Eleventh-Century Germany Research Articles

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do: Dissolving Royal and Noble Marriages in Eleventh-Century Germany*

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do: Dissolving Royal and Noble Marriages in Eleventh-Century Germany*

Book Review: Ecclesiastical Reform in Eleventh-Century Germany: John Eldevik, Episcopal Power and Ecclesiastical Reform in the German Empire: Tithes, Lordship, and Community, 950–1150

Book Review: Ecclesiastical Reform in Eleventh-Century Germany: John Eldevik, <i>Episcopal Power and Ecclesiastical Reform in the German Empire: Tithes, Lordship, and Community, 950–1150</i>

History and Politics in Late Carolingian and Ottonian Europe: The Chronicle of Regino of Prüm and Adalbert of Magdeburg (translated by Simon MacLean) and Eleventh-Century Germany: The Swabian Chronicles (translated by I. S. Robinson)

<i>History and Politics in Late Carolingian and Ottonian Europe: The Chronicle of Regino of Prüm and Adalbert of Magdeburg</i> (translated by Simon MacLean) and <i>Eleventh-Century Germany: The Swabian Chronicles</i> (translated by I. S. Robinson)

Eleventh-century Germany: the Swabian chronicles

Series editor's foreword Preface Abbreviations Introduction Herman of Reichenau, Chronicle Berthold of Reichenau, Chronicle: First Version Berthold of Reichenau, Chronicle: Second Version Bernold of St Blasien, Chronicle Bibliography Index -- .

The Uta Codex: Art, Philosophy, and Reform in Eleventh-Century Germany. Adam S. Cohen

The Uta Codex: Art, Philosophy, and Reform in Eleventh-Century Germany. Adam S. Cohen

The Uta Codex: Art, Philosophy, and Reform in Eleventh-Century Germany (review)

The Uta Codex: Art, Philosophy, and Reform in Eleventh-Century Germany. By Adam S. Cohen. (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press. 2000. Pp. xv, 276. $65.00.) Nobody who has seen the Uta Codex, a masterpiece of Regensburg book art and book construction from around 1025, is ever likely to forget it. Adam Cohen's book on it is very valuable and helps to fill a gap, since it is the first fullscale study of Regensburg art in the 'Ottonian' period since Swarzenski (1901). First of all Cohen discusses the date; here he has steered a marvelous course between historical common sense and the palaeographical big guns. Next he places the book within the context of monastic reform, beginning at Regensburg with Wolfgang as bishop and Ramwold as abbot of St. Emmeram. He is always sure-footed on monastic politics, brilliant, for instance, on historical memory and reform at Regensburg (pp. 94-96). Then there follow in-depth studies of the great frontispiece and evangelist illuminated pages and afterwards general studies of the visual sources and concepts (visual and textual) of these pages. The Uta Codex, with its highly sophisticated images and tituli, gives one an exceptional opportunity to make a study of the now fashionable text and image issue, and Cohen has seized it admirably. These in-depth studies are all written with perfect lucidity and in a style which makes them a pleasure to read. The illuminated pages are always beautifully described, and their visual meaning is brought out with great insight. The judgments on their visual sources seem to me almost always unerring and, as in the case of their geometrical structure, sometimes brilliant. The knowledge of relevant parallels, e.g., in Anglo-Saxon art, is very broad and appositely applied. An exceptionally strong feature of the book is that, amidst the richness of these pages, Cohen is always stressing their conceptual unity, what I am tempted to call a Platonist unity. (Plato's Timaeus is mentioned only in passing in this book, but I believe it to be more fundamental to the intellectual culture of this period than might at first meet the eye.) This is how Cohen puts it (p.113)-profoundly: these compositions come together not simply because their progressions could illuminate each other, but also because they reflect parallel operations in God's single universal system. His critique reminds me of what in Mozart criticism is sometimes called the Master's `serialism: Also the discussion of the `Harmony of the Gospels' (pp. 128-134) is superbly done. It seems necessary to express some reservations. The principal of these is that there is a certain degree of learned overkill in the interpretations. In discussing the numbers which represent the harmonies in the crucifixion page, for instance, there is a learned palaver (p. 69 and notes at 220-222), while Cohen, who is in general aware of the importance of Boethius's Arithmetic, overlooks that a short passage in this work provides the obvious explanation (Arith II, 49, 3). For ordinary educated people in this period, it was not primarily the tracts on music but this text which was the basic source of understanding of musical theory-this text and Martianus Capella Book IX. Again, in the picture of the Erhard Mass, the second titulus is first misunderstood (p. 81)-it should be understood as meaning that Christ nourishes the Church on earth (in the Eucharist) by faith (per fidem) and the angels in heaven by the actual sight of Him (per spec/em)-and then Eriugena is invoked to explain the derivation of the fides-species formula. Now Eriugena was undoubtedly important for this picture, as Boeckler and Bischoff showed, but here one really needs to apply Occam's Razor. …

Review article: Playing by the rules: Conflict management in tenth and eleventh‐century Germany

Gerd Althoff, Spielregeln der Politik im Mittelalter: Kommunikation in Frieden und Fehde.

