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No more Icelandic or Old Norse at University of Copenhagen

From 2019, the University of Copenhagen will no longer offer courses for students in Old Danish, Norse, modern Icelandic, and Faroese. The reason is that the elective courses in Norse, as well as the other languages, have not been able to muster the required minimum of 30 students, set as a standard by the Chancellors office.

For 2019, the University of Copenhagen has been required by the Danish Government to cut the budget with 160 mills. DKR. Apart from weeding small subjects from the curriculum – like e.g. art- and cultural history – this has led to a general requirement: courses offered has to be able to muster at least 30 students. Recently, it was revealed that the University would no longer offer courses in such old and venerated subjects as Norse, Modern Icelandic, Faroese, and Old Danish. As numerous scholars have pointed out, this will be the end of not only a golden era but also endanger recruitment of the necessary “nerds” to people such venerable institutions as The Arnamagnæan Institute in the future. The Arnamagnæan holds the largest collection of old Icelandic manuscripts outside of Iceland and has been at the centre of Norse research since the 18thcentury. The Arnamagnæan Institute’s chief function is to preserve and further the study of the manuscripts in the Arnamagnæan collection, in accordance with the terms of the Arnamagnæan Foundation, established in 1760. The collection, which comprises some 3000 items, is now divided between Copenhagen and Reykjavík. In 2009 the collection was added to UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register in recognition of its historical value.

Also, future recruitment to large projects like “The Danish Dictionary” and its subsidiaries like “Gammeldansk Ordbog“ (Old Danish Dictionary) is threatened.

It may be a tactical manoeuvre. Already, the Associate Dean, Jens Erik Mogensen, has been hinting at the possibility that the courses will be re-established if government funding can be found.

– I will fight to get a grant for the small language subjects, which will not otherwise be financially feasible, says the Jens-Erik Mogensen to the University Paper, adding that: – Many of them are actually research subjects, where it does not make sense to talk about a wider labour market or a large number of student admissions, so they are different.

At the strategic level, it is nevertheless, quite tasteless. The subjects not only belong to a group of smaller languages, which have been threatened for years. They represent a vastly significant immaterial heritage of not only national Danish and Scandinavian value, but also with a recognised global standing. We live at a time when media corporations produce global series (e.g. Vikings) and games (e.g. Hellblade), which resonate among countless youngsters, while people, in general, participate in cultural tourism exploring the many sites of “Viking” importance. Who is going to help these people to a better and more fulfilling experience, when no one can any longer read the sagas, the laws and the poetry, which are the texts offering the context for historians and archaeologists, and more amateurish re-enactors?

The University of Copenhagen full well knows that the government is bound to step up. The political landscape offers no backdoor.

Thus, the formulated plans reveal nothing but a feeble will to save at least some of the threatened subjects, currently under review. Others will not be as lucky. Nor will the students, who will never experience the joy of studying at a university, because it has been reduced to a factory with no less than at a minimum 30 students in classes. No tutoring in small groups. On the other hand: for a long time it has been uphill to teach students that “studying at a university” is not the same as “going to school”!

SOURCE

Det er slut med at læse dansk på KU.
By Nanna Balslev
In: Uniavisen 24.05.2018

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Rock-Carved Churches in France

Remains of rock-hewn churches may be found in several European and Middle-Eastern landscapes, where natural caves and calciferous rocks invited hermits to shelter in solitude and prayer. In France, such churches were common in Aquitaine.

Full alike of dignity and courtesy, Martin of Tours kept up the position of a bishop properly, yet in such a way as not to lay aside the objects and virtues of a monk. Accordingly, he made use, for some time, of the cell connected with the church but afterwards, when he felt it impossible to tolerate the disturbance caused by the numbers of those visiting it, he established a monastery for himself about two miles outside the city. This spot was so secret and retired that he enjoyed in it the solitude of a hermit. For, on one side, it was surrounded by a precipitous rock of a lofty mountain, while the river Loire had shut in the rest of the plain by a bay extending back for a little distance; and the place could be approached only by one, and that a very narrow passage. Here, then, he possessed a cell constructed of wood. Many also of the brethren had, in the same manner, fashioned retreats for themselves, but most of them had formed these out of the rock of the overhanging mountain, hollowed into caves. There were altogether eighty disciples, who were being disciplined after the example of the saintly master. No one there had anything, which was called his own; all things were possessed in common. It was not allowed either to buy or to sell anything, as is the custom among most monks. No art was practised there, except that of transcribers, and even this was assigned to the brethren of younger years, while the elders spent their time in prayer. Rarely did any one of them go beyond the cell, unless when they assembled at the place of prayer. They all took their food together, after the hour of fasting was passed. No one used wine, except when illness compelled them to do so. Most of them were clothed in garments of camels’ hair. Any dress approaching softness was there deemed criminal, and this must be thought the more remarkable because many among them were such as are deemed of noble rank.
Sulpicius, Vita, X – translation from Sulpicius Severus: On the Life of St. Martin. Translation and Notes by Alexander Roberts. In A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, New York, 1894.

