Island Monastery Research Articles

К вопросу о роли Спасо-Каменного монастыря в карательной политике Российского государства (XVI–XVII вв.)

The purpose of the article is to reveal causes and features of punitive practice of the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery in the pre-imperial period when there was a rapid separation of the state and church jurisdiction in various spheres of society. The article tries to define the most significant events which determined the inclusion of this monastery in the punitive policy of the state. Another task of the research is to determine the peculiarities of the exile to the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery at the early stage of its development. Due to its special geographical location, initially it was used for punitive purposes rarely and rather selectively. The complexity of the research work can be explained by the limited availability of the sources related for the period under consideration, which did not allow us to recreate a complete picture of the functioning of the prison premises and the everyday life of prisoners. It was possible to create a more detailed picture only by turning to the documents of the era of the regular state of Peter the Great. Therefore, the accent in the research was made first of all on generalization and analysis of the most striking and at the same time insufficiently studied facts of exile to the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery of various well-known persons, including Metropolitan Zosimus, Metropolitan Varlaam, Archbishop Arsenii, and Archimandrite Ivan Neronov, who played an important role in the history both of the church and of the state. The author analyzes the causes and conditions of exile in the context of the events of that time. The conclusion is made that the content of punitive functions of the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery was constantly changing. The basis for these changes was the desire of the grand-princely power to see the monastery as a supporter of the spread of its own influence. A peculiarity of the first stage in the punitive activity of the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery was the fact that representatives of the religious elite were exiled there. It was explained by special natural conditions and geopolitical location of the island monastery. Later this trend continued, but the contingent of exiles significantly expanded.

Island monasticism in Wales: towards an historical archaeology

Wales has a significant number of islands that have supported monastic life at some time in their histories. These monastic islands do not command quite the same international attention as those from other Celtic nations, for example Skellig Michael (Ireland) or Iona (Scotland), but islands such as Ynys Enlli (Bardsey) and Caldey Island (Ynys Bŷr) have sustained recognition as 'holy islands' in Welsh tradition. Those seeking assessments of the phenomenon of island monasticism in Wales will also find only a modest literature, now requiring some careful recalibration in the light of changing interpretations of Welsh church history. This discussion is an attempt to establish the data and models for a holistic reassessment. This is not necessarily just an academic desideratum. Welsh islands have recently, for example, been identified as assets for the emerging trend of 'faith tourism', with potential economic as well as environmental impact.<br/> In this study I will approach the archaeology of the Welsh islands initially by way of their historical context. There are a number of reasons for this choice of approach. It is arguable that only a multi-disciplinary approach here offers a sustainable body of data for analysis. Island sites are characteristically materially poor and the eremitical ethos of much island monasticism converges with that tendency. The 'island monastery' is also prone to rather singular conception as an 'early Christian' artefact, whereas much of what we think we know concerning the Welsh islands speaks most definitely of later medieval use—and only uncertainly of the early medieval. So a strongly diachronic approach is essential. For one or two of the islands, moreover, there is a requirement simply to resolve their historical identities. Finally, there is a pressing need to uncouple these islands from dated historical models of evangelism via the seaways and other models in which monasticism is conflated with secular Christianity—assumptions that can influence interpretation of archaeological evidence for settlement.

Reconstruction of Lost Cultural Heritage Sites and Landscapes: Context of Ancient Objects in Time and Space

Diachronic studies play a key role in the research and documentation of cultural heritage and its changes, ranging from architectural fragments to landscape. Regarding the reconstructions of lost cultural heritage sites, the determination of landscape conditions in the reconstructed era goes frequently unheeded. Often, only ruins and detached archeological artefacts remain of the built heritage. Placing them correctly within the reconstructed building complex is of similar importance as placing the lost monument in the context of the landscape at that time. The proposed method harmonizes highly heterogeneous sources to provide such a context. The solution includes the fusion of referential terrain models of different levels of detail (LODs) as well as the fusion of diverse 3D data sources for the reconstruction of the built heritage. Although the combined modeling of large landscapes and small 3D objects of a high detail results in very large datasets, we present a feasible solution, whose data structure is suitable for Geographic Information Systems (GIS) analyses of landscapes and also provides a smooth and clear 3D visualization and inspection of detailed features. The results are demonstrated in the case study of the island monastery, the vanished medieval town of Sekanka, and the surrounding landscape, which is located in Czechia and was the subject of intensive changes over time.

