Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 1968, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects:

Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 2024, History

Slavery in early medieval Europe was an institution in transition from the Roman form of slavery into an institution that would eventually prohibit the enslavement of Christians. The successor Germanic kingdoms, including the Visigoths and Lombards, perpetuated the slave trade and expand on modes of enslavement. Simultaneously, the Church attempted to both maintain its slave labor force as well as establish itself as a manumitter of all Christian slaves through Church councils and episcopal letters. However, Christian aspirations for the manumission of slaves were prevalent throughout the early medieval literature of the Church. Many hagiographies and other idealistic sources depicted slavery as a violent and brutal institution, with popes and saints often manumitting slaves from monasteries, redeeming war-captives, or outright denouncing the institution as a whole. The aim of this thesis is to analyze the role of the Church in the institution of slavery between 600 and 800 C.E. in a comparative analysis of hagiography, councils, epistles, and legal codes in order to assess this discrepancy of what the Church said and what the Church actually did. Ultimately, ecclesiastical slavery saw little decline in this period, despite the Church's establishment as manumitter of Christian slaves.

Committee: Casey Stark Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Douglas Forsyth Ph.D. (Committee Member); Nikolas Hoel Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: History; Middle Ages

Artium Baccalaureus (AB), Ohio University, 2023, History

This thesis examines the career of Ebroin, Frankish mayor of the palace from 664- 673 and 675-680 CE. His career as mayor was controversial: his enemies called him an unjust tyrant for acting against the interests of the Frankish aristocracy, and he became infamous for ordering the blinding and murder of Bishop Leudegar of Autun. After his assassination in 680, Ebroin's legacy fell into the hands of his enemies, who used it to further their own agendas. Although a study of Ebroin can make use of a multitude of sources, their accounts of the mayor are often contradictory and biased. This thesis seeks to uncover the successes of Ebroin's career hidden in contemporary sources and trace how his legacy changed soon after his death, during the Carolingian period, and beyond. A thorough investigation of the differing accounts of near-contemporary sources and later sources reveals that Ebroin's career was more successful than authors made it out to be and that the influence of his enemies transformed his legacy into a simplified and misunderstood shadow of itself centuries after his death.

Committee: Kevin Uhalde (Advisor) Subjects: History; Medieval History

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2019, English

This dissertation reconsiders hagiographic narratives about holy women, arguing that medieval conceptions of community, sexuality, and devotional practice are future-orientated and queer. Using The Life of Saint Katherine of Alexandria, The Book of Margery Kempe, and The Life of Dorothea of Montau, I argue that hagiography is not a closed genre governed by strict conventions, but instead a literary “place” in which social, institutional, and textual boundaries are tested. My research expands a queer historical and literary archive by examining medieval narratives that allow affective recognition between queer individuals and communities across historical periods. My research specifically traces the development of queer futures in medieval religious writing, identifying the political and textual affordances provided by the presence of these futures to nonnormative individuals and communities in the medieval period as well as the present. My dissertation foregrounds queer practices and relationships in medieval narratives, thereby expanding current understandings of medieval culture and sexuality. Reconsidering holy women through a queer lens challenges modern understandings of history that essentialize sexual identity in order to legitimize racist and sexist ideologies. My dissertation extends medieval sexuality beyond binary gender categories to account for religious representations of nonnormative sexuality and gender within the textual relationships between hagiographers and their subjects.

Committee: Karen Winstead (Advisor); Jennifer Higginbotham (Committee Member); Ethan Knapp (Committee Member) Subjects: Middle Ages

MA, University of Cincinnati, 2009, Arts and Sciences : Communication

In July 1980, in Dayton, Ohio, church history reached a milestone for gender equality. Marjorie Swank Matthews became the first woman to be elected as a bishop in any Protestant Christian denomination. The purpose of this thesis project is to conduct a feminist rhetorical criticism of three of Bishop Matthews's sermons from across her four-year term in the episcopal leadership of the United Methodist Church. Feminist rhetorical scholarship broadly falls into two perspectives, writing women in and challenging rhetorical standards. While neither perspective is complete, this project's method is to combine the two perspectives, an approach that offers the potential for insightful and productive knowledge generation. Therefore, this thesis simultaneously considers questions from scholars with diametric understandings of feminism and the application of feminist values to rhetorical theory and criticism. The sermons this project considers, in chronological order, are “Chosen for Challenge,” dated February 16, 1982; “The Sign of Discipleship,” dated May 1, 1983 and May 15, 1983; and “We Shall Go Forth,” dated October 13, 1984. This project uncovers the rhetorical strategies of the first woman bishop in any Christian denomination and argues that understanding her life and rhetoric as hagiographic is valuable. Implications for the usefulness of each perspective (and the combination of perspectives) for rhetorical theory and criticism are considered.

