Celtic Asceticism and Carolingian Authority in early medieval Brittany

Author(s):

Julia M. H. Smith

Keyword(s):

Middle Ages ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Ninth Century ◽

Early Medieval ◽

Ecclesiastical Authority ◽

The Impact

In the earlier Middle Ages, Brittany enjoyed a mixed reputation as a region in which to lead a life of ascetic discipline and dedication to God. The (eleventh-century?) Life of Me wan describes Samson and his disciples leaving Britain for a life of spiritual exile. They headed for Brittany because, according to the hagiographer, the region was not only a ‘desert’ where life would be harsher than elsewhere, but also because the ferocity of its inhabitants made it crueller. Others were not so sure whether this was an advantage. Abelard’s tribulations as abbot of Saint-Gildas-de-Rhuys are well known: though himself originating fromBretagne gallo, he complained that the Bretons ofBretagne bretonnantewere a barbarian, lawless race, and that the monks of Saint-Gildas were dissolute and uncontrollable. Abelard’s comments echo a long tradition of French, or Frankish, castigation of the Bretons, stretching back at least to the ninth century. This criticism often expresses more than hostility to agenswhose language made them incomprehensible and hence ridiculous: amongst the tensions it reflects are problems of Christian discipline and ecclesiastical authority which the Frankish church was unable fully to resolve. In exploring behind the Bretons’ bad reputation, it is worthwhile investigating both the ascetic practices of early medieval Brittany and the reactions to those practices of the Frankish church. In so doing, I hope to elucidate my juxtaposition of ‘Celtic asceticism’ and ‘Carolingian authority’ by showing how Breton ascetic traditions were modified under the impact of Carolingian political circumstances.

Fiona J. Griffiths, Nuns’ Priests’ Tales: Men and Salvation in Medieval Women’s Monastic Life. The Middle Ages Series. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2018, pp. 360, 29 illus.

Mediaevistik ◽

10.3726/med.2019.01.30 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 32 (1) ◽

pp. 286-288

Author(s):

Therese Martin

Keyword(s):

Middle Ages ◽

Paradigm Shift ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Family Members ◽

Ninth Century ◽

Religious Communities ◽

University Of Pennsylvania ◽

Medieval Studies ◽

Monastic Life ◽

Multiple Levels

The year 2018 saw the publication of two important monographs, each with groundbreaking scholarship on complementary aspects of monasticism; together they offer a clear path forward for Medieval Studies as a whole. While Fiona Griffiths’s Nuns’ Priests’ Tales and Steven Vanderputten’s Dark Age Nunneries approach the essentially interrelated natures of men’s and women’s medieval monasticism from different perspectives, it is by reading them in concert that one becomes aware of the paradigm shift they signal. In a welcome change from a traditional consideration of so-called “double” monasteries as neither fish nor fowl, Griffiths and Vanderputten offer a feast of evidence for the multiple levels of interactions between the genders—including priests and nuns, students and teachers, patrons, family members, and rulers, as well as the conventionally understood mixed religious communities of monks and nuns—at majority female monasteries in Western Christendom from the early through central Middle Ages. Vanderputten starts at the beginning of the ninth century and carries his investigation forward to the mid-eleventh, at which point Griffiths launches her study, moving the matter on from the late eleventh century into the early thirteenth.

Muslim Roma in the Balkans

Nationalities Papers ◽

10.1080/00905990050002470 ◽

2000 ◽

Vol 28 (1) ◽

pp. 93-128 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

David M. Crowe

Keyword(s):

Early Modern ◽

Middle Ages ◽

Fourteenth Century ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Word Meaning ◽

Ninth Century ◽

Byzantine Empire ◽

Wild Animals ◽

The Balkans ◽

The Roma entered the Balkans from India during the Middle Ages. They reached Persia sometime in the ninth century and by the eleventh century had moved into the Byzantine Empire. According to the eleventh-century Georgian Life of Saint George the Athonite, the Emperor Constantine Monomachus asked the Adsincani to get rid of wild animals preying on the animals in his royal hunting preserve. Adsincani is the Georgian form of the Greek word Atsínganoi or Atzínganoi, from which the non-English terms for Roma (cigán, cigány, tsiganes, zigeuner) are derived. Adsincani means “ner-do-well fortune tellers” or “ventriloquists and wizards who are inspired satanically and pretend to predict the unknown.” “Gypsy” comes from “Egyptian,” a term often used by early modern chroniclers in the Balkans to refer to the Roma. Because of the stereotypes and prejudice that surround the word “Gypsy,” the Roma prefer a name of their own choosing from their language, Romani. Today, it is preferable to refer to the Gypsies as Rom or “Roma,” a Romani word meaning “man” or “husband.” Byzantine references to “Egyptians” crop up during this period as Byzantine political and territorial fortunes gave way to the region's new power, the Ottomans. There were areas with large Roma populations in Cyprus and Greece which local rulers dubbed “Little Egypt” in the late fourteenth century.