Vango: Between Sky and Earth by Timothée de Fombelle (review)

Reviewed by: Vango: Between Sky and Earth by Timothée de Fombelle Elizabeth Bush de Fombelle, Timothée Vango: Between Sky and Earth; tr. from the French by Sarah Ardizzone. Candlewick, 2014 421 p ISBN 978-0-7636-7196-9 $17.99 R* Gr. 8–12 It’s 1934, and nineteen-year-old Vango, a young man who has only incomplete knowledge of his own family background, has found his calling on a secluded island monastery. Now, on the day of his ordination to the priesthood in Paris, he’s being chased by the police, shot at by a Russian assassin, and (unbeknownst to him) tracked down by a love-smitten girl whom he met in his childhood. But why? He finds a partial answer quickly: a priest has been murdered and he’s the suspect. The identity of the sniper, however, is more perplexing, and the existence of the girl, Ethel, isn’t even on his radar. As Vango dodges arrest and death by scaling the walls and running the rooftops of Paris, stowing away on the Graf Zeppelin, and looking for answers from Mademoiselle, the devoted woman who raised him, he and readers gradually piece together some of the backstory that brought him to this crisis. Playwright de Fombelle is a master of the perfectly honed scene, and the action speeds by with theatrical flair and crafty sleight of hand that will be particularly appreciated by teens who relish foreign and indie films. Although Vango eventually discovers a hint of his own identity, several cliffhangers remain provocatively unresolved—not the least of which is Joseph and daughter Svetlana Stalin’s roles in this multi-layered mystery. This intriguing imported thriller demands a sequel. Copyright © 2014 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

English

Nowadays, tourism plays pivotal role for economic and social development of many nations. It is considered as the world’s first investment movement of the 21st century. Thus, developing countries are giving due attention to service delivery industries like tourism that contributes a lot to their economy. Ethiopia has its own long centuries of history and rich culture. For instance, Amhara national regional state has been endowed with rare and endemic cultural and natural heritages. In this regard, the island monasteries of Lake Tana which are the green flower baskets of the lake have potentials for the development of tourism in the area but yet it is fully unexploited. Currently, tourism sector is facing multifaceted challenges, and it is attracting the intellectual gaze of many scholars from various disciplines. This article is a step in that direction. The grand objective of this article is to examine the historical vicissitude of tourism developments in the island monastery of Kebran Gabriel. Towards this end, archival sources are consulted and interview is made with informants.  So, it is needless to say that this article attests the challenges and prospects of the island monastery of Kebran Gabriel as a tourist site since 1950’s.   Key words: Kebran Gabriel, treasury, attraction, preservation, museum.

The island monastery of Valaam in Finnish homeland tourism: Constructing a “Thirdspace” in the Russian borderlands

The Orthodox island monastery of Valaam in Russian Karelia is today a popular destination for Finnish tourists visiting Russia’s western borderlands. Many of these tourists are descendants of the Karelians who had evacuated the area following World War II. The monastery’s institutionally sanctioned genealogies construct it as the civilizing force, which had brought Christian enlightenment to the local heathen population. This discursive template is played out in the way the place is presented to visitors, with each highlight telling a carefully constructed story that promotes the monastery’s significance for the Russian religious and national identity. Yet, drawing on lived experience, as well as on popular culture, family lore and meanings from collective memory, the Finnish visitors break the monolithic official discourse and produce a complex “thirdspace” in their own measure. This paper is based on participant observation and semi-structured interviews conducted during a homeland visit to Ladogan Karelia in June 2010.

