After Rome's Fall. Narrators and Sources of Early Medieval History

Description

This richly documented collection of essays, commissioned from a distinguished group of historians, deals with a wide range of issues in the medieval and modern historiography of the early middle ages. Authors who receive extensive treatment are Cassiodorus, Gregory of Tours, Jonas of Bobbio, Fredegar, Lupus of Ferrières, Claudius of Turin, Benjamin of Tudela, and the brothers du Tillet; anonymous sources include the Royal Frankish Annals, the Tale of Rigrannus of Le Mans, and the Plan of St Gall. Among the subjects treated at length are war, ethnicity, divine descent, gender, aristocratic power, Charlemagne, and Carolingian monasticism. The volume is presented in honour of the work of Walter Goffart, whose scholarship has had a profound impact on our present understanding of the character of the early medieval west and its historical writing. CONTENTS MAP AND FIGURES PREFACE ABBREVIATIONS Introduction: Walter André Goffart Walter Goffart: Bibliography, 1957–[1997] 1 Our Forefathers? Tribes, Peoples, and Nations in the Historiography of the Age of Migrations 2 The Purposes of Cassiodorus' Variae 3 Gregory of Tours and the Franks 4 Heresy in Books I and II of Gregory of Tours' Historiae 5 War, Warlords, and Christian Historians from the Fifth to the Seventh Century 6 Jonas, the Merovingians, and Pope Honorius: Diplomata and the Vita Columbani 7 Post vocantur Merohingii: Fredegar, Merovech, and 'Sacral Kingship' 8 Aristocratic Power in Eighth-Century Lombard Italy 9 Making a Difference in Eighth-Century Politics: The Daughters of Desiderius 10 The 'Reviser' Revisited: Another Look at the Alternative Version of the Annales Regni Francorum 11 Pirenne and Charlemagne 12 Lupus of Ferrières in His Carolingian Context 13 What Was Carolingian Monasticism? The Plan of St Gall and the History of Monasticism 14 The Chronicle of Claudius of Turin 15 Monks and Canons in Carolingian Gaul: The Case of Rigrannus of Le Mans 16 Jews, Pilgrimage, and the Christian Cult of Saints: Benjamin of Tudela and His Contemporaries 17 The Trojan Origins of the French and the Brothers Jean du Tillet NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS