St Andrews Institute of Mediaeval Studieshttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/4452024-03-29T16:02:15Z2024-03-29T16:02:15ZLook at the Sky : the bird Simurgh in text and image in Iran (1010-1650)Castro Royo, Laurahttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/285682023-10-26T08:11:13Z2023-11-29T00:00:00ZThis research focuses on the mythological bird Sīmurgh and her representations in literature and art in the Persianate world from 1010 to 1650. Sīmurgh is generally overlooked in both art and literature, and she has not been the subject of monographic study. This dissertation proposes a combination of approaches from literary and art historical analyses to offer a complete picture of the importance of this bird for the arts and culture of the Persianate world. The results of the research show that Sīmurgh is a multifaceted subject: she is a narrative character, a mystical symbol, and a decorative motif. There is no division between these aspects; rather, they coexist.
The dissertation is divided in two parts. The first five chapters are dedicated to the study of the role of Sīmurgh in literature. The chapters are divided by genre: epic poetry, encyclopaedic works, and Sufi-mystical poetry. The following four chapters that form the second part of this dissertation analyse the iconography of Sīmurgh. They first investigate the possible origins of her visual representation up until c. 1300s. Following, a chapter is dedicated to the critical stage in which text and image became related and a recognisable iconography was established for the literary character of Sīmurgh. The dissertation ends with a chapter that discusses a following stage in which the iconography of Sīmurgh detached itself from the narrative text and started to function as decoration.
2023-11-29T00:00:00ZCastro Royo, LauraThis research focuses on the mythological bird Sīmurgh and her representations in literature and art in the Persianate world from 1010 to 1650. Sīmurgh is generally overlooked in both art and literature, and she has not been the subject of monographic study. This dissertation proposes a combination of approaches from literary and art historical analyses to offer a complete picture of the importance of this bird for the arts and culture of the Persianate world. The results of the research show that Sīmurgh is a multifaceted subject: she is a narrative character, a mystical symbol, and a decorative motif. There is no division between these aspects; rather, they coexist.
The dissertation is divided in two parts. The first five chapters are dedicated to the study of the role of Sīmurgh in literature. The chapters are divided by genre: epic poetry, encyclopaedic works, and Sufi-mystical poetry. The following four chapters that form the second part of this dissertation analyse the iconography of Sīmurgh. They first investigate the possible origins of her visual representation up until c. 1300s. Following, a chapter is dedicated to the critical stage in which text and image became related and a recognisable iconography was established for the literary character of Sīmurgh. The dissertation ends with a chapter that discusses a following stage in which the iconography of Sīmurgh detached itself from the narrative text and started to function as decoration.Title redactedO'Harrow, Haileyhttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/284282023-10-17T02:06:57Z2023-11-29T00:00:00ZAbstract redacted
2023-11-29T00:00:00ZO'Harrow, HaileyAbstract redactedEarly English genealogies : the evolution of their content, form, and functionEddington, Christopher Markhttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/272932023-11-11T03:08:30Z2022-11-30T00:00:00ZThis thesis traces, for the first time in detail, the evolution of early English genealogical literary forms in pre-Conquest texts, from the short pedigrees written in Latin in Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum in the early eighth century to the extensive pedigree of Æthelwulf in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in the late ninth. It argues that early English genealogies were modelled on those in the Bible, and influenced by theological number symbolism and chronological frameworks, which were based on biblical genealogy. Key characteristics of English genealogy are discussed including: descent from Woden; the use of ethnonyms and dynastic eponyms; the alliteration of names, and the formal properties of structures and patterns in genealogies. A central argument of this thesis is that many of the variations between the content of different versions of shared or similar genealogical materials result from the increasing importance to writers of their structural, alliterative, and metrical forms, the development of which reflects, or even affects, the changing priorities or ideologies of the genealogists. As almost all of the genealogies are incorporated into other texts, the purposes of those texts are considered and the use the genealogies are put to. A second key argument of this thesis is that genealogy performs ideological work within narrative and other literary texts
2022-11-30T00:00:00ZEddington, Christopher MarkThis thesis traces, for the first time in detail, the evolution of early English genealogical literary forms in pre-Conquest texts, from the short pedigrees written in Latin in Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum in the early eighth century to the extensive pedigree of Æthelwulf in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in the late ninth. It argues that early English genealogies were modelled on those in the Bible, and influenced by theological number symbolism and chronological frameworks, which were based on biblical genealogy. Key characteristics of English genealogy are discussed including: descent from Woden; the use of ethnonyms and dynastic eponyms; the alliteration of names, and the formal properties of structures and patterns in genealogies. A central argument of this thesis is that many of the variations between the content of different versions of shared or similar genealogical materials result from the increasing importance to writers of their structural, alliterative, and metrical forms, the development of which reflects, or even affects, the changing priorities or ideologies of the genealogists. As almost all of the genealogies are incorporated into other texts, the purposes of those texts are considered and the use the genealogies are put to. A second key argument of this thesis is that genealogy performs ideological work within narrative and other literary textsPatterns of commemoration in central Italy : manuscript calendars and social time in Perugia, Assisi and Gubbio, c. 1100–1500Kaasik, Holgerhttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/269462023-11-30T03:07:39Z2022-11-30T00:00:00ZThis thesis examines the use of medieval calendars as commemorative devices. Medieval calendars were practical and open-ended texts that could remain in use for several generations, accumulating layers of modification according to the needs and preferences of their users. Composed to regulate social time and annual collective commemoration, calendars bridged past, present and future action and synchronised individuals and communities within urban centres, on a regional level and across vast distances throughout Latin Christendom. Scholarly interest has typically focused on individual manuscripts and key calendar traditions, such as that of the Roman Curia, aiming to reconstruct seminal liturgies. This thesis instead repositions calendars in their social context and compares the calendars of three neighbouring towns and diocesan centres of distinct size, political, economic and religious influence in Central Italy – Perugia, Assisi and Gubbio – set against an extended corpus of Central and Northern Italian calendars. Altogether, the material comprises eighty manuscripts and 21354 calendar entries. By revealing how calendars served differing functions between the centres of this geographically compact area, and how these practices evolved following divergent trajectories, the comparative approach allows for the identification of trends and patterns of commemoration that would otherwise remain hidden.
