Zusammenfassungen der Beiträge in englischer Sprache

doi:10.1515/fmst-2022-0013

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Zusammenfassungen der Beiträge in englischer Sprache

Published/Copyright: October 29, 2022

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From the journal Frühmittelalterliche Studien Volume 56 Issue 1

Marco Cristini, The Letters of Gregory the Great and Cassiodorus’ ‘Variae’, S. 1–14

The authorship of the letters included within the ‘Registrum’ of Gregory the Great has been a matter of scholarly debate for decades, since it is unclear whether the pope left all administrative documents to his secretaries, writing only personal letters by himself, or if he drafted the whole of his correspondence himself. A study of the occurrences of eleven expressions attested only or almost only in the letters of Cassiodorus and Gregory can contribute to a better understanding of both the circulation of the ‘Variae’ in sixth-century Italy and the authorship of the letters included within the ‘Registrum’. Those who wrote Gregory’s correspondence in all likelihood used the ‘Variae’ as a model, closely imitating a few sentences, which are present in both letter collections within similar documents. Moreover, these expressions are not evenly distributed throughout the ‘Registrum’, but occur mostly ( or solely ) in letters written in a short time-span and addressed to a single recipient or group of recipients. It is therefore possible to identify at least two different secretaries who drafted a few administrative letters on behalf of the pope, as well as to show that the ‘Variae’ circulated in the Lateran chancery during the papacy of Gregory the Great.

Till Stüber, Die ‚Scintillae de canonibus uel ordinationibus episcoporum‘. Eine kleine Kanonessammlung aus der Merowingerzeit, S. 15–47

This paper takes a close look at a short canonistic compilation from Merovingian Gaul, which has almost been completely neglected by modern scholarship. Aside from a thorough analysis of the canonistic sources and their arrangement within the collection, the present study provides a critical edition as well as a German translation. The compilation, figuring as ‘Scintillae de canonibus uel ordinationibus episcoporum’ in the extant manuscripts, combines five fourth-century conciliar decrees with a Frankish canon from the sixth century. The selected canons deal with conditions for episcopal ordinations and demand the deposition of bishops whose ordinations were deemed uncanonical. The author also laid special emphasis on the rights of metropolitans. The deliberate selection of canonistic material and the reworking of the original texts make it quite obvious that this canon law collection was not the product of scholarly pastime, but was assembled to serve a specific purpose. It will be argued that the ‘Scintillae de canonibus’ were written with regards to a contested episcopal ordination in the 560s, having taken place in the town of Saintes, nowadays southern France. We can infer from this that the author skilfully made use of late antique canonistic sources in order to create a novel compilation that perfectly fitted his needs.

Carl I. Hammer, Piety and Nepotism at Early-Carolingian Freising. Archbishop Arn, Bishops Hitto and Erchanbert and the Deed of 758, S. 49–63

The important Carolingian churchman, Archbishop Arn of Salzburg, first occurs in a 758 Freising deed where he was professed by his father, Haholt, and his unnamed mother at a Freising proprietary monastery, Isen. In that deed, Haholt also conveyed property at Bittlbach to Freising on the condition that it be granted to his son, Arn, for life. Although the deed was subsequently copied by the Freising monk Cozroh for his great Freising cartulary composed from 824 under Bishop Hitto, it was never entered into the cartulary and survives as a separate sheet bound at the beginning of the modern codex. This article explores the descent of both the document itself and the conveyance at Bittlbach. With the agreement of Archbishop Arn, of Bishop Hitto, and of Hitto’s nephew and successor, Bishop Erchanbert, the property continued in the possession of Haholt’s family for two more generations. The transmission of the deed of 758 and the property at Bittlbach witness to the familial solidarity exercised by Bishops Hitto and Erchanbert with their kin, both male and female, which was reciprocated and found full expression in the extraordinary memorial entry which Erchanbert created for the Reichenau Liber memorialis. This evidence suggests, moreover, that Arn and Hitto were related and may explain Hitto’s sudden elevation as bishop at Freising in 811, where he was assiduous in implementing the reform program promoted by Archbishop Arn.

Takuro Tsuda, Die sogenannten Kapitularien und ihre Archivierung in der Karolingerzeit, S. 65–95

The so-called ‘capitularies’ of the Carolingian period have recently undergone a major reevaluation, as it has been pointed out that such a document type may not have existed in the Carolingian period. In order to promote such a new view, this paper examines information related to court archives appearing in texts that have been regarded as ‘capitularies’. A special feature of this paper is that it focuses on the changes in practice in each period. As a result of the analysis, it became clear that there were no attempts to systematically archive and disseminate capitularies during the period of Charlemagne and Louis the Pious, and that all the cases that previous studies have considered as such correspond to special cases that apply to individual texts only. On the other hand, under the reign of Charles the Bald, such attempts were detected, partly due to the influence of the Ansegis collection. It was also pointed out that Charles probably believed that his predecessors had undertaken attempts to archive and disseminate capitularies. This, however, was a false conclusion stemming from his use of the Ansegis collection. In other words, while Charles the Bald seems to have thought that he was following the practices of Charlemagne and Louis the Pious, these practices in fact changed fundamentally under Charles.