A Florilegium on the Ecclesiastical Grades in CLM 19414: Testimony to Ninth-Century Clerical Institution

Harvard Theological Review ◽

10.1017/s0017816000004144 ◽

1970 ◽

Vol 63 (2) ◽

pp. 235-259 ◽

Author(s):

Roger E. Reynolds

Keyword(s):

Fourteenth Century ◽

Canon Law ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Ninth Century ◽

Sacramental Theology ◽

Early Medieval ◽

Religious Instruction ◽

Fields Of Study ◽

Art Historians ◽

Medieval Canon Law

The treasure manuscriptClm 19414of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich has for many years provided scholars in three fields of study with a rich lode of material. Art historians have found one of the best examples of fourteenth-century GermanBibliae pauperumin this manuscript. Historians of canon law have discovered several books of the early eleventh-centuryCollectio XII Partium. For historians of the barbarian lawsClm 19414contains an excellent witness to theLex Baiuwariorum. The purpose of this article is to bring to light another portion ofClm 19414, a florilegium on the ecclesiastical grades which should be of interest to historians of early medieval canon law, religious instruction, and sacramental theology.

Elites in the Early Middle Ages: Identities, Strategies, Mobility

Annales Histoire Sciences Sociales (English edition) ◽

10.1017/s2398568200000169 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 68 (04) ◽

pp. 733-768

Author(s):

François Bougard ◽

Geneviève Bührer-Thierry ◽

Régine Le Jan

Keyword(s):

Structural Analysis ◽

Social Status ◽

Middle Ages ◽

Social Mobility ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Political Sociology ◽

Social Position ◽

Social Recognition ◽

Early Medieval ◽

Early Middle Ages

When considering status within early medieval societies, it is necessary to set aside juridical classifications in favor of concepts derived from political sociology—the notion of an “elite” can thus encompass any individual occupying an elevated social position within his or her community, be it through wealth, power, or culture. Using textual and archaeological sources, historians can seek out the processes of distinction and social recognition that were characteristic of elites throughout the early Middle Ages (from the sixth to the eleventh century). The Carolingian period shows signs of increasing hierarchization, which led both individuals and groups to devise strategies for bolstering their position and forestalling the loss of social status. Within the framework of these processes of social mobility, it becomes possible to examine elites at various levels and from different chronological and regional perspectives while avoiding an overly structural analysis.

The Julian Calendar and the Problem of the Equinoxes in the Early Middle Ages

10.1093/oso/9780198799559.003.0002 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

C. Philipp E. Nothaft

Keyword(s):

Middle Ages ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Medieval Literature ◽

Seventh Century ◽

Observational Methods ◽

Early Medieval ◽

Early Middle Ages ◽

Julian Calendar ◽

Medieval Europe ◽

Solar Astronomy

This chapter familiarizes readers with the ancient back-story of the Julian calendar and describes how one of the central problems inherent in this calendar—the drift of the equinoxes and solstices caused by an overestimation of the length of the tropical year—manifested itself in medieval literature until the end of the eleventh century. It also explores how the development of the computus genre in seventh-century Ireland was instrumental in preserving knowledge of the Western calendar’s Roman-pagan roots. The final two sections show how the existence of diverging traditions for the dates of the equinoxes and solstices in the Julian calendar created an important context for the practice of solar astronomy in early medieval Europe, which included the use of observational methods.

Wild Strawberries from Reichenau: Ruminations on Authority and Difference in Eleventh-Century “Gregorian” Chant

Journal of the American Musicological Society ◽

10.1525/jams.2017.70.1.1 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 70 (1) ◽

pp. 1-60 ◽

Author(s):

Henry Parkes

Keyword(s):

Middle Ages ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Contemporary Music ◽

Ninth Century ◽

Gregorian Chant ◽

Liturgical Chant ◽

Intellectual Status ◽

The Many ◽

Music Theorist ◽

Textual Content

One of the paradoxes of Gregorian chant is the way in which written sources become ever more plentiful across the Middle Ages while commentaries on its cultural and intellectual status take the opposite direction, becoming rare after the ninth century. An exception to that trend is the essay De varia psalmorum atque cantuum modulatione (On the Varied Modulation of Psalms and Chants), a substantial yet little known offering from the music theorist and liturgist Berno of Reichenau (d. 1048). Previously considered to be of uncertain authorship and doubtful musical value, the work is now shown to be an authentic witness, in part through evidence provided by a rediscovered manuscript (Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, Mus.ms.theor. 95). This permits a new appreciation of the author's unique and revealing agenda—to soothe the many tensions reportedly incited by the textual content of chant. With resonances in contemporary music theory, De varia psalmorum testifies to divergent practices in need of a new theoretical underpinning, as well as to previously unstudied cultures of textual correction existing between the ninth and twelfth centuries. In so doing it offers a rare insight into the liturgical chant traditions of the post-Carolingian age, both in Berno's native Germany and further afield.

