Leeds: Monday

[aryanhwy]

So I took notes during most of the sessions I went to; this is the first time I've tried taking notes on a laptop rather than by hand, and I actually found it rather difficult. I don't really have the time or energy right now (woke up with a cold on Saturday which has progressed to the point where I feel like my brain is dripping out through my nose) to do much editing, so I'm just going to post the notes as I took them -- sorry they won't make that much sense. But it was an interesting experiment nonetheless, and I'll try it again at other conferences.


Heresies and Rhetorics, John H. Arnold

Benedict of Agivnon's theology from 1261, 2,000 chapters, not very sophisticated, not an educated writer, said to be almost immediately superceded by Aquinas's theology.

Benedict, a Benedictine monk, became abbot in 1215, 1229: bishop of Marseille, participated in Albigensian crusade, went on Crusade in 1240s, which is when he first conceived of writing the theology. died 1268, a Franciscan.

First-hand experience with heretics -- Albigensians, Muslims, Jews in Marseille. View of heretics involving negotiation rather than just conflict.

In the last two decades, approaches to heresy have taken a "rhetorical" turn. Understand rhetoric as not just language, but a synthesis of secular debating practices, and Christian textual "deconstruction".

There's an assumption that heresy has a "heretical discourse", which is uniform and universal. This is because when we study heresiology, we look for similarities, and when we find them, we emphasize them. If instead we look at the context of heretical ascriptions, the culture they're situated in, and their specifics, we get a plural, rhetorical view.

The same form, lexicon, and rhetorical habits can be used for wholly different reasons. Cf. 17th C treatise on "how to recognize Catholics" which uses the rhetorical techniques of heresiology, but in fact may be an instruction booklet of "how to be a Catholic" hidden in a handbook of heresy.

Benedict's theology follows the pattern of rejecting error, but the errors he considers are not specifically associated with some heresy. Rather, he follows the creed, and explores *every* possible error. Essentially, he's working within orthodoxy, rather than against heresy. It's not a polemic or a debate. Instead, it's intended to "strengthen the faithful in their faith". He looks at both Christian and pre-Christian heresy. Again this differs from other 13th C texts, which focus just on contemporary heresy. The next time you see something like benedict's is from the mid-14th C.

Real and imagined debates were a big part of late antique heresiology. The rhetorical stance assumes that the opponent, the heretic, have ideas, not immediately stupid, and is able to argue/think.

Benedict's tractatus has three distinct indices. This is unusual. With the indices and the table of contents, and also an "executive summary" at the end, is intended to make the book commonly usable. The summary also contains references to the relevant bibilical passages.

But one 15th C MS copy does not contain the summary, even though its toc says it will. Some other later MSs have a reduced form (21 chapters) of the entire tract, which shows that the "useful" bits were in fact reused. Grabmann found 17 MSs, someone else found another 2, and the present speaker has found 13 more, of both the full and the reduced tract. 2-3 early versions, the other 28 are late-14th or 15th C. Produced around the time of the Council of Constance. However, it appears to have been contemporarily unnoticed; in the decades after its publishing, no one mentioned it. But other contemporary works on heresy also have similarly small circulation/little mention. In the 12th-13th C, the popular books on heresy were from late antiquity; 9th and 10th C copies of Augustine were still in use in the 13th C. Few contemporary works on heresy were widely circulated. They became widely circulated in later centuries.

1. Heresy is not univocal. Tone, form, imagined audience, and context is all important.

2. Hereseological texts work in a culture of debate and discussion.

3. Types of others: the "decaffienated" other; others who are a long way off in time and space; etc. The self/other division is not a coherent distinction nor the only one used in heresiological contexts.

Between Christian and Jew: Orthodoxy, Violence, and Living Together in Medieval England, Jeffrey J. Cohen

Geraldus Cambrensis was writing in a context where Jews and Christians were living together. He tells a story of a Jew who parodizes the healing powers of St. Frideswinde in Oxford. The Jew in effect asks "how can a saint who died 500 years ago have any effect today?", a question that probably many Christians privately asked. Christians were fascinated by Jewish incredulity. Jews by their very presence were a question of Christian legitimacy. Thus, "Jew" or "Jew of Unbelief" could be used as a label for any heretic. The Jew is an intrusive into modernity of the past.

But this isn't really the case: Jews were not ostracized/separated. Until 1290, Christians and Jews lived in the same urban spaces. What is the story of the "real" Jew, what is the story of the real cohabitation of Christians and Jews? Gerald has a story where the servants of a Christian family are Jewish, showing one way that there was the interrelation/connection between Christians and Jews.