Andrea Colli, Eternity and Prophetic Cognition. A Note on Paschasius Radbertus’ Understanding of ‘Philosophiae Consolatio’ V, 6, S. 97–107

Boethius’ definition of eternity as “to embrace and possess at once the whole fullness of unending life” is a cornerstone of medieval discussions on the different duration modes. The first quotations of this notorious definition lie in the writings of the Carolingian scholar Paschasius Radbertus ( 8^th–9^th centuries ). In contrast to the following usages, Paschasius provides a very suggestive understanding of the Boethian eternity, by assuming the possibility that the divine eternal act of knowing described in ‘Philosophiae Consolatio’, V, 6 may also be associated with prophetic cognition. The present study aims to explore this atypical interpretation which seems to make certain humans similar to God, revolutionizing the patristic image of prophet.

Roland Zingg, Das ‚Breviarium Erchanberti‘ – der Beginn der St. Galler Historiographie? Analyse, Edition und Übersetzung, S. 109–149

The anonymous source known as ‘Breviarium Erchanberti’ or ‘Breviarium regum Francorum’ gives us a brief account of political events from the 5^th century to 826. As Bernhard von Simson showed in the late 19^th century, the part covering the years from 840 to 881 is a continuation written by the Saint-Gall monk Notker the Stammerer ( probably in 881 ) which has attracted more attention than the ‘Breviarium Erchanberti’ itself. The original text does not form an entity but consists of three parts: the oldest one ( 613–727 ) was probably written about 800 and ends together with its main source, the ‘Liber historiae Francorum’. In 826 a first continuation ( 727/741–826 ) was added, focussing on Pippin’s promotion to the throne. Sometime in the following decades ( probably before 881 ) a ‘prequel’ ( 5^th century–584/613 ) was composed, focussing on Clovis and his baptism. While the whole source apparently originated in the Alemannic/Swabian area, it has been questionable so far where exactly the ‘Breviarium’ ( or its parts ) had been written. But the evidence of manuscript tradition, palaeography, codicology and the availability of the sources used quite clearly points to Saint-Gall. Thus, the ‘Breviarium Erchanberti’ is the oldest surviving historiographical text from that monastery. Even if its literary quality by far does not reach the level of Notker’s or Ratpert’s works in the late 9^th century, it is a very important witness of how their predecessors tried to deal not only with the past of their monastery but also with history in a broader context.

Colin Arnaud, Überlegungen zur frühmittelalterlichen Textilproduktion als Frauenarbeit anhand der Hubenlisten des Lorscher Codex und anderer Polyptycha, S. 151–187

The general assumption that textile production has been exclusively female work during the early Middle Ages, and that the women of peasants were specifically engaged in this process, is verified here through the rereading of several polyptychs and rentals from Northern France and Western Germany dated between the 9^th and the 12^th centuries. Most rents or labour services related to textile production mentioned in the propriety registers related to the farms as a whole, not only to women. The great majority of the cases of an explicit link between textile production and female work concerned specific categories of women, mostly groups of unfree women directly attached to the demesne and without tenure, like in the urbarium from Prüm. The propriety registers of Lorsch Abbey in the middle Rhine valley show a regional specialisation of certain farms in textile production: in those regions, textile production required a large workforce that probably exceeded the female one. Moreover, the same sources reveal that the monetarisation of textile work or product rents between the 9^th and the 12^th centuries was not linear: the assumption of a male monetarised and commercial textile production replacing the early female domestic textile labour seems too simplistic here.

Maya Maskarinec, Annulling Inherited Contracts. Legal Possibilities and Strategies at Early Medieval Italian Monasteries ( Taf. I–V, Abb. 1–6 ), S. 189–216

This paper considers a recurrent ‘problem’ for abbots in early medieval Italy: contracts made by their predecessors that abbots deemed unfavorable to their monasteries. I use this as a case study for exploring the legal possibilities and choices made by abbots at early medieval Italian monasteries. The first two parts present two texts and some of their manuscript contexts that offered different ‘solutions’ to this problem: ( 1 ) Lothar’s ‘Capitulare Olonnense ecclesiasticum primum’ ( 825 ), Ch. 10: De praecariis; and ( 2 ) Otto III’s ‘Capitulare Ticinense’ ( 998 ). The third part examines one of the strategies pursued by Farfa’s abbot Hugo ( 998–1039 ) in attempting to annul contracts made by his predecessors, namely alleging that procedural irregularities in drawing up a charter ( according to Roman law ) rendered the document invalid. The fourth part considers an excerpt of Justinian’s code ( CJ 7.38.2 ) included in a 9^th/10^th-century north Italian manuscript ( Walters MS. PC.2 ) preserved ( and perhaps written ) at the monastery of Nonantola. In sum I suggest that monastics took a proactive legal approach to annulling contracts of their predecessors: by excerpting and commissioning relevant imperial legislation and by creatively mobilizing existing legal principles as innovative ‘solutions’.

