Cluniac Studies

Du lendemain des guerres de Religion à la Révolution française, Menat, abbaye clunisienne depuis 1107, règne sur la vallée de la Sioule, au nord-ouest du diocèse de Clermont. Les religieux, propriétaires terriens, tissent des liens multiples et complexes avec leur entourage en levant des droits seigneuriaux, en fournissant du travail au petit peuple rural et en côtoyant quotidiennement les notaires, marchands et chirurgiens. Bien qu’ils ne participent qu’indirectement à l’encadrement des fidèles, les moines jouent un rôle moteur dans la vie religieuse grâce à la mise en place du clergé paroissial, à la pratique de la charité et de l’assistance et à leur rôle d’intercesseurs. Cette communauté monastique auvergnate constitue, jusqu’à sa suppression sous la Révolution, un rouage essentiel des structures économiques, sociales et religieuses d’un terroir français d’Ancien Régime.

From the end of the Wars of Religion to the French Revolution, Menat, a Clunisian abbey dating back to 1107, ruled over the Sioule valley, in the northwest region of the Clermont diocese. The monks were large landholders and developed a diversified and complex set of links with their neighbors ; they received seignorial rights, provided work to the rural poor, and were in daily contact with notaries public, merchants and surgeons. While they did not directly manage the religious life of the faithful, they did constitute a motive force in it through their setting up a parish clergy, providing alms and social services, and playing a role of intercessors. Down to the French Revolution, this monastic community of Auvergne constituted a key element of the economic, social and religious life of a local French territory under the Old Regime.

Klöster wirkten in die Welt. Der Band nimmt Phänomene in den Blick, in denen die Wirkmacht des klösterlichen Handelns zum Ausdruck kommt. Die Beiträge gehen der Frage nach, welche Möglichkeiten Nonnen und Mönche hatten, innovativ zu sein, und welche Grenzen ihnen hierbei gesetzt waren. Durch ihre Regeln und Verfahrensabläufe, durch spirituelle wie ökonomische Effizienz, aber auch durch die gestalterische Kraft des Einzelnen konnten sie nicht nur eine Potenz entwickeln, mit der sie die eigene Lebensform auf Dauer stellten, sondern sie waren ebenso in der Lage, innovatorisch über den eigenen Bereich hinaus zu wirken. Auf diese Weise waren Klöster und religiöse Orden über Jahrhunderte hinweg Wegbereiter gesellschaftlichen Wandels und vermochten es, das Leben in Europa und weit darüber hinaus nachhaltig zu prägen. Die vielfältigen klösterlichen Lebensformen erweisen sich ebenso als entscheidende Faktoren menschlicher Kultur wie als innovative Triebkräfte gesellschaftlicher Veränderungen.

- Klöster als Grundmodule menschlicher Kultur und innovative Triebkräfte gesellschaftlicher Veränderungen
- Welche Möglichkeiten hatten Mönche und Nonnen, innovativ zu wirken, und welche Grenzen waren Ihnen hierbei gesetzt?

Mit Beiträgen von Henryk Anzulewicz, Mirko Breitenstein, Julia Burkhardt, Michael Hänchen, Anette Kehnel, Martin Kintzinger, Volker Leppin, Gert Melville, Jens Röhrkasten, Regina Schiewer, Eva Schlotheuber, Jean-Claude Schmitt, Jörg Sonntag, Matthias M. Tischler, Stefan Weinfurter (+)

This is the presentation that I give within the course "Medeltidens Europa" at the University of Gothenburg. The 60-minute lecture (40+20 minutes) is followed by group work in which students try their hand in medieval source criticism and analysing artwork.

https://www.chbeck.de/breitenstein-benediktiner/product/27671842
Ora et labora – bete und arbeite! Das benediktinische Mönchtum hat mit der Verbindung von Askese und tätigem Leben die Kultur Europas geformt. Mirko Breitenstein schildert die Geschichte der Benediktiner von ihrem sagenumwobenen Gründer Benedikt von Nursia und seiner Ordensregel bis zur Gegenwart und macht deutlich, warum Lebensformen und Spiritualität der Benediktiner einen so nachhaltigen Einfluss auf Politik, Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft hatten.