Matthew of Paris's story about Hugh of Lincoln, child martyr who was tortured by Jews. Supersession: the Jews are solely anachronisms.

ohn Mandeville's Travels is able to render promiscuous, nudist, communist cannibals in a sympathetic way, but is unable to find anything good to say about the Jews. He says that Jews learn Hebrew so that they can speak to the Jews in the Caspian Mountains, who will eventually escape from their prison there and will come to take over Christendom. This intolerance attitude is significantly more hostile than ordinary views towards Jews. Is there more to Mandeville's story than this? Is it more than just a paranoid fantasy? Before the 1290 expulsion, the Jews were "polychronic"; they were both the characters from the Bible, but they were also contemporary. Mandeville's view of Jews is "explosive".

Mockery, Murder, and Apocalyptic Mayhem. But the three stories show much more mundane relationships between Christians and Jews. Gerald's family has Jewish servants; Hugh's mother seeks him at the neighboring Jewish house because he went there to play with his friend. Matthew offers a hybrid space where Jews and Christians can mingle with friendliness. Mandeville's story provides no glimpse of friendship -- does it? Is it more than just a Christian fantasy? Maybe it's a Jewish fantasy? The Jewish anger, not just the 'bad Jew'. Does it say something about how Jewish living among Christians affects Jewish identity and development? A story where modernity ends. Borrowing from Christian crusades, the idea of a messiah coming and freeing the Jews who march on Christendom. The liberating, vengeance-bringing Messiah-King was influenced by crusader Kings, but crusader Kings/the view of Messiah fighting against Antichrist, were influenced by the Jewish view.

There's more to the story than vengeance and hostility: the desire that the present reflect the past and that the future does not constrain us to repeat the present.

Luminescence Dating of Medieval Essex Brick, Thomas Gurling

Essex has a large number of important historic brick structures. Brick was used xtensively by the romans. Saxons generally reuse roman materials. Brick production seems to have vanished with the departure of the Romans.

Indigenous bricks first appear in the 12th C, e.g., Coggeshall Abbey, a Cistercian abbey. These medieval bricks are called "great bricks": 30cx15cmx5cm. Used 12t-13th C.

13th-14th C: Felmish cream bricks, often used in ecclesiastical settings.

15th-16th C: red Tudor bricks. Flemish and Tudor bricks have modern dimensions (length twice height twice width). Used in churchs and manors.

Optical Luminescence Science: how reliable is it? Nether Hall: heraldry, dendochronology, and other features date it to 1440s-1460s. The mean dates of three bricks from Nether Hall are from 1455.

Great Bricks thought to originate in Coggeshall in the mid-late 12th C. But Bradwell-juxta-Coggeshall, c.1125-1150, has great brick!

Coggeshall OSL: 1144 +/- 58
Bradwell OSL: 1038 +/- 60

So, we have reuse of great bricks: the 12th C should be seen as a terminus ante quem.

There are other pre-12th C brick examples: Boreham, an 11th C, Saxon church.

Tudor brick: many Essex sites with it. Brick became fashionable in 15th-16th C.
Terracotta -- introduced in early 16th C. Earliest: 1510-1540s (lack of Italian craftsman after split from Rome). Quite often older buildings were dismantled and reused, along with newer material. 66% of results suggest re-use of brick. Reflection of need for speed and economy. Mark of high status -- need for quick production.

The Origin of Ceramic Building Materials for the Early Medieval Church at Chipping Ongar, Essex, Sophie Blain

The church at Chipping Ongar, first mentioned in 1043-5, in the will of Thurston.

One hypothesis is that the bricks at Chipping Ongar were re-used Roman material. Nearby churches in Essex (colchester, Canterbury), almost all late anglo-Saxon churchs reused Roman brick. Broken bricks also are evidence of reuse.

Bricks at Chipping Ongar: 380x190x38, unlike any other known type of bricks in Essex. Are these Roman? Or later?

OSL (Optically Stimulated Luminesence), dates the last firing of the material, usually via quartz. Principle: Radioactivity, continuous and constant. The grains absorb and store an amount which is destroyed at 400 degrees.

4 bricks from 3 locations were taken as samples. The average is around 1066. This is the first brick from this period in England known. Related to late Anglo-Saxon floor tiles? Or, related to 9th/10th C French brick making?

Fragmentary state of bricks, not necessarily used immediately after production.IIt would make sense if these were imported because of the Norman architecture of the church, and also its dedication to St Martin of Tours.