Dieter von der Nahmer, Vom Götterstammbaum zur Familie der Könige, S. 217–256

When examining the origins and interconnections of early medieval nobility, as Gerd Tellenbach and his school did, the question arises to which ancestors rulers referred at the time. Fragmentary records attest, in all likelihood, to divine genealogy of the pagan dynasties of Anglo-Saxon and Frankish kings after a territorial conquest. This was rejected by Clovis through baptism. The christianised Anglo-Saxons made Wotan a descendant of Abraham. Later generations acted differently: the Carolingians cited a saint ( Arnulf ), the Ottonians their earliest Christian ancestors, founders of monasteries and collectors of relics. The Hohenstaufen ( Staufer ) created their dynasty of kings, which included even childless rulers as ancestors. Lothair of Supplinburg was passed over by them. Henry the Lion did not cite Welf ancestors, but rather the same Lothair. The Welfs stopped using the name Welf. Henry did not make an imperial claim, particularly not in the miniature in the Gospels of Henry the Lion. The meaning formulated by the inscriptions is only realised when the codex is closed.

Marieke Neuburg, Heilige Frauen ergreifen Partei II. Nivelles – Trier – Aquileia. Die Verbreitung der ‚Vita Geretrudis B‘, S. 257–324

As was shown in the first part of this paper, the ‘Vita Geretrudis B’ is not a Carolingian, but an 11^th-century version of the life of Nivelles’ first abbess. The second part is focusing on the spread of the ‘Vita B’, which can be found in several monasteries in Trier since shortly after its composition in Nivelles. However, the Trier witness does not focus on Gertrud of Nivelles, but on the Trier abbess Modesta of Oeren who only appears in the miracles of Saint Gertrud, which were as widely spread as the vita itself. Due to the events in 11^th-century Trier, in many cases they do no longer show up as the miracles of Saint Gertrud, but as ‘Vita sanctae Modestae’. These renamed miracles of Saint Gertrud are a precious source for 11^th-century Trier and perfectly fit into the complicated situation during the mid- and late 11^th century when the archbishops of Trier were seeking control over many monasteries in and around the town of Trier. This religious-political impetus is reflected in the renamed miracles of Saint Gertrud and the way they took from Trier up to Aquileia.

Simon Groth, Mediävistische Wissenschaftsgeschichte. Eine Bestandsaufnahme, S. 325–374

Reflecting on one’s own approach represents an integral part of a critical historical science that takes epistemological conditions into account. A large number of corresponding publications have also focused on medieval studies – especially in the two decades since the turn of the millennium. Since, in contrast to the history of historiography, there is no appropriate research report, the present contribution seeks to offer a concentrated cross-section ( as a preliminary survey without claim to comprehensiveness ) of the scattered results in three steps, which may serve as a starting point for further research. First, a brief study of the relevant terminology is required. To separate it from various other terminologies in the history of science, it is advisable to connote the history of medieval studies as mediävistische Wissenschaftsgeschichte. The most significant works on this topic are then summarised by organising them into three groups based on their main perspective. The focus initially lies on the books that can be assigned to the narrower field of ‘historiographic history’, i. e. the historicising of the historiography about the medieval period. In addition, some structures and institutions of medieval research have already been considered in the past, and the life and works of selected exponents of medieval research have been examined. The article ends with a summary, including the mention of some desiderata.

Martin Kintzinger, Knowledge History of the Middle Ages. Discussions and Perspectives, S. 375–394

The article gives an overall view of the development and recent focus of international historical research on the history of knowledge. It might be read as a short introduction not only to the history of a specific field of research, but as well to the methodological improvement coming from digital networking in the humanities for international cooperations. In detail the use of a specific terminology and the understanding of knowledge in the Middle Ages is described in order to show how knowledge has been defined in Medieval societies and in how far modern history of knowledge is in fact dealing with the same subject as Medieval contemporaries did. Therefore, different recent traditions of research, European as well as non-European, are analysed and the intention is to summarise the recent state of research on the history of knowledge to encourage further studies on premodern history of schooling, universities, learned cultures and the use of knowledge.

Published Online: 2022-10-29

Published in Print: 2022-10-04

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