Marmoutiers at Tours. Source: Wikipedia
Marmoutiers at Tours. Source: Wikipedia

This description of the early Abbey at Marmoutiers near Tours founded in 371 helps us to understand the background for the rock-carved churches, which may still be visited in France. Albeit the Abbey began as a hermitage for St. Martin of Tours and his followers and was said to be primarily infused by the spirit of the “solitude of the desert”, it soon became a memorial shrine and a pilgrimage site. This may have taken off when the bishop of Volusianus of Tours constructed a rock-carved church, dedicated to St. John. Also, it appears, there was an ancient bridge across the Loire, built in the 1stcentury AD, which provided easy communion between the town and the abbey.

The exact layout of the Marmoutier of St. Martin of Tours is not known. Archaeological excavations, though, have shown a continued residence since late Antiquity.

Elsewhere, though, remains of similar hermitages, which were later turned into churches, pilgrimage centres and monasteries demonstrate the importance of these rock sanctuaries in late Antiquity. Albeit the exact date of these monuments escapes medieval historians, they nevertheless seem to offer an identical historical background. Asceticism continued to be en vogue and hermits continued to settle near local villages and settlements until the 12thcentury. Although in principle, solitaries, hermits tended to draw crowds of followers and admirers, and it is likely, this led to the diverse character of these places: some continued to be chapels in the wilderness, others turned into lively monastic centres. The three best preserved monolithic churches preserved can be found in the Aubeterre-sur-Dronne, Saint-Emilion and Gurat.

Aubeterre-sur-Dronne

Aubeterre -sur-Dronne. Source: wikipedia
Aubeterre -sur-Dronne. Source: wikipedia

One of the earliest preserved cave-churches in France stems from the early Middle Ages. For centuries, it was inaccessible due to a rock fall. Great was the amazement when it was rediscovered in the 50s. The sheer scale of the structure astounds any visitors. The height soars 27 metres, while the church measures 20 x 16 metres and includes a vestibule, a nave, a baptismal font, octagonal columns, a gallery and a precious reliquary carved as a replica of the holy sepulchre in Jerusalem.

The baptismal font is especially important since it was carved out of the rock in the form of a Greek cross, which dates it to the 4th– 9thcenturies. Also, at the end of the nave, a necropolis has been excavated which can be dated to late antiquity. However, the Romanesque church as it stands today reflects a construction from the 12thcentury. The splendid stone reliquary was originally created to house relics, which were brought home from Jerusalem by Pierre II de Castillon, crusader and lord of the castle in Aubeterre. These relics secured Aubeterre a slot on the pilgrimage route to Santiago.

The soaring height is marked out by the existence of the high gallery or triforium, which can be accessed by a staircase cut out of the rock. This gallery also served as an entrance to the church from above.

In Aubeterre-sur-Dronne is also a Romanesque church, the church of St Jacques which was also built to welcome pilgrims on the route to Santiago de Compostela. This has a wonderful 12th-century Romanesque facade with Moorish influence. It shows finely carved arches and some crumbling, yet gorgeous carvings on the capitals. The facade has a strong Moorish influence. The rest of the church was destroyed in the religious wars of the 16thcentury, and today only the facade remains. A walk up to the church following a dinner in the village is highly recommended

Aubeterre is built up from the river Dronne, offering a superb vista and the charm of being considered one of the most beautiful villages in France. At the foot of the village, where the meadows meet the River Dronne, are to be found a river beach and restaurant.

The Monolithic Church of Saint-Emilion

Church in Saint-Emilion. Source: Wikipedia
Church in Saint-Emilion. Source: Wikipedia

Saint-Emilion is, of course, best known for its vineyards, listed as UNESCO World Heritage in 1999. But it is also a charming medieval village housing the largest of the preserved rock-hewn churches, Saint Emilion. Carved out of limestone in the 12thcentury, it measures 38 in the length and is 12 meters high. Above ground a 53-meter high bell-tower raises. Also, the main entrance is fronted with an impressive gothic portal. Its three naves, with a small crypt beneath, is dedicated to Emillon, an 8thcentury Breton monk, who fled to escape persecution by the Benedictine Order. According to legend, he had been accused of theft. This led him on a long pilgrimage until he finally ended up in what later became the town named after him. Emillon, who adopted an eremitic existence, lived in a cave and was said to perform miracles. Later, he attracted a following of monks. Afterwards, the town acquired wealth and prominence due to its wine production and to its strategic position along a pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela.

In 1996 the edifice was severely threatened by water seeping in, undermining the bell-tower and closing off the monument for visitors. Recently though, restoration was finalized and the church was once more open for visitors. During the restoration, archaeologists found drainpipes, which had been installed by the monks to lead off the rainwater.

Next, to the church, a passage leads through the tourist office into the subterranean catacombs, where burial niches had been dug directly into the rock. Also, a passage through the Chapelle de la Trinité leads to what was later claimed to be the actual hermitage of Emillion.

