Viator

Historians have traditionally seen the rulers of early medieval Bulgaria as either poor imitations of the Byzantine emperor or qagans of a “steppe empire.” Despite consistent use in Western ninth-century sources of the phrase rex Bulgarorum in reference to Krum and his successors, historians of the early Middle Ages often refer to his pagan predecessors as “khans.” However, the power of the Bulgar rulers was less a matter of titles and more a matter of action. This article examines the evidence of “true” politics, as well as ruler images as projected through buildings or inscriptions, to illuminate a key aspect of the history of eighth- and ninth-century Bulgaria, whose significance has never been fully recognized. Power contestation at home was directly associated to the projection of the ruler’s image beyond the limits of Bulgaria, as several rulers used the latter to overcome the former.

The so-called Capitulatio de partibus Saxoniae is commonly associated with Charlemagne’s brutal campaign in Saxony during the years 782–785. This article reexamines the evidence concerning the Capitulatio de partibus Saxoniae, arguing that it should be associated with Charlemagne’s final campaign in Saxony (around 795), and that in order to understand the unusual policy it prescribes one should consider the Capitulatio against a broader political and cultural background. As suggested by the author, the Capitulatio’s policy did not emerge ex nihilo; it was deeply rooted in the political as well as the religious ideology that characterized Muslim Spain (al-Andalus) at the time.

Architectural historians, focused on whether form or meaning had primacy in the medieval “copy,” have debated the significance and value of Letaldus of Micy’s statement that Theodulf’s oratory at Germigny-des-Prés was “manifestly in the likeness” of Aachen, as Germigny-des-Prés bore little formal resemblance to Charlemagne’s famous chapel. Letaldus’s quote, however, has been divorced from its textual and historical contexts. Considered as part of his tenth-century Miracula Sancti Maximini and the circumstances of its production, Letaldus’s association of the ninth-century buildings confirms Richard Krautheimer’s well-known assertion that meaning was primary in medieval notions of likeness, voicing an image of a Carolingian past remembered in light of fierce present struggles within the monastic world of the Orléanais. Indeed, rather than answering the question of whether Germigny-des-Prés was built as a “copy” of Aachen, Letaldus’s quote raises the issue of how buildings’ complex, layered, and transforming meanings are rooted in time and place.

This article examines the consequences of the ninth-century Viking incursions for religious houses in the southwest of France, and the portrayal of those raids in contemporary and later medieval sources. Focusing on three houses in particular—Saint-Hilaire and Saint-Maixent in the Poitou and Saint-Cybard in Angoulême—the author uses both narrative and diplomatic evidence to make two arguments. First, the charter record of these houses indicates that although the Viking raids did cause damage, which was often exacerbated by opportunistic predation by locals, recovery took place relatively quickly. Second, the accounts in tenth-century and later medieval texts, in contrast to the contemporary charter evidence, often evoke more persistent destruction at these houses. This disjunction occurred because the authors of those later accounts shaped their portrayals of the Vikings and the consequences of the raids to serve purposes such as glorifying a restorer or emphasizing a reform in observance.

The Middle Ages inherited from classical writers a debate as to whether the heart or brain is the master organ of the body that governs movement and mental phenomena. Studies of literary, poetic, and homiletic writings of the Anglo-Saxon period have shown that these texts use language that tends to locate the mind in the heart or breast. The present work examines the Old English medical writings and their Latin sources, texts in which one might expect a literal, rather than a figurative or metaphoric, use of the names of the physical organs. These texts cite a variety of causes for mental disorders, but when an organ is identified as ultimately responsible for the manifestations, that organ is the brain and not the heart. Some texts known to the Anglo-Saxons assert explicitly that the brain or the head is the locus of thought, perception, memory, and even the soul.

This article explores a range of connections between the foundation of Fontevraud by Robert of Arbrissel and Hersende, its first prioress, and of the Paraclete by Abelard and Heloise, arguing that both communities were characterized by uncertainty and controversy about gender roles. It explores Abelard’s support for Robert, against the criticisms of Roscelin, yet distrust of the practice of an abbess having authority over both men and women, as happened when Petronilla became abbess in 1115. In particular it supports Robl’s hypothesis that Hersende of Fontevraud was the same person as Hersende, mother of Heloise. Fulbert’s willingness to have Heloise educated by Abelard reflects the same literary values as Baudri of Bourgueil, a great admirer of Robert of Arbrissel. Heloise’s assertion of her role as abbess of the Paraclete reflects her awareness, not shared by Abelard, that it was necessary for her to emulate Petronilla as abbess with authority of both men and women.