The thesis argues that while the primary functions of medieval calendars – sustaining communal memory and structuring the liturgical year – are widely recognised, a great variety of practices can be uncovered considering sufficient comparative context. The thesis demonstrates that although commemorations of patron saints remained a staple of calendars, to the point of seeming almost detached from surrounding socio-religious and political developments, there are fundamental and systematic differences between the centres examined in how calendars were used to perpetuate minor local commemorations, reconcile local patterns of commemorations with those of transregional religious orders and to construct and maintain connections with neighbouring regions. Such differences go well beyond the appearance of individual saints in particular manuscripts and reflect the varying needs and preferences of the communities producing and using the manuscripts, affected by the scale, centrality and geographical orientation of the urban centres examined, as well as by broader developments such as the expansion of the Franciscan order and the Papal Curia’s presence in the region over the thirteenth century.
2022-11-30T00:00:00ZKaasik, HolgerThis thesis examines the use of medieval calendars as commemorative devices. Medieval calendars were practical and open-ended texts that could remain in use for several generations, accumulating layers of modification according to the needs and preferences of their users. Composed to regulate social time and annual collective commemoration, calendars bridged past, present and future action and synchronised individuals and communities within urban centres, on a regional level and across vast distances throughout Latin Christendom. Scholarly interest has typically focused on individual manuscripts and key calendar traditions, such as that of the Roman Curia, aiming to reconstruct seminal liturgies. This thesis instead repositions calendars in their social context and compares the calendars of three neighbouring towns and diocesan centres of distinct size, political, economic and religious influence in Central Italy – Perugia, Assisi and Gubbio – set against an extended corpus of Central and Northern Italian calendars. Altogether, the material comprises eighty manuscripts and 21354 calendar entries. By revealing how calendars served differing functions between the centres of this geographically compact area, and how these practices evolved following divergent trajectories, the comparative approach allows for the identification of trends and patterns of commemoration that would otherwise remain hidden.
The thesis argues that while the primary functions of medieval calendars – sustaining communal memory and structuring the liturgical year – are widely recognised, a great variety of practices can be uncovered considering sufficient comparative context. The thesis demonstrates that although commemorations of patron saints remained a staple of calendars, to the point of seeming almost detached from surrounding socio-religious and political developments, there are fundamental and systematic differences between the centres examined in how calendars were used to perpetuate minor local commemorations, reconcile local patterns of commemorations with those of transregional religious orders and to construct and maintain connections with neighbouring regions. Such differences go well beyond the appearance of individual saints in particular manuscripts and reflect the varying needs and preferences of the communities producing and using the manuscripts, affected by the scale, centrality and geographical orientation of the urban centres examined, as well as by broader developments such as the expansion of the Franciscan order and the Papal Curia’s presence in the region over the thirteenth century.Livery and dule : dressing life and death in the late medieval Scottish royal householdWesterhof Nyman, Perin Joyhttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/231742021-07-21T14:49:00Z2021-07-01T00:00:00ZThis thesis examines the use of meaningful and symbolic dress at the late medieval Scottish royal court, arguing that group displays of colour-coded clothing, exemplified by livery and mourning dress, played key political roles both in the day-to-day functioning of the court and royal household and at large-scale ceremonial events. The discussion takes an interdisciplinary approach to a wide body of source types, and considers evidence from the fourteenth to the mid-sixteenth centuries, concluding with the funeral of James V in 1543. Although a number of Scottish historians have considered the political implications of individual sixteenth-century monarchs’ wardrobes, there has been little focused discussion of the dress of the wider household and court before the mid-sixteenth century. This thesis shows that dress was employed throughout the late medieval period and the early sixteenth century as a means of visually defining the structures of the household and parts of the court, the roles of the people within them, and their relationships to each other and to the monarch. It argues that clothing’s ability to express constructed meaning and identity made it a powerful and versatile tool. Examinations of livery and heraldic dress, funereal dress and textile displays, and mourning dress are used to explore the employment of clothing by the Scottish crown, nobility, and household officials. These discussions culminate in three case studies of the finely-tuned displays of liveries and mourning that were organised for the funerals of Scottish monarchs Madeleine de Valois, Margaret Tudor, and James V. By showing that meaningful dress was a core element in the expression of interpersonal and political discourse at all levels of court life, and by making the technical definitions, forms, functions, and associated meanings of late medieval Scottish dress more accessible, this thesis seeks to facilitate the wider integration of dress evidence into Scottish historical research.
