The saint as patron in the work of Gregory of Tours

Gregory of Tours and his world have long been out of fashion; but despite modern neglect of his works, Gregory gives us access to an understanding of many important aspects of late antiquity, among which is the role of the saint as patron. Saints appear as patrons throughout Gregory's works; the focus of this study is his account of the miraculous deeds of St. Martin. The role of the saint as patron is best understood against the background of the recent work of Peter Brown on holy men in late antiquity; several other scholars have also emphasized the importance of patrons in the Roman world. Appeals to the saints in Gregory's world are to be understood as one manifestation of the Roman ritual of appeal to a patron. More important than their afflictions are the social circumstances of those who appeal to St. Martin and analyzing some others in detail, we can demonstrate that the most important elements in those appeals are the social weakness of the appellants, their need for a saintly patron, and Martin's role as a model saintly patron in Gregory's world     

The spring,the seed and the tree: Gregory of Tours on the wonders of nature

In the preface to his liturgical calendar The reckoning of the course of the stars Bishop Gregory of Tours (538–594) — author also of Ten books of histories and Eight books of miracles as well as of a Commentary on the understanding of the Psalter (of which, however, only fragments are preserved) — declares God's “wonders” of the natural world to be superior to the seven ancient wonders of the world. The reason for this is that the latter, being works of men, are subject to decay and destruction, while the former, as miraculous works of God, are divinely sustained and renewed daily or annually, thereby becoming imperishable. An examination of the associative contexts in which two of these wonders — the sea (enlarged to include water in its various forms) and plant life — occur in the rest of Gregory's works reveals several essential themes of his thinking not only about nature, but also about God, man and society. Thought, for him, nature as a (divinely sustained) system of regularities does exist as a kind of backdrop, sudden unpredictable divine — and sometimes diabolic — action in and through phenomena occupies the center of the stage. Gregory tends to see this action in the shape of what he regards as pre-existing images or patterns of invisible spiritual truth, to which the visible, even material, structure of events must necessarily conform. He shows, too, how this action could reflect as well as meet various needs of the individual and of society as a whole. An association which recurs almost constantly in his treatment of divine action in these natural phenomena, which he sometimes describes as analogous to that in man, is precisely that with the cluster of closely related concepts of renewal, rebirth and creation ex nihilo. Together with what appears as an extreme, as it were ‘poetical’, sensitivity to sudden perceptions and intuitions, something like a longing for and surrender to what he describes as “astonished admiration” may have helped to make possible his recognition of that which he designated as divine creative power in the world of visible reality as well as in man's inner experience. His seeing this as an essential dynamic of the holy may mean that he felt it to be a fundamental need and concern not only of the individual personality but also, more obscurely, of the society in which he found himself.     

The Merovingian accounting documents of Tours: form and function

A little fewer than thirty Merovingian accounting documents which originated from the Abbey of St Martin of Tours, though fragmentary, provide for the historians of early medieval Europe an unexpected tool with which the latter could cast a new light over actual conditions in tribute collection and the management system for the fiscal administration of the abbey. The present article asks some basic questions about these accounting documents in the hope of casting further light on their form and function: which form did take the documents while they had been used for the collection of dues? At which stage of collecting procedure they served in the abbey as a tool for the keeping of records? When was each document prepared? In which historical context could be placed the birth of fiscal document of the abbey? All of these question are important for an understanding of the history of St Martin's of Tours and of the use of documents in general in the Merovingian era.     

The complete Himerius translated and explained

The Alexander Romance depicts Alexander going alone to the court of Darius disguised as his own messenger, dining with the Persians and advancing his own reputation as a munificent king. This episode substitutes a fictional scene for a number of dramatic banqueting incidents in the historical record that cast Alexander in a negative light, specifically, the burning of Persepolis, the proskynesis affair, and the wedding at Susa, which are all banqueting scenes concerned with Alexander’s generosity, reputation, and relations with the Persians. It is also an opportunity for intertextual allusion, especially to Homer and Herodotus. It is, further, only one of many occasions in the Romance when Alexander is said to go alone to visit his enemies in disguise; these episodes integrate the composition and evince a concern with the treatment of ambassadors. It is finally one of the only instances of the explicit characterization of Alexander in the Romance.     

《黄河十四走》

最近读到作家出版社出版的杨先让、杨阳的旧题新作《黄河十四走》,心情十分兴奋。事实上,十年前笔者在台湾出版的《汉声》杂志上已经拜读了连载文章《黄河十四走》。笔者对杨先生在民间艺术上的开