To what degree was the inner life of the soul considered private by twelfth-century writers? Much current work in areas as diverse as medieval penance, theological anthropology, and ethics demonstrates the period’s richly complicated conception of the inner self. The evidence also reveals, however, contemporary ambivalence as to whether this inner realm should be removed from the communal gaze. For this discussion the author’s approach to medieval conceptions of interiority and the soul’s secret life is the examination of changing attitudes towards sins of thought. Beginning with a biblical allegory first developed by St. Augustine, the article traces how the privacy of Augustine’s metaphorical “house of conscience” was expanded by twelfth-century schoolmen to include not only God but also priest.

As Marian devotion rose to prominence in the Latin West after the first millennium, images of the Virgin came to occupy central roles in Christian meditative and liturgical practices. A reading of Latin and vernacular miracles composed in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries suggests that such images were understood not merely as works of art or devotional aids but as surrogate bodies of the Virgin. Moreover, narratives involving women and men portray the source of these images’ miraculous power differently; while the feminine beauty of Marian images lent the Virgin power over male devotees, such images served a more maternal, protective function in their interactions with women. This essay reads Marian image-miracles in light of contemporary interest in the Virgin’s body and its ultimate fate, as evidenced by debates over Mary’s conception and bodily Assumption, and proposes that images may have offered medieval Christians a means of access to the Virgin’s body otherwise denied them.

This article proposes a rereading of the Old Testament imagery in the Painted Chamber in Westminster Palace, London, patronized by Edward I between 1292–1297. It is argued here that the paintings—which represent the battles for the Holy Land—must be understood within the context of the crusading efforts of the English court, and in particular that they were intended to be a reflection of Edward’s own zeal to return on crusade in the aftermath of the fall of Acre in 1291. In seeking to understand the Old Testament imagery within its broader cultural contexts, its themes and meanings are explored within the contexts of contemporary crusading propaganda. Like the Capetians, the Plantagenets also embraced the typological conceit of being successors to the kings of Judah, and manipulated this connection in their own propaganda. Edward’s use of Old Testament imagery in his crusading propaganda—and particularly the image of Judas Maccabeus—provides a crucial context in which to understand the otherwise unprecedented display of Old Testament iconography in one of England’s greatest rooms of state.

Historia de rebus Hispanie (1243) is a search for Spain’s unity amid a diversity of political, ethnic, and religious impetus. Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada’s interpretation of Spain’s historical calling is examined in light of Neoplatonic philosophical thought, developed by Spanish Muslims, Jews, and Christians between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries and diffused through the translating activities carried out in Toledo. Averroës, Ibn Gabirol, Jehuda Halevi, and Dominicus Gundissalinus shared the view that all objects in the visible world are manifestations of the single Creator, and that one could arrive at the understanding of God by studying the multiple manifestations of the creation. By studying material signs of Spain’s past, in particular the landmarks left by the invading Greek, Phoenician, Roman, Arab, and Frankish civilizations, Jiménez de Rada establishes a contrast between the multiplicity of nations that had successively sought to dominate the Iberian peninsula and Spain’s everlasting connection to its true origin and historical purpose. The Neoplatonic framework is used to define Spain’s role in universal history as a place where all manifestations of the Creator find home under the patronage of Castilian monarchy.

That Philip the Chancellor wrote Dogmatum falsas species is clear from its juxtaposition, in two manuscripts, with other poems known to be by him. Its condemnation of French bishops for not taking action against heretics aligns Philip with the tenor of Gregory IX’s bull Dudum ad aliquorum murmur (21 August 1235). Philip is known to have assisted Robert le Bougre in the trial and execution of heretics at Châlons-sur-Marne early in 1236. Whether Philip accompanied Robert in the following months in his campaign against heretics in Flanders is not clear from our sources, but an analysis of the text of the poem suggests that this is likely. Henry of Braine, archbishop of Reims, had reasons for allowing Robert to pursue heretics in his province while keeping him out of his diocese.

When the Crusaders captured Constantinople in 1204, they converted a Byzantine hospital, the xenon of St. Sampson, into a Western hospitale, a hostel for poor and/or sick pilgrims, which was soon organized as the basis of a military order, attracting numerous donations. Prominent among them was the property given in Douai (Flanders) by the Latin archbishop of Thessalonica, aiming to create a daughter institution that would serve the local poor. This house flourished throughout the thirteenth century, then faced serious problems that led to its incorporation into the Order of St. John of Jerusalem. When the Byzantines recaptured Constantinople in 1261, the brothers of St. Sampson fled to Corinth, where they built another hospital. This structure has been recently excavated, revealing a multi-purpose unit wherein people received medical care, while the house served the public in numerous (including commercial) ways.

