Articles
The smallest matters: vanishing water, missing birds, revived animals, recovered coins and other trifling miracles in the Thomas Becket collections
Rachel Koopmans
Pages: 587-606
https://doi.org/10.1080/03044181.2022.2130404
Stories involving lost items, sick or missing birds and animals, and the strange behaviour of objects such as coins, candles and relic containers are frequently encountered in high medieval miracle collections, with the ‘jokes' of St Foy of Conques being a well-known example. Such miracles, in which saints were thought to incongruously exercise their powers on ‘minor' or ‘trifling' matters, provoked a range of reactions, from laughing delight to unease and outright dismissal. This essay argues that the ‘trifling' miracle would be a useful addition to typologies of medieval miracles, and contrasts the ways in which two late twelfth-century monks at Canterbury, Benedict of Peterborough and William of Canterbury, worked to integrate and explain stories like these in their collections of the miracles of Thomas Becket.
Governing through influence at the thirteenth-century papal court
Jeffrey M. Wayno
Pages: 607-630
https://doi.org/10.1080/03044181.2022.2130963
This article uses a case study from the late 1230s to expand our understanding of how the papacy exercised power in the high Middle Ages. In the early thirteenth century, the papal court was one of Europe's most important and innovative governing institutions. But while many historians have described the development and structure of the administrative and legal tools popes used to implement their will, less well understood is how the papal court used those tools to get things done. In 1237–8, the papal court under the leadership of Pope Gregory IX spent 14 months trying to help Florentine merchants collect money they had lent to crusaders in France. Using a remarkable set of 22 letters from Gregory's registers, the following pages unpack the details of this case and argue that personal influence was essential to the papacy's efforts to bring it to a successful conclusion.
Parliament, politics and protocol: the Modus tenendi parliamentum and the settlement of the realm under Edward II
Gwilym Dodd
Pages: 631-663
https://doi.org/10.1080/03044181.2022.2131601
The Modus tenendi parliamentum has long perplexed scholars. For over a century they have battled to make sense of its 26 chapters, which purport to describe the centuries-old traditions, functions and processes of the English parliament. A number of hypotheses have emerged to explain its compilation, most notably that it was a Lancastrian political manifesto, a legal treatise or an administrator's programme for reform. In this discussion I argue that a fresh approach is needed. Whilst agreeing with the scholarly consensus that the Modus was originally written in the reign of Edward II (1307–27), I suggest instead that it was a product of the deep political fissures which bedevilled the political community. Its defining characteristic was an attempt to steer a middle ground between the warring factions, and its purpose was to project parliament as the vital institutional context for renewed political consensus.
A healthy Christian city: Christianising health care in late fourteenth-century Seville
Naama Cohen-Hanegbi
Pages: 664-685
https://doi.org/10.1080/03044181.2022.2131602
This essay traces the interconnected endeavours to forge civic health-care provisions and to Christianise the public sphere in late fourteenth-century Seville. Following waves of plague and civil unrest, and growing religious fervour, Seville of the period was building its civic structures anew. Within this process, the municipality and central religious figures in the city took initiatives to advance health care and public health. This essay demonstrates the breadth of measures invested in pursuing health in the city and their entanglement with the religious agenda. The individuals and institutions which sponsored and endorsed health care also advocated the ideal of a Christian community versed in the principles of the Christian faith. The unique case study of Seville's closely-knit community of health-care promoters sheds light on the significant role of health care and the perception of health within Iberian religious culture of the period.
Credit practices and networks in the medieval Italian city: the memoriale of Dr Iacopo di Coluccino of Lucca
So Nakaya
Pages: 686-713
https://doi.org/10.1080/03044181.2022.2132415
A memoriale, or memorandum book, kept by the Lucchese doctor, Iacopo di Coluccino (1373–1416), offers insight into informal credit practices of wealthy citizens and credit networks among ordinary people in late fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Italy, in ways not evident from studies of moneylenders' books, notarial registers or court records. Maestro Iacopo provided small amounts of credit as cash, goods or sales on credit without taking collateral or, in many cases, relying on notaries. This was possible because his credit network was confined to acquaintances and tenants, and because loans to the latter who faced difficulty had a co-operative nature. He sometimes brought legal proceedings against solvent clients to enforce debt collection. His credit network co-existed and overlapped with those of other wealthy citizens, local banks and pawnshops, and through his clients' borrowing practices, he was deeply and extensively implicated in the urban and rural economy.
