The Scholar’s Suitcase: Books and the Transfer of Knowledge in Twelfth-Century Europe

2004 ◽  
Vol 38 ◽  
pp. 87-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christoph Egger
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Full Text ◽  
Critical Discussion ◽  
Literary Genre ◽  
Transfer Of Knowledge ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The North ◽  
New Concepts ◽  
Medieval Europe

One day early in the thirteenth century a wandering scholar broke his journey at the Benedictine monastery of Prüfening near Regensburg in Bavaria. Of the books this scholar was carrying, one Liebhard, a monk of the monastery, was especially fascinated by a copy of Peter the Chanter’s Distinctiones Abel, a dictionary of the Bible for the preacher’s use and a prominent example of the recently developed literary genre of biblical distinctiones. Unfortunately, soon afterwards the scholar resumed his interrupted journey, and was not willing to leave the book behind at Prüfening, so Liebhard was unable to copy the full text but could only take down excerpts, which he later completed with texts from other sources. The result, which he called Horreum formicae (the ant’s harvest), still extant in at least two manuscripts, combines the approach of the masters of the Parisian schools with that of monastic theology. It is, therefore, an excellent example of a process ongoing throughout the whole twelfth century: the transfer of knowledge from the centres of learning in the north of France (Laon, Chartres, Paris) and of Italy (Bologna) towards the periphery of medieval Europe, resulting in the reception and critical discussion of new concepts and ideas, a process most readily visible in the distribution of books. This paper offers a preliminary sketch of this process with special emphasis on medieval Bavaria and Austria.

Signs of Salvation: The Evolution of Stigmatic Spirituality Before Francis of Assisi

2013 ◽  
Vol 82 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-68
Author(s):  
Carolyn Muessig
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Seventh Century ◽  
Early Middle Ages ◽  
Medieval Europe ◽  
The Face ◽  
Biblical Commentaries ◽  
The Ideal

Francis of Assisi's reported reception of the stigmata on Mount La Verna in 1224 is widely held to be the first documented account of an individual miraculously and physically receiving the wounds of Christ. The appearance of this miracle, however, in the first quarter of the thirteenth century, is not as unexpected as it first seems. Interpretations of Galatians 6:17—“I bear the marks of the Lord Jesus Christ in my body”—had been circulating in biblical commentaries since the early Middle Ages. These works posited that clerics bore metaphorical and sometimes physical wounds(stigmata)as marks of persecution, while spreading the teaching of Christ in the face of resistance. By the seventh century, the meaning of Galatians 6:17 had been appropriated by bishops and priests as a sign or mark of Christ that they received invisibly at their ordination, and sometimes visibly upon their death. In the eleventh century, Peter Damian articulated a stigmatic spirituality that saw the ideal priest, monk, and nun as bearers of Christ's wounds, a status achieved through the swearing of vows and the practice of severe penance. By the early twelfth century, crusaders were said to bear the marks of the Passion in death and even sometimes as they entered into battle. By the early thirteenth century, “bearing the stigmata” was a pious superlative appropriated by a few devout members of the laity who interpreted Galatian 6:17 in a most literal manner. Thus, this article considers how the conception of “bearing the stigmata” developed in medieval Europe from its treatment in early Latin patristic commentaries to its visceral portrayal by the laity in the thirteenth century.

The reconstruction of the abbey church at St-Denis (1231–81): the interplay of music and ceremony with architecture and politics

1985 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 187-238 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Walters
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Substantial Evidence ◽  
Northern France ◽  
The North ◽  
Liturgical Manuscripts ◽  
The Church ◽  
The Middle Ages

During the Middle Ages, the construction or renovation of a great church was a vast undertaking in terms of time and of money. An array of cathedrals that still rise above the cities and towns of northern France bears witness to medieval ingenuity and industry. The first structure which embodies many of the elements that are now called Gothic was begun at St-Denis in 1140. The church as we know it, however, was not entirely the work of the twelfth century. Only much later, between 1231 and 1281, was St-Denis finally completed. Substantial evidence of the thirteenth-century rebuilding is found in the monument which stands just to the north of Paris. But the stones of St-Denis do not tell the entire story: a small handful of documents refer to stages of the fifty-year reconstruction of the abbey, and now, new witness exists in the form of the liturgical manuscripts which have survived from the thirteenth century.

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam in Medieval Europe

2021 ◽  
pp. 78-99
Author(s):  
Ryan Szpiech
Keyword(s):  
Iberian Peninsula ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Christian Belief ◽  
Islamic World ◽  
Medieval Europe ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Fourth Lateran Council

This chapter discusses the interaction between Judaism, Christianity, and Islam in medieval Europe. It considers the importance of Augustine’s doctrine of Jews as ‘witnesses’ to Christian truth in the formation of the medieval image of the ‘hermeneutical Jew’. Jews, who lived primarily in the Islamic world in the first millennium, began to migrate into Christian lands in greater numbers from the eleventh century. As Christian ideas about Judaism evolved in the twelfth century, culminating in the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215, Jewish authors responded with detailed critiques of Christian belief. The simultaneous Christian engagement with Muslim sources led to a triangular encounter, especially significant in the Iberian Peninsula, between Jewish, Christian, and Muslim writers, reflected in numerous dialogues and polemics about prophecy and history. Beginning in the thirteenth century, mendicant friars, including converts, played a greater role in engagement with Islam and Judaism, taking on important roles as translators and inquisitors.