2021-07-01T00:00:00ZWesterhof Nyman, Perin JoyThis thesis examines the use of meaningful and symbolic dress at the late medieval Scottish royal court, arguing that group displays of colour-coded clothing, exemplified by livery and mourning dress, played key political roles both in the day-to-day functioning of the court and royal household and at large-scale ceremonial events. The discussion takes an interdisciplinary approach to a wide body of source types, and considers evidence from the fourteenth to the mid-sixteenth centuries, concluding with the funeral of James V in 1543. Although a number of Scottish historians have considered the political implications of individual sixteenth-century monarchs’ wardrobes, there has been little focused discussion of the dress of the wider household and court before the mid-sixteenth century. This thesis shows that dress was employed throughout the late medieval period and the early sixteenth century as a means of visually defining the structures of the household and parts of the court, the roles of the people within them, and their relationships to each other and to the monarch. It argues that clothing’s ability to express constructed meaning and identity made it a powerful and versatile tool. Examinations of livery and heraldic dress, funereal dress and textile displays, and mourning dress are used to explore the employment of clothing by the Scottish crown, nobility, and household officials. These discussions culminate in three case studies of the finely-tuned displays of liveries and mourning that were organised for the funerals of Scottish monarchs Madeleine de Valois, Margaret Tudor, and James V. By showing that meaningful dress was a core element in the expression of interpersonal and political discourse at all levels of court life, and by making the technical definitions, forms, functions, and associated meanings of late medieval Scottish dress more accessible, this thesis seeks to facilitate the wider integration of dress evidence into Scottish historical research.Gift-giving and inheritance strategies in late Roman law and legal practiceHumfress, Carolinehttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/166412023-11-08T18:30:01Z2017-06-07T00:00:00ZIn Roman law, an inheritance could be passed on according to the rules of intestate or testate succession. The Roman law of succession presents people with an enormous display of legal ingenuity. This chapter analyses some of the legal instruments and rules by which late Roman testators and donors were able to pursue making over bequests and inheritances to the institutional Christian church. It presents an overview of Roman family law and inheritance structures, paying particular attention to post-classical legal developments. The chapter explores donation and inheritance law in the specific context of the institutional Christian church from the age of Constantine onwards. It expands on this analysis via a focus on specific examples of strategic behaviour relating to Christian gift-giving and inheritance in the later fourth, fifth and sixth centuries AD. It shows that Roman legislators themselves engaged in strategic behaviour, attempting to use the Roman law of donation and inheritance as a means of socio-religious control.
2017-06-07T00:00:00ZHumfress, CarolineIn Roman law, an inheritance could be passed on according to the rules of intestate or testate succession. The Roman law of succession presents people with an enormous display of legal ingenuity. This chapter analyses some of the legal instruments and rules by which late Roman testators and donors were able to pursue making over bequests and inheritances to the institutional Christian church. It presents an overview of Roman family law and inheritance structures, paying particular attention to post-classical legal developments. The chapter explores donation and inheritance law in the specific context of the institutional Christian church from the age of Constantine onwards. It expands on this analysis via a focus on specific examples of strategic behaviour relating to Christian gift-giving and inheritance in the later fourth, fifth and sixth centuries AD. It shows that Roman legislators themselves engaged in strategic behaviour, attempting to use the Roman law of donation and inheritance as a means of socio-religious control.Unrecorded copies of Middle English verse and prose in Dublin, Trinity College, MS 352Connolly, Margarethttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/141772023-04-18T23:37:58Z2018-01-01T00:00:00ZThis article gives details of otherwise unrecorded copies of extracts from Walter Hilton's 'Scale of Perfection' and from 'Dives and Pauper' which occur in a sixteenth-century manuscript commonplace book, Dublin, Trinity College, MS 352. Some of the extracts may have been copied from printed sources.
2018-01-01T00:00:00ZConnolly, MargaretThis article gives details of otherwise unrecorded copies of extracts from Walter Hilton's 'Scale of Perfection' and from 'Dives and Pauper' which occur in a sixteenth-century manuscript commonplace book, Dublin, Trinity College, MS 352. Some of the extracts may have been copied from printed sources.The eponymous Jacquerie : making revolt mean some thingsFirnhaber-Baker, Justinehttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/135502023-07-24T14:30:17Z2016-11-29T00:00:00ZLabelling an activity makes it mean something. The decision to term a group of actions a ‘revolt’ or an ‘uprising’ today has profound implications for interpretation, just as calling them ‘rumours’ or ‘takehan’ went to the very heart of the perception and reception of contentious political acts 600 years ago. The word ‘jacquerie’ is no exception. In English, as in French, the word has meant ‘a peasant revolt, especially a very bloody one’ since the nineteenth century.2 But what the modern term’s medieval eponym, the French Jacquerie of May-June 1358, actually meant to its observers and participants is a curiously underexplored subject. Only one scholarly monograph, published in the nineteenth century, has ever been written, and since then fewer than a dozen articles have appeared, the most cogent of them written by Raymond Cazelles over 30 years ago
This work was undertaken with the support of a British Arts and Humanities Research Council Early Career Fellowship (grant reference AH/K006843/1).
