The church and sexuality in medieval Iceland

Although the Church's regulation of marriage and sex was felt by all Germanic tribes, this subject can be studied most closely in Iceland because of the richness of its source material. Four problems are examined here, from literary, legal, and historical sources, namely marriage, divorce, clerical celibacy and extramarital sex. All three categories of sources agree that marriage was a contractual arrangement between the families of the bride and the groom, as known elsewhere among Germanic tribes. They likewise concur that divorce was possible and easily obtainable. Clerical marriage, among both bishops and priests, was seen as acceptable in the legal and historical sources; the literary sagas do not deal with this issue. That extramarital sexual activities were common, is clear from the legal and historical sources but, in contrast, the literary materials depicts Icelandic couples as largely monogamous and faithful. This discrepancy between the historical and literary sagas, both products of the thirteenth century, can be explained by the growing influence of the Church, which by this time was attempting to introduce clerical celibacy and marital fidelity into Iceland. The thirteenth-century clerical authors of the literary sagas, set in ancient times, provided models intended to improve the sexual behavior of their audiences.     

The church and sexuality in medieval Iceland

Although the Church's regulation of marriage and sex was felt by all Germanic tribes, this subject can be studied most closely in Iceland because of the richness of its source material. Four problems are examined here, from literary, legal, and historical sources, namely marriage, divorce, clerical celibacy and extramarital sex. All three categories of sources agree that marriage was a contractual arrangement between the families of the bride and the groom, as known elsewhere among Germanic tribes. They likewise concur that divorce was possible and easily obtainable. Clerical marriage, among both bishops and priests, was seen as acceptable in the legal and historical sources; the literary sagas do not deal with this issue. That extramarital sexual activities were common, is clear from the legal and historical sources but, in contrast, the literary materials depicts Icelandic couples as largely monogamous and faithful. This discrepancy between the historical and literary sagas, both products of the thirteenth century, can be explained by the growing influence of the Church, which by this time was attempting to introduce clerical celibacy and marital fidelity into Iceland. The thirteenth-century clerical authors of the literary sagas, set in ancient times, provided models intended to improve the sexual behavior of their audiences.     

The knighthood in and around late medieval Brussels

This article focuses on the social and political features of the knighthood in one of the most densely populated areas of the Low Countries, the administrative district of Brussels, known as the ammanie, in the fifteenth century. A systematic identification of all knights (rather than a selection) enables us to correct Huizinga’s picture and that of other, more recent, historians of the late medieval nobility as a social group in decay. Moreover, this case study contributes to ongoing debates on the position and status of late medieval knighthood. First, the data make it possible to assess the impact of Burgundian policies on the social, political and military relevance of the knighthood of Brabant. Second, special attention is given to their feudal possessions, in particular lordships and fortified residences, in order to establish stratification within the knighthood. Finally, the status and position of bannerets within the Brabantine knighthood is highlighted since they played a crucial role as intermediaries between the duke of Brabant and the urban elites of Brussels.     

The world of medieval learning

Karl Kautsky's writings on the French Revolution were crucial to the construction not only of the Marxist interpretation of the Revolution, which was perhaps the most important reference point for the historiography of that event during the 20th century, but even of Marxism itself as a comprehensive, systematic theory partly based on historical studies. However, these writings have been neglected and practically forgotten for decades, mainly because of the general rejection of Kautsky's theories after the October Revolution of 1917, in Marxist as well as non-Marxist circles.

Studying these writings, spanning roughly four decades from 1889 till 1930, we may see dynamic interrelations between historical study, theory construction and contemporary political intervention. Kautsky's approach to such key Marxist concepts as class and state prove to be much more subtle and nuanced than what has commonly been assumed, incorporating the results of historical study rather than pure social theory. Yet, his account does contain important internal tensions and contradictions between agency and objective conditions and between the historical material and the normative and political perspective of the historiographer. Several of these internal tensions were carried on into mainstream Marxist accounts of the Revolution, with important historiographical as well as political consequences.     