Committee: John Lynch PhD (Committee Chair); Heather Zoller PhD (Committee Member); James W. Crocker-Lakness PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Communication; Religion; Religious Congregations; Religious Education; Religious History; Rhetoric; Womens Studies

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2002, Arts and Sciences : English and Comparative Literature

In this study, my purpose has been to formulate a context in which the image of the medieval body can be better understood and appreciated. Chapter One sets up the context of medieval bodies within the medical understanding of the physical body and how metaphoric representation was shaped by classical rhetoric. Chapter Two covers how, specifically in Juliana, Andreas , and Guthlac B , the imagery of the saint's body reinforces the hagiography's rhetorical structure and Christian ideals. Chapter three examines Richard Rolle, Walter Hilton, the author of The Cloud of Unknowing, Julian of Norwich and Margery Kempe, and how through their visions their bodies demonstrate the experience of a deep spiritual union with God. Female mystics move beyond the limitations set for women and claim authority in this relationship with God. Chapter Four examines the portrayal of bodies in Middle English romances, specifically The Squire of Low Degree and The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnell . Dame Ragnell's physical ugliness allows her to transgress the normal limitations of her station. Once she is transformed she immediately conforms to social expectations. In The Squire of Low Degree , the manner in which he is transformed from lowly squire to king is pivotal to his success. Chapter Five covers Chaucer's Prologue to The Canterbury Tales, the Knight's Tale, the Wife of Bath's Tale and the Parson's Tale. Chaucer uses rhetorical devices with bodies in his works, but he changes the traditional nature of these bodies, giving them a new dimension yet one that still works within the medieval framework of literary and social types. By approaching body imagery in medieval literature through the perspective of poetic ornamentation and physical science as it was understood by medieval authors and audiences, a more complete view of the culture and concerns of the medieval world emerges.

Committee: Dr. Lowanne Jones (Advisor) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy, University of Toledo, 2012, History

During the Middle Ages the Church worked to make official liturgical services unified and universal. Close textual and historical analysis of Latin liturgical documents offers insight into the writers' method and the sentiments expressed in prayer. The repertory for this study is a set of poems drawn from selected hours of the Divine Office: first vespers, matins, lauds, second vespers. All of the Offices date from the late Middle Ages (A.D. 1100-1500) and were written to honor saints who served as bishops. Although the texts are late medieval, there is a great range in the bishops' lifetime. A discussion of liturgy and the cycle of celebrations is followed by a consideration of the special Divine Office category: services dedicated to bishop saints. Thirty-five Latin Offices honoring thirteen bishops are considered. This study restricts itself to the lyrics, not the musical notation. The identification of rhyme scheme, metrical pattern, and overall structure is followed by delineation of peculiar features of each poem. They are examined for such elements as figures of speech, scriptural allusion, place names, and hagiographical convention. Especially notable are references to the bishop's interaction with secular authorities. Special attention is given to two saints especially popular during the period under consideration: Bishop Nicholaus of Bari (fourth century) and Bishop Guillelmus of Bourges (early thirteenth century). The former represents early saints whose cult spread throughout Europe during the late Middle Ages and who were revered, not through the official canonization process, but rather by force of popular devotion. The aim of this study is threefold. It establishes the late medieval identity of the bishop saint. It also traces, in Nicolaus of Bari and Guillelmus of Bourges, the outline of the bishop saint as a patron who also stood up to secular authority when the Church's position was challenged. Third, the examination of texts of Nicolaus as an ea (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Carol Bresnahan (Committee Chair); Robert Curtis I (Committee Member); Michael Jakobson (Committee Member); Diane Britton (Committee Member) Subjects: European History; Foreign Language; Medieval History; Medieval Literature; Religious History