Traditionally, historians of thirteenth-century English politics have focused on legal, fiscal, and administrative reform; the development of institutions and mechanisms to counterbalance the power of the monarch; and the conventions surrounding issues of aristocratic property and inheritance. By contrast, questions of symbolism of ritual, sacrality or ceremonial, were thought to have at best a decorative, never a formative, function. This essay uses acts of knighting and homage involving the kings of England and their neighbors in Britain and mainland Europe to outline the continuing importance of ritual and symbolism in England. This, in turn, makes it possible to deal with a series of more general questions about the importance of such acts in a wider European context, dealing specifically with ritual ambiguity, the role of the audience in defining the meaning of ritual, and the relationship between political symbolism and other means of political communication.

The debt transactions recorded in the notarial registers of Santa Coloma de Queralt demonstrate that lending was a multi-religious activity at the turn of the fourteenth century. Economic, social, and religious attitudes shaped the manner in which notaries, creditors, and debtors documented their activity. At first glance, this appears to conform to medieval and modern stereotypes concerning moneylending and debt. However, the reality of financing in this rural Catalan town included the participation of both Christians and Jews as lenders, although the written record reflected prevailing cultural attitudes towards usury. Christians avoided the appearance of charging interest, while Jews more normally stated their loans in money-terms. Both Jews and Christians provided credit through direct loans and credit-sales. Despite the stereotypes, Christians were, in reality, the primary lenders of Santa Coloma. Jews played a secondary, although significant, role as creditors, an activity necessary for the better operation of this rural market place.

In late-medieval Italian scenes of the Last Judgment, Satan is a monstrous parody of Christ. These figures are shown to parody not only Christ as ruler, but also the theology of the body of Christ. In particular, the figures of Satan are emasculated, and in some cases they give mock birth to sinners. These Satans confirm the importance of somatization and gender ambiguity in late-medieval Latin Christianity. They also help to explain the Last Judgment as an image: it represents the body of Christ, both historically and institutionally. Examples include the mosaic at Torcello, Giotto’s fresco at Padua, the fresco in the Camposanto at Pisa, the fresco at San Gimignano by Taddeo di Bartolo, and the Satan described by Dante in the Inferno.

This article explores an unpublished set of records surrounding a rape inquest in fourteenth-century Catalonia, and examines its implications for the relationship between law and community in the High Middle Ages. The rise of inquisitorial procedure during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries made fama (reputation) a part of preliminary inquests, thereby giving legal voice to a broad cross-section of medieval communities, including children who were procedurally barred from giving sworn testimony. This article uses the documents in this case to show how fama was created, and how it was translated into terms actionable at law. The role that fama and the testimony of children played indicates a close relationship between community opinion and formal legal proceedings, even during the heyday of the ius commune. Furthermore, such testimony strongly suggests that participation in legal discourse was much broader than previously suspected.

This article discusses the effect the Christian propaganda in favor of pilgrimage to the shrines of healing saints had on inner-Jewish social phenomenon. It explores the ways Jews confronted this issue and shows how Jews devised methods of their own to balance this propaganda, either by directly confronting the message or by offering Jewish solutions—especially to those Jews seeking the aid and healing powers that were reported to have existed at the shrines of saints. The argument is based on a review of attitudes found in medieval Jewish sources towards the alleged powers of the Christian saints, the inner-Jewish discussion concerning the authenticity of the miracles reported to have taken place at the saint’s shrines. Finally, it describes what appears to be a “Jewish alternative” constructed in pious Jewish circles to balance and counter the common practice among Christian neighbors to seek the aid of the saints, especially when health matters were concerned.

Did Langland compose the fanciful Middle English alliterative romance William of Palerne, concerning a werewolf and lovers in bear suits? Although no one has seriously pursued the possibility, compelling circumstances make room for it. Yet the issue remains firmly in the realm of speculation. This essay shows, first, that no amount of testing of metrics, etc., will help. All we have are a sequence of prerequisites to common authorship (the author’s dialects, etc.) and the circumstance that if he did, certain problems of the “Alliterative Revival” make more sense. The essay then suggests that the connection Piers Plowman forges between “disguise” and atonement, both in its opening lines and the account of the Christ-knight, make new sense if Langland indeed wrote the romance. We might never know the answer, but taking the question seriously will result in a fairer assessment of the place of speculation within Middle English studies.