Mythic Realism: Magic and Mystery in Marele Day's Lambs of God

Lambs of God is a bizarre novel penned by an unlikely author. A popular mystery writer, Marele Day describes being motivated by a somewhat experimental curiosity. She describes how theoretically I wondered what would happen if you took a group of people out of contact with rest of world, because I realized that if you leave things alone and don't interfere they generally go back to earth .... So stones we pick up from ground and put into a vertical fashion to build houses and high rises, if you leave them alone they will eventually crumble, and I wondered if that would happen to people as well. (qtd. in Margetts 2) The resulting novel has a somewhat odd premise: three aging nuns live a materially impoverished yet spiritually rich existence in a crumbling island monastery, which a pragmatic priest wants to sell. Whether these characters crumble or, instead, somehow flourish through goodness of creation depends on Day's success in creating a Christian mythic realist text. The novel was an immediate hit, published not only in Day's native Australia but also United Kingdom, United States, Germany, Spain, and Netherlands. Nominated for an International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, it has been praised for its universal resonance (Atkins 1), its strange interweaving of comic and mystical [that] is simply divine (Corrigan B12), its acute view of women and men, worldliness and transcendence (Great Reads D7), and its success in convinc[ing] us that lives of principals have changed forever (Wolfe 50). However, other critics were disturbed by its presentation of corrupted Catholic liturgy (Hughes 18) and a bastardized sort of Catholicism (Treneman 19). Though as a writer Marele Day is known neither for her attention to religion or spirituality nor for artistic experimentation associated with magical realism, I argue that in Lambs of God she combines two to create an unusual synthesis that effectively offers its readers a Christian comedy created in large part through magical realist literary devices. Comedy affirms life; while acknowledging that human experience does not unfold exactly as one might wish, comic world view always concludes that life is good and is worth living. In a Christian comic world view, goodness of life is affirmed most universally in sacramentality of creation and most concretely in myth of Christ's birth, death, and resurrection. Such a world view does not deny life's struggles, but sees their meaning as derived from Christian myth. Christian literature ranging from grittiness of Graham Greene's The Power and Glory or Georges Bernanos' Diary of a Country Priest, to far less dark The Tree of Man by Patrick White, Evensong by Gail Godwin, or Babette's Feast by Isak Dinesen, offers a comic world view that emerges from attention to Christian myth and its temporal manifestation in Christian ritual. This is basis of Alejandro Garcia-Rivera's understanding of theological aesthetics: an appreciation of representations of the fullness of cosmos (172) that both transcends merely material aspects of life and integrates them into a deeply spiritual engagement with beauty and creation. What is particularly interesting about Day's novel is not merely its presentation of the fullness of cosmos through its reliance on Christian myth, but its employment of magical realist devices to achieve this. Far from being associated with Christian myth, magical realism tends to focus on political. Certainly magical realist literature--especially that of Latin America--is peppered with references to Christianity and its representatives, but these tend to be either mere elements of cultural landscape or agents of colonial oppression. For example, priests abound in Isabel Allende's The House of Spirits, ranging from judgmental Father Restrepo, to kindly if rather inept Father Antonio, to Father Jose Dulce Maria, who transform [s] biblical parables into Socialist propaganda (137). …

New light on early Insular monasteries - Heather F. James & Peter Yeoman with numerous contributors. Excavations at St Ethernan's monastery, Isle of May, Fife (Tayside & Fife Archaeological Committee Monograph 6). xii+220 pages, 103 illustrations, 8 colour plates, 66 tables. 2008. Perth: Tayside & Fife Archaeological Committee; 1360-5550 paperback £15. - Christopher Lowe. Inchmarnock: an Early Historic island monastery

