher : Oxford University Press is association with the British Academy | Published : Oxford, UK

Baldwin Hamey (2003-09-23)
Grell, Ole Peter
In: Matthew, H.C.G. and Harrison, Brian eds. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
ISBN : 019861411X | Publisher : Oxford University Press in association with the British Academy | Published : Oxford, UK

General themes: health care and poor relief in 18th and 19th century Northern Europe (2002-05)
Grell, Ole Peter and Cunningham, Andrew
In: Grell, Ole. Peter; Cunningham, Andrew and Jütte, Robert eds. Health care and poor relief in 18th and 19th century Northern Europe. The history of medicine in context
ISBN : 754602753 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot, UK

Vroomheid en wereldsheid: Johan Radermacher (1538-1617),een humanistisch koopman van de hervormde diaspora (2002)
Grell, Ole
In: Nederland in de wereld: Bronnen en essays. Horizonreeks: Instituut voor Nederlandse Geschiedenis (pp. 157-172)
ISBN : 9053527737 | Publisher : Boom | Published : Netherlands

It All Depends on the Dose: Poisons and Medicines in European History (2018-05)
Grell, Ole Peter; Cunningham, Andrew and Arrizabalaga, Jon eds.
ISBN : 9781138697614 | Publisher : Routledge

Medicine, Natural Philosophy and Religion in Post-Reformation Scandinavia (2016-11-03)
Grell, Ole Peter and Cunningham, Andrew eds.
The History of Medicine in Context
ISBN : 978-1-4724-3958-1 | Publisher : Routledge | Published : London/New York

Centres of Medical Excellence? Medical Travel and Education in Europe 1500-1789 (2010)
Grell, Ole Peter; Cunningham, Andrew and Arriabalaga, Jon
Grell, Ole Peter; Cunningham, Andrew and Arriabalaga, Jon eds.
History of Medicine in Context
ISBN : 978-0-7546-66-99-8 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot

The Impact of the European Reformation: Princes, Clergy and people (2008)
Grell, O.P. and Heal, B.
Heal, Bridget and Grell, Ole eds.
St. Andrews Studies in reformation History
ISBN : 978-0-7546-6212-9 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot

Medicine and Religion in Enlightenment Europe (2007)
Grell, Ole Peter and Cunningham, Andrew eds.
History of medicine in context
ISBN : 978 0 7546 5638 8 | Publisher : Ashgate Publishing Ltd | Published : Aldershot, UK

Health care and poor relief in 18th and 19th Century Southern Europe (2005-06)
Grell, Ole Peter; Cunningham, Andrew and Roeck, Bernd eds.
The History of medicine in context
ISBN : 754651568 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot, UK

Health care and poor relief in 18th and 19th Century Northern Europe (2002-05)
Grell, Ole Peter; Cunningham, Andrew and Jütte, Robert eds.
The History of medicine in context
ISBN : 754602753 | Publisher : Ashgate | Published : Aldershot, UK