Keywords: Hugh Capet; Robert II the Pious; Bertha of Burgundy; French royal government (early Eleventh century);  Odo I of Blois; Loire monasticism expansion bordering Parisian pagus; Melun siege (991); Montlhéry-Chevreuse lordship origins; Montmorency lordship origins; Montfort-l’Amaury lordship origins; Gometz lordship origins; Orsay battle (fl. 992); Ottonian empire and its relationship with western kingdoms of Burgundy and Francia; Onomastic enigma of the very first Simon; Dapifer title among the Nevers; Hodierna of Gometz and the Longpont cluniac priory; Dammartin county; Rochefort viscounty (Yvelines) ; Châteaufort (Yvelines) ; Broad-foot and Goose-foot Queen

Cette contribution s’attache à montrer comment les domaines clunisiens étaient administrés, à voir quelles institutions administratives ont été créées pour installer leur domination sur les terres et les hommes, à expliquer comment les moines ont adapté leur système domanial aux nouvelles exigences économiques de la fin du Moyen Âge.

I materiali ceramici
NADIA BOTALLA BUSCAGLIA

Lo studio dei reperti ceramici dell’ex priorato cluniacense di Castelletto Cervo ha consentito di inquadrare i circa 1400 frammenti rinvenuti che, nell’insieme, coprono un arco cronologico di circa dieci secoli a partire dal periodo precedente la fondazione priorale, sino alle più recenti fasi di occupazione del complesso. Pur nella permanente difficoltà di definire il panorama delle ceramiche in uso a ridosso dell’epoca della fondazione monastica sino a tutto il XIV secolo, è possibile, in linea generale, individuare due grandi insiemi ceramici ascrivibili rispettivamente a fine XIV-XVI secolo e al XIX secolo, per i quali risulta assai arduo, allo stato attuale delle conoscenze, precisare ulteriori scansioni interne anche a causa dell’elevata frammentarietà e dispersione stratigrafica dei reperti, dovute ad evidenti rimaneggiamenti avvenuti nel sito sin dall’epoca bassomedievale.
Nel presentare il materiale ceramico si è adottata una suddivisione per classe tecnologica, cercando di delineare all’interno di ogni gruppo gli aspetti funzionali e la scansione cronologica dei vari manufatti, inquadrandoli nel panorama delle conoscenze regionali e subregionali in cui la maggior parte delle produzioni si colloca, segnalando caratteri peculiari che potrebbero suggerire eventuali relazioni con altre manifatture.

parole chiave
Ceramica medievale, ceramiche rivestite, ceramiche graffite, Vercellese, priorato cluniacense

Pottery
NADIA BOTALLA BUSCAGLIA

The archaeological study of the pottery discovered in Castelletto Cervo’s former cluniac priory allowed to frame the 1400 fragments found that, overall, cover a period of about ten centuries from the period before the foundation of the priory, to the most recent stages of settlement of the complex. Despite the ongoing difficulties in defining the overview of pottery in use at the time of the monastic foundation until the end of the fourteenth century, it is possible, in principle, to identify two large ceramic sets attributable respectively at the end of the fourteenth-sixteenth century and the nineteenth century; for these groups it is very difficult, at the present state of knowledge, to specify additional internal scans. This difficulty is also due to the fragmentation and dispersion of stratigraphic findings, caused by natural and deliberated soil disturbance occurred at the site since the late medieval period.
The presentation of this study is organized by technological classes of pottery, trying to define within each group the functional aspects and the chronology of the various components, framing them in the environment of regional and sub regional knowledge about pottery productions, signaling peculiar characteristics that might suggest any relationship with other manufactures.


Medieval pottery, glazed pottery, “graffita” pottery, Vercellese, cluniac priory

"Odo of Cluny is best known for having served as the second abbot of Cluny (926-944), although he also has a reputation for his extant prose writings: a Vita of S. Gerald of Aurillac, an epitome of S. Gregory's Moralia in Job, a theological work based on further extracts from patristic exegesis, and five sermons. His poetry includes the verse preface to the Epitome moralium S. Gregorii in Job and a few hymns, but these short works are overshadowed in both length and complexity by the little-studied Occupatio.