The evolution of urbanization in medieval Ireland

In Ireland, relatively little research has been carried out into the influence during the medieval period of the Anglo-Normans upon the evolution of urbanization. This paper presents a model (which primarily operates at a regional scale), the purpose of which is to explain interrelationships between the evolutionary processes operating in the early medieval period. It is argued that a settlement's relationship to a stratified land-holding system determined the operation of locational and temporal constraints, varying combinations of which influenced the functional development of urban settlements. Evidence supporting the validity of the model is presented and discussed.     

The mystery of plague in medieval Iceland

This article is aimed at encouraging scholars to continue to take critical, interdisciplinary approaches to understanding the cause and scale of historic plague outbreaks. It does this by reinvestigating two recorded outbreaks of plague in Iceland in 1402–4 and 1494–5. It is argued that these were episodes of pneumonic plague, caused by Yersinia pestis, and that the likely mortality was no more than 25% of the population in both cases. This contrasts with the higher rates (50–60% and 30–50%) postulated elsewhere. Although it is recognised there are other explanations for plague in Iceland, greater caution needs to be taken in interpreting the direct and indirect evidence for its demographic effects. A lower mortality rate fits better with a less widespread and more fragmented epidemic. The numbers and types of Icelandic farms which might have been vacant during the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries are given more detailed consideration than in previous accounts. ‘Farm abandonment’ in the fifteenth century was continually driven by a series of environmental and economic factors and need not be interpreted as a demographic collapse caused solely by the plague. Greater attention is also given to understanding how plague could have reached Iceland and the biological, ecological and sociological factors which might then have sustained it.     

The conjugal debt and medieval canon law

Marriage in Western European society was the preserve of the Christian Church throughout the later middle ages. The law of the Church played a significant role in the formation of doctrine concerning that institution, including the sexual relationship of spouses. Adopting a debt-model of conjugal relations, the canonists maintained that each partner owed marital coitus to the other. The lawyers emphasized the mutually binding character of this obligation, and consistently dejended the right of spouses to exact their marital due, insisting that this duty could be abrogated only by mutual consent. As heirs to an ascetic patristic tradition, however, the lawyers tended to be suspicious of fleshly pleasure. A peculiar and ambivalent doctrine resulted from this tension between an appreciation of the intrinsic goodness of the married state and a distrust of sex, one of its major constituents.     

The conjugal debt and medieval canon law

Marriage in Western European society was the preserve of the Christian Church throughout the later middle ages. The law of the Church played a significant role in the formation of doctrine concerning that institution, including the sexual relationship of spouses. Adopting a debt-model of conjugal relations, the canonists maintained that each partner owed marital coitus to the other. The lawyers emphasized the mutually binding character of this obligation, and consistently dejended the right of spouses to exact their marital due, insisting that this duty could be abrogated only by mutual consent. As heirs to an ascetic patristic tradition, however, the lawyers tended to be suspicious of fleshly pleasure. A peculiar and ambivalent doctrine resulted from this tension between an appreciation of the intrinsic goodness of the married state and a distrust of sex, one of its major constituents.     

The dregs of trembling, the draught of salvation: the dual symbolism of the cup in medieval literature

This article examines the symbolism of the cup in Old English poetry and Old French romance. It argues that the dual symbolism of the cup in the Bible, both the cask of divine wrath and the vessel of mercy, invested the image with a particular dichotomy that was inherited by its metaphoric social functions in the literature of the middle ages. In Old English literature, the cup became a metonym for the contract for lord and thane, the conviviality and treasure exchange that united the mead-hall community. But never far beneath the surface is the fact that this contract requires the thane to die, and this unspoken yet unavoidable truth is writ large in the contagious imagery and vocabulary of the cup. In Old French romance, dichotomy crystallises into binary. The association of the cup of the Last Supper with Joseph of Arimathea, and the development of the Grail legend, made the service of the cup an exclusive loyalty, at the expense of social obligation, and its exigencies are made absolute and immediate. This article offers parallel readings of the same biblical metaphor in different literary cultures and a detailed analysis of a symbol that stands simultaneously for the positive image and its reversal, opposites that are mutually contingent: the community’s desire for unity and preservation and its concomitant fear of disintegration and death.