The reigning cultural and legal standard of family relations in late medieval Florence, if not indeed for Italy as a whole, was patrilineal, agnatic, and public (legitimate). That standard was enshrined in law and celebrated in culture. Economic and biological realities, however, prevented some people from achieving a model existence in their lives. This essay follows a “trouble case” in which one Florentine attempted in his dying moments to transmit his property to his illegitimate son. The son’s claims were countered by his aunts. The canonist Domenico da San Gimignano reviewed the case for the court and argued in favor of the son’s claims, following a line of legal reasoning reluctant to penalize a child. His opinion indicates where and how, through consensual acts of some public weight, there was some flexibility in that reigning scheme of family relations.

This study assesses the corpus of late medieval pilgrim badges (chiefly from the Low Countries) that feature “pseudo-text” inscriptions. Such inscriptions either have sequences of well-formed letters that cannot be construed or sequences of unreadable letter-like characters. Rather than suggesting that such texts are cryptic or magical, this study argues that pilgrim badge “pseudo-texts” functioned iconographically as signs of text. The conclusion that “textual communities” (as per Brian Stock) functioned around such inscriptions follows directly, and thus this study suggests that we can understand these inscriptions as revealing attitudes about (and ideologies of) literacy, even in contexts where the skills of literacy were not being used. As such, these brief pilgrim badge texts offer a new perspective on thinking about the nature, distribution, and functioning of late medieval literacy.

The scandal surrounding the downfall of Eleanor Cobham, second wife of Duke Humphrey of Gloucester—especially as represented in the anonymous Lament of the Duchess of Gloucester—forms an important historical precedent for several features of Henryson’s Testament of Cresseid otherwise unaccounted for in previous scholarship. In charting the relationship between these two late medieval poems, the author examines the network of literary and political interactions between Scotland and England in the fifteenth century and identifies the larger cultural field in which both poems participate as “historical” complaint narratives. Finally, the author uncover traces left by the intersection of the Lament and the Testament in Renaissance poetry, especially the flowering of poems in the Mirror for Magistrates tradition. Recognizing this new source of Henryson’s poem allows us to situate the Testament in a political milieu, and illuminates the complicated generic contexts of the Testament and the methods behind Henryson’s imaginative use of source material.

Michelangelo’s prestigious commission of April 1503 for twelve over-life-sized marble Apostle statues for the Cathedral of Florence is often overlooked, almost certainly because this project barely got off the ground, as it was interrupted by three major commissions allotted to the artist by Pope Julius II. We do have one statue, namely the St. Matthew begun no earlier than April 1506, which was left two-thirds unfinished. This sculpture must form the point of departure for the assembly of drawings preparatory for the Apostle statues, a task no one has previously attempted. This is remarkable, considering that only the St. Matthew and the preparatory drawings for the statues can shed light upon Michelangelo’s changing intentions for the cycle. Several drawings that are undoubtedly related to this commission have received considerable scholarly attention. Three sheets never previously connected to the project are tentatively introduced here as potential Apostle studies.

For over a millennium, the relics of James the Apostle (Santiago) were widely believed to lie in Santiago de Compostela in northwestern Spain. A closely related legend was that James had traveled to Spain and preached the Gospel there in the first century. Both beliefs, firmly established by the ninth century, are usually thought to have prevailed until the critiques of the Counter-Reformation historians Bellarmine and Baronius in the later sixteenth century. The present study shows, however, that medieval Spanish historians did not consider Santiago the founder of the Spanish Church. While most historians writing between 1100 and 1450 upheld the tradition of the translation of the apostle’s relics to Compostela, they did not consistently maintain that he had come to Spain during his lifetime. The tradition of “the coming of the apostle” only become a central part of national historiography in the Renaissance, when humanist historians began to seek apostolic origins for Spanish Catholicism. The tradition was further consolidated during the Counter-Reformation, as part of a defensive response to Protestant challenges to the cult of the saints.

Demosthenes has been renowned since antiquity as one of the major Athenian orators of the fourth century B.C. His speeches were effectively forgotten in the Latin-speaking west after the fall of the Roman Empire, though they continued to be studied in the Byzantine east. Those speeches were among the first Greek texts to be brought to Italy during the Renaissance, and significant humanists translated some of them into Latin. This essay considers the growth and development of these early humanist studies. Humanists were interested in Demosthenes because of his ancient fame, and because they considered that he could help them improve their own oratory, but overall his place in their range of interests was fairly restricted. Renaissance studies of Demosthenes are significant, however, because they inspired and in some ways influenced later work.