Of the many ways in which the Occupatio could be studied profitably, I would like to focus upon the poem as an expression of Odo's monastic ideal; for the Occupatio deserves a place beside the two other major tenth-century sources of insight into Odo's monasticism, namely, his sermon on the feast of S. Benedict and John of Salerno's Vita Odonis. Although Odo left no written rule, the spirit of his monasticism survives in these three works."

Le informazioni di cui ancora oggi disponiamo sull'evoluzione della presenza umana e sul popolamento dei territori dell'alta Valsesia durante l'antichità e l'alto Medioevo sono scarsissime o quasi del tutto assenti ( 1 ). Sull'epoca remota in cui in quelle terre si videro le prime presenze di cacciatori e di pastori con i loro armenti possiamo soltanto avanzare vaghe ipotesi; così come incerte sono le nostre conoscenze riguardo alla fase in cui si diffuse con accresciuto vigore lo sfruttamento stagionale delle risorse boschive e dei pascoli dell'alta valle, dapprima in forma episodica e marginale, poi con sempre maggiore intensità fino alla creazione dei primi insediamenti stabili, che si ritiene possano risalire ai secoli centrali del Medioevo. Tali insediamenti -resi possibili anche dalla favorevole congiuntura climatica del cosiddetto optimum climatico medievale dei secoli X-XIII -erano però, ancora nei primi decenni del Duecento, limitati alle aree di fondovalle e non superavano i mille metri di altitudine. Al di sopra di tale quota esistevano soltanto insediamenti temporanei e alpeggi, spesso soltanto piccole radure strappate a prezzo di dure fatiche alla foresta, dove sorgevano i provvisori ripari per i pastori, e superfici di pascolo in cui il bestiame poteva essere condotto soltanto per poche settimane ogni anno nel pieno dell'estate: tra questi -non lontano dalle nevi del Monte Rosa, alla testata della val Grande, in alta Valsesia, e a ridosso del crinale che la separa dalla valle del Lys -l'alpe d'Otro.

This article presents an edition and translation of an unpublished 72-line Latin poem discovered at the end of an eleventh-century manuscript in the Médiathèque de l'Agglomeration troyenne in Troyes. The theme of the poem is the certainty of death and its author was almost certainly Bernard of Cluny, an author of satirical poems and a long "contemptus mundi" who flourished in the middle decades of the twelfth century. The meter of the poem is particularly interesting: the first 48 verses are written in the rare and difficult "tripertiti dactylici caudati," while the last 23 verses are written in leonine hexameter.

Mit dem Eintritt eines Menschen in ein Kloster geht nicht automatisch ein entsprechender Wandel in Persönlichkeit und Habitus einher. Religiöses Leben muß vielmehr im Kloster selbst erlernt werden. Im Zentrum der Untersuchung stehen Fragen nach den je spezifischen Konditionen der Auswahl und Aufnahme geeigneter Kandidaten sowie den verschiedenen Instrumentarien zur Unterweisung und Integration des Nachwuchses. Am Beispiel von Cluniazensern, Cisterziensern und Franziskanern wird dabei sowohl versucht, einen historischen Überblick der Probezeiten in den genannten Gemeinschaften zu gewinnen als auch den Begriff des Noviziates neu zu akzentuieren.