2016-11-29T00:00:00ZFirnhaber-Baker, JustineLabelling an activity makes it mean something. The decision to term a group of actions a ‘revolt’ or an ‘uprising’ today has profound implications for interpretation, just as calling them ‘rumours’ or ‘takehan’ went to the very heart of the perception and reception of contentious political acts 600 years ago. The word ‘jacquerie’ is no exception. In English, as in French, the word has meant ‘a peasant revolt, especially a very bloody one’ since the nineteenth century.2 But what the modern term’s medieval eponym, the French Jacquerie of May-June 1358, actually meant to its observers and participants is a curiously underexplored subject. Only one scholarly monograph, published in the nineteenth century, has ever been written, and since then fewer than a dozen articles have appeared, the most cogent of them written by Raymond Cazelles over 30 years agoTheoArtistry, and a contemporary perspective on composing sacred choral musicCorbett, Georgehttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/124162023-04-18T23:42:54Z2017-12-28T00:00:00ZThis article presents the methodology and research underpinning the TheoArtistry Composers’ Scheme, a project based in ITIA (the Institute for Theology, Imagination and the Arts), School of Divinity, University of St Andrews (2016-17). I analyse Sir James MacMillan’s theology of music, outline some practical and theoretical issues that arose in setting up theologian-composer partnerships, and reflect critically on the six new works of sacred choral music that emerged (these are printed as an appendix). The article assesses the implications of such collaboration for future work at the interface between theology and music, and between theology and the arts more generally.
2017-12-28T00:00:00ZCorbett, GeorgeThis article presents the methodology and research underpinning the TheoArtistry Composers’ Scheme, a project based in ITIA (the Institute for Theology, Imagination and the Arts), School of Divinity, University of St Andrews (2016-17). I analyse Sir James MacMillan’s theology of music, outline some practical and theoretical issues that arose in setting up theologian-composer partnerships, and reflect critically on the six new works of sacred choral music that emerged (these are printed as an appendix). The article assesses the implications of such collaboration for future work at the interface between theology and music, and between theology and the arts more generally.Looking beyond Guinevere : depictions of women in Chrétien de Troyes’ Arthurian romances, the cult of saints, and religious texts of the twelfth centuryHayes, Lydia Helenhttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/121002018-05-02T16:10:03Z2017-12-08T00:00:00ZThis thesis provides a reading of Chrétien de Troyes’ Arthurian romances that reflects the cultural and intellectual context of twelfth-century Christianity. The impact of this context on Chrétien’s romances is examined by identifying the influence that contemporaneous biblical expository texts, hagiography, and the material culture of the cult of saints had upon his work. Although scholars have devoted much attention to the study of Chrétien’s romances, and some have examined the potential influences of various medieval Christian beliefs, practices, and symbols on his work, none have yet to produce a thorough study of these elements while focusing specifically on the female characters.
Scholars have identified the influence of the cult of saints on the depiction of Guinevere in The Knight of the Cart, but have not examined this influence on the depictions of the ladies in the other four romances in detail. I look beyond Guinevere, examining all of the female protagonists in the Arthurian romances, comparing their attributes and actions to those of biblical women in contemporaneous biblical exposition and those of saints in hagiography. At the heart of this comparison is the relationship between the lady and her knight, a relationship that is described in similar terms to that between a biblical woman and God and that between saint and devotee.
2017-12-08T00:00:00ZHayes, Lydia HelenThis thesis provides a reading of Chrétien de Troyes’ Arthurian romances that reflects the cultural and intellectual context of twelfth-century Christianity. The impact of this context on Chrétien’s romances is examined by identifying the influence that contemporaneous biblical expository texts, hagiography, and the material culture of the cult of saints had upon his work. Although scholars have devoted much attention to the study of Chrétien’s romances, and some have examined the potential influences of various medieval Christian beliefs, practices, and symbols on his work, none have yet to produce a thorough study of these elements while focusing specifically on the female characters.
Scholars have identified the influence of the cult of saints on the depiction of Guinevere in The Knight of the Cart, but have not examined this influence on the depictions of the ladies in the other four romances in detail. I look beyond Guinevere, examining all of the female protagonists in the Arthurian romances, comparing their attributes and actions to those of biblical women in contemporaneous biblical exposition and those of saints in hagiography. At the heart of this comparison is the relationship between the lady and her knight, a relationship that is described in similar terms to that between a biblical woman and God and that between saint and devotee.Magna CartaHolt, Jameshttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/94442024-03-24T00:46:42Z2015-05-01T00:00:00Z3rd edition of classic work, with new introduction and additional material
2015-05-01T00:00:00ZHolt, James3rd edition of classic work, with new introduction and additional materialCalculating Time and the End of Time in the Carolingian World, c.740-820Palmer, James Trevorhttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/76002023-04-18T09:43:39Z2011-12-01T00:00:00ZThe hopes and fears associated with the imminence of apocalypse acted as catalysts for a number of significant changes in history. Relevant patterns of behaviour are not, however, always consistent. This paper examines the intellectual contexts for the (sometimes quite real) fear that the world might end or be revolutionised in c. AD800 with the advent of the ‘6000th year of the world’. It argues that, in the Carolingian world, apocalyptic belief was widespread but that it centred on an undefined sense of imminence and a concern for reform, rather than a prioritisation of specific dates. Indeed, building on recent developments in the study of computus (‘time-reckoning’), it is clear that chronological systems such as AD-dating were adapted and discussed – at length – for their relevance to paschal reckonings, not apocalypticism. Evidence here also points towards the relative independence of centres such as Auxerre, St Gall and Monte Cassino, where questions about time could be pursued without much or any central direction from figures such as Charlemagne. It is therefore dangerous to posit a relative ‘consensus of silence’ about apocalypticism to explain the thin evidence; and doubly dangerous to extrapolate from it that, for example, Charlemagne’s imperial coronation occurred on Christmas Day AD800 for undocumented apocalyptic reasons rather than for the pressing political concerns indicated in the sources. Apocalypticism was real in eighth-century Europe, but it was more varied than often thought.
