‘In me porto crucem’: a new light on the lost St Margaret’s crux nigra

2018 ◽  
Vol 47 ◽  
pp. 351-364
Author(s):  
Francesco Marzela
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Sufficient Information ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
King David ◽  
Sacred Object ◽  
Political Message

AbstractSt Margaret of Scotland owned a reliquary containing a relic of the True Cross known as crux nigra. Both Turgot, Margaret’s biographer, and Aelred of Rievaulx, who spent some years at the court of Margaret’s son, King David, mention the reliquary without offering sufficient information on its origin. The Black Rood was probably lost or destroyed in the sixteenth century. Some lines written on the margins of a twelfth-century manuscript containing Aelred’s Genealogia regum Anglorum can now shed a new light on this sacred object. The mysterious lines, originally written on the Black Rood or more probably on the casket in which it was contained, claim that the relic once belonged to an Anglo-Saxon king, and at the same time they seem to convey a significant political message.

The frescoes of Cremona Cathedral

1956 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 206-215
Author(s):  
T. S. R. Boase
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Basic Structure ◽  
Great Earthquake

The cathedral of Cremona in its basic structure is the work of the twelfth century, of the rebuilding undertaken by Bishop Uberto Dovara after the original church was destroyed in the great earthquake of 1117. By 1190 the new cathedral was consecrated, and the neighbouring octagonal baptistery, begun in 1167, was also well advanced. But for some three centuries the citizens constantly sought to improve and embellish their work. In 1250 the commune raised the great campanile, the highest and noblest in Lombardy, and its octagonal spire commemorates the triumph of the Guelfs in 1267. The great rose window is dated by an inscription to 1274. In the following century the porch was added with the three statues of the Virgin and Child between the local patrons, St. Omobono and St. Imerio. In 1491 the facade was terminated by a lofty pediment, supported by two great volute scrolls, and enclosing four statues in niches. A gallery, connecting the façade with the Baptistery, was added in the first half of the sixteenth century, and the statues crowning it date from 1738.

Latency and Topicality: Communication of Threats in Medieval Theatre Latenz und Aktualität: Bedrohungskommunikation im mittelalterlichen Schauspiel

2020 ◽  
Vol 149 (4) ◽  
pp. 479-497
Author(s):  
Klaus Ridder
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Medieval Theatre ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Production Techniques

The twelfth-century 'Ludus de Antichristo' already contains a number of the threatening scenarios (Ottoman Expansion, Heresy, Antichrist, etc.) that maintain a presence in the theatre up until the sixteenth century. This essay aims to investigate which scenarios of religious threat are dominant in the dramas of the later Middle Ages and Reformation, and what kinds of dramatic and production techniques are used in order to perform these scenarios on stage. Three levels of dramatic staging may be distinguished (Latency, Presence, Topicality), and these will be analysed here on the basis of three exemplary plays published before and after the Reformation (Hans Folz, 'Der Herzog von Burgund' / 'The Jewish Messiah'; Niklaus Manuel, 'Vom Papst und seiner Priesterschaft' / 'Of the Pope and his Priesthood'; Thomas Naogeorg, 'Pammachius' / 'Pammachius'). Bereits im 'Ludus de Antichristo' (12. Jh.) findet sich ein Großteil der Bedrohungsszenarien (Osmanische Expansion, Häresie, Antichrist etc.), die im Schauspiel bis ins 16. Jh. präsent bleiben. Der Aufsatz fragt danach, welche religiösen Bedrohungsszenarien im spätmittelalterlichen und reformatorischen Schauspiel dominant sind und auf welchen dramatischen Darstellungstechniken deren Wirkung in der Aufführung beruht. Drei Ebenen der theatralen Inszenierung von Bedrohung (Latenz, Präsenz, Aktualität) werden analytisch unterschieden und anhand von drei Schauspielen vor und nach der Reformation (Hans Folz, 'Der Herzog von Burgund'; Niklaus Manuel, 'Vom Papst und seiner Priesterschaft'; Thomas Naogeorg, 'Pammachius') exemplarisch beschrieben.

scholarly journals St Edith of Polesworth and her Cult

2019 ◽  
Vol 71 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
NIGEL TRINGHAM
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Seventh Century ◽  
Anglo Saxon

Venerated at Polesworth (Warws.) in the late Anglo-Saxon period, the identity of St Edith remains uncertain, with medieval chroniclers suggesting various candidates, but she is likely to have been a seventh-century Mercian princess, perhaps also connected with a church near Louth (Lincs.). Buried at Polesworth, where miracles were still being recorded in the thirteenth century, and perhaps with relics in the collegiate church at nearby Tamworth, her cult was very localised, with only a few outliers elsewhere in the Midlands, probably linked to the Marmion family, lords of Tamworth castle and the founders in the mid twelfth-century of a female religious house at Polesworth.