Raoul tortaire 1 , moine fleurisien et poète né à la fin du xi e siècle, a fait l'objet de relativement peu d'études; cela s'explique peut-être par le fait qu'il n'est pas le plus agréable des poètes. Il reste pourtant un excellent versificateur, et, en outre, l'abondance de son oeuvre fait de lui l'un des personnages du xii e siècle dont la vie soit le mieux documentée 2 . Les renseignements 1. Le présent article est issu, dans son principe, d'une étude réalisée dans le cadre d'une thèse pour le diplôme d'archiviste paléographe, Poétique de louange et d'éloge à Cluny au xii e siècle: édition critique des oeuvres poétiques complètes de Pierre le Vénérable et de Pierre de Poitiers, et du Mariale de Bernard de Morlas, 2 t., 2011, dactyl., t. I, pp. 29-37; résumé dans Ecole nationale des chartes, positions des thèses…, 2011, pp. 105-15. Madame anne-Marie turcan-verkerk a grandement contribué par ses relectures, ses remarques, ses conjectures aussi, à la publication de cet article: je ne saurais trop la remercier. 2. Le premier en date à s'être intéressé à Raoul tortaire est dom J. Mabillon, Annales Ordinis s. Benedicti, occidentalium monachorum patriarchae, in quibus non modo res monasticae sed etiam ecclesiasticae historiae non minima pars continetur, 6 t., 2 e éd., complétée par dom E. Martène, Lucca 1739-1745 [1 re éd. Paris 1703-1739], t. vI, pp. 383-4 (on trouvera en annexe ce passage, dans la mesure où il intéresse également l'établissement du texte des épitaphes de Raoul dont on va reparler); vient ensuite la notice de l'Histoire littéraire de la France, 2 e éd., 38 t., Paris 1865-1949, t. X, pp. 85-94, puis un important article d'E. de Certain, Raoul Tortaire, «Bibliothèque de l'Ecole des chartes» 16 (1855), pp. 489-521; ses conclusions sont reprises sans augmentation dans la préface à l'édition des oeuvres poétiques de Raoul tortaire, Rodulfi Tortarii Carmina, éd. M. B. ogle et d. M. Schullian, Rome 1933 (Papers and Monographs of the american academy in Rome 8), dans le commentaire des Lettres en vers de Raoul: Fr. Bar, Les épîtres latines de Raoul le Tourtier (1065?-1114?): étude de sources, la légende d'Ami et Amile, Paris 1937, et dans la notice de M. Manitius, Geschichte der lateinischen Literatur des Mittelalters, 3 t., Munich 1911-1931, t. III, «vom ausbruch des Kirchenstreites bis zum Ende «Filologia mediolatina» XX (2013)

Since Piers Plowman occupies a central place in the study of medieval English literature, much attention has been paid to the vexed question of the poem's authorship. This justified interest in revealing the human agent behind the family of interrelated versions of the poem, usually named A, B, and C, continues to feed a vibrant industry of speculative scholarship on the person behind the poem. This article reassesses the relevance of the 'Langland' myth for the contemporary reception of the poem, and argues that medieval audiences of the B Version associated the work with a 'Long Will' author-persona. In this context, the case of a previously unnoticed Norfolk poacher in the weeks leading up to the 1381 rising, a William Longewille, and his encroachment on the estate of the former sheriff and tax collector Richard Holdych echo the Ploughing of the Half-Acre in Piers Plowman, in particular as it is presented in the B Version of the poem. As a result, this article proposes that both the A and B Versions of the poem may have been available to (some of) the rebels of 1381, and that the B Version may have circulated in Norfolk along Cluniac and Benedictine networks before and after the unrest.

Este trabajo pretende revisar las más recientes investigaciones académicas sobre la sátira latina del siglo XI llamada Garcineida, a fin de determinar su origen, autoría y credibilidad. El análisis de esta obra, así como de otras fuentes primarias y secundarias, nos lleva a dos interesantes conclusiones. Primero, a rechazar la teoría de un origen alemán y apreciar lo plausible de un origen hispánico cluniacense. En segundo lugar, planteamos la existencia de hechos que contrarían la imagen de Urbano II como un reformador inmaculado y permiten constatar que, a pesar de su virulencia, la susodicha sátira se basaba en una realidad.

Cette contribution s'intéresse à un des principaux auxiliaires des moines de Cluny : le prévôt. Agent laïc au service des moines, cette fonction nous est plus familière en raison d'une documentation plus abondante. Au tournant du XIIe siècle, le premier d'entre eux est connu des études clunisiennes pour ses démêlées avec la communauté monastique.