2011-12-01T00:00:00ZPalmer, James TrevorThe hopes and fears associated with the imminence of apocalypse acted as catalysts for a number of significant changes in history. Relevant patterns of behaviour are not, however, always consistent. This paper examines the intellectual contexts for the (sometimes quite real) fear that the world might end or be revolutionised in c. AD800 with the advent of the ‘6000th year of the world’. It argues that, in the Carolingian world, apocalyptic belief was widespread but that it centred on an undefined sense of imminence and a concern for reform, rather than a prioritisation of specific dates. Indeed, building on recent developments in the study of computus (‘time-reckoning’), it is clear that chronological systems such as AD-dating were adapted and discussed – at length – for their relevance to paschal reckonings, not apocalypticism. Evidence here also points towards the relative independence of centres such as Auxerre, St Gall and Monte Cassino, where questions about time could be pursued without much or any central direction from figures such as Charlemagne. It is therefore dangerous to posit a relative ‘consensus of silence’ about apocalypticism to explain the thin evidence; and doubly dangerous to extrapolate from it that, for example, Charlemagne’s imperial coronation occurred on Christmas Day AD800 for undocumented apocalyptic reasons rather than for the pressing political concerns indicated in the sources. Apocalypticism was real in eighth-century Europe, but it was more varied than often thought.Abbatial elections : the case of the Loire Valley in the eleventh centuryHowie, Catriona Vhttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/68112020-02-29T03:02:59Z2015-06-25T00:00:00ZThis thesis examines a series of documents described as electoral charters, produced in monastic institutions of the Loire Valley from the late tenth to late eleventh centuries. By considering the variations in the formulas used for each charter, the study considers what the charters were saying about power or wanted to project about the powers at play in the events they described. Through this, the thesis demonstrates that the power of lordship projected by such documents was of a very traditional nature throughout the period in which they were being produced. The count’s role on each occasion showed him to be a dominant force with a power of lordship composed of possession and rights of property ownership, but also intangible elements, including a sacral interest.
By considering the context of events surrounding each charter of election, the thesis demonstrates that elements of this lordship could be more or less projected at different times in order that different statements might be made about the count. Thus, the symbolic expressions of power appear to have been bigger elements or more strongly emphasised in periods when the count’s political or military power was under pressure.
The differences in formulas used throughout the period of the charters’ production demonstrate that, despite the appearance of new elements that may appear to have been important novelties, these processes were likely to have been original to proceedings, and therefore the notions of a reform of investitures taking place in the mid-eleventh century must be nuanced. Instead of demonstrating a mutation in relationships between lord and Church, the documents demonstrate an alteration in style and content, becoming more narrative and verbose and in these ways revealing elements of the process of abbatial elevations that had previously been hidden from view.
2015-06-25T00:00:00ZHowie, Catriona VThis thesis examines a series of documents described as electoral charters, produced in monastic institutions of the Loire Valley from the late tenth to late eleventh centuries. By considering the variations in the formulas used for each charter, the study considers what the charters were saying about power or wanted to project about the powers at play in the events they described. Through this, the thesis demonstrates that the power of lordship projected by such documents was of a very traditional nature throughout the period in which they were being produced. The count’s role on each occasion showed him to be a dominant force with a power of lordship composed of possession and rights of property ownership, but also intangible elements, including a sacral interest.
By considering the context of events surrounding each charter of election, the thesis demonstrates that elements of this lordship could be more or less projected at different times in order that different statements might be made about the count. Thus, the symbolic expressions of power appear to have been bigger elements or more strongly emphasised in periods when the count’s political or military power was under pressure.
The differences in formulas used throughout the period of the charters’ production demonstrate that, despite the appearance of new elements that may appear to have been important novelties, these processes were likely to have been original to proceedings, and therefore the notions of a reform of investitures taking place in the mid-eleventh century must be nuanced. Instead of demonstrating a mutation in relationships between lord and Church, the documents demonstrate an alteration in style and content, becoming more narrative and verbose and in these ways revealing elements of the process of abbatial elevations that had previously been hidden from view.Italian queens in the ninth and tenth centuriesCimino, Robertahttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/53592019-04-01T10:57:04Z2014-06-26T00:00:00ZThis thesis investigates the role of queens in ninth and tenth century Italy. During the Carolingian period the Italian kingdom saw significant involvement of royal women in political affairs. This trend continued after the Carolingian empire collapsed in 888, as Italy became the theatre of struggles for the royal and imperial title, which resulted in a quick succession of local rulers. By investigating Italian queens, my work aims at reassessing some aspects of Italian royal politics. Furthermore, it contributes to the study of medieval queenship, exploring a context which has been overlooked with regard to female authority. The work which has been done on queens over the last decades has attempted to build a coherent model of early medieval queenship; scholars have often privileged the analysis of continuities and similarities in the study of queens’ prerogatives and resources. This thesis challenges this model and underlines the peculiarities of individual queens. My analysis demonstrates that, by deconstructing the coherent model established by historiography, it is possible to underline the individual experiences, resources and strengths of each royal woman, and therefore create a new way to look at the history of queens and queenship.
The thesis is divided into four main thematic sections. After having introduced the subject and the relevant historiography on the topic in the introduction, in Chapter 2 I consider ideas about queenship as expressed by narrative and normative sources. Chapter 3 deals with royal diplomas, which are a valuable resource for the understanding of queens’ reigns. Chapter 4 analyses queens’ dowers and monastic patronage. Chapter 5 examines the experience of Italian royal widows. Finally, the conclusive chapter outlines the significance of this thesis for the broader understanding of medieval queenship.