“Do Not Relinquish Your Offspring”

2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 (139) ◽  
pp. 123-144
Author(s):  
Amelia Kennedy
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Common Good ◽  
Later Life ◽  
Active Aging ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
Medieval Europe ◽  
Monastic Community ◽  
The Common ◽  
Good For

Abstract This article explores issues of labor, community, and authority in medieval Europe through an examination of older Cistercian abbots and the practice of abbatial “retirement.” While historians typically associate the Cistercians with greater acceptance of abbatial resignation, this article focuses on the fervent twelfth-century opposition to the practice. Many Cistercians asserted that abbatial retirement harmed the reputation of the monastic community and constituted a form of self-indulgence on the part of the abbot, whose soul would consequently be jeopardized as he prepared for death. This article argues that these attitudes reflected the importance of service and labor in later life, as well as the abbot’s continued importance within the community. Medieval monasticism thus offers a concept of “active aging” focused on community and care of others. The thirteenth-century trend in favor of retirement stemmed from increasing institutionalization and new understandings of what constituted the “common good” for a monastic community.

Kabbalistic Physiology: Isaac the Blind, Nahmanides, and Moses de Leon on Menstruation

AJS Review ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 317-339 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sharon Koren
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
The Body ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Science And Faith

Science and faith were inextricably intertwined in the Latin Middle Ages. Clerics would attend to both spiritual and physical needs because the need to care for the body coincided with the need to care for the soul. Until the rise of universities in the twelfth century, monasteries were the centers of scientific knowledge. And, even after the professionalization of medicine in the thirteenth century, Christian physicians continued to look to the Bible, in addition to their license, as the source of their authority. Indeed, many Christian physicians who received medical degrees went on to pursue higher degrees in theology. It is therefore not surprising that several Christian theologians used medical theories in the service of theology.

INCISED DESIGN FOR GOTHIC WINDOW TRACERY, WYMONDHAM ABBEY, NORFOLK

2017 ◽  
Vol 97 ◽  
pp. 171-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roland B Harris
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Black Pigment ◽  
The North ◽  
Important Addition ◽  
East End ◽  
Insight Into ◽  
New Facilities

The building of new facilities at the east end of Wymondham Abbey, Norfolk, in 2014–15 involved re-opening a Romanesque arch. This had previously connected the nave’s north aisle with the north transept, and appears to have been blocked at the Dissolution when the transepts and eastern arm of the abbey church were demolished. As works progressed in 2014–15, a remarkable Gothic window tracery design was gradually revealed, incised on the early twelfth-century ashlar of the southern respond. The discovery is one of the most substantial and complete incised designs identified to date and, beyond being an important addition to the emerging corpus of incised designs on walls, it is significant for revealing use of black pigment to make the drawing more visible, for providing an insight into the lost monastic parts of the abbey and, most tantalisingly, for raising the possibility that Wymondham – like its nearby sister priory at Binham – was at the forefront of the development of bar tracery in England in the thirteenth century.

The Bible in the spiritual culture of Kievan Rus

1998 ◽  
pp. 46-52
Author(s):  
S. V. Rabotkina
Keyword(s):  
Full Text ◽  
Spiritual Life ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Spiritual Culture ◽  
Slavonic Language ◽  
Long Time ◽  
The Church

A huge place in the spiritual life of medieval Rusich was occupied by the Bible, although for a long time Kievan Rus did not know it fully. The full text of the Holy Scriptures appears in the Church Slavonic language not earlier than 1499.

A Short Survey of Yemeni Sufism from Its Inception up to the Thirteenth Century

2009 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Muhammad Aziz
Keyword(s):  
Cultural History ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Mountainous Area ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Short Survey ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Intellectual Activities

This paper analyzes the historical conditions of Yemen’s Sufi movement from the beginning of Islam up to the rise of the Rasulid dynasty in the thirteenth century. This is a very difficult task, given the lack of adequate sources and sufficient academic attention in both the East and theWest. Certainly, a few sentences about the subject can be found scattered in Sufi literature at large, but a respectable study of the period’s mysticism can hardly be found.1 Thus, I will focus on the major authorities who first contributed to the ascetic movement’s development, discuss why a major decline of intellectual activities occurred in many metropolises, and if the existing ascetic conditions were transformed into mystical tendencies during the ninth century due to the alleged impact ofDhu’n-Nun al-Misri (d. 860). This is followed by a brief discussion ofwhat contributed to the revival of the country’s intellectual and economic activities. After that, I will attempt to portray the status of the major ascetics and prominent mystics credited with spreading and diffusing the so-called Islamic saintly miracles (karamat). The trademark of both ascetics and mystics across the centuries, this feature became more prevalent fromthe beginning of the twelfth century onward. I will conclude with a brief note on the most three celebrated figures of Yemen’s religious and cultural history: Abu al-Ghayth ibn Jamil (d. 1253) and his rival Ahmad ibn `Alwan (d. 1266) from the mountainous area, andMuhammad ibn `Ali al-`Alawi, known as al-Faqih al-Muqaddam (d. 1256), from Hadramawt.

Bastard Feudalism and the Framing of Thirteenth-Century England

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Coss
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
The State ◽  
The Other ◽  
Great Work ◽  
Early Middle Ages ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship

In the introduction to his great work of 2005, Framing the Early Middle Ages, Chris Wickham urged not only the necessity of carefully framing our studies at the outset but also the importance of closely defining the words and concepts that we employ, the avoidance ‘cultural sollipsism’ wherever possible and the need to pay particular attention to continuities and discontinuities. Chris has, of course, followed these precepts on a vast scale. My aim in this chapter is a modest one. I aim to review the framing of thirteenth-century England in terms of two only of Chris’s themes: the aristocracy and the state—and even then primarily in terms of the relationship between the two. By the thirteenth century I mean a long thirteenth century stretching from the period of the Angevin reforms of the later twelfth century on the one hand to the early to mid-fourteenth on the other; the reasons for taking this span will, I hope, become clearer during the course of the chapter, but few would doubt that it has a validity.

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