Medieval Studies Commons^™

A Fourteenth-Century Augustinian Approach To The Jews In Riccoldo Da Monte Croce’S Ad Nationes Orientales, Lydia M. Walker

Comparative Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

A Penitent Prepares: Affect, Contrition, And Tears, Christopher B. Swift

Publications and Research

This essay draws upon a poetic and devotional texts from late medieval Spain to show how public displays of emotion (weeping, in particular) during penitential processions could be learned and prepared for in advance.

Mythology In The Middle Ages: Heroic Tales Of Monsters, Magic, And Might, Christopher R. Fee

Gettysburg College Faculty Books

Myths of gods, legends of battles, and folktales of magic abound in the heroic narratives of the Middle Ages. Mythology in the Middle Ages: Heroic Tales of Monsters, Magic, and Might describes how Medieval heroes were developed from a variety of source materials: Early pagan gods become euhemerized through a Christian lens, and an older epic heroic sensibility was exchanged for a Christian typological and figural representation of saints. Most startlingly, the faces of Christian martyrs were refracted through a heroic lens in the battles between Christian standard-bearers and their opponents, who were at times explicitly described in demonic terms. …

The Prince And The Prostitute: Competing Sovereignties In 14th Century Milan, Martina Saltamacchia

Medieval/Renaissance Studies Faculty Publications

On the morning of November 27, 1401, a brief confrontation took place at a countryside road just outside Milan. A small but intent group of delegates from the Fabbrica del Duomo, the institution in charge of the building and maintenance of the Cathedral of Milan, met Prince Gian Galeazzo Visconti right outside his castle, as he was riding toward the city.1 The angry ambassadors complained to the prince about his latest interference in the governance of the Fabbrica: a letter ordering it to re-hire Jean Mignot, the French architect whom the Council of the Cathedral had fired a month before. …

Lutheran Christian Hebraism In The Time Of Solomon Glassius (1593-1656), Stephen G. Burnett

Department of Classics and Religious Studies: Faculty Publications

Lutheran Hebrew scholarship in the era of Orthodoxy has suffered the same kind of scholarly neglect as theology from this period. A few Hebraists such as Wilhelm Schickard or Wolfgang Ratke have been the subjects of monographs or collections of articles, while others receive mention in university histories or books related to Jewish-Christian relations in early modern Germany. Only within the past decade have scholars addressed this facet of Reformation-era Christian Hebraism. Johann Anselm Steiger examined the use that Johann Gerhard and Solomon Glassius made of post-biblical Jewish literature, while Kenneth G. Appold has stressed the pivotal role that Hebrew …

In Memoriam Karl Heinz Göller (May 13, 1924 - April 22, 2009), Richard Utz

Medieval Institute Affiliated Faculty & Staff Publications

Eulogy on academic teacher, adviser, and mentor; founding dean of the College of Languages and Literatures at the University of Regensburg, Germany; and founder and honorary president of the German Medieval Academy (Mediävistenverband).

Minhag And Migration: A Yiddish Custom Book From Venice, 1553, Lucia Raspe

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

This presentation focuses on a Yiddish book of customs written in Venice in the mid-sixteenth century, which describes synagogue and home observances over the course of the Jewish year. Comparing MS Oxford Can. Or. 12 to the fifteenth-century Hebrew custumal it is based on (MS Frankfurt hebr. oct. 227), the presentation will discuss the efforts of Ashkenazic émigrés to northern Italy trying to preserve their identity in the face of a Jewish world suddenly become complex.

This presentation is for the following text(s):

• Book of Customs (MS Frankfurt hebr. oct. 227)
• Book of Customs (MS Oxford Can. Or. 12)

Ladies, Whores, And Holy Women: A Sourcebook In Courtly, Religious, And Urban Cultures Of Late Medieval Germany, Ann Marie Rasmussen, Sarah Westphal-Wihl

TEAMS Medieval German Texts in Bilingual Editions

This sourcebook presents editions and translations of seven fourteenth- and fifteenth-century texts that advance our understanding of gender, sexuality, and class in the late medieval German-speaking world. Three of the translated texts are fiction. Additionally, there is a religious treatise, a religious legend, an inventory of books, and a legal document. While each of these texts is instructive in and of itself, they gain in complexity when brought into dialogue with one another.