Doctor of Philosophy, University of Toledo, 2012, History

During the Middle Ages the Church worked to make official liturgical services unified and universal. Close textual and historical analysis of Latin liturgical documents offers insight into the writers' method and the sentiments expressed in prayer. The repertory for this study is a set of poems drawn from selected hours of the Divine Office: first vespers, matins, lauds, second vespers. All of the Offices date from the late Middle Ages (A.D. 1100-1500) and were written to honor saints who served as bishops. Although the texts are late medieval, there is a great range in the bishops' lifetime. A discussion of liturgy and the cycle of celebrations is followed by a consideration of the special Divine Office category: services dedicated to bishop saints. Thirty-five Latin Offices honoring thirteen bishops are considered. This study restricts itself to the lyrics, not the musical notation. The identification of rhyme scheme, metrical pattern, and overall structure is followed by delineation of peculiar features of each poem. They are examined for such elements as figures of speech, scriptural allusion, place names, and hagiographical convention. Especially notable are references to the bishop's interaction with secular authorities. Special attention is given to two saints especially popular during the period under consideration: Bishop Nicholaus of Bari (fourth century) and Bishop Guillelmus of Bourges (early thirteenth century). The former represents early saints whose cult spread throughout Europe during the late Middle Ages and who were revered, not through the official canonization process, but rather by force of popular devotion. The aim of this study is threefold. It establishes the late medieval identity of the bishop saint. It also traces, in Nicolaus of Bari and Guillelmus of Bourges, the outline of the bishop saint as a patron who also stood up to secular authority when the Church's position was challenged. Third, the examination of texts of Nicolaus as an ear (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Carol Bresnahan PhD (Committee Chair); Robert Curtis PhD (Committee Member); Michael Jakobson PhD (Committee Member); Diane Britton PhD (Other) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2012, French and Italian

This dissertation traces the literary and cultural implications of the representation of suicide and despair in courtly literature from medieval France. The study begins with an introduction to the scholarly work already done on literary texts and is followed by a historical introduction to the problem of suicide and despair in medieval society. Scenes of suicide and despair fall into five main categories: the martyr trope, the desire for union outside the constraints of mortal life, the erotic, the way to truly express the value of life, and the apprehension of death, and they function together to show pieces of the individual personality of each character as well as to highlight societal and cultural problems that would lead a character to despair. Despair and suicide were both grave sins according to the Church in the Middle Ages, yet authors make no obvious commentary or explicit judgment against their despairing or suicidal characters. They do judge them for other sins and transgressions, so this dissertation seeks to examine how the authors do view their characters and what that implies about societal reactions to their problems. Texts from Augustine of Hippo, Ratherius of Verona, and the Fourth Lateran Council provide the religious implications of suicide and despair, and the use of historical studies also inform the societal practices. The texts studied are: The Golden Legend in its Latin, French, and Old Occitan versions; Le Roman d'Eneas; Le Roman de Troie; Partonopeus de Blois; Chretien de Troyes's Le Chevalier au Lion, ou Yvain; and Crescas du Caylar's Le Roman de la Reine Ester. The saints and martyrs from early Christianity provide a significant amount of literary inspiration in the Middle Ages, and their tradition sets the stage for characters to express a wish for an end to earthly existence in a religiously acceptable way. The romans antiques, inspired by Classical war epics, provide another tradition of facing voluntary death or even wishing for d (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Sarah-Grace Heller PhD (Advisor); Jennifer Willging PhD (Committee Member); Christopher A. Jones PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Literature

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2007, English

This dissertation examines the narrative of incidents of doubt in Anglo-Saxon hagiography. Anglo-Saxon hagiography shows a much wider range both in the ways doubt is depicted and the purposes for which it is deployed than that described by Michael Goodich's work on doubt in the later Middle Ages. Anglo-Saxon hagiography has examples of not one, but four broad types of doubt: questions about the saint, accusations against the saint that sow doubt in the minds of others, self-doubt on the part of the saint, and postmortem doubt which derides the saint's sanctity and assumes the saint is powerless to act. Not all hagiographies treat doubt as sinful. Furthermore, not all sinful doubt is punished; some hagiographers treat doubt much more leniently than others. Anglo-Saxon hagiographers had several patristic sources available to them which offered incidents upon which a theology of doubt could have been modeled, but they did not settle on one. Considered against their historic contexts, the moments in which hagiographers chose to use doubt and the ways in which they chose to portray it show a high correspondence between the concerns, agendas and pressures under which the hagiographer wrote and the way in which doubt is treated in the hagiography. Several hagiographers introduce or reproduce doubting incidents in ways which address threats to the cult of their saint. Other hagiographers, Bede and Ælfric, use incidents of doubt to model virtues or characteristics which they wish to spread through the English people. This reminds us that, despite hagiography's investment in the universal and eternal, each hagiography was still directly bound to the concerns and issues of the time and place in which it was written. Those hagiographers who take the narrative risk of using doubt reveal those pressures and concerns under which they wrote.