Gurat –  a monolithic church from the later Middle Ages

Entrance to rock-Hewn church at Gurat in Charente. Source: wikipedia
Entrance to rock-Hewn church at Gurat in Charente. Source: wikipedia

Located on a ridge overlooking the Lizonne valley through which the small river of Ronsenac runs below, visitors have to descend below the village of Gurat to enter the monolithic church. Moving inside, a series of seven grottos open up as well as the cave church itself. The entrance is through a passageway into an aisle, which measures 12 x 3,4 metres. With a height of 4,4 metres, it is fitted with an apse. The aisle is separated from the nave by two columns, hewn out of the rock and leading up to an apse-like structure, which probably held the remains of the founder of the church. Light streams from a small round window in the apsidal end of the aisle.

In 1967, Michael Gervers suggested that the church was constructed on a site containing numerous grottos, which had been “formed naturally by water erosion” and that a hermit at some point took up residence there. At some point, a community grew up around a hermit, which led to the construction of the cave church in the 13thcentury. Coin-finds and C14 dating have indicated that the church was last used as a shelter during the religious wars.

Recently, a study carried out by Jacqueline Meijer of the remains of 18 individuals buried outside the entrance of the cave has shown that it probably functioned as a monastic hostel. Based on strontium isotope analysis It was concluded that the eighteen individuals were born elsewhere but on average had lived at least five years at Gurat.

Recently, the cave church at Gurat was acquired by the village, which intends to restore it as a tourist venue. Until the 60s it was used as the village dump.

SOURCES:

The Cave Church at Gurat (Charente). Preliminary report
By Michael Gervers
In: Gesta, Vol 6,  1967

Exploring the Origins and Mobility of the Medieval Monastic Inhabitants of a Cave Church in Gurat, France, Using Strontium Isotope Analysis.
By Jacqueline Meijer
Unpublished thesis presented to the University of Waterloo, Master of Arts in Public Issues Anthropology.
Waterloo 2018

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Fighting for Israel, Searching for Peace

by Ehud Barak

In the summer of 2000, the most decorated soldier in Israel’s history—Ehud Barak—set himself a challenge as daunting as any he had faced on the battlefield: to secure a final peace with the Palestinians. He would propose two states for two peoples, with a shared capital in Jerusalem. He knew the risks of failure. But he also knew the risks of not trying: letting slip perhaps the last chance for a generation to secure genuine peace.

It was a moment of truth.

It was one of many in a life intertwined, from the start, with that of Israel. Born on a kibbutz, Barak became commander of Israel’s elite special forces, then army Chief of Staff, and ultimately, Prime Minister.

My Country, My Life tells the unvarnished story of his—and his country’s—first seven decades; of its major successes, but also its setbacks and misjudgments. He offers candid assessments of his fellow Israeli politicians, of the American administrations with which he worked, and of himself. Drawing on his experiences as a military and political leader, he sounds a powerful warning: Israel is at a crossroads, threatened by events beyond its borders and by divisions within. The two-state solution is more urgent than ever, not just for the Palestinians, but for the existential interests of Israel itself. Only by rediscovering the twin pillars on which it was built—military strength and moral purpose—can Israel thrive. Keep reading for an excerpt of Ehud Barak’s definitive memoir.

Kibbutz Roots

I am an Israeli. But I was born in British-ruled Palestine, on a fledgling kibbutz: a cluster of wood-and-tar-paper huts amid a few orange groves and vegetable fields and chicken coops. It was just across the road from an Arab village named Wadi Khawaret, whose residents fled in the weeks before the establishment of the State of Israel, when I was six years old.

As prime minister half a century later, during my stubborn yet ultimately fruitless drive to secure a final peace treaty with Yasir Arafat, there were media suggestions that my childhood years gave me a personal understanding of the pasts of both our peoples, Jews and Arabs, in the land that each saw as its own. But that is in some ways misleading. Yes, I did know firsthand that we were not alone in our ancestral homeland. At no point in my childhood was I ever taught to hate the Arabs. I never did hate them, even when, in my years defending the security of Israel, I had to fight, and defeat, them. But my conviction that they, too, needed the opportunity to establish a state came only later, after my many years in uniform—especially when, as deputy chief of staff under Yitzhak Rabin, Israel faced a violent uprising in the West Bank and Gaza that became the first intifada. And while my determination as prime minister to find a negotiated resolution to our conflict was in part based on a recognition of the Palestinian Arabs’ national aspirations, the main impulse was my belief that such a compromise was profoundly in the interest of Israel, whose existence I had spent decades defending on the battlefield and which I was ultimately elected to lead.

Zionism, the political platform for the establishment of a Jewish state, emerged in the late 1800s in response to a brutal reality. That, too, was a part of my own family’s story. Most of the world’s Jews, who lived in the Russian empire and Poland, were trapped in a vise of poverty, powerlessness, and anti-Semitic violence. Even in the democracies of Western Europe, Jews were not necessarily secure. Theodor Herzl, a largely assimilated Jew in Vienna, published the foundational text of Zionism in 1896. It was called Der Judenstaat. “Jews have sincerely tried everywhere to merge with the national communities in which we live, seeking only to preserve the faith of our fathers,” he wrote. “In vain are we loyal patriots, sometimes super-loyal. In vain do we make the same sacrifices of life and property as our fellow citizens … In our native lands where we have lived for centuries, we are still decried as aliens.” Zionism’s answer was the establishment of a state of our own, in which we could achieve the self-determination and security denied to us elsewhere.