The Uta Codex: art, philosophy, and reform in eleventh-century Germany

Created at the behest of an early 11th-century abbess names Uta, the is not only one of the most beautiful of Ottoman manuscripts but also one of the most complex. The Uta Codex is a luxury Gospel lectionary, produced for the Niedermunster convent in Regensburg (Bavaria). This collection of liturgical readings is preceded by four full-page frontispieces illustrating the Hand of God, dedicating the codex to the Virgin and Child, a Symbolic Crucifixion, and Saint Erhard (patron saint of the convent) celebrating the Mass. Four evangelist portraits accompany the readings from each Gospel. The lavish miniatures, among the most elaborate pictures of the Middle ages, are non-narrative illuminations that carefully manipulate images, ornament, Latin tituli and geometric schemata to produce complex statements of visual exegesis. This volume situates the manuscript in the monastic context of Regensburg and methodically explicates each of its pictures and considers questions of programme, patronage, the relationship betwen text and image, and the function of the book. The emerges as a sophisticated memorial of abess Uta's reforming efforts. The Uta Codex provides an examination of the miniatures as well as a broader investigation of the place of the manuscript within the structures of patronage and spirituality in early 11th-century Germany. It should be of interest to scholars of mediaeval art, as well as those exploring questions of monastic culture, intellectual life and women in the Middle Ages.

The Salian century: main currents in an age of transition

Historical scholarship often has overlooked the sheer energy that the Salian rulers devoted to shaping and solidifying their kingship. Indeed, changes in the German realm during the Salian era, 1024-1125, affected German history for centuries to come. This dynasty began relying on a new class of royal officials to consolidate its power, gained and lost dominance over the papacy, and stubbornly insisted on its imperial prerogatives even as it was clashing with changing social and spiritual values. In his interpretative study, the German historian Stefan Weinfurter takes a fresh look at the lives and ambitions of the Salian emperors and closely examines their interaction with the princes, bishops, and popes held influence over eleventh-century Germany. Drawing richly upon primary sources and modern political and socioeconomic analysis, Weinfurter addresses such topics as Henry III's intervention in Rome in 1046 and the Saxon uprising of 1073. He discusses the significance of the building of Speyer cathedral, at one time the largest church in Europe, as a representation of regal power.And he persuasively argues against the prevailing view that the confrontation between Henry IV and Pope Gregory, known as the Investiture Conflict, played the defining role in the decline of the Salian dynasty. Generously illustrated with maps and figures, The Salian Century provides a splendidly accessible overview of the fundamental transformations that occurred in the German kingdom and German society in the course of the eleventh century.

The production ofde luxemanuscripts and the patronage of King Cnut and Queen Emma

The illustrated manuscripts of later Anglo-Saxon England are justly famed for their beauty. The expense lavished on the most elaborate of them is paralleled in Western Europe at the time only in late-tenth- and eleventh-century Germany. Neither France, Spain nor Italy can offer anything that is comparable to this sustained luxury production. Modern art-historical scholarship on the Anglo-Saxon material has not really attempted to explain this phenomenal industry beyond implying that the vast majority of these books were made in monastic scriptoria and for the use of the church. If this implication is correct, it begs the questions, ‘where did the money come from?’ and ‘whence the desire to spend it in this way?’ Perhaps the questions are not asked because the answers in general terms seem rather obvious. Expenditure on any particular luxury item is usually in part a question of fashion, and fashion in certain circumstances becomes a priority which determines that surplus money is directed towards its indulgence. Doubtless a response along these lines could be fleshed out by a discussion of the sources of income of the Anglo-Saxon church and of its aspirations to conspicuous display. But any exploration of monastic wealth and rivalry for prestige which attempts to explain book production at this period would be based on the assumption, and it is no more than an assumption, that the phenomenon is to be accounted for by ecclesiastical patronage. The arguments brought forward in this paper will be directed towards a different end: that many of the most famous English illuminated books of this period owe their creation to royal money, and that they were produced, sometimes without a particular recipient in mind, to be given as presents which would help cement allegiance to the crown and serve as an indication of the donor's piety. But what is the evidence for this upturn in the production ofde luxemanuscripts?

The Ruodlieb. The First Medieval Epic of Chivalry from Eleventh-Century Germany

The Ruodlieb. The First Medieval Epic of Chivalry from Eleventh-Century Germany

1. The Ruodlieb: The first medieval epic of chivalry from eleventh-century Germany. Translated by Gordon B. Ford. Pp. 104. Leiden: Brill, 1965. Paper, fl. 14. - 2. Isidore of Seville: History of the Goths, Vandals, and Suevi. Translated by Guido Donini and Gordon B. Ford. Pp. viii+46. Leiden: Brill, 1966. Paper, fl. 12.

1. The Ruodlieb: The first medieval epic of chivalry from eleventh-century Germany. Translated by Gordon B. Ford. Pp. 104. Leiden: Brill, 1965. Paper, fl. 14. - 2. Isidore of Seville: History of the Goths, Vandals, and Suevi. Translated by Guido Donini and Gordon B. Ford. Pp. viii+46. Leiden: Brill, 1966. Paper, fl. 12. - Volume 17 Issue 2

The Ruodlieb: The First Medieval Epic of Chivalry from Eleventh-Century Germany. Gordon F. Ford, Jr.

<i>The Ruodlieb: The First Medieval Epic of Chivalry from Eleventh-Century Germany</i>. Gordon F. Ford, Jr.