New light on early Insular monasteries - Heather F. James & Peter Yeoman with numerous contributors. Excavations at St Ethernan's monastery, Isle of May, Fife (Tayside & Fife Archaeological Committee Monograph 6). xii+220 pages, 103 illustrations, 8 colour plates, 66 tables. 2008. Perth: Tayside & Fife Archaeological Committee; 1360-5550 paperback £15. - Christopher Lowe. Inchmarnock: an Early Historic island monastery and its archaeological landscape. xxii+314 pages, 156 b&w & colour illustrations, 34 tables. 2008. Edinburgh: Society of Antiquaries of Scotland; 978-0-903903-37-0 hardback £30 (Fellows £25). - Thomas McErlean & Norman Crothers. Harnessing the tides: the Early Medieval tide mills at Nendrum monastery, Strangford Loch. xx+468 pages, 344 b&w & colour illustrations, tables. 2007. Norwich: Environment & Heritage Service/The Stationery Office; 978-0-08877-3 hardback £25. - Martin Carver. Portmahomack: monastery of the Picts. xvi+240 pages, 94 illustrations, 16 colour plates. 2008. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press; 978-0-7486-2441-6 hardback £75; 978-0-7486-2442-3 paperback £24.99. - Volume 83 Issue 322

Mary or Michael? Saint-Switching, Gender, and Sanctity in a Medieval Miracle of Childbirth

Medieval pilgrims making the dangerous journey from the Norman-Breton coast to the island monastery of Mont-Saint-Michel would have passed a tall stone cross rising out of the sands about halfway between the mainland and the north shore of the Mont. In the unlikely event that the visitors had not already heard the story of this monument, the so-called “croix des grèves,” they were sure to hear it—and perhaps even see it reenacted—once they arrived at their destination, since the miracle it commemorated was one of the most famous in the shrine's vast store of legend. Popularly known as the “Peril,” the miracle told of a pregnant woman who had come on pilgrimage to the shrine in the time of Abbot Hildebert I(1009–17). As she was making her way across the sands toward the abbey at low tide, a sudden storm blew in from the sea, carrying the tide in its wake. In her frantic efforts to reach the shore before the pilgrims' path was submerged, the woman went into labor and was unable to escape the quickly rising waters. According to the version of this story recounted to generations of pilgrims to Mont-Saint-Michel, the abbey's patron Saint Michael took pity on the unfortunate woman and made a dry space for her to wait out the storm in the midst of the sea, preserving her from harm while she was safely delivered of a healthy son. The boy was christened “Peril” in commemoration of his dangerous birth, and in gratitude to the archangel his mother designated him for the priesthood.

Solovki: The Story of Russia Told through Its Most Remarkable Islands by Roy R. s> Robson (review)