During the 1890s and the early years of the new century, more than a million Jews fled Eastern Europe, but mostly for America. It was only in the 1920s and 1930s that significant numbers arrived in Palestine. Then, within a few years, Hitler rose to power in Germany. The Jews of Europe faced not just discrimination and pogroms. They were systematically, industrially murdered. From 1939 until early 1942, when I was born, nearly 2 million Jews were killed. Six million would die by the end of the war. Almost the whole world, including the United States, rejected pleas to provide a haven for those who might have been saved. Even after Hitler was defeated, the British shut the doors of Palestine to those who had somehow survived.

* * *

I was three when the Holocaust ended. Three years later Israel was established, in May 1948, and neighboring Arab states sent in their armies to try to snuff the state out in its infancy. It would be some years before I fully realized that this first Arab-Israeli war was the start of an essential tension in my country’s life, and my own: between the Jewish ethical ideals at the core of Zionism and the reality of our having to fight, and sometimes even kill, in order to secure, establish, and safeguard our state. Yet even as a small child, I was keenly aware of the historic events swirling around me.

Mishmar Hasharon, the hamlet north of Tel Aviv where I spent the first seventeen years of my life, was one of the early kibbutzim. These collective farming settlements had their roots in Herzl’s view that an avant-garde of “pioneers” would need to settle a homeland that was still economically undeveloped, and where even farming was difficult. Members of Jewish youth groups from Eastern Europe, among them my mother, provided most of the pioneers, drawing inspiration not just from Zionism but from the still untainted collectivist ideals represented by the triumph of Communism over the czars in Russia.

It is hard for people who didn’t live through that time to understand the mind-set of the kibbutzniks. They had higher aspirations than simply planting the seeds of a future state. They wanted to be part of transforming what it meant to be a Jew. The act of first taming, and then farming, the soil of Palestine was not just an economic imperative. It was seen as deeply symbolic of Jews finally taking control of their own destiny. It was a message that took on an even greater power and poignancy after the mass murder of the Jews of Europe during the Holocaust.
Even for many Israelis nowadays, the physical challenges and the all-consuming collectivism of life on an early kibbutz are hard to imagine. Among the few dozen families in Mishmar Hasharon when I was born, there was no private property. Everything was communally owned and allocated. Every penny—or Israeli pound—earned from what we produced went into a communal kitty, from which each one of the seventy-or-so families got a small weekly allowance. By “small,” I mean tiny. For my parents and others, even the idea of an ice cream cone for their children was a matter of keen financial planning. More often, they would save each weekly pittance with the aim of pooling them at birthday time, when they might stretch to the price of a picture book, or a small toy.

Decisions on any issue of importance were taken at the aseifa, the weekly meeting of kibbutz members held on Saturday nights in our dining hall. The agenda would be tacked up on the wall the day before, and the session usually focused on one issue, ranging from major items like the kibbutz’s finances to whether, for instance, our small platoon of delivery drivers should be given pocket money to buy a sandwich or a coffee on their days outside the kibbutz or be limited to wrapping up bits of the modest fare on offer at breakfast time. That debate ended in a classic compromise: a little money, very little, so as to avoid violating the egalitarian ethos of the kibbutz.

But perhaps the aspect of life on the kibbutz most difficult for outsiders to understand, especially nowadays, is that we children were raised collectively. We lived in dormitories, organized by age group and overseen by a caregiver: in Hebrew, a metapelet, usually a woman in her twenties or thirties. For a few hours each afternoon and on the Jewish Sabbath, we were with our parents. Otherwise, we lived and learned in a world consisting almost entirely of other children.

Everything around us was geared toward making us feel like a band of brothers and sisters, as part of the wider collective. Until our teenage years, we weren’t even graded in school. And though we didn’t actually study how to till the land, some of my fondest early memories are of our “children’s farm”—the vegetables we grew, the goats we milked, the hens and chickens that gave us our first experience of how life was created. And the aroma always wafting from the stone ovens in the bakery at the heart of the kibbutz, where we could see the bare-chested young men producing loaf after loaf of bread, not just for Mishmar Hasharon but small towns and villages for miles around.

Until our teenage years, we lived in narrow, oblong homes, four of us to a room, unfurnished except for our beds, under which we placed our pair of shoes or sandals. At one end of the corridor was a set of shelves where we collected a clean set of underwear, pants, and socks each week. At the other end were the toilets—at that point, the only indoor toilets on the kibbutz, with real toilet seats rather than just holes in the ground. All of us showered together until the age of twelve. I can’t think of a single one of us who went on to marry someone from our own age group in the kibbutz—it would have seemed almost incestuous.

Mishmar Hasharon and other kibbutzim have long since abandoned the practice of collective child rearing. Some in my generation look back on the way we were raised not only with regret, but pain: a sense of parental absence, abandonment, or neglect. My own memories are more positive. The irony is that we probably spent more waking time with our parents than town or city children whose mothers and fathers worked nine-to-five jobs. The difference came at bedtime, or during the night. If you woke up unsettled, or ill, the only immediate prospect of comfort was from the metapelet or another of the kibbutz grown-ups who might be on overnight duty. Still, my childhood memories are overwhelmingly of feeling happy, safe, protected. I do remember waking up once, late on a stormy winter night when I was nine, in the grips of a terrible fever. I’d begun to hallucinate. I got to my feet and, without the thought of looking anywhere else for help, made my wobbly way through the rain to my parents’ room and fell into their bed. They hugged me. They dabbed my forehead with water. The next morning, my father wrapped me in a blanket and took me back to the children’s home.