Un document, transmis par une copie de Louis Henri Lambert de Barive, permet de connaître le train de vie d’un de ces agents domaniaux au XIIIe siècle. Cet aspect sera ici étudié à travers l’analyse d’un testament nuncupatif daté de 1273 et rassemblant les dernières volontés du prévôt de Chevignes.

Silence and Sign Language in Medieval Monasticism explores the rationales for religious silence in early medieval abbeys and the use of nonverbal forms of communication among monks when rules of silence forbade them from speaking. After examining the spiritual benefits of personal silence as a form of protection against the perils of sinful discourse in early monastic thought, this work shows how the monks of the Abbey of Cluny (founded in 910 in Burgundy) were the first to employ a silent language of meaning-specific hand signs that allowed them to convey precise information without recourse to spoken words. Scott Bruce discusses the linguistic character of the Cluniac sign language, its central role in the training of novices, the precautions taken to prevent its abuse, and the widespread adoption of this custom in other abbeys throughout Europe, which resulted in the creation of regionally specific idioms of this silent language.

En este trabajo se examinan, comentando o revisando, las siguientes publicaciones: Noticia breve acerca de la restauración de un monumento funerario militar en Britania. Continúo en esta entrega la serie iniciada en AQVILA LEGIONIS 1, 2001, 85-112, donde reviso o simplemente informo de inscrip-ciones militares que, a mi juicio, tienen particular interés. En esta ocasión comento textos relativos al exercitus hispanicus (ya sean documentos militares de Hispania o de hispanos) [items 1-3]. Concluyo con una nota de distinto signo, de carácter informativo y museístico, referida a un extraordinario monumento militar funerario romano de Colchester, el retrato ecuestre-funerario del duplicarius Longinus Sdapeze, en Colchester.

Sie war 68 Jahre alt, so schien es, und sah dem Tod entgegen; im Laufe des Winters 998/999 unternahm Adelheid von Burgund ihre letzte Reise, und dieses religiös wie politisch motivierte, auch mit Blick auf die Memoria eingeschlagene Itinerar führte sie noch einmal in die Gebiete ihrer Kindheit. Adelheid war eine der bedeutendsten Frauen des 10. Jahrhunderts: Tochter eines Königsdes Rudolfingers Rudolf II. -, consors regni als Gemahlin Ottos I., coimperatrix augusta zu Zeiten ihres Sohnes Otto II. sowie omnium regnorum materden Erinnerungen und der Korrespondenz Gerberts von Aurillac zufolge. 2 Sie stand für eine besonders ruhmreiche Verbindungslinie zwischen dem rudolfingischen Königshaus und dem ottonischen Reich, war sie doch zugleich die Tante eines in Schwierigkeiten geratenen Königs -Rudolf III. von Burgundund die verehrte Grossmutter eines ganz aussergewöhnlichen Kaisers, Otto III. 3 In dieser doppelten Rolle kehrte sie nach vielen Jahren an die 1 Der Studie geht auf einen Vortrag zurück, der am 8. Dezember 2012 unter dem Titel «L'impératrice Adélaïde et le royaume de Bourgogne» beim Deutsch-französischen Forschungsatelier «Junge Mediävistik I» an der Albert-Ludwigs-Universität (Freiburg i. Br.) gehalten und von Jessika Nowak ins Deutsche übertragen wurde. 2 «Omnium regnorum mater»: Gerbert d'Aurillac, Correspondance, ed. Pierre Riché, Jean-Pierre Callu, Bd. I, Paris 1993, Brief 74, S. 180-182 (aus dem Jahr 986) und Brief 128, S. 304-306 (aus dem Jahr 988). In einer Urkunde Kaiser Ottos II. aus dem Jahr 974 wird Adelheid als « coimperatrix augusta necnon imperii regnorumque consors» bezeichnet (Diplomata regum et imperatorum Germaniae, II: Ottonis II. et III. diplomata [MGH DD O II/DD O III], Hannover 1893, II/1, D 76, S. 92).