REVIEWS 533 Robson, Roy R. Solovki:TheStoy of RussiaToldThrough Its Most Remarkable Islands.Yale University Press, New Haven, CT and London, 2004. xviii + 302 pp. Maps. Illustrations.Notes. Bibliographicalessay. Index. /J20.00. SOMEWHAT surprisingly,Roy R. Robson's fascinatingbook is the firstin any language to provide a comprehensive history of the Solovetskii monastery from its foundation in I429 to the end of the twentiethcentury. It is of course an extraordinarystory: the remote island monastery in the White Sea also served at varioustimes as a fortress,a place of pilgrimageand a prison under the tsars.Laterit became one of the earliestand most notoriouslabourcamps in the Soviet Gulag. Now, in the post-Sovietperiod, Solovkihas been restored as an active monastery and has been recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Robson dealswith his subjectchronologically,devotingdue attentionto the earlycenturies.There is a lengthy chapteron the uprisingof I667-76 against Patriarch Nikon's reforms of the Orthodox Church; and chapter thirteen ('Pilgrims')provides an intriguing account of the way in which religious pilgrimage to the site in the late nineteenth century was organized, using methods which anticipated modern 'package' tourism. The chapters on the twentieth century provide a harrowing description of life (and death) in Solovkiin the I920S and '30s:disappointingly,the period afterthe evacuation of the camp in I939 is dealtwith only in a brief 'Epilogue'. Inevitablyfor a workcovering such a long period of history,the author has had to use a wide range of differenttypesof sources.His introductorychapter on the prehistoryof the islands cites archaeological evidence; the chapter on the earliest history of the monastery relies heavily on the hagiographic 'Life' of itsfounder, Savvatii,although (asRobson himselfrecognizes)this is largely legendary. For the later period, Robson frequentlyrefersto the unpublished Rule of the monastery, and cites other Russian archival materials for the nineteenth century. In addition, he makes good use of various published primaryand secondarysources. One feature of the author's narrativeis his inclusion of numerous lengthy extracts from primary sources. For example, he quotes verbatim from an anonymous English seventeenth-century description of the monastery (pp. 65-67); from the monasterychronicle'saccount of Peterthe Great'svisit to Solovki in 1702 (pp. II8-24); and from the camp newspaper, SLON,in I924 (pp. 23I-34). In two chapters Robson employs the device of following the storiesof three individualswho leftwrittenrecordsof theirexperienceson the islands. In the chapter on pilgrims he relies on the accounts of Bishop Evdokim Meshcherskii, the peasant A. A. Zamaraev and the Reverend Alexander Boddy, an Anglican priest. The chapter on the Gulag is based on the memoirsof BorisCederholm, a Finnishinmate;the LatvianE. I. Solovieff; and D. S. Likhachev, the future Academician, who was sent to Solovki as a studentin I928. In his Preface,Robson statesthathe has used these extensive quotations in order to 'let Solovki speak for itself' (p. xi); while this claim is somewhat disingenuous, the device does help to convey the 'feel' of the monastery. Even more effective in communicating the atmosphere of the 534 SEER, 83, 3, 2005 island are the plentifulblack-and-whitephotographswhich enhance this well producedvolume. Robson's book provides a multi-facetedhistory of the islands, dealing not only with the spirituallife of the monastery, but also with monastic politics (whichin the late nineteenth centuryappearto have beenjust aspersonalized, petty and vindictiveas those of most secularinstitutions).The authordoes not avoidthesensitiveissuesofmonastichomosexualityandpaedophilia,although he deals with them somewhat euphemistically (the relevant passages are indexed as 'Boys at Solovki'). The monastery's economic enterprises are vividly described, especially the all-importantactivities of salt production in the earlymodern period, and pilgrimage-tourismin the nineteenth century. The book'ssub-titleimpliesthat the authorintendsto presentthe historyof Solovkias a microcosm of the historyof Russiaas a whole, but thisadmittedly ambitious aim is only partiallyachieved. Forthe most part, Robson provides only sufficient background information to explain, for example, why the Britishbombarded Solovki in I854, or why the monasterywas disbanded in 192I. The curious exception is chapter four, which provides a lurid general account of the reign of Ivan the Terrible material which is included, it seems, only because Filipp Kolychev had been Father Superior of Solovki beforebeing appointedMetropolitanof Moscow by Ivan. Robson statesin his Prefacethatthe book is aimed primarilyat the 'general reader' and only secondarily at 'scholars...

Sixteenth-century monastic architecture and the incarnation of the sacred on Solovetskii island

Sixteenth-century monastic architecture and the incarnation of the sacred on Solovetskii island. Throughout the latter half of the sixteenth century the Transfiguration Monastery on Great Solovetskii Island, in the White Sea, was able to acquire the technical and physical resources necessary to initiate major building projects, including the main Church of the Transfiguration and the massive stone fortress walls. The impetus for this development originated with a gifted and dynamic hegumen, Filipp, the future metropolitan of the Russian church and, ultimately, the victim of a tragic confrontation with Ivan the Terrible. By virtue of support from Novgorod and other northern towns, as well as from Moscow, Filipp embarked on an ambitious program of construction and amelioration that transformed much of Solovetskii Island over a period of four decades. This article examines the sources and the design of these distinctive sixteenth-century monastic buildings, which form one of the greatest ensembles of Russian architecture. Indeed, one can speak of this island monastery as a masterpiece of medieval European culture.