Committee: Christopher Jones (Advisor) Subjects: Literature, Medieval

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2004, History

At the heart of much scholarship on the Central Middle Ages (c. 950-1150) in western Europe is a debate about the rapidity and nature of change after the disintegration of the Carolingian empire. On the one hand, there is the traditional “mutationist” position, represented by such scholars as Marc Bloch, Jean-Pierre Poly, Eric Bournazel, Georges Duby, and T.N. Bisson. Scholars who adopt this position argue that a revolution, a radical and sharp break with the past, occurred in the structure of western European society around the turn of the millenium. On the other hand, a diverse group, including Dominique Barthelemy, Susan Reynolds, Timothy Reuter and Chris Wickham, has either argued for less rapid change or questioned key aspects of the traditional position. In Phantoms of Remembrance, Patrick Geary has suggested that the debate over the mutationist interpretation has ceased to bear positive fruit, and that the important question in studying the Central Middle Ages is “why and how generations perceived discontinuity, and how these perceptions continued to influence the patterns of thought for a thousand years.” According to Geary, although people in the eleventh century were surrounded with the residue of the previous two centuries, they were unable to make sense of the structures that had given this residue its coherence. Nevertheless, people in the period still attempted to make sense of the past, shaping it to fit contemporary needs. This process is important because it determined both the information people chose to make available to future generations and the form it would take. Put simply, how they chose to remember their past influences how we remember it. My dissertation examines how the hagiography produced for the eleventh-century, Flemish abbey of Saint-Winnoc remembers the past. More specifically, it approaches these texts from three perspectives. First, it identifies the literary strategies their authors employed to construct the past. Second, it exam (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Joseph Lynch (Advisor) Subjects:

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2004, Religion

The purpose of this paper is to examine the popular religious phenomena of relic thefts during the Middle Ages. The hagiographic accounts, where monks and nuns record many of these thefts, reflect some ambivalence over these actions. Questions arise on how then the thefts were justified and moralized, and why certain members of society, especially clerics and royalty, were able to not only participate, but also to have their deeds labeled as sacred. Applying the sociological approach to this study of the thefts within hagiographic texts reveals that the divine authority of clerics and kings, which allowed them to participate in these acts, enabled these members of the medieval church to justify their involvement in theft because the sacredness of the theft, and the person committing it, trumped the situation's ethical concern.

Committee: Peter Williams (Advisor) Subjects:

Master of Arts, University of Akron, 2009, History

For Ottonian Germany and the Saxon Kings, one of the primary works available to modern scholars is Thietmar of Merseburg's Chronicon, written in the early eleventh century. Thietmar was Bishop of Merseburg from 1009-1018. He wrote the Chronicon for his contemporary, King Henry II (1002-1024). The Cathedral was one of the reasons that Henry II found himself frequently in Merseburg. Thietmar's motivations for writing the Chronicon were to convey to Henry the greatness of the Ottonian line and, accordingly, Thietmar detailed battles and the political framework of the past kings.Thietmar also felt that it was his duty as bishop to inform the new king of incidents and actions that had not found grace in the eyes of God. Recognizing that all written documents bear the influence of their authors and are thus reflective of circumstances contemporary to the author as much as they are descriptions of the past allows one to use a source, such as the Chronicon, to explore the author's views and understandings of his society. Thietmar's work offers great insight into how the people of the day experienced religion and their God in their daily lives and the way that they understood their circumstances. God acted through history. It was only when people failed to adhere to the earlier examples that God had to act in the present; when he acted, it was through historical forms. Furthermore, it was through God's historical actions that people related their experiences. The concepts of memory and remembering are central to Thietmar's work. He was mindful of his role in the greater picture to offer a record of past events. Thietmar declares that he wished to act “as the whetstone [sharpening] the iron but not itself.” (Thietmar, Chronicon, I. 14). His work is the whetstone and future readers are the iron, and he intended his readers to return to his work, to his examples, to find inspiration and guidance. There is a sense that Thietmar believed and recognized that events and people, who (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Constance Bouchard PhD (Advisor) Subjects: European History; History; Middle Ages; Religion; Religious History; Theology