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Full-Text Articles in History
Holy Places & Imagined Hellscapes: Qualifying Comments On Loca Sancta Sermon Studies—Christian Conversion In Northern Europe & Scandinavia, C. 500-1300, Todd P. Upton
Quidditas
The paper uses methods from medieval sermon studies to argue that an insularity in “monastic consciousness” can be traced to earlier centuries than the more generally discussed (and better documented) scholastic environments of 13th century monastic and cathedral schools. It assesses how a monastic discourse reliant on Biblical typologies informed the Christian conversion of northern Germanic and Scandinavian peoples (c. 500-1300, including the British Isles and Iceland). Moments of encounter between Christian missionaries and pagan cultures helped delineate this discourse, most apparent in extant records that reveal Christian and Norse perceptions of geography, holy places, deity worship, and eschatological expectations. …
Approaches To The Atonement In The Mystery Plays, Adam C. Wolfe
Approaches To The Atonement In The Mystery Plays, Adam C. Wolfe
Quidditas
The English Corpus Christi plays were a vibrant expression of late medieval Christianity, but they did not survive the Reformation. Many Protestant reformers opposed religious drama altogether, but there were some attempts by reformers to edit the plays and recast them in a Protestant mold, attempts which were ultimately unsuccessful. This paper examines one such attempt and finds that the problem went far beyond obvious references to, and representations of, specifically Catholic beliefs. Focusing on representations of the Atonement in the York and Towneley plays, I found at least four distinct theological approaches to this central concept of Christian theology, …
The Education Of The Son In Paradise Regained: Milton’S Of Education As A Guide, Alice Matthews
The Education Of The Son In Paradise Regained: Milton’S Of Education As A Guide, Alice Matthews
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“The Education of the Son in Paradise Regained: Milton’s Of Education as a Guide” argues that the character of Christ provides a model for effective learning, which is outlined in Milton’s treatise On Education. In the treatise, first published in 1644, some twenty- seven years before his brief epic, Milton explains the purpose for education as strengthening one’s relationship with God, and the best method for acquiring it— gradually, progressing from the easy to the more difficult. In my essay, I will analyze each step in Christ’s education, beginning with his boyhood and culminating in his temptation on …
William Of Auvergne And Popular Demonology, Thomas De Mayo
William Of Auvergne And Popular Demonology, Thomas De Mayo
Quidditas
Theologian and bishop of Paris during St. Louis’ early reign, William of Auvergne (d. 1249) aimed in his life and writings to combat the myriad threats he perceived as facing Christianity. The early thirteenth century saw many potential competitors to official doctrines concerning the natural and supernatural worlds—Arabic philosophy imported into the universities, heretical attacks on the institutional church, and persistent folk beliefs and practices. William attributed these challenges to an underlying demonic conspiracy directed against humankind. This paper examines William’s treatment of popular beliefs on the Wild Hunt, a mysterious congregation of spirits, and related beliefs about female spirits …
Charlemagne’S Denarius, Constantine’S Edicule, And The Vera Crux, John F. Moffitt
Charlemagne’S Denarius, Constantine’S Edicule, And The Vera Crux, John F. Moffitt
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In 806 a much-discussed silver denarius bearing the likeness of Charlemagne was issued. This is called the “temple-type” coin due to the (as yet unidentified) architectural structure illustrated on the reverse side, and which is explicitly labeled as representing the epitome of “Christian Religion.” By examining different kinds of archeological and documentary evidence, this building can now be finally identified. It is, in short, the “Edicule” built by Constantine the Great in 326 to cover the Tomb of Christ (or Holy Sepulcher) in Jerusalem.
Helena, Heraclius, And The True Cross, Hans A. Pohlsander
Helena, Heraclius, And The True Cross, Hans A. Pohlsander
Quidditas
More than three hundred years stand between the empress Helena, or St. Helena, and the Byzantine emperor Heraclius. This chronological distance has not been a hindrance to a very close association of the two personalities with each other. The link is not dynastic but thematic; it is provided by the Holy Cross, or the True Cross, i. e. the very cross of Christ's passion. It is the purpose of this article to show the manifestation of this link in the religious literature and ecclesiastical art of the Middle Ages and in the liturgy to this day.
