Dreams, Visions, and Spiritual Authority in Merovingian Gaul

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Publisher : Cornell University Press
ISBN 13 : 0801474671
Total Pages : 279 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (14 download)

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Book Synopsis Dreams, Visions, and Spiritual Authority in Merovingian Gaul by : Isabel Moreira

Download or read book Dreams, Visions, and Spiritual Authority in Merovingian Gaul written by Isabel Moreira and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2002-02-15 with total page 279 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In early medieval Europe, dreams and visions were believed to reveal divine information about Christian life and the hereafter. No consensus existed, however, as to whether all Christians, or only a spiritual elite, were entitled to have a relationship of this sort with the supernatural. Drawing on a rich variety of sources—histories, hagiographies, ascetic literature, and records of dreams at saints' shrines—Isabel Moreira provides insight into a society struggling to understand and negotiate its religious visions. Moreira analyzes changing attitudes toward dreams and visionary experiences beginning in late antiquity, when the church hierarchy considered lay dreamers a threat to its claims of spiritual authority. Moreira describes how, over the course of the Merovingian period, the clergy came to accept the visions of ordinary folk—peasants, women, and children—as authentic. Dream literature and accounts of visionary experiences infiltrated all aspects of medieval culture by the eighth century, and the dreams of ordinary Christians became central to the clergy's pastoral concerns. Written in clear and inviting prose, this book enables readers to understand how the clerics of Merovingian Gaul allowed a Christian culture of dreaming to develop and flourish without compromising the religious orthodoxy of the community or the primacy of their own authority.

Bishops and the Politics of Patronage in Merovingian Gaul

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Publisher : Cornell University Press
ISBN 13 : 1501739328
Total Pages : 220 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (17 download)

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Book Synopsis Bishops and the Politics of Patronage in Merovingian Gaul by : Gregory I. Halfond

Download or read book Bishops and the Politics of Patronage in Merovingian Gaul written by Gregory I. Halfond and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2019-09-15 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Following the dissolution of the Western Roman Empire, local Christian leaders were confronted with the problem of how to conceptualize and administer their regional churches. As Gregory Halfond shows, the bishops of post-Roman Gaul oversaw a transformation in the relationship between church and state. He shows that by constituting themselves as a corporate body, the Gallic episcopate was able to wield significant political influence on local, regional, and kingdom-wide scales. Gallo-Frankish bishops were conscious of their corporate membership in an exclusive order, the rights and responsibilities of which were consistently being redefined and subsequently expressed through liturgy, dress, physical space, preaching, and association with cults of sanctity. But as Halfond demonstrates, individual bishops, motivated by the promise of royal patronage to provide various forms of service to the court, often struggled, sometimes unsuccessfully, to balance their competing loyalties. However, even the resulting conflicts between individual bishops did not, he shows, fundamentally undermine the Gallo-Frankish episcopate's corporate identity or integrity. Ultimately, Halfond provides a far more subtle and sophisticated understanding of church-state relations across the early medieval period.

The World of Gregory of Tours

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Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004473815
Total Pages : 468 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (44 download)

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Book Synopsis The World of Gregory of Tours by : Mitchell

Download or read book The World of Gregory of Tours written by Mitchell and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2021-10-01 with total page 468 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In a fascinating series of essays, the life, works and world of Gregory of Tours are evaluated. This sixth-century bishop is probably best known as writer of the History of the Franks. The collection of essays makes a valuable contribution to the flourishing field of Gregory of Tours studies. Though the contributors take full account of his political dimension, they also see Gregory in his cultural context. In addition to being representative of the age in which he lived, Gregory is presented here as an exceptional man. Furthermore, the contributors offer an up-to-date assessment of Merovingian culture, history and religion. Themes include: the urban history of Tours and the Merovingian world; ideas, politics and international contacts in the Merovingian world; the Merovingian church; Gregory's hagiographic writings; the Histories; and the manuscript tradition. Contributors include: Bernard S. Bachrach, Peter Brown, John J. Contreni, S. Fanning, Nancy Gauthier, Walter Goffart, Guy Halsall, Yitzak Hen, Conrad Leyser, Felice Lifshitz, Jo Ann McNamara, Kathleen Mitchell, William Monroe, Janet L. Nelson, Giselle de Nie, Thomas F.X. Noble, Patrick Périn, Walther Pohl, E.M. Rose, B.H. Rosenwein, Danuta Shanzer, Julia M.H. Smith, Ian Wood, andBarbara Yorke.