The naming of Byzantium and the Old FrenchPartonopeus de Blois

2019 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 42-59 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zuzana Černáková
Keyword(s):  
French Text ◽  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Old French ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
Story Telling ◽  
East West ◽  
Ideological Context

This paper draws attention to the twelfth-century French romance Partonopeus de Blois and its author's original use of the name ‘Byzantium’ instead of conventional ‘Greek’ or ‘Constantinopolitan Empire’. It investigates roots of the modern-day belief that the term has been applied as a designation of the medieval state only since the sixteenth century. A linguistic and literary analysis challenges the premise and explores possible scenarios of the name's introduction into the Old French text. A suggested interpretation de-emphasizes the popular east-west ideological context in favour of simpler story-telling concerns.

From the Dome of the Chain to Miḥrāb Dāʾūd: The Transformation of an Umayyad Commemorative Site at the Haram al-Sharif in Jerusalem

2017 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Heba Mostafa
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
King David ◽  
Changing Trends ◽  
History Of ◽  
A Chain

As a monument with a disputed function and iconography, the Dome of the Chain is something of an art historical conundrum. Constructed by the Umayyad caliph ʿAbd al-Malik b. Marwan (r. 685–705) in 692 on the Haram al-Sharif in Jerusalem, it reportedly commemorates a chain tethered to the heavens that aided the Prophet King David (Dāʾūd) in the dispensation of justice. By the sixteenth century, however, the Dome of the Chain became associated with other sites of Davidic commemoration such as the Qurʾanic Mihrab of David (Miḥrāb Dāʾūd) referred to in Qurʾan 38:21–26, and was believed to be located in the western citadel of Jerusalem. Through an analysis of the Arabic primary sources, this study situates the history of the Dome of the Chain and the Qurʾanic Miḥrāb Dāʾūd within the context of the Davidic repertoire and commemorative practice in Islam. By examining changing trends of Davidic commemoration in Jerusalem from the seventh to the sixteenth centuries, this study reveals trajectories of Islam’s engagement with its biblical past in relation to the localized commemoration of Davidic justice and kingship within Jerusalem.


Two pre-Conquest manuscripts from Glastonbury Abbey

1987 ◽  
Vol 16 ◽  
pp. 197-212 ◽  
Author(s):  
James P. Carley
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Tenth Century ◽  
Early History ◽  
Reform Movement ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
The West ◽  
History Of ◽  
Fine Collection ◽  
Irish School ◽  
William Of Malmesbury

The earliest identified surviving manuscripts from Glastonbury Abbey date from the ninth and tenth centuries, but there are reliable post-Conquest traditions claiming that valuable books were found at the monastery as early as the reign of Ine, king of the West Saxons (688–726). By the tenth century at the latest there are reports of an ‘Irish school’ at Glastonbury, famous for its learning and books, and St Dunstan's earliest biographer, the anonymous. B., relates that Dunstan himself studied with the Irish at Glastonbury. During Dunstan's abbacy (940–56) – that is, at the period when most historians would place the beginnings of the English tenth-century reform movement – there was a general revival at Glastonbury which included a concerted policy of book acquisition and the establishment of a productive scriptorium. Not surprisingly, Dunstan's abbacy was viewed by the community ever afterwards as one of the most glorious periods in the early history of the monastery, especially since the later Anglo-Saxon abbots showed a marked falling off in devotion and loyalty to the intellectual inheritance of their monastery. Æthelweard and Æthelnoth, the last two Anglo-Saxon abbots, were especially reprehensible, and confiscated lands and ornaments for the benefit of their own kin. Nor did the situation improve immediately after the Conquest: the first Norman abbot, Thurstan, actually had to call in soldiers to quell his unruly monks. In spite of these disruptions, a fine collection of pre-Conquest books seems to have survived more or less intact into the twelfth century; when the seasoned traveller and connoisseur of books, William of Malmesbury, saw the collection in the late 1120s he was greatly impressed: ‘tanta librorum pulchritudo et antiquitas exuberat’.