To the extent that I was aware my childhood was different, I was given to understand it was special, that we were the beating heart of a Jewish state about to be born. I once asked my mother why other children got to live in their own apartments in places like Tel Aviv. “They are ironim,” she said. City-dwellers. Her tone made it clear they were to be viewed as a slightly lesser species.


EHUD BARAK served as Israel’s Prime Minister from 1999 to 2001. He was the leader of the Labor Party from 2007 until 2011, and Minister of Defense, first in Olmert’s and then in Netanyahu’s government from 2007 to 2013. Before entering politics, he was a key member of the Israeli military, occupying the position of Chief-of-Staff. Barak holds a B.Sc. in Physics and Math from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and an M.Sc. degree from Stanford in Engineering-Economic Systems.

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Rare Glimpse of Early Medieval Ireland

This summer, the Library of the Trinity College in Dublin, exhibits its collection of more than 200 precious medieval and early modern manuscripts written in Irish.

The Long Room in the Library of the Tinity College in Dublin ©TCD
The Long Room in the Library of the Tinity College in Dublin ©TCD

Trinity College houses an invaluable collection of 200 manuscripts written in Irish (Gaeilge). Some of these manuscripts are on permanent display, like for instance the Book of Kells and the and Book of Arnagh. Both are singularly important witnesses to the early history of the green island. This summer a huge part of the library’s less famous collection will be on show in Dublin.

One example of this is the exhibition of the Book of Leinster (Leabhar na Núachongbhála), one of the most important manuscripts of the Early Irish period and the earliest manuscript in the Library’s collection written entirely in Irish. An anthology of prose, verse and genealogy, it provides a precious glimpse of the worldview and mode of life of the Old Irish People. Other significant manuscripts are later, but still, important witnesses to for instance the laws of the land as they were laid down in the 7thand 8thcenturies.

This is an exciting exhibition and well worth a visit if you are visiting Ireland and Dublin this summer.

However, Irish is not – as claimed on the official website – the oldest vernacular language in Europe, in which a formidable literature is preserved. This prize goes to Gothic and the writings from the 4thcentury as well as early Runic inscriptions in Germanic from the 1stcentury and onwards. In fact, the first significant texts in Irish are preserved in the Liber Ardmachanus (Book of Armagh) from the 9thcentury. Visitors would thus be well advised to take some of the nationalistic pride with a pinch of salt. The illuminated manuscripts, however, are astounding.

The exhibition, drawn from the world’s largest and most important collection of medieval Irish manuscripts, is being held to mark two decades of the college’s collaboration on a digitisation project with the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies on the Irish Script on Screen (ISOS) – Irish Script on Screen  – In connection with this anniversary, Trinity College Dublin is hosting a conference and exhibition to celebrate its collection of 200 precious medieval and early modern manuscripts written in Irish. The collection ranks as one of the most important in the world.

The Irish Manuscripts in the Library of Trinity College exhibition at the Old Library (the Long Room) will run from May 17 until the end of June. The online exhibition with an introduction is well worth a visit.

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Dark Age Nunneries and Female Monasticism

Nunneries in the Carolingian and Ottonian World 800–1050 were vibrant and creative lifeworlds

Dark Age Nunneries. The Ambiguous Identity of Female Monasticism, 800–1050
By Steven Vanderputten
Ithaca, Cornell University Press 2018

In Dark Age Nunneries, Steven Vanderputten dismantles the common view of women religious between 800 and 1050 as disempowered or even disinterested witnesses to their own lives. It is based on a study of primary sources from forty female monastic communities in Lotharingia—a politically and culturally diverse region that boasted an extraordinarily high number of such institutions. Vanderputten highlights the attempts by women religious and their leaders, as well as the clerics and the laymen and -women sympathetic to their cause, to construct localized narratives of self, preserve or expand their agency as religious communities, and remain involved in shaping the attitudes and behaviors of the laity amid changing contexts and expectations on the part of the Church and secular authorities.

Rather than a « dark age » in which female monasticism withered under such factors as the assertion of male religious authority, the secularization of its institutions, and the precipitous decline of their intellectual and spiritual life, Vanderputten finds that the post-Carolingian period witnessed a remarkable adaptability among these women. Through texts, objects, archaeological remains, and iconography, Dark Age Nunneries offers scholars of religion, medieval history, and gender studies new ways to understand the experience of women of faith within the Church and across society during this era.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Steven Vanderputten is Professor in the History of the Early and Central Middle Ages at Ghent University. He is the author of Monastic Reform as Process: Realities and Representations in Medieval Flanders, 900–1100 and Imagining Religious Leadership in the Middle Ages: Richard of Saint-Vanne and the Politics of Reform, both from Cornell University Press.