A Companion to Gregory of Tours

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Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004307001
Total Pages : 685 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (43 download)

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Book Synopsis A Companion to Gregory of Tours by : Alexander C. Murray

Download or read book A Companion to Gregory of Tours written by Alexander C. Murray and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2015-11-16 with total page 685 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Gregory, bishop of Tours (573-594), was among the most prolific writers of his age and uniquely managed to cover the genres of history, hagiography, and ecclesiastical instruction. He not only wrote about events (of the secular, spiritual, and even natural variety) but about himself as an actor and witness. Though his work (especially the Histories) has been recycled and studied for centuries, our grasp of an even basic understanding of it, never mind Gregory’s significance in the history of the late antique West, has hardly yet attained a definitive perspective. A Companion to Gregory of Tours brings together fourteen scholars who provide an expert guide to interpreting his works, his period, and his legacy in religious and historical studies. Contributors are: Pascale Bourgain, Roger Collins, John J. Contreni, Stefan Esders, Martin Heinzelmann, Yitzhak Hen, John K. Kitchen, Simon Loseby, Alexander Callander Murray, Patrick Périn, Joachim Pizarro, Helmut Reimitz, Michael Roberts, Richard Shaw.

The Bishop of Rome in Late Antiquity

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Publisher : Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
ISBN 13 : 1472455517
Total Pages : 287 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (724 download)

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Book Synopsis The Bishop of Rome in Late Antiquity by : Revd Dr Geoffrey D. Dunn

Download or read book The Bishop of Rome in Late Antiquity written by Revd Dr Geoffrey D. Dunn and published by Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.. This book was released on 2015-05-28 with total page 287 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The essays in this volume examine the bishop of Rome in late antiquity from the time of Constantine in the fourth century to the death of Gregory the Great in the seventh. The volume canvasses a wide range of opinions about the nature of papal power by concentrating on how the holders of the office exercised their episcopal responsibilities and prerogatives within the city or in relation to both civic administration and churches in other areas.

Cultures of Eschatology

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Publisher : Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN 13 : 3110593580
Total Pages : 1181 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (15 download)

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Book Synopsis Cultures of Eschatology by : Veronika Wieser

Download or read book Cultures of Eschatology written by Veronika Wieser and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2020-07-20 with total page 1181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In all religions, in the medieval West as in the East, ideas about the past, the present and the future were shaped by expectations related to the End. The volumes Cultures of Eschatology explore the many ways apocalyptic thought and visions of the end intersected with the development of pre-modern religio-political communities, with social changes and with the emergence of new intellectual and literary traditions. The two volumes present a wide variety of case studies from the early Christian communities of Antiquity, through the times of the Islamic invasion and the Crusades and up to modern receptions, from the Latin West to the Byzantine Empire, from South Yemen to the Hidden Lands of Tibetan Buddhism. Examining apocalypticism, messianism and eschatology in medieval Christian, Islamic, Hindu and Buddhist communities, the contributions paint a multi-faceted picture of End-Time scenarios and provide their readers with a broad array of source material from different historical contexts. The first volume, Empires and Scriptural Authorities, examines the formation of literary and visual apocalyptic traditions, and the role they played as vehicles for defining a community’s religious and political enemies. The second volume, Time, Death and Afterlife, focuses on key topics of eschatology: death, judgment, afterlife and the perception of time and its end. It also analyses modern readings and interpretations of eschatological concepts.

The Rhetoric of Free Speech in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1107038138
Total Pages : 291 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (7 download)

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Book Synopsis The Rhetoric of Free Speech in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages by : Irene van Renswoude

Download or read book The Rhetoric of Free Speech in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages written by Irene van Renswoude and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019-09-26 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Analyses the rhetoric of dissidents, outsiders and truth-tellers to challenge preconceptions about free speech and political criticism in the early Middle Ages.