The Sincere Body: The Performance Of Weeping And Emotion In Late Medieval Italian Sermons, Lyn Blanchfield
The Sincere Body: The Performance Of Weeping And Emotion In Late Medieval Italian Sermons, Lyn Blanchfield
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In 1493 the well-known and controversial Franciscan preacher Bernardino of Feltre gave a series of Lenten sermons to the people of Pavia. On March 11 he dedicated an entire sermon to the necessity of contrition—or perfect sorrow over sin—in the rite of confession. Speaking to a large audience of both men and women, rich and poor, and the local ecclesiastical and civic authorities, Bernardino discussed how one should behave when contrite: “If you cannot feel sorrow of the body, then at least [feel it] in [your] heart, and if you cannot weep with [your] bodily eyes, then at least [weep] …
Living In The Palaces Of Love: Love And The Soul In A Vision Of St. Aldegund Of Maubeuge (Ca. 635–684), Isabel Moreira
Living In The Palaces Of Love: Love And The Soul In A Vision Of St. Aldegund Of Maubeuge (Ca. 635–684), Isabel Moreira
Quidditas
Abbess Aldegund of Maubeuge, in dictating her visions to the cleric Subnius in her later years, recalled a vision she had experienced in her youth. She saw herself entering a heavenly mansion, richly bejeweled and "steeped" with Christ's "sweet odor." The vision had made a great impression on her. She accredited it with having matured her spiritual understanding, for having first misunderstood the vision's meaning, she now understood it, "the scales having fallen from her eyes." Yet as historians we are not as fortunate as Aldegund claimed to be. Many centuries removed from the events of the seventh century, the …
Review Essay: Sheehan, Michael M. Csb. Marriage, Family, And Law In Medieval Europe. Collected Studies, Albrecht Classen
Review Essay: Sheehan, Michael M. Csb. Marriage, Family, And Law In Medieval Europe. Collected Studies, Albrecht Classen
Quidditas
Sheehan, Michael M. CSB. Marriage, Family, and Law in Medieval Europe. Collected Studies. Ed. James K. Farge. University of Toronto Press, Toronto, 1996. xxxi + 330 pp. $45.00.
Review Essay: Dinzelbacher, Peter, And James Lester Hogg, Eds. Kulturgeschichte Der Christlichen Orden In Einzeldarstellungen, Albrecht Classen
Review Essay: Dinzelbacher, Peter, And James Lester Hogg, Eds. Kulturgeschichte Der Christlichen Orden In Einzeldarstellungen, Albrecht Classen
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Dinzelbacher, Peter, and James Lester Hogg, eds. Kulturgeschichte der christlichen Orden in Einzeldarstellungen, ed. Kröners Taschenausgabe, 450. Kröner, Stuttgart, 1997. xii + 419 pp., 6 illustrations. DM 42.
Review Essay: Ardolino, Frank. Apocalypse And Armada In Kyd's Spanish Tragedy, Robin B. Barnes
Review Essay: Ardolino, Frank. Apocalypse And Armada In Kyd's Spanish Tragedy, Robin B. Barnes
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Ardolino, Frank. Apocalypse and Armada in Kyd's Spanish Tragedy. Sixteenth-Century Essays and Studies, 29. Sixteenth-Century Journal Publishers, Kirksville, Mo., 1995. xvi + 187 pp. $35.00.
"Pleasing Passages": Style In The Old English Pastoral Care, Ray Moye
"Pleasing Passages": Style In The Old English Pastoral Care, Ray Moye
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The Old English Pastoral Care, a translation of Gregory the Great's Liber Regula Pastoralis which King Alfred completed sometime in the first few years of the 890s, was the first in a series of translations of Latin Christian works in English that would serve as the foundation of Alfred's program of cultural and educational reform aimed at restoring England's preeminence as a leading Christian intellectual center. This reputation that the land had enjoyed during the glory days of Bede and Alcuin had been lost as a consequence of continual Viking invasions in the eighth and ninth centuries, with the …
Review Essay: Bodin, Jean. On The Demon-Mania Of Witches, Hans Sebald
Review Essay: Bodin, Jean. On The Demon-Mania Of Witches, Hans Sebald
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Bodin, Jean. On the Demon-Mania of Witches. Trans. Randy A. Scott. Intro. Jonathan L. Pearl. Toronto Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, Victoria University, 1995. 218 pp. Paperback. U.S.$ 12.00. Cdn$ 15.00.
Review Essay: Cole, Penny J. The Preaching Of The Crusades To The Holy Land, 1095-1270, David Harry Miller
Review Essay: Cole, Penny J. The Preaching Of The Crusades To The Holy Land, 1095-1270, David Harry Miller
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Cole, Penny J. The Preaching of the Crusades to the Holy Land, 1095-1270. Medieval Academy Books no 98. Medieval Academy of America, Cambridge, Mass. 1991. xiv + 281 pp. $35.00.
Review Essay: Timothy Verdon And John Henderson, Eds., Christianity And Renaissance: Image And Religious Imagination In The Quattrocento, Edward J. Olszewski
Review Essay: Timothy Verdon And John Henderson, Eds., Christianity And Renaissance: Image And Religious Imagination In The Quattrocento, Edward J. Olszewski
Quidditas
Timothy Verdon and John Henderson, eds., Christianity and the Renaissance: Image and Religious Imagination in the Quattrocento, Syracuse University Press, 1990, xix, 611 pp., ill., $55.00 (cloth), $18.95 (paperback).