 

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Macht & Mythos in Sachsen-Anhalt 2018

This year the Romanesque Route in Sachsen-Anhalt celebrates its 25th anniversary. In connection with the celebrations, three exhibitions have been organised. Also, a new Cathedral Museum in Magdeburg is scheduled to open its doors this autumn.

Germany in the 10th century was a European superpower. From the ranks of the ruling dynasties – the Ottonians and Salians – a number of remarkable kings and emperors were seen to take the mantle form the Carolingians. Albeit based on the exploitation of the new-found silver mines near Goslar, the heartland for the itinerant royals was the lush and rich agrarian landscape on the corridors through which the River Elbe and its tributaries flow. To the south, winegrowing is a thousand -year old tradition. To experience this landscape a cultural route was marked out in the landscape of Sachsen-Anhalt in 1993, The Romanesque Route. Celebrating its 25th year anniversary in 2018, three exhibitions and one new museum are scheduled to open up the region for cultural tourists and not least medievalists.

Memleben – Wissen & Macht

Wissen und Macht coverArchaeological excavations in the 20thcentury have demonstrated that the grand ideas behind the construction of a special memorial shrine for the Ottonian dynasty at Memleben foundered. Apart from the innards of Otto I (the Great), the Ottonians were buried elsewhere. And the plans hatched by Otto II and his queen Theophanu fell to the earth when he died in Italy and she had to scramble to secure the reign of her under-age son. Also, soon after the foundation of the Benedictine monastery, they had orchestrated as part of the building programme, was attacked in a Slavic uprising. Today, the magnificent cathedral in Memleben can only be traced through the ground plan as it is marked in the landscape.

In the now-defunct monastery, a local museum tells the story about the place. This year, a special exhibition aims to shed light on the main protagonists of the story – The emperor, Otto II, the queen, Theophanu, Benedikt of Nursia and the Benedictines and the eremite Heimerad. By circling their life-world, visitors get a glimpse of what it meant to live in the 10thcentury in a world marked out by palaces, bishoprics, and monasteries. This was a sacral landscape bent on emphasizing the sacred nature of the royal power, commitments and entitlements (so-called Sakalkönigstum).

Merseburg – Thietmar’s Welt

Thietmar of Merseburg (975 – 18) bishop of Merseburg 1009 – 1018, was an idiosyncratic chronicler providing his readers with countless juicy details and descriptions of the lifeworlds of people in the 10thand 11thcenturies. As next of kin to the ruling elite of Saxony, not least the royal family, he was abreast of all that happened in his lifetime as well as the period leading up to the events around the millennium. Without his chronicle, the world of the Ottonians would definitely lose their lustre. No wonder, German medievalists have literally “plundered” his text for insight into the mentality of people living at the millennial turn.

This year, a special exhibition is planned in Merseburg to celebrate his life-world. The exhibition opens to the public in July and as yet details are not available. According to the early presentation, though, the exhibition promises to help visitors visualise and sense life as he and his protagonists experienced it.

Saale-Anstrut – The World of the Monasteries

The south corner of Sachsen-Anhalt falls between two tributaries to the river Elbe, the Saale and the Unstrut. The corridors around the riverbanks provided a lush and rich agrarian landscape. No wonder, the Ottonians sought to develop the region through founding monasteries and bishoprics, which might function as well-equipped stepping stones on their itinerant schedules.

This year, a series of the more prominent monasteries in the Saale-Unstrut region have teamed up to shed light on their medieval heritage. Read more about the programme here

Dommuseum Ottonianum Magdeburg

Autumn 2018 a brand new cathedral museum in Magdeburg is scheduled to open its doors. The new museum will be housed in the former Reichsbank from 1924, which is located next to the cathedral in Magdeburg. With 650 m2 the intention is to focus on Otto the Great (912-973) and his queen, Editha (910 -946), both buried in the Cathedral. Another important part will be played by the finds from the recent archaeological excavations in and around the cathedral. On show will be the fragments of the sumptuous textiles, the queen was buried with as well as the results from the extensive studies of her remains and her interment. Other exhibits are provided from the tomb of Archbishops Wichmann von Seeburg (1115-1192) and Otto von Hesse (1301-1361). Currently, a virtual interactive reconstruction of the first Gothic Cathedral begun in 1207 on German soil is under preparation.

VISIT:

Memleben – Wissen & Macht

Kloster und Kaiserpfalz Memleben
Thomas-Müntzer-Str. 48
D-06642 Memleben
Germany

Merseburg – Thietmar’s Welt

Merseburger Dom
Domplatz 7
06217 Merseburg

Saale-Anstrut – The World of the Monasteries

Kloster und Kaiserpfalz Memleben
Thomas-Müntzer-Str. 48
D-06642 Memleben
Germany

Dommuseum Ottonianum Magdeburg

Am Dom 1
39104 Magdeburg
Germany

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The Romanesque Route in Sachsen-Anhalt

Through the scenery of Sachsen-Anhalt runs a fascinating route along which it is possible to discover the riches of Romanesque architecture. Established in 1993, it is the perfect showcase for Germany in the 10thand 11thcenturies

Map of the Romanesque Route 2018
Map of the Romanesque Route 2018

With Magdeburg as its centre, the Romanesque Route takes the visitor through the Middle Ages of Saxony-Anhalt, the frontier zone between 10thcentury Germany and the pagan Slavs and Magyars from the east. Covering the eastern part of Harzen, the route runs east of the silver mines near Goslar, upon which the wealth and power base of the Ottonian and Salian dynasties was built; but also the lush land along the river Elbe and its tributaries. Here Charlemagne established a series of fortified outposts. Later, some of these were turned into royal centres and bishoprics complete with royal palaces and monasteries. This was the heartland of the Saxon dukes.

