Holy Bones, Holy Dust: How Relics Shaped the History of Medieval Europe

Description

Relics were everywhere in medieval society. Saintly morsels such as bones, hair, teeth, blood, milk, and clothes, and items like the Crown of Thorns, coveted by Louis IX of France, were thought to bring the believer closer to the saint, who might intercede with God on his or her behalf. In the first comprehensive history in English of the rise of relic cults, Charles Freeman takes readers on a vivid, fast-paced journey from Constantinople to the northern Isles of Scotland over the course of a millennium. In Holy Bones, Holy Dust, Freeman illustrates that the pervasiveness and variety of relics answered very specific needs of ordinary people across a darkened Europe under threat of political upheavals, disease, and hellfire. But relics were not only venerated—they were traded, collected, lost, stolen, duplicated, and destroyed. They were bargaining chips, good business and good propaganda, politically appropriated across Europe, and even used to wield military power. Freeman examines an expansive array of relics, showing how the mania for these objects deepens our understanding of the medieval world and why these relics continue to capture our imagination. Contents Illustrations Preface Prologue: The Making of a Martyr CHAPTER ONE How the Christian Relic Emerged CHAPTER TWO The Incorruptible Flesh of the Martyrs CHAPTER THREE Creating a Christian Landscape CHAPTER FOUR The Battle for Acceptance CHAPTER FIVE The View from Byzantium CHAPTER SIX Bishops, Magic and Relics in the Post-Roman World CHAPTER SEVEN ‘A barbarous, fierce and unbelieving nation’ CHAPTER EIGHT The Great Consolidator CHAPTER NINE Hope and Desperation in a Disordered World CHAPTER TEN Cults and the Rise of Anti-Semitism CHAPTER ELEVEN Fervent Christian Pilgrims CHAPTER TWELVE ‘The eyes are fed with goldbedecked reliquaries’ CHAPTER THIRTEEN Looting the East CHAPTER FOURTEEN Louis IX and the Sainte-Chapelle CHAPTER FIFTEEN Sacred Flesh Between Death and Resurrection CHAPTER SIXTEEN ‘Christ’s recruits . . . fight back’ CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Protectors of il Popolo CHAPTER EIGHTEEN The Virgin Mary and the Penitent Whore CHAPTER NINETEEN The Wondrous Blood of Christ CHAPTER TWENTY Rescuers and Devils CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE ‘Of far-off saints, hallowed in sundry lands’ CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO ‘dead images that . . . may not . . . help any man of any disease’ CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE Protestantism and the New Iconoclasm CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR Intimations of Reality CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE Reasserting the Miraculous CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX Within the Community of the Supernatural Notes Select Bibliography Index