Connections to the roles of Cistercians.

Roof Tile and Brick in Medieval York, Sandra Garside-Neville

Brick and tile is very regional in nature, in size and form. Focus: brick and tile in artifacts, rather than in buildings. What things are common in York brick and tile?

1) Thin, not red like roman bricks, oxidized. Occasionally glazed. Sanding on the inside (odd).

3) 10th-century contexts; perhaps intrusive material? More frequent in 11th C. this particular kind was very unusual, curved.

4) Related to pre-conquest tiles such as #4? high status sites.

5) cross of four lozenges, voided. A varity of patterns.

Re-hydroxilation: new dating technique for buried ceremics.

6) curved & flanged tiles, in continental forms -- these are medieval.

7) (another pic of 6), these are smaller than Roman ones, done in a lot of different fabrics. Tiles are rarely glazed.

8) shows how the curved tiles can fit together. Originally from Sussex, dated around 1100, but more often from late 12th/early 13th C. Many c&f tiles in Coppergate, from the late 12th c.

9) More curved & flange. Usually used in high status buildings. found in London, Scarborough, Southampton. Not always identified because it's often mixed up with Roman.

10) + 11) can be rough in fabric, 300mm x 190mm x 15mm. Edward VII stipulates size of 207 x 160 x 20. So the Yorkshire brick is pretty big. Yorkshire roof tiles cost more than southern ones.

12) often with surface marks. Tile with baby's footprint.

13) wolf's paw print!

14) nibbed tiles. Usually one nib, but sometimes more than one. Found only in a few sites in York, perhaps used in patching. Probably not from York.

16) Ridged roof tiles: regional. rarely glazed.

18) Reconstructed roof at Barley hall; nice embattled/ridged tiles.

20) Other uses for roof tiles: hearths.

21) glazed tiles around the edge. Flat bricks around the hearth tiles.

22) heavy sanding on the edges and base of typical York bricks. Top surface often hand-smoothed. 260x130x50mm -- quite big.

23) Another use for brick: spits and roof furniture. Particular example, stamped with seals. 14th-15th C

Changing the Name, Altering the Spelling: Anglo-Saxons in the 10th Century Reich, Andreas Bihrer

C/K difference in names.

c. 900, poem in Latin, for future king Athelstan, interpreting Athelstan as 'noble stone'. The person's fate is bound in his name, and his name can indicate future events in his life.

Names of many people can be found in Libri Vitae, often these are foreigners from very far away. These names were included to oblige the future readers to pray for these people.

Early Middle Ages: names had immence importance, creating and consolidating relationships. Connections both historical and future. There are few examples of variation or renaming from the early period. When we have examples of alteration from this period, then they are of great interest. What was the signal/statement being made when a name was changed?

Encounters with other ethnic groups can induce alteration of names. 10th-11th c Saxons in the Reich: temporary and permanent contacts (messengers, clerics, wives, etc.). New scopes for the use of names, hence new scope for potential change. But even in these situations, names remained stable, except for some variation of spelling. Quite often, the Anglo-Saxons born names similar to the original Saxons. Immigrants, though, named their children contintental Germanic names.

First form of name variation: Modification of spelling
Usually only slightly meaning, resulting from lack of standardized orthography.
Adaption of a name from one language to another.

Example: Cenweald, died 950s, bishop, sometimes spelled his name with K- and sometimes with C-. Charters he produced himself spelled his name with the K-, a continental Saxon spelling as opposed to an A-S form. In external charters, the C- form was more common.

Example: English monk Leofsige (sp?), lived in Trier. Two spellings: when abbot of Metlach, OHG principles of Latinization, when he was at another place, he used A-S principles of Latinization. He was trying to dissociate himself from Metlach.

Second form of name variation: Name change
Perhaps more frequently than we know, esp. if it happened when the bearer was young.
Use of baptismal names were limited to a local area, and not used continuously there, but only rarely.

Example: Change of names of queens. Gunnhild, daughter of Cnut, = emp. Henry III. Name changed from Gunnhild to Cunigunde at consecration. Used to express a status change. Cunigunde = Henry II, end of the previous dynasty, had saint-like recognition. Gunnhild's name change was an identity change. The change was only partly recognized in the outside world, and since she died young, her original name came to be the primary one.

Example: King Harald, survivor of 1066, went to Saxony and then to Jerusalem. Changed his name to Christian, and returned to England, incognito.

Conclusions: extraordinary stability. Self-perception, social affiliation, and salvation depended on the consistency of Christian names. Change in name was generally done intentionally and with connection to a programmatic message. But often those changes did not 'stick'.