The Vikings in England: a review

1975 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 181-206 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gillian Fellows Jensen
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Life Time ◽  
Present Review ◽  
Place Names ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Domesday Book ◽  
First Time

In the preface to F. M. Stenton's collected papers Lady Stenton notes that the publication ofAnglo-Saxon Englandin 1943 marked the culmination of a life-time spent largely preparing for and writing a book in which ‘place-names, coins and charters, wills and pleas, archaeology and the laws of the Anglo-Saxons were all for the first time adequately used to produce a balanced narrative, supported by Domesday Book and the twelfth-century charters which made it easier to understand the earlier material’. Indeed, with the exception of archaeology, Sir Frank had been actively engaged in all these fields of research, as is revealed by the list of his published works, and it seemed unlikely at the time that it would ever be necessary to make major adjustments to the view of the Scandinavian settlements that he presented. Only twelve years had passed, however, when voices of dissent began to arise and the first of three papers that were to herald two decades of controversy about the Vikings in England was published. The present review examines the most significant contributions to the ensuing debate and considers whether it has, in fact, been necessary to depart substantially from the views held by Stenton.

The ‘Colores Rhetorici’ in the Investiture Contest

Traditio ◽  
1976 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 209-238 ◽  
Author(s):  
I. S. Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Important Group ◽  
Henry Iv ◽  
Italian Origin ◽  
Letter Collection

The polemics of the investiture contest, both those of German and those of Italian origin, in most cases owe their survival to the copying activity of scribes in the monasteries and cathedral chapters of Germany during the twelfth century. This survival is in itself unexpected: the Libelli de lite continued to be copied at a period when their argumentation and critical apparatus must have appeared unsophisticated by comparison with the canonical and theological textbooks of the mid-twelfth century. The polemics seem to have been preserved not for their erudition but for their literary qualities. Thus the two most famous twelfth-century collections of eleventh-century libelli — that of the Codex Udalrici and that transcribed in the sixteenth-century codex, Hanover, Niedersächsische Landesbibliothek XI. 671 — are found to exploit the polemics for teaching purposes: not for the elucidation of the rights of King Henry IV or of Pope Gregory VII (as their contents might suggest), but as models of epistolary style for the instruction of the twelfth-century pupils of the cathedral school of Bamberg. ‘Codex I’ of the composite Hanover letter collection — which, like the Codex Udalrici, seems to have originated in Bamberg — contains an important group of pro-Henrician and anti-papal materials: the only extant exemplar of the Defensio Heinrici IV regis of Petrus Crassus, the decrees of the imperialist synods of Worms and Brixen, the encyclical of 1089 of the antipope Wibert of Ravenna, and the treatise of Pseudo-Udalric in favour of clerical marriage. However, ‘Codex I’ also includes pro-papal materials: the two letters of Archbishop Gebhard of Salzburg in support of Gregory VII, letters of Gregory VII himself concerning German ecclesiastical politics, a well-known letter of Urban II and the decrees of the reforming council of Piacenza of 1095. The eclectic nature of the compilation of ‘Codex I’ suggests that the polemical works were regarded by the compiler primarily as model performances in the rhetorical art of the trivium.

The English Navy in the Twelfth Century*

2020 ◽  
Vol 135 (575) ◽  
pp. 743-774
Author(s):  
Susan Raich Sequeira
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Royal Navy ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Norman Conquest ◽  
Territorial Expansion ◽  
Royal Power ◽  
Crucial Component ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
Trading Networks ◽  
Shed Light

Abstract This article investigates the naval strategies of England’s post-Conquest kings, especially from c.1100–1189, a period for which modern scholarship has yet to recognise the existence of a royal navy. It demonstrates that post-Conquest kings deployed warships, summoned defensive fleets, and launched their own invasion navies throughout the long twelfth century. Previously unnoticed evidence for the maintenance of warships under Henry II is discussed and records of fleet recruitment are used to shed light on the systems behind naval levies. Given all this evidence, it can firmly be concluded that there was a navy at the disposal of England’s Anglo-Norman and Angevin kings. The origins of this navy are twofold. Firstly, twelfth-century tactics drew on Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Danish systems and precedents, suggesting the long continuity of post-Conquest naval activities rather than sudden naval innovation under any particular king. The ‘English navy’ therefore did not decline after the Norman Conquest, nor was it a new foundation of Richard I. Secondly, England’s twelfth-century rulers relied upon the maritime skills and co-operation of coastal and port inhabitants across the realm. These coastal denizens’ motivations for participation in royal navies reveal both the extent and the limitations of English royal power. Royal naval activities took place against the backdrop of a European north that was becoming ever more connected by sea routes. English navies were therefore a crucial component of territorial expansion and warfare across a realm situated in the midst of extensive pan-European trading networks.

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