Epic Lives and Monasticism in the Middle Ages, 800–1050

This is the first book to focus on Latin epic verse saints' lives in their medieval historical contexts.

Anna Lisa Taylor (Author)

9781107030503, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 2 September 2013

342 pages, 11 b/w illus. 1 map
23.5 x 15.7 x 2 cm, 0.62 kg

'… this is an excellent book that brings to the fore one of the most obscure corners of early medieval literature. Taylor's superb analysis demonstrates just how multifaceted verse Lives really were, and anybody interested in hagiography, education, poetry or classicism ought to read this and look much more closely at these hitherto neglected works.' Edward Roberts, Early Medieval Review

This is the first book to focus on Latin epic verse saints' lives in their medieval historical contexts. Anna Taylor examines how these works promoted bonds of friendship and expressed rivalries among writers, monasteries, saints, earthly patrons, teachers and students in Western Europe in the central Middle Ages. Using philological, codicological and microhistorical approaches, Professor Taylor reveals new insights that will reshape our understanding of monasticism, patronage and education. These texts give historians an unprecedented glimpse inside the early medieval classroom, provide a nuanced view of the complicated synthesis of the Christian and Classical heritages, and show the cultural importance and varied functions of poetic composition in the ninth, tenth and eleventh centuries.

Introduction: saints, teachers, princes, and students
1. Forging sanctity: Hilduin of Saint-Denis and the epic Passio Dionysii
2. Glossing the imaginary: epic vitae in the classroom
3. Classical nightmares: Christian poets and the pagan past
4. Bishops, monks, and mother bees: an epic vita at the millennium
5. Mothers and daughters, affiliation and conflict in the lives of Rictrude and Euseba
Conclusions: 'black seeds on a white field'
Appendix 1. St Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, cod. sang. 265
Appendix 2. Douai Bibliotheque municipale ms 849.

Subject Areas: Christianity [HRC], Medieval history [HBLC1], European history [HBJD]