The Name of the Father, [I don't remember the name of the speaker; it was a late addition so her name isn't in the programme]

Illegitimate children.

Children bore the sins of the parents; even if the parents didn't know that their marriage was not ecclesiastically acceptable, their children forfeited their inheritance. Illegitimacy: problem of mobility throughout various social stratuses. 1448 (Basl): many people lived out of wedlock, including men with other men's wives, and vice versa. Cohabitation and adultery were identified. With children born out of wedlock, it was generally the father who was most involved. Paternity was generally not questioned. It was publically announced at baptism. This could also be done by solemn oath. Many fathers took illegitimate children into their household, and gave them their surnames. The father had more influence on the names than the mother. Fathers could also designate illegitimate children as heirs above their wives. Fathers and sons sharing a name are found in both trade occupations and clerical occupations.

It's easier to give your illegitimate children your name than your money/possessions!

Reconstructing Narrative Identity Without Narrative Sources, Christof Rolker

Good narratives, sources for identities, such as autobiographies, are rare. (a) identities are culturally constructed, (b) this construction is communication and communicative. Identity is built up out of the stories that people share. People construct identities by locating themselves in a set of stories. We have better numbers for sources of cultural identity, fewer for personal identity. Since we don't have many good sources for personal identity, what else can we use to discover info about medieval personal identity? Look at signs: names, coats of arms, seals, notary signs, trademarks, badges, signatures, etc. But these need to be able to identify the change in identity in people. Argument: the signs are not just signs of previously existing epiphenomena, but are also media for changes of phenomena.

The signs follow different rules: names are universal. Notarial signs are more restricted, as are signatures, and are generally written. Trademarks are found in many different media. All of these are signs of self.

Surnames of two groups:
(1) French/A-N nobility in 11th C: Both men and women used their surnames as if they were titles, i.e., they were used in official situations.

German towns 15thC: Lineages done by collecting people with the same surname, and not by "real" relationships. If the persons shared a surname, they must have some type of relationship. Women would take their husband's surname, but would continue to use their maiden name after marriage. Tax role from Konstanz: Most female taxpayers were designated with given name & surname, with fewer by just given name or just byname, and even fewer with no name, but just a relationship to a man.

Tax rolls 1418-1570: full name most common in the middle of the 16th . But by the 16th C, women were primarily by their relationship to men.

Surnames were used as a criteria for kinship much later than the development of surnames itself. Surnames had less effect on kinship constructs in the 11th C than in the 15th C.

I don't have notes from this session, since it's the one I chaired. It had three pretty disparate papers, and a pretty small audience (we did have a larger audience than we had number of speakers -- by one!)

Place Names of Fife vols. 1 and 2
Richard Brinkley's Obligationes
Place Names of the Isle of Wight
Russian Illuminated Manuscripts
English Inn and Tavern Names
Dictionary of Lincolnshire Place-Names
Dictionary of County Durham Place-Names
Dictionary of Lake District Place-Names
Alien Communities in London
A Commodity of Good Names
Dictionary of Manx Place-Names
Dictionary of Leicester and Rutland Place-Names
Names, Places, and People
Rashdall's Histories of the Universities of Europe vols. 2 and 3
Dictionary of Welsh Place-Names

Monday evening was the medieval feast, which I attended with Stephen and Karin. It was yummylicious as expected, but what was unexpected was the asparagus. Now, I don't like asparagus. At all. But I like medieval food enough that I'm willing to try pretty much anything. So I tried the asparagus -- small, young stalks that were rolled in flour, fried, and then sprinkled with coarse pepper and salt. OMG delicious. I would definitely have asparagus again if it was made like this!

Afterwards the three of us went to the St. Andrews Institute of Medieval Studies reception, since Stephen is from there, and then we went to the Brill reception, since I wanted to touch bases with one of the Brill editors. There I ran into Ellie, whom I'd met at the Anselm conference in April. She and I and Karin ended up finishing the night at the Bodington Bar, which was fun but starting a conference with a late night in a pub isn't exactly the best way to ensure optimal functioning for the rest of the week! :)

Comments

[xrian.livejournal.com]

Example: King Harald, survivor of 1066, went to Saxony and then to Jerusalem. Changed his name to Christian, and returned to England, incognito.

I don't think I've heard this story before. Do you remember more?

[aryanhwy.livejournal.com]

That's about all I got. But I too found the story interesting, and if there's two of us, I'll see about emailing the speaker for more details.