Negotiating Space

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Publisher : Cornell University Press
ISBN 13 : 1501718681
Total Pages : 292 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (17 download)

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Book Synopsis Negotiating Space by : Barbara H. Rosenwein

Download or read book Negotiating Space written by Barbara H. Rosenwein and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2018-10-18 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why did early medieval kings declare certain properties to be immune from the judicial and fiscal encroachments of their own agents? Did weakness compel them to prohibit their agents from entering these properties, as historians have traditionally believed? In a richly detailed book that will be greeted as a landmark addition to the literature on the Middle Ages, Barbara H. Rosenwein argues that immunities were markers of power. By placing restraints on themselves and their agents, kings demonstrated their authority, affirmed their status, and manipulated the boundaries of sacred space.Rosenwein transforms our understanding of an institution central to the political and social dynamics of medieval Europe. She reveals how immunities were used by kings and other leaders to forge alliances with the noble families and monastic centers that were central to their power. Generally viewed as unchanging juridical instruments, immunities as they appear here are as fluid and diverse as the disparate social and political conflicts that they at once embody and seek to defuse. Their legacy reverberates in the modern world, where liberal institutions, with their emphasis on state restraint, clash with others that encourage governmental intrusion. The protections against unreasonable searches and seizures provided by English common law and the U.S. Constitution developed in part out of the medieval experience of immunities and the institutions that were elaborated to breach them.

The Mediterranean Diaspora in Late Antiquity

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 019022228X
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (92 download)

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Book Synopsis The Mediterranean Diaspora in Late Antiquity by : Ross Shepard Kraemer

Download or read book The Mediterranean Diaspora in Late Antiquity written by Ross Shepard Kraemer and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-01-21 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Mediterranean Diaspora in Late Antiquity examines the fate of Jews living in the Mediterranean Jewish diaspora after the Roman emperor Constantine threw his patronage to the emerging orthodox (Nicene) Christian churches. By the fifth century, much of the rich material evidence for Greek and Latin-speaking Jews in the diaspora diminishes sharply. Ross Shepard Kraemer argues that this increasing absence of evidence is evidence of increasing absence of Jews themselves. Literary sources, late antique Roman laws, and archaeological remains illuminate how Christian bishops and emperors used a variety of tactics to coerce Jews into conversion: violence, threats of violence, deprivation of various legal rights, exclusion from imperial employment, and others. Unlike other non-orthodox Christians, Jews who resisted conversion were reluctantly tolerated, perhaps because of beliefs that Christ's return required their conversion. In response to these pressures, Jews leveraged political and social networks for legal protection, retaliated with their own acts of violence, and sometimes became Christians. Some may have emigrated to regions where imperial laws were more laxly enforced, or which were under control of non-orthodox (Arian) Christians. Increasingly, they embraced forms of Jewish practice that constructed tighter social boundaries around them. The Mediterranean Diaspora in Late Antiquity concludes that by the beginning of the seventh century, the orthodox Christianization of the Roman Empire had cost diaspora Jews--and all non-orthodox persons, including Christians--dearly.

Dreams, Visions, Imaginations

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Publisher : Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN 13 : 3110714744
Total Pages : 556 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (17 download)

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Book Synopsis Dreams, Visions, Imaginations by : Jens Schröter

Download or read book Dreams, Visions, Imaginations written by Jens Schröter and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2021-02-08 with total page 556 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The contributions in this volume are focused on the historical origins, religious provenance, and social function of ancient Jewish and Christian apocalyptic literature, including so-called ‘Gnostic’ writings. Although it is disputed whether there was a genre of ‘apocalyptic literature,’ it is obvious that numerous texts from ancient Judaism, early Christianity, and other religious milieus share a specific view of history and the world to come. Many of these writings are presented in form of a heavenly (divine) revelation, mediated through an otherworldly figure (like an angel) to an elected human being who discloses this revelation to his recipients in written form. In different strands of early Judaism, ancient Christianity as well as in Gnosticism, Manichaeism, and Islam, apocalyptic writings played an important role from early on and were produced also in later centuries. One of the most characteristic features of these texts is their specific interpretation of history, based on the knowledge about the upper, divine realm and the world to come. Against this background the volume deals with a wide range of apocalyptic texts from different periods and various religious backgrounds.

