Labels and Libels: Naming Beguines in Northern Medieval Europe

Description

This volume investigates the diverse meanings assigned to and adopted by lay religious women in northern Europe between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries. While many outstanding studies have unearthed the local or regional significance of such women, little comparative or transregional scholarship exists to date. Moreover, traditional emphasis on medieval ecclesiastical condemnation of beguines has obscured the extent to which their communities were intertwined with supportive local social structures. Exploring the multiplicity of contemporary perspectives in the Belgian, Dutch, French, and German contexts over time, the volume traces not only the women's relationships to various authorities and institutions, but also the specific terms used to represent and respond to 'beguines'. Illuminating the kaleidoscopic ways in which medieval people categorized, described, and engaged with such women, the collected essays also underscore the extent to which simple dualities of 'clerical' and 'lay', 'elite' and 'popular', and 'orthodox' and 'heretical' are insufficient constructs with which to map intersections of medieval gender, lay religiosity, and society. In doing so, they propose new avenues and coordinates for exploring the sociospiritual topography of medieval Europe. Illustrations vii Foreword ix Preface xi Introduction / Giles Constable 1 Beginnings: Naming Beguines in the Southern Low Countries, 1200–50 / Walter Simons 9 From Case Studies to Comparative Models: Würzburg Beguines and the Vienne Decrees / Jennifer Kolpacoff Deane 53 When is a Beguine not a Beguine? Names, Norms, and Nuance in Canonical Literature / Elizabeth Makowski 83 Dangerous Heretics or Silly Fools? The Name 'Beguine' as a Label for Lay Religious Women of Early Thirteenth-Century Brabant / Vera von der Osten-Sacken 99 On Being a Beguine in France, c. 1300 / Sean L. Field 117 'Love is Beguine': Labelling Lay Religiosity in Thirteenth-Century Paris / Tanya Stabler Miller 135 Merging into Clergy: Beguine Self-Promotion in Cologne in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries / Letha Böhringer 151 Beguines and the 'Devotio Moderna' at the Turn of the Fifteenth Century / Koen Goudriaan 187 Epilogue: The View Ahead 219 Index 227