The Cistercian Studies Conference, 2010, The Institute Of Cistercian Studies

Conference on Cistercian Studies Programs

Program for the 2010 Cistercian Studies Conference at Western Michigan University in conjunction with the International Medieval Studies Congress. This conference was a celebration of the 1110-1178 life of Aelred of Rievaulx. This conference happened between May 13-16.

45th International Congress On Medieval Studies, Medieval Institute, Western Michigan University

International Congress on Medieval Studies Archive

The printed program of the 45th International Congress on Medieval Studies (May 13-16, 2010), including the Corrigenda.

In Praise Of The Saints: Introducing Medieval Hagiography Into The British Literature Survey, John P. Sexton

English Faculty Publications

Despite increased interest in hagiographic writing among scholars of early literature in the last few decades, serious study of saints’ lives in the undergraduate classroom remains rare. To some degree, this is a result of poor representation in the leading anthologies,^[1]but another contributing factor has been the perception of a distinction between hagiographic and other medieval writing it terms of genre or of literary value. Such distinctions, however, are modern inventions, and do not accurately reflect the medieval reader or writer’s view. Nor is the inclusion of the literature alongside the expected “great works” difficult or jarring; a …

Borrowing In Context : The Importance And Artistic Implications Of Chaucer's Use Of Sources In The Merchant's Tale, Austin Taylor Mcintire

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

In this thesis, I consider the implications of Chaucer not only as a man of his age but also as a poet who made deliberate decisions to borrow, imitate, and adapt the work of others, specifically in the context of The Merchant’s Tale. Chapter I of this thesis establishes the significance of the medieval understanding of auctor and auctoritas during the medieval literary period and, furthermore, examines Chaucer’s artistic output both during his career as a court poet and following his removal to Kent in an attempt to reach a clearer understanding of Chaucer’s use of source material when composing …

Medieval Synagogues In The Mediterranean Region, Samuel D. Gruber

Religion - All Scholarship

Throughout the Middle Ages, the synagogue developed as the central identifying institution and physical building for Jews, replacing the still yearned for but increasingly distant Jerusalem Temple as the focus of Jewish identity. Equally important, the synagogue became the symbol par excellance of the Jews and their community for the Christian (or Muslim) majority populations in the countries where Jews were settled. For Christians, the synagogue was a Jewish church, but much more so, it came to symbolize in opposition all that the church represented.

Though relatively little known today, medieval synagogues were not symbolic abstractions to the men and …

John Of Cermenate, Martina Saltamacchia

Medieval/Renaissance Studies Faculty Publications

John of Cermenate ca 1280-1344. Town chronicler and notary. Author of Historia Iohannis de Cermenate notarii Mediolanensis in Latin prose, completed ca. 1322.

Stefanandro Of Vimercate, Martina Saltamacchia

Medieval/Renaissance Studies Faculty Publications

Stefanardo da Vimercate [Stephanus de Mediolano] ca 1230(?)-1298. Town chronicler and Dominican lecturer of Theology.

The Pencil, The Pin, The Table, The Bowl And The Wheel, Valerie Allen

Publications and Research

The commodity created under global capitalism originates from everywhere and seems to have been made by everyone. Endlessly fungible, it is also endlessly divisible. Analysis of the commodity reveals the indissoluble link between commodification and technologization. Although the medieval commodity is a very different kind of object, not issuing from an economy dedicated to commodity production, and being produced more regionally, the link between production and technology applies to the Middle Ages as much as it does to now. Medieval technology, in particular road-building, is commonly regarded as a regression in comparison to Roman engineering skills. I argue, however, for …