The Merovingians

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Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000530698
Total Pages : 390 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

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Book Synopsis The Merovingians by : Alexander Callander Murray

Download or read book The Merovingians written by Alexander Callander Murray and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-05-17 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The studies collected here cover a period of about 33 years, from 1986 to 2019, and represent a sustained effort to understand the institutions of the Merovingian kingdom and its history. There has long been a predisposition to cast the Merovingian period in the dark colours of barbarism or to treat it with reference to personal relationships and archaic institutions. The present volume, instead, recognizes the Merovingian world not as an archaic, primitive intrusion on the Mediterranean civilization of the Roman Empire but simply as a participant in the wider commonwealth that existed before and remained after the dissolution of the western imperial system; in so doing, it serves to refute the scholarly tendency to primitivize Merovingian governance, its underlying institutions, and the broader culture upon which these rested. The collection is divided into four parts. Part I considers the question of whether Merovingian kingship should be viewed as a species of archaic, ‘sacral’ kingship. Part II, on institutions, has chapters that deal with various offices (the grafio and centenarius), public institutions (especially immunity and public security), and the broader makeup of the Merovingian state system. Part III, on charters, procedure, and law, has chapters on the profile of the charter evidence as now presented in the new MGH edition of the Merovingian diplomas and one on particular procedures before the royal tribunal, mistakenly referred to in scholarship as ‘fictitious’ trials; a final chapter provides a reflection on, and basic guide to, the law in general of the successor kingdoms, with an eye to the evidence of Merovingian Gaul. Part IV, a slight change of pace, deals with historiography, both the modern variety (Reinhard Wenskus) and the Merovingian (Gregory of Tours). All chapters deal extensively with the historiography of their subjects. This book will appeal to students and scholars alike interested in Early Medieval European history, Merovingian history, Early Medieval law and society, Early Medieval historiography, and the influence of Merovingian law and governance on later centuries. (CS 1104).

Society and Culture in Late Antique Gaul

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Publisher : Taylor & Francis
ISBN 13 : 135189921X
Total Pages : 343 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (518 download)

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Book Synopsis Society and Culture in Late Antique Gaul by : Ralph Mathisen

Download or read book Society and Culture in Late Antique Gaul written by Ralph Mathisen and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-07-05 with total page 343 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Late Roman Gaul is often seen either from a classical Roman perspective as an imperial province in decay and under constant threat from barbarian invasion or settlement, or from the medieval one, as the cradle of modern France and Germany. Standard texts and "moments" have emerged and been canonized in the scholarship on the period, be it Gaul aflame in 407 or the much-disputed baptism of Clovis in 496/508. This volume avoids such stereotypes. It brings together state-of-the-art work in archaeology, literary, social, and religious history, philology, philosophy, epigraphy, and numismatics not only to examine under-used and new sources for the period, but also critically to reexamine a few of the old standards. This will provide a fresh view of various more unusual aspects of late Roman Gaul, and also, it is hoped, serve as a model for ways of interpreting the late Roman sources for other areas, times, and contexts.

Rituals of Power

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Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004477551
Total Pages : 515 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (44 download)

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Book Synopsis Rituals of Power by : Frans Theuws

Download or read book Rituals of Power written by Frans Theuws and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2021-10-01 with total page 515 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 13 papers by 16 leading archaeologists and historians of late antiquity and the early middle ages break new ground in their discussion, analysis and criticism of present interpretations of early medieval rituals and their material correlates. Some deal with rituals relating to death, life cycles and the circulation in other contexts of objects otherwise used in the burial ritual. Others are concerned with the symbolism and ideology of royal power, the formation of a political ideology east of the Rhine from the mid-5th century onwards, and penance rituals in relation to Carolingian episcopal discourse on ecclesiastical power and morale. All deal with the creation of new identities, cultures, norms and values, and their expression in new rituals and ideas from the period of the Great Migrations through the Later Roman Empire down to the society of Beowulf and the later Carolingians.

Creative Selection between Emending and Forming Medieval Memory

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Publisher : Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN 13 : 3110757303
Total Pages : 284 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (17 download)

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Book Synopsis Creative Selection between Emending and Forming Medieval Memory by : Sebastian Scholz

Download or read book Creative Selection between Emending and Forming Medieval Memory written by Sebastian Scholz and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2021-11-08 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Karl Valentin once asked: "How can it be that only as much happens as fits into the newspaper the next day?" He focussed on the problem that information of the past has to be organised, arranged and above all: selected and put into form in order to be perceived as a whole. In this sense, the process of selection must be seen as the fundamental moment – the “Urszene” – of making History. This book shows selection as highly creative act. With the richness of early medieval material it can be demonstrated that creative selection was omnipresent and took place even in unexpected text genres. The book demonstrates the variety how premodern authors dealt with "unimportant", unpleasant or unwanted past. It provides a general overview for regions and text genres in early medieval Europe.

