Epitaph for an Era
Politics and Rhetoric in the Carolingian World

Challenges the divide between political and literary history, in an analysis of a major polemical text from mid-ninth century Europe.

Mayke de Jong (Author)

9781108813884, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 28 May 2020

284 pages, 1 map 4 tables
15 x 23 x 2 cm, 0.43 kg

'… the book … presents a remarkably sympathetic portrait …' Maya Maskarinec, Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies

Wala, abbot of Corbie, played a major role in the rebellions against Emperor Louis the Pious, especially in 830, for which he was exiled. Radbert defended his beloved abbot, known to his monks as Arsenius, against accusations of infidelity in an 'epitaph' (funeral oration), composed as a two-book conversation between himself and other monks of Corbie. Whereas the restrained first book of Radbert's Epitaphium Arsenii was written not long after Wala's death in 836, the polemical second book was added some twenty years later. This outspoken sequel covers the early 830s, yet it mostly addresses the political issues of the 850s, as well as Radbert's personal predicament. In Epitaph for an Era, an absorbing study of this fascinating text, Mayke de Jong examines the context of the Epitaphium's two books, the use of hindsight as a rhetorical strategy, and the articulation of notions of the public good in the mid-ninth century.

1. Introduction
Part I. History: 2. Interconnected lives
3. Between the cloister and the court
Part II. Rhetoric: 4. Lament and dialogue
5. Strategies of persuasion
6. What's in a name?
Part III. Politics: 7. Radbert and the rebellions
8. For God, King and country
9. The world they had lost
Conclusion.

Subject Areas: Church history [HRCC2], Religion: general [HRA], Revolutions, uprisings, rebellions [HBTV], Medieval history [HBLC1], European history [HBJD]