In The Context of the Aisles of the Abbey Church at Cluny, C. Edson Armi examines the construction, structure, and design of the ruined aisles of the abbey church at Cluny, the largest Christian basilica in the eleventh century. The empirical study of a peripheral part of the mother church of the Cluniac Order reveals new information about the context of creation, the synthesis of masonry traditions, and the originality of architectural ideas at the abbey.

En este artículo el autor estudia la afinidad de la liturgia romano-diocesana del obispado de Segovia con la tradición litúrgica de Cluny a través del oficio de Todos los Santos y de las fuentes manuscritas conservadas en la Catedral de la ciudad castellana.

This article examines the ways in which the customary of Cluny was used in monastic communities of the southern Low Countries. Through an examination of an unpublished and little-known letter concerning liturgical practices that is preserved in a copy of the customary from the monastery of Saint-Trond, it argues that there was no single use for the customary among monastic communities in the southern Low Countries. Rather, it was a flexible document whose use was dictated more by the local context in which it was deployed and the goals and traditions of particular communities. The letter and the manuscript it contains reveals two possible such uses for the customary: it could operate as an instrument of monastic authority or serve as an inspirational text for Benedictine identity.

Perdita femina: the queen or one mistress?

It’s a fact that the epistles of the pope Gregory VII, addressed to his legacy Richard of St. Victor, to the abbot of Cluny Hugo and to the king Alfonso VI of León and Castile, dated June 27, 1080, got lots of ink. In the one that the pope sent to the king, intimate him to separate from a «woman of perdition», without mentioning his name. Historians over time made several attempts to identify the female in question, without reaching a consensus. In this paper we analyze how the facts are moving in the plot of the documental data and in the texture of the historical inferences, in order to produce a hypothetical reconstruction of the events, deduced by indirect information.

Ce livre analyse les crimes commis à l’intérieur des monastères médiévaux (violences, homicides ou encore vols) et la manière dont les religieux criminels étaient corrigés tant par les abbés, les évêques, les chapitres généraux des ordres religieux que par les organes de la curie romaine. Il compare, à l’échelle de l’Europe, les établissements de moines, chanoines réguliers et moniales, qu’ils appartiennent à un ordre (Cluny, Cîteaux, Prémontré, Grande Chartreuse) ou à une nébuleuse moins définie sur le plan juridique (abbayes et prieurés de moines bénédictins ou de chanoines réguliers). En explorant le fonctionnement de la justice claustrale, les peines prescrites ainsi que les mécanismes de réconciliation des criminels, l’ouvrage éclaire sous un angle nouveau les processus de construction institutionnelle et de réforme des ordres religieux entre les XIIe et XVe siècles.

La haine entre les religieux emprunte dans le cloître les mêmes codes que chez les laïcs : les religieux refusent de se parler ou de se côtoyer, recourent aux injures et parfois à la violence. Comme les laïcs, les religieux investissent le champ judiciaire pour régler leur conflit. Cependant, contrairement aux sources laïques où le mot « haine » est constant, les occurrences d’odium ou d’inimicitia restent rares dans la documentation interne. Les autorités ecclésiastiques manient l’art de la litote, préférant évoquer le manque de charité. En effet, la haine n’est pas une émotion sociale légitime, qui contribuerait à organiser la société en réseaux de solidarité antagonistes, permettant à chacun des protagonistes de mesurer son capital social. Elle est inadmissible car elle ronge les liens de charité et provoque la destruction de l’idéal régulier.

This paper takes a bottom-up look at Cluniac integration in the decades on either side of the year 1100 in order to explore the diverse institutional, contextual, and personal dynamics at play. Taking as its case study the French diocese of Saintes, it charts the transformation of the ecclesia Cluniacensis, the impact on relations with monastic houses in the region, and the response by diverse stakeholders. It reveals that local groups of monks and their patrons actively participated in the then-ongoing integration of monastic administration, facilitating the exchange of personnel and know-how. But they also expected these processes to be subject to negotiation and compromise: and when the Cluniacs challenged these expectations the destabilizing effect on Saintes society was profound. As such, this study helps to adjust a former narrative that contrasted the Cluniacs' reform of monastic administration in this period with the resistant attitude of individual communities and their local patrons.