2014-06-26T00:00:00ZCimino, RobertaThis thesis investigates the role of queens in ninth and tenth century Italy. During the Carolingian period the Italian kingdom saw significant involvement of royal women in political affairs. This trend continued after the Carolingian empire collapsed in 888, as Italy became the theatre of struggles for the royal and imperial title, which resulted in a quick succession of local rulers. By investigating Italian queens, my work aims at reassessing some aspects of Italian royal politics. Furthermore, it contributes to the study of medieval queenship, exploring a context which has been overlooked with regard to female authority. The work which has been done on queens over the last decades has attempted to build a coherent model of early medieval queenship; scholars have often privileged the analysis of continuities and similarities in the study of queens’ prerogatives and resources. This thesis challenges this model and underlines the peculiarities of individual queens. My analysis demonstrates that, by deconstructing the coherent model established by historiography, it is possible to underline the individual experiences, resources and strengths of each royal woman, and therefore create a new way to look at the history of queens and queenship.
The thesis is divided into four main thematic sections. After having introduced the subject and the relevant historiography on the topic in the introduction, in Chapter 2 I consider ideas about queenship as expressed by narrative and normative sources. Chapter 3 deals with royal diplomas, which are a valuable resource for the understanding of queens’ reigns. Chapter 4 analyses queens’ dowers and monastic patronage. Chapter 5 examines the experience of Italian royal widows. Finally, the conclusive chapter outlines the significance of this thesis for the broader understanding of medieval queenship.Out of the wilderness : a fourteenth-century English drawing of John the BaptistLuxford, Julian Marcushttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/52152023-04-18T09:40:39Z2010-01-01T00:00:00ZLondon, British Library, MS Royal 10 B XIV contains a large drawing of St. John the Baptist that is both exceptional for its quality and iconographically unique. Not previously noticed by art historians, it constitutes an important addition to English art of the early to mid-fourteenth century. This paper explores the physical nature of the drawing, its bibliographical context (in a book of natural philosophy), the nature and meaning of its imagery, and its artistic context and associations, within the broader framework of its ownership and use by Benedictine monks of Saint Augustine's Abbey, Canterbury. The drawing is considered a symptom of a wider interest in the acquisition of manuscript illumination at the abbey during the first half of the fourteenth century. It can be dated to about 1335-40 and is thought to have been executed in southeast England or East Anglia, where the works of art to which it is closest in stylistic and iconographic terms were produced. The iconography includes a number of motifs rare or unparalleled in images of John the Baptist, including a figure of Salome beneath the saint's feet and, most remarkably, a monumental Gothic arch composed of living oak trees, which frames the saint. The detail and semantic richness of this imagery make it practically certain that the drawing was made as a focus of devotion, probably for the manuscript's first recorded owner, the Oxford scholar-monk John of Lingfield.
2010-01-01T00:00:00ZLuxford, Julian MarcusLondon, British Library, MS Royal 10 B XIV contains a large drawing of St. John the Baptist that is both exceptional for its quality and iconographically unique. Not previously noticed by art historians, it constitutes an important addition to English art of the early to mid-fourteenth century. This paper explores the physical nature of the drawing, its bibliographical context (in a book of natural philosophy), the nature and meaning of its imagery, and its artistic context and associations, within the broader framework of its ownership and use by Benedictine monks of Saint Augustine's Abbey, Canterbury. The drawing is considered a symptom of a wider interest in the acquisition of manuscript illumination at the abbey during the first half of the fourteenth century. It can be dated to about 1335-40 and is thought to have been executed in southeast England or East Anglia, where the works of art to which it is closest in stylistic and iconographic terms were produced. The iconography includes a number of motifs rare or unparalleled in images of John the Baptist, including a figure of Salome beneath the saint's feet and, most remarkably, a monumental Gothic arch composed of living oak trees, which frames the saint. The detail and semantic richness of this imagery make it practically certain that the drawing was made as a focus of devotion, probably for the manuscript's first recorded owner, the Oxford scholar-monk John of Lingfield.An English lecturer, a palliative care practitioner, and an absent poet have a confabulationJones, ChrisMacpherson, Catrionahttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/46062023-04-25T23:38:26Z2014-07-09T00:00:00ZThe possibilities for developing the poet Douglas Dunn’s archive (which includes the drafts and manuscripts for his collection Elegies, dealing with the terminal illness and death of the poet’s wife from cancer) for therapeutic benefit are explored by an English lecturer (C.J.) and a palliative care practitioner (C.M.). This has led us to explore the potential benefit of this resource for health practitioners working with those affected by cancer and other life-limiting conditions. This article offers a “written conversation” (an acknowledged oxymoron of genre) about working with the themes of death and loss: a conversation which includes Douglas Dunn, who was not actually there. We reflect on the value of this “confabulation” as methodological inquiry, and its potential influence on practice. Thus, an example of “creative writing” (the confabulation) becomes a piece of research into methodology regarding the use of “creative writing” resources (the poetry archive) in palliative health care.