Review Essay: John N. Wall, Transformations Of The World: Spenser, Herbert, Vaughan, Wilson G. Baroody
Review Essay: John N. Wall, Transformations Of The World: Spenser, Herbert, Vaughan, Wilson G. Baroody
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John N. Wall, Transformations of the Word: Spenser, Herbert, Vaughan, University of Georgia Press, 1988.
Review Essay: Gillian R. Evans, Alister E. Mcgrath, And Allan D. Galloway, The History Of Christian Theology, Vol. I: The Science Of Theology, Harry Rosenberg
Review Essay: Gillian R. Evans, Alister E. Mcgrath, And Allan D. Galloway, The History Of Christian Theology, Vol. I: The Science Of Theology, Harry Rosenberg
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Gillian R. Evans, Alister E. McGrath, and Allan D. Galloway, The History of Christian Theology, Vol. I: The Science of Theology, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1986.
Review Essay: Rowland Wymer, Suicide And Despair In The Jacobean Drama, William Mccarron
Review Essay: Rowland Wymer, Suicide And Despair In The Jacobean Drama, William Mccarron
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Rowland Wymer, Suicide and Despair in the Jacobean Drama, St. Martin's Press, 1986.
Review Essay: Marta Sordi, The Christians And The Roman Empire, Janine Marie Idziak
Review Essay: Marta Sordi, The Christians And The Roman Empire, Janine Marie Idziak
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Marta Sordi, The Christians and the Roman Empire, University of Oklahoma Press, 1986.
Adam's Dream: Fortune And The Tragedy Of The Chester 'Drapers Playe', George Ovitt Jr.
Adam's Dream: Fortune And The Tragedy Of The Chester 'Drapers Playe', George Ovitt Jr.
Quidditas
In glossing a passage from his translation of Boethius's De consolatione philosophiae, Chaucer provides a definition of tragedy which would have been familiar to any fourteenth-century reader and which, perhaps, still seems adequate to the twentieth-century reader: "What other thyng bywaylen the cryinges of tragedyes but oonly the dedes of Fortune, that this unwar strook overturneth the realmes of greet nobleye? (Glose. Tragedye is to seyn a dite of a prosperite for a tyme, that endeth in wrecchidnesse.)" The substance of this gloss is repeated in the 'Prologue' to the "Monk's Tale": "Tragedie is to seyn a certeyn storie, …
"Bishop Avitus Of Vienne And Teh Burgundian Kingdom, A. D. 494-518", Harry Rosenberg
"Bishop Avitus Of Vienne And Teh Burgundian Kingdom, A. D. 494-518", Harry Rosenberg
Quidditas
Late antiquity provides the matrix for the complex historical development of early medieval church-state relations. Old values and social structures were eroded and replaced by new ones in the Germanic kingdoms established within the fragments of the western Roman Empire.
Vegetable Love: Metamorphosis And Morality In Hesperides, Frances M. Malpezzi
Vegetable Love: Metamorphosis And Morality In Hesperides, Frances M. Malpezzi
Quidditas
Recent critics of Hesperides, less content than their predecessors with the plucking of but one of Herrick's golden apples, the examination of its beauty, and the savoring of its sweetness, have attempted the task of surveying the landscape of the entire garden, elucidating the pattern of its design, and identifying the various species of plants growing therein. The emphasis now is on seeing Hesperides as an integrated and thematically unified construct. The studies by Whitaker, Chambers, Deming, Rollin, and DeNeef are concerned with the ceremonial mode that pervades the poems in Hesperides. The consensus of these writers is …
"The Wyclyf" — Thrills And Dangers Of Editing A Medieval Text, Allen D. Breck
"The Wyclyf" — Thrills And Dangers Of Editing A Medieval Text, Allen D. Breck
Quidditas
In 1983 we shall be observing the six hundredth anniversary of the death of one of England's great contributors, along with William of Ockham and John Duns Scotus, to the thought, learning, and literature of the fourteenth century. John Wyclyf died at the comparatively advanced age oof sixty-four after two years' illness attendant upon a stroke, on St. Sylvester's day, December 31, 1384. He had been stricken a second time while hearing Mass said by his curate in his parish church at Lutterworth, some thirteen miles northeast of Coventry. We know nothing about his burial, save that in accordance with …
The Celestial Sign On Constantine's Shields At The Battle Of The Mulvian Bridge, Charles Odahl
The Celestial Sign On Constantine's Shields At The Battle Of The Mulvian Bridge, Charles Odahl
Quidditas
Most scholars now accept the reality and sincerity of Constantine's conversion to Christianity during his military campaign against Maxentius for control of Rome in A.D. 312—provided that "conversion" is understood in terms of the superstitious religious environment of the times. The ancient pagan and Christian sources that described the campaign all agreed that the war was waged in an atmosphere of intense religious fervor, even superstitiosa maleficia as one source described it, and that each commander appealed to divine power for aid against his enemy. Christian accounts of the campaign reported that Constantine turned to the Christian God at this …