The route is organised as a figure-of-eight with Magdeburg at the centre of two loops. The route invites the visitor to explore a multitude of village churches, monasteries, cathedrals, and castles built between 950 and 1250. With 73 points of interest and 88 sites, the route covers more than a 1000 km and is not transversed in a few days. It does pay off, though, to follow in the footsteps of the 10th and 11th century itinerant Holy Roman Emperors as the route offers an insight into this heartland of medieval Germany.

The Romanesque Route is a partner of the Transromanica network, a major European Cultural Route since 2006.

VISIT:

Overview of Romanesque Route

Strasse der Romanik

Map with up-to-date information about the Route (2018):
Die Strasse der Romanik in Sachsen –Anhalt

Read more about the route in German:
Faszination – Strasse der Romanik in Sachsen-Anhalt

The Route is also presented in a handy App

 

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Memleben – a Royal and Monastic Centre in 10thcentury Germany

Memleben, one of the royal centres in Ottonian Germany is located at the river Unstrut. Founded in the 8th century, its heyday fell in the late 10th century, when the last Ottonians briefly planned to turn the place into a memorial shrine for their dynasty

Crypt in Memleben Cathedral © Strasse der Romanik
Crypt in Memleben © Strasse der Romanik

In the 10thcentury, the powerful centre of Europe tilted from France to Germany. Although the shift had already begun in the 9thcentury with the civil wars in the 840s and the later consolidation of the power base of Louis the German (c. 806 – 876), it was symptomatic that the short reunification of Western and Eastern Francia, which took place after the death of Louis, did not last. In the end, it petered out with the death of Louis the Child in 911. It was the chief councillors of this last Carolingian – the Archbishop of Mainz and the Bishop of Constance – who transferred the reins of power into the hands of the Frankish Conradines. At the death of Conrad the first, the power finally ended up in the hands of the Saxon Duke, Henry the Fowler, and with him the dynasty of the Ottonians.

Part of their heartland was Harz including the southeastern frontier region of the Saale-Unstrut. The settlement at Memleben was already mentioned at the end of the 8thcentury. However, it was not until the 10thcentury, the place gained in status and importance. Henry the Fowler (876 – 936) had a royal villa in Memleben. Here, he died in 936. Although his remains were interred at Quedlingburg, his son, Otto I continued to favour the place and at his approaching death in 973, he was once more drawn to the palace. According to Thietmar of Merseburg, his heart was buried at Memleben, while the rest of his remains were interred at Magdeburg.

Later, in 979, his son and successor, Otto II and his wife Theophanu, founded a Benedictine monastery near the royal palace. Endowed with huge tracts of land in Thuringia, Saxony, Hesse and Brandenburg it continued to grow when Otto III made plans to establish it as the centre of a bishopric. Regrettably, though, Memleben was located too close to the border and in 983 it lost most of its income and possessions due to a Slavic uprising.

Also, the last of the Ottonians, Henry II (973 – 1024) had other ideas. Soon the rights to hold markets, mint coin, and demand toll were abolished. The pet project of Henry II was the new bishopric in Bamberg, and as a consequence, the Abbey at Memleben was subordinated to the old Carolingian foundation, the ancient Abbey at Hersfeld. With these organisational changes, Memleben lost its status as the main memorial for the Ottonians. It is likely the great abbey church was never completed. The last German monarch to stay at Memleben was Conrad the II in 1033.

During the Reformation, peasants plundered the monastery and the revenues from the land were deeded to the Pforta School. After 1945, the remaining 3300 ha of land was appropriated by an agrarian commune, which was worked by more than 1200 farmers. Finally, after 1990, Memleben was renamed as Kloster und Kaiserpfalz Memleben vying for the position as the local tourist centre and gatekeeper of the Naturepark, Saale-Unstrut-Triaspark. Today, the Abbey is a museum

The Palace and the Monastery

Exactly where the Ottonian Palace was located is not known. Probably next to or beneath the Benedictine Monastery of which extensive ruins still stand; or it might be located at the ruins of the Wendelstein Castle.

The Ottonian memorial church measured c. 80 metres x 28 metres and had three naves, a double apse  (one at each end), and possibly two crypts. It was apparently never finished. It is likely the crypts were intended as a double sanctuary, one for the sarcophagi of the kings and their family, with the adjoining one housing the celebration of the memorial masses and liturgical hours. The closest relative of the grand church in Memleben is the Cathedral in Cologne (version VII) c. 953 – 65.

The ruins next to the monastery belong to a church built to accommodate the community in the later Middle Ages.