2014-07-09T00:00:00ZJones, ChrisMacpherson, CatrionaThe possibilities for developing the poet Douglas Dunn’s archive (which includes the drafts and manuscripts for his collection Elegies, dealing with the terminal illness and death of the poet’s wife from cancer) for therapeutic benefit are explored by an English lecturer (C.J.) and a palliative care practitioner (C.M.). This has led us to explore the potential benefit of this resource for health practitioners working with those affected by cancer and other life-limiting conditions. This article offers a “written conversation” (an acknowledged oxymoron of genre) about working with the themes of death and loss: a conversation which includes Douglas Dunn, who was not actually there. We reflect on the value of this “confabulation” as methodological inquiry, and its potential influence on practice. Thus, an example of “creative writing” (the confabulation) becomes a piece of research into methodology regarding the use of “creative writing” resources (the poetry archive) in palliative health care.Prostitution and subjectivity in late mediaeval Germany and SwitzerlandPage, Jamiehttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/40372023-11-15T03:02:35Z2013-11-30T00:00:00ZThis thesis is a study of the problem of subjectivity and prostitution in the Middle Ages. Three legal case studies of unpublished archival material and one chapter focussing on fictional texts from late mediaeval Germany and Switzerland are used to investigate the conditions of prostitutes’ subjectification in law and literature. The thesis takes impetus from Ruth Karras’s recent articulation of the problem of prostitution and sexuality, seeking to engage critically with her notion of “prostitute” as a medieval sexual identity that might be applied to any woman who had extra-marital sex. In dealing with trial records, it also aims to make a methodological contribution to the study of crime and the problem of locating the individual.
Chapters I-III examine the records of criminal cases featuring the testimony of prostitutes, or women who risked such categorisation, to consider the available subject positions both within and outwith the context of municipal regulation. Whilst acknowledging the force of normative ideas about prostitutes as lustful women, these chapters argue that prostitutes’ subject positions in legal cases were adopted according to local conditions, and depended upon the immediate circumstances of the women involved. They also consider trial records as a form of masculine discourse, arguing that an anxious masculine subject can be seen to emerge in response to the phenomenon of prostitution. Chapter IV expands this discussion by drawing on literary texts showing how prostitutes prompted concern on the part of male poets and audiences, for whom their sexual agency was a threat which belied their theoretical status as sexual objects.
Note: Transcriptions of the legal cases making up chapters I-III are provided in Appendices A, B, and C.
2013-11-30T00:00:00ZPage, JamieThis thesis is a study of the problem of subjectivity and prostitution in the Middle Ages. Three legal case studies of unpublished archival material and one chapter focussing on fictional texts from late mediaeval Germany and Switzerland are used to investigate the conditions of prostitutes’ subjectification in law and literature. The thesis takes impetus from Ruth Karras’s recent articulation of the problem of prostitution and sexuality, seeking to engage critically with her notion of “prostitute” as a medieval sexual identity that might be applied to any woman who had extra-marital sex. In dealing with trial records, it also aims to make a methodological contribution to the study of crime and the problem of locating the individual.
Chapters I-III examine the records of criminal cases featuring the testimony of prostitutes, or women who risked such categorisation, to consider the available subject positions both within and outwith the context of municipal regulation. Whilst acknowledging the force of normative ideas about prostitutes as lustful women, these chapters argue that prostitutes’ subject positions in legal cases were adopted according to local conditions, and depended upon the immediate circumstances of the women involved. They also consider trial records as a form of masculine discourse, arguing that an anxious masculine subject can be seen to emerge in response to the phenomenon of prostitution. Chapter IV expands this discussion by drawing on literary texts showing how prostitutes prompted concern on the part of male poets and audiences, for whom their sexual agency was a threat which belied their theoretical status as sexual objects.
Note: Transcriptions of the legal cases making up chapters I-III are provided in Appendices A, B, and C.Living like the laity? : The negotiation of religious status in the cities of late medieval ItalyAndrews, Franceshttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/35052023-04-18T09:40:03Z2010-12-01T00:00:00ZFramed by consideration of images of treasurers on the books of the treasury in thirteenth-century Siena, this article uses evidence for the employment of men of religion in city offices in central and northern Italy to show how religious status (treated as a subset of ‘clerical culture’) could become an important object of negotiation between city and churchmen, a tool in the repertoire of power relations. It focuses on the employment of men of religion as urban treasurers and takes Florence in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries as a principal case study, but also touches on the other tasks assigned to men of religion and, very briefly, on evidence from other cities (Bologna, Brescia, Como, Milan, Padua, Perugia and Siena). It outlines some of the possible arguments deployed for this use of men of religion in order to demonstrate that religious status was, like gender, more contingent and fluid than the norm-based models often relied on as a shorthand by historians. Despite the powerful rhetoric of lay–clerical separation in this period, the engagement of men of religion in paid, term-bound urban offices inevitably brought them closer to living like the laity.
2010-12-01T00:00:00ZAndrews, FrancesFramed by consideration of images of treasurers on the books of the treasury in thirteenth-century Siena, this article uses evidence for the employment of men of religion in city offices in central and northern Italy to show how religious status (treated as a subset of ‘clerical culture’) could become an important object of negotiation between city and churchmen, a tool in the repertoire of power relations. It focuses on the employment of men of religion as urban treasurers and takes Florence in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries as a principal case study, but also touches on the other tasks assigned to men of religion and, very briefly, on evidence from other cities (Bologna, Brescia, Como, Milan, Padua, Perugia and Siena). It outlines some of the possible arguments deployed for this use of men of religion in order to demonstrate that religious status was, like gender, more contingent and fluid than the norm-based models often relied on as a shorthand by historians. Despite the powerful rhetoric of lay–clerical separation in this period, the engagement of men of religion in paid, term-bound urban offices inevitably brought them closer to living like the laity.Excavating the borders of literary Anglo-Saxonism in nineteenth-century Britain and AustraliaD'Arcens, LouiseJones, Chrishttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/33372023-04-18T09:46:41Z2013-12-01T00:00:00ZComparing nineteenth-century British and Australian Anglo-Saxonist literature enables a "decentered" exploration of Anglo-Saxonism's intersections with national, imperial, and colonial discourses, challenging assumption that this discourse was an uncritical vehicle of English nationalism and British manifest destiny. Far from reflecting a stable imperial center, evocations of 'ancient Englishness' in British literature were polyvalent and self-contesting, while in Australian literature they offered a response to colonization and emerging knowledge about the vast age of Indigenous Australian cultures.