Resetting the Origins of Christianity

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1009290495
Total Pages : 419 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (92 download)

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Book Synopsis Resetting the Origins of Christianity by : Markus Vinzent

Download or read book Resetting the Origins of Christianity written by Markus Vinzent and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2023-01-12 with total page 419 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do we know what we know about the origins of the Christian religion? Neither its founder, nor the Apostles, nor Paul left any written accounts of their movement. The witnesses' testimonies were transmitted via successive generations of copyists and historians, with the oldest surviving fragments dating to the second and third centuries - that is, to well after Jesus' death. In this innovative and important book, Markus Vinzent interrogates standard interpretations of Christian origins handed down over the centuries. He scrutinizes - in reverse order - the earliest recorded sources from the sixth to the second century, showing how the works of Greek and Latin writers reveal a good deal more about their own times and preoccupations than they do about early Christianity. In so doing, the author boldly challenges understandings of one of the most momentous social and religious movements in history, as well as its reception over time and place.

Amalasuintha

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Publisher : University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN 13 : 0812294343
Total Pages : 308 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (122 download)

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Book Synopsis Amalasuintha by : Massimiliano Vitiello

Download or read book Amalasuintha written by Massimiliano Vitiello and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2017-09-26 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, Massimiliano Vitiello situates the life and career of the Ostrogothic queen Amalasuintha (c. 494/5-535), daughter of Theoderic the Great, in the context of the transitional time, after the fall of Rome, during which new dynastic regimes were experimenting with various forms of political legitimation. A member of the Gothic elite raised in the Romanized palace of Ravenna, Amalasuintha married her father's chosen successor and was set to become a traditional Gothic queen—a helpmate and advisor to her husband, the Visigothic prince Eutharic—with no formal political role of her own. But her early widowhood and the subsequent death of her father threw her into a position unprecedented in the Gothic world: a regent mother who assumed control of the government. During her regency, Amalasuintha clashed with a conservative Gothic aristocracy who resisted her leadership, garnered support among her Roman and pro-Roman subjects, defended Italy from the ambitions of other kings, and negotiated the expansionistic designs of Justinian and Theodora. When her son died unexpectedly at a young age, she undertook her most dangerous political enterprise: forming an unmarried coregency with her cousin, Theodahad, whom she raised to the throne. His final betrayal would cost Amalasuintha her rule and her life. Vitiello argues that Amalasuintha's story reveals a key phase in the transformation of queenship in late antiquity and the early Middle Ages, a time in which royal women slowly began exercising political power. Assessing the ancient sources for Amalasuintha's biography, Cassiodorus, Procopius, Gregory of Tours, and Jordanes, Vitiello demonstrates the ways in which her life and public image show the influence of late Roman and Byzantine imperial models on the formation of female political power in the post-Roman world.

The Humblest Sparrow

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Publisher : University of Michigan Press
ISBN 13 : 0472025201
Total Pages : 607 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (72 download)

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Book Synopsis The Humblest Sparrow by : Michael Roberts

Download or read book The Humblest Sparrow written by Michael Roberts and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2010-02-09 with total page 607 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Humblest Sparrow, Michael Roberts illuminates the poetry of the sixth-century bishop and poet Venantius Fortunatus. Often regarded as an important transitional figure, Fortunatus wrote poetry that is seen to bridge the late classical and earlier medieval periods. Written in Latin, his poems combined the influences of classical Latin poets with a medieval tone, giving him a special place in literary history. Yet while interest has been growing in the early Merovingian period, and while the writing of Fortunatus' patron Gregory of Tours has been well studied, Fortunatus himself has often been neglected. This neglect is remedied by this in-depth study, which will appeal to scholars of late antique, early Christian, and medieval Latin poetry. Roberts divides Fortunatus' poetry into three main groups: poetry of praise, hagiographical poetry, and personal poetry. In addition to providing a general survey, Roberts discusses in detail many individual poems and proposes a number of theses on the nature, function, relation to social and linguistic context, and survival of Fortunatus' poetry, as well as the image of the poet created by his work. Jacket illustration: L. Alma Tadema, Venantius Fortunatus Reading his Poems to Radegonda VI AD 555. (Courtesy of Dordrecht, Dordrechts Museum.)