VISIT:

Kloster und Kaiserpfalz Memleben
Thomas-Müntzer-Str. 48
D-06642 Memleben
Germany

Memleben is a point of interest listed on the Romanesque Route

READ MORE:

Memleben. Königspfalz, Reichskloster, Propstei
von Helge Wittmann
Vereins des Klosters und der Kaiserpfalz Memleben 2001 (2008)

 

 

 

 

 

 

SEE MORE:

Summer 2018, Memleben hosts a special exhibition focusing on Memleben as the Royal centre of the Ottonians.

Wissen & Macht

 

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Monasteries in the Region of Saale and Unstrut 2018

Summer 2018 in the region of Saale-Unstrut celebrates the Romanesque heritage preserved in cathedrals, churches and monasteries – or the ruins thereof

Kloster Huysberg © Andreas Schrader
Kloster Huysberg © Andreas Schrader

Between AD 900 and 1250, some of the most beautiful ecclesiastical buildings were constructed in the Romanesque style. Characterised by its typical semi-circular arches over portals, windows, cross vaults, and porticos, the Romanesque sought to visualise the omnipotence of God and Emperor. Although Pan-European, the style was massively adopted in the Germany of the Ottonians and the Salians. Some of the more prominent Romanesque cathedrals and monasteries were built here as part of securing the frontier in Eastern Europe towards the pagan Slavs and Magyars. at the heart of this frontier was the Saale-Unstrut region, where several decisive battles were fought in the 10th century.

The Unstrut is a tributary river to the Saale and runs through the Thuringian Basin. These rivers form the boundaries of the wine-growing region of Saale-Unstrut, now mainly located in Saxony-Anhalt. A hilly and swampy frontier region between 10thcentury Germany and the invading Magyars, it became home to a number of abbeys founded by Henry I and his descendants, Otto I, II and III as well as members of the Salian dynasty. These monasteries came to invigorate the region through wine-growing, innovative agriculture as well as important centres of learning. These foundations continue to set their mark on the region; a few as still living monasteries, others as schools, institutions, or just as medieval ruined heritage.

In 1998, The ′Naumburg Cathedral and the surrounding cultural landscape along the rivers Saale and Unstrut′ were placed on the tentative list to be nominated as World Heritage by UNESCO.  One of the arguments is that nowhere else in the world such a high density of monuments and cultural landscape elements from the High Middle Ages have been preserved in such a small space. The proposition was discussed at the 41st meeting in 2017 and referred to further revision. On 1st of February 2018, Germany submitted the revised nomination “Naumburg Cathedral”. According to the decision in Krakow 2017, however, the renewed submission for 2018 should limit itself to the Cathedral of Naumberg and surroundings. Nevertheless, local authorities continue to “market” the region as a Romanesque landscape, well worth a visit for the medievalist. 

In 2018, a number of the monasteries in the region – Memleben together with Donndorf, Göllingen, Goseck, Helfta, Huysburg, Naumburg, Posa (Zeitz), Pforta, Reinsdorf (Nebra), Zscheiplitz –  celebrate their medieval cultural heritage through a number of exhibitions and cultural programmes. Even two living monasteries have opened their ports this summer, the Cistercian convent of Helfta in Eisleben and the Benedictine monastery at Hoysburg.

Places to visit

  • Map ofMonasteries in Saale-Unstrut © Kloster & Welt 2018
    Map of monasteries in Saale-Unstrut © Kloster & Welt 2018

    Kloster Donndorf c. 1250

  • Göllingen c. 992
  • Kloster Goseck c. 800
  • Kloster Helfta 1229
  • Kloster Huysburg (c. 790) c. 977
  • Kloster Memleben (c. 786) c. 900
  • Kloster Naumburg c. 1046
  • Kloster Posa 1114
  • Kloster Pforta 1131
  • Kloster Reinsdorf 1135
  • Kloster Freyburg c. 1041

Partner to the exhibitions and calendar of events is the “Festival Montalbâne”.

PROGRAMME:

Kloster & Welt 2018

 

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Festival Montalbâne 2018

Festival Montalbâne is a festival for medieval music, which is held each year in the region of the Unstrut-Saale. It now runs in its 28th year. This year it is part of the exhibition programme, Monastery & World 2018

This year – 2018 – the theme of the Montalbâne Festival is Mysticism and Extacy. The musical programme intends to explore the sound of the medieval monasteries, of which the German region of Unstrut-Saale is so rich.

Usually, the festival is housed at Neuenburg in Freyburg. This year, however, the festival is housed at the Cistercian Abbey at Pforta. It is part of the celebration of the many monasteries in the region offering exhibitions, visits, and other activities.

The program this year offers concerts with Ars Choralis Coeln from Cologne, Stimmen from Byzans (Byzantion), Kelly Landerkin, Gilles Binchois and Miroir de Musique from France and Tavagna from Corsica, as well as the Montalbãne Ensemble. The festival opens with a performance of Hildegard von Bingen’s “Ordo Virtutem”, known as the first mystery play from Europe.

Featured Photo:

The Circle of Angels. From Scivias, an illustrated work by Hildegard von Bingen, completed in 1151 or 1152.

VISIT:

Montalbâne 2018
Der Klang mittelalterlicher Klosterwelten
XXVIII International Festival of Medieval Music
06.07.2018 – 08.07.2018

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