2013-12-01T00:00:00ZD'Arcens, LouiseJones, ChrisComparing nineteenth-century British and Australian Anglo-Saxonist literature enables a "decentered" exploration of Anglo-Saxonism's intersections with national, imperial, and colonial discourses, challenging assumption that this discourse was an uncritical vehicle of English nationalism and British manifest destiny. Far from reflecting a stable imperial center, evocations of 'ancient Englishness' in British literature were polyvalent and self-contesting, while in Australian literature they offered a response to colonization and emerging knowledge about the vast age of Indigenous Australian cultures.While crowding memories came : Edwin Morgan, Old English and nostalgiaJones, Chrishttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/33192023-04-18T09:47:04Z2012-01-01T00:00:00Z2012-01-01T00:00:00ZJones, Chris"No word for it" : Postcolonial Anglo-Saxon in John Haynes' Letter to PatienceJones, Chrishttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/22852024-03-11T00:40:56Z2010-01-01T00:00:00ZThis article examines a number of allusions to Old English, especially to the poem The Wanderer, in John Haynes’s award winning poem Letter to Patience (2006). A broad historical contextualisation of the use of Anglo-Saxon in modern poetry is offered first, against which Haynes’s specific poetic Anglo-Saxonism is then analysed in detail. Consideration is given to the sources – editions and translations – that Haynes used, and a sustained close reading of sections of his poem is offered in the light of this source study. The representation of English as an instrument of imperialism is discussed and juxtaposed with the use and status of early English to offer a long historical view of the politics of the vernacular. It is argued that Haynes’s poem, set partly in Nigeria, represents a new departure in the use it finds for Old English poetry, in effect constituting a kind of ‘postcolonial Anglo-Saxonism’.
2010-01-01T00:00:00ZJones, ChrisThis article examines a number of allusions to Old English, especially to the poem The Wanderer, in John Haynes’s award winning poem Letter to Patience (2006). A broad historical contextualisation of the use of Anglo-Saxon in modern poetry is offered first, against which Haynes’s specific poetic Anglo-Saxonism is then analysed in detail. Consideration is given to the sources – editions and translations – that Haynes used, and a sustained close reading of sections of his poem is offered in the light of this source study. The representation of English as an instrument of imperialism is discussed and juxtaposed with the use and status of early English to offer a long historical view of the politics of the vernacular. It is argued that Haynes’s poem, set partly in Nigeria, represents a new departure in the use it finds for Old English poetry, in effect constituting a kind of ‘postcolonial Anglo-Saxonism’.Living in the past : Thebes, periodization, and The Two Noble KinsmenDavis, Alexander Leehttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/18522023-04-18T09:40:36Z2010-01-01T00:00:00ZOur sense of the distinction between the "medieval" and the "early modern" is structured by two notions: that the early modern period is characterized by the death of a chivalric culture that is dominant in the medieval period; and that the early modern is distinguished from the medieval by its superior historical self-awareness. This essay reassesses these themes through a reading of Shakespeare and Fletcher's The Two Noble Kinsmen (1634). This is a play of knighthood and chivalric spectacle, adapted from Chaucer's Knight's Tale, which brings Chaucer on stage in the play's prologue. Reading the play through a tradition of "Theban" narratives that proliferated from antiquity through the Middle Ages shows that the representation of chivalric culture in The Two Noble Kinsmen constructs a vision of the past very different from how modern accounts distinguish between medieval and early modern cultures.
2010-01-01T00:00:00ZDavis, Alexander LeeOur sense of the distinction between the "medieval" and the "early modern" is structured by two notions: that the early modern period is characterized by the death of a chivalric culture that is dominant in the medieval period; and that the early modern is distinguished from the medieval by its superior historical self-awareness. This essay reassesses these themes through a reading of Shakespeare and Fletcher's The Two Noble Kinsmen (1634). This is a play of knighthood and chivalric spectacle, adapted from Chaucer's Knight's Tale, which brings Chaucer on stage in the play's prologue. Reading the play through a tradition of "Theban" narratives that proliferated from antiquity through the Middle Ages shows that the representation of chivalric culture in The Two Noble Kinsmen constructs a vision of the past very different from how modern accounts distinguish between medieval and early modern cultures.Scottish medieval parish churches : the evidence from the dioceses of Dunblane and DunkeldFawcett, RichardOram, RichardLuxford, Julian Marcushttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/18272023-04-18T09:43:27Z2010-02-01T00:00:00ZAn account of a research project into the architectural and historical evidence for the survival of medieval fabric in the parish churches of the dioceses of Dunblane and Dunkeld.
2010-02-01T00:00:00ZFawcett, RichardOram, RichardLuxford, Julian MarcusAn account of a research project into the architectural and historical evidence for the survival of medieval fabric in the parish churches of the dioceses of Dunblane and Dunkeld.