Penitents and Their Proxies: Penance for Others in Early Medieval Europe

Church History ◽

10.1017/s0009640717000038 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 86 (1) ◽

pp. 1-32 ◽

Author(s):

Gavin Fort

Keyword(s):

Middle Ages ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Religious Practice ◽

Early Medieval ◽

Early Middle Ages ◽

Medieval Europe ◽

Liturgical Texts

This article investigates the religious practice of suffering for others in the early Middle Ages. In proxy penance, one person completed a penitential work for another, who received the spiritual benefit. This practice was based on the idea that one person could stand in for another to bear his burden. Using penitential, conciliar, liturgical, and epistolary sources, I uncover two types of proxy penance. First, priests shared in the penance of those who confessed to them. Liturgical texts include Masses in which the priest completes the penance for someone who could not complete it himself. Penitential texts admonish the priest to “share in the foulness” with the sinner in order to bring about the remission of his sin. Second, there was both a promotion and a criticism of proxy fasting among the laity. Thissic et nonrhythm shows that early medieval penitential culture could not control the demand for proxy penance. Some attention is also paid to the practice of proxy penance in the eleventh-century monastic milieu of Peter Damian. This article broadens the scope of current scholarship on penance by focusing on its substitutionary ability. Also, this article explores the changing notions of and metaphors about sin in this period—from medical to economic—that fueled proxy activity.

Yoni of Kamakhya

Religions of South Asia ◽

10.1558/rosa.19013 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (3) ◽

Author(s):

Paolo E. Rosati

Keyword(s):

Gender Identity ◽

Middle Ages ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Religious Studies ◽

Historical Evolution ◽

Early Medieval ◽

Male And Female ◽

Northeastern India ◽

Gender Theories ◽

The mythology of the yoni of Sati was introduced in the early medieval Kalikapurana (ninth–eleventh century ce), a sakta text that linked the sexual symbol of the Goddess to the Kamakhya-pitha in Assam. This article will analyse the medieval Puranas and Tantras compiled in northeastern India—focusing on their mythological accounts of the cosmogony of the yoni pitha—in order to outline a historical evolution of the yoni symbol through the Middle Ages. Combining leftist Freudian, post-structuralist and post-gender theories with religious studies, the yoni will be considered both as a source of power and as a battlefield of sex–gender identity. In conclusion, this article will challenge the idea of a static yoni but will underline a sex–gender evolution of its identity, which encompasses and transcends both male and female powers.

The Early Middle Ages and the Christianization of Europe

Pagans and Philosophers ◽

10.23943/princeton/9780691142555.003.0005 ◽

2015 ◽

Author(s):

John Marenbon

Keyword(s):

Middle Ages ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Christian Belief ◽

Early Medieval ◽

Early Middle Ages ◽

Classical Culture ◽

This chapter looks at the ease with which the ancient pagan culture was adopted and adapted to fit into a Christian world (without in many cases being actually Christianized) during the Early Middle Ages. In writing which was not strictly theological or philosophical, early medieval scholars used ancient models and language freely within a Christian context. They took the compatibility of pagan culture and Christian belief so much for granted that the Problem of Paganism did not arise; and the same is true for their predecessors in the sixth and seventh centuries as for some tenth- and eleventh-century writing. This broad, unproblematic acceptance of classical culture set what would remain the mainstream view throughout the Middle Ages. The chapter also looks at how Christian Europe came about only as the result of a long process.

Early Medieval Poetry

The Experience of Poetry ◽

10.1093/oso/9780198833154.003.0008 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 147-176

Author(s):

Derek Attridge

Keyword(s):

Middle Ages ◽

Old English ◽

Eleventh Century ◽

Ninth Century ◽

Tenth Century ◽

Fifth Century ◽

Oral Poetry ◽

Old High German ◽

Medieval Poetry ◽

This, the first of four chapters on the Middle Ages, explores the rise of vernacular verse from the fifth to eleventh centuries. There is a little surviving evidence for oral poetry in the vernacular languages prior to the fifth century, and the first written example comes from the beginning of that century. The story of Caedmon’s inspired poetry is examined, as is Bede’s ‘death song’ and other evidence for poetic activity in England in the seventh and eighth centuries. Several Old High German poems of the ninth century are considered, as well as Alfred the Great’s interest in poetry. Beowulf, dated somewhere between the late seventh and the eleventh century, includes scenes of poetic performance and may be itself an example of the kind of poem it depicts in performance. Also discussed are the Old English poems Deor and Widsith and the Viking and Viking-influenced poems of the tenth century.