Oral and Written: Saints, Miracles, and Relics in Brittany, c. 850-1250

Previous articleNext article No AccessOral and Written: Saints, Miracles, and Relics in Brittany, c. 850-1250Julia M. H. SmithJulia M. H. Smith Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Speculum Volume 65, Number 2Apr., 1990 The journal of the Medieval Academy of America Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.2307/2864295 Views: 47Total views on this site Citations: 18Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1990 Medieval Academy of AmericaPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:SARAH HAMILTON LITURGY AS HISTORY: THE ORIGINS OF THE EXETER MARTYROLOGY, Traditio 74 (Nov 2019): 179–222.https://doi.org/10.1017/tdo.2019.11Kelly Gibson The Carolingian World through Hagiography, History Compass 13, no.1212 (Dec 2015): 630–645.https://doi.org/10.1111/hic3.12287 The style and science of persuasion, (Apr 2014): 88–139.https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107279605.004 Bibliographie, (Jan 2014): 847–859.https://doi.org/10.3917/perri.minoi.2014.01.0847Stephen Mark Holmes The relics of St Merolilanus and Scotland, The Scottish Historical Review 91, no.11 (Apr 2012): 150–158.https://doi.org/10.3366/shr.2012.0075Andrew Evans The Levitating Altar of Saint Illtud, Folklore 122, no.11 (Apr 2011): 55–75.https://doi.org/10.1080/0015587X.2011.538569Amy K. Bosworth Learning from the Saints: Ninth-Century Hagiography and the Carolingian Renaissance, History Compass 8, no.99 (Sep 2010): 1055–1066.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1478-0542.2010.00714.xHilary Powell “Once Upon a Time There Was a Saint …”: Re-evaluating Folklore in Anglo-Latin Hagiography, Folklore 121, no.22 (Aug 2010): 171–189.https://doi.org/10.1080/0015587X.2010.481149Thomas F. X. Noble, Julia M. H. Smith The Cambridge History of Christianity, (Mar 2010).https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521817752ALEXANDRA WALSHAM THE REFORMATION AND ‘THE DISENCHANTMENT OF THE WORLD’ REASSESSED, The Historical Journal 51, no.22 (Jun 2008): 497–528.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0018246X08006808Huw Pryce Wales: Religion and Piety, (Dec 2007): 411–429.https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470998786.ch21Tomás Ó Carragáin Regional Variation in Irish Pre-Romanesque Architecture, The Antiquaries Journal 85 (Apr 2011): 23–56.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003581500074369Leidulf Melve Literacy --Aurality --Orality A Survey of Recent Research into the Orality/Literacy Complex of the Latin Middle Ages (600-1500), Symbolae Osloenses 78, no.11 (Jan 2003): 143–197.https://doi.org/10.1080/00397670310000383David C Harvey Constructed Landscapes and Social Memory: Tales of St Samson in Early Medieval Cornwall, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 20, no.22 (Nov 2016): 231–248.https://doi.org/10.1177/026377580202000201 Huw Pryce Lawbooks and Literacy in Medieval Wales, Speculum 75, no.11 (Oct 2015): 29–67.https://doi.org/10.2307/2887424John A. F. Thomson St Eiluned of Brecon and her Cult, Studies in Church History 30 (Mar 2016): 117–125.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0424208400011657 BOOK REVIEWS, The Heythrop Journal 34, no.11 (Jan 1993): 70–122.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2265.1993.tb00906.xBrian Murdoch Walter Berschin, Biographie und Epochenstil im lateinischen Mittelalter. Bd. II: Merowingische Biographie. Italien, Spanien und die Inseln im frühen Mittelalter., Arbitrium 10, no.11 (Jan 1992).https://doi.org/10.1515/arbi.1992.10.1.24

The Book of Kells and Iona

No agreement exists on the place of origin of the Book of Kells: Northumbria, Eastern Scotland, and the monastery of Hy (our Iona) have all been suggested. This article explores three new lines of argument, all leading to the island monastery of Hy. The manuscript itself contains a clue indicating that those who produced it held Saint Columba in the highest veneration; the later history of the manuscript, when it was treated as a relic of Columba, links it with Columba's foundation at Hy; some elements of the decoration may be connected with the visit to Hy of Arculf, a well-traveled Frankish bishop.

The Abbey of Reichenau. New Studies in the History and Culture of the Island Monastery

The Abbey of Reichenau. New Studies in the History and Culture of the Island Monastery