Poetry and Prayer: Women and Politics of Spiritual Relationships in the Early Twelfth Century

Writers such as the author of the Histoire , Richard of Devizes, Jordan Fantosme, earlier writers such as Orderic Vitalis and William of Malmesbury, or even the dubious Geoffrey of Monmouth, used gendered language to comment, criticise or alternatively applaud women's roles. Their views on women can be explained by the climate of clerical misogyny within which they wrote, their desire to please their patron and the convention of genre. There were many influences working on individual writers which can explain their views. William of Malmesbury was partisan to the Angevin cause; Orderic Vitalis wrote an ecclesiastical history which criticised the morals of secular society and castigated violently the enemies of the patrons of his monastery. The complex nature of the portrayals of both men and women therefore has to be studied in the light of such biases. Noblewomen participated in literary patronage, they inspired authors as models of virtue, were condemned for typically feminine vices, and as such exerted some influence over the shape of texts. They also commissioned texts, were connected with churchmen and such networks could be used for political purposes. Literary sources have been the subject of much theoretical discussion, yet they can be read alongside charters, the evidence of women's economic, administrative, religious patronage and individual initiative, which have in comparison been relatively neglected.     

Enslaved African Women in Nineteenth-Century Iran: The Life of Fezzeh Khanom of Shiraz

Fezzeh Khanom (c. 1835–82), an African woman, was a slave of Sayyed ‘Ali-Mohammad of Shiraz, the Bab. Information about her life can be recovered from various pious Baha'i histories. She was honored, and even venerated by Babis, though she remained subordinate and invisible. The paper makes the encouraging discovery that a history of African slavery in Iran is possible, even at the level of individual biographies. Scholars estimate that between one and two million slaves were exported from Africa to the Indian Ocean trade in the nineteenth century, most to Iranian ports. Some two-thirds of African slaves brought to Iran were women intended as household servants and concubines. An examination of Fezzeh Khanom's life can begin to fill the gaps in our knowledge of enslaved women in Iran. The paper discusses African influences on Iranian culture, especially in wealthy households and in the royal court. The limited value of Western legal distinctions between slavery and freedom when applied to the Muslim world is noted.     

An anthropologist among the film‐makers: A cautionary tale: Part 2. The politics of circulation (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

In this second part, Pat Caplan continues her account of the production of one episode in the Face values ethnographic film series, an early example of the efforts the Royal Anthropological Institute made to popularize anthropology under royal patronage in the 1970s. Part one, as published in the previous issue, sought to cover the aims of the series, and in this second part she considers the extent to which the original aims were realized.     

Employment on the Priory of Durham Estates, 1494–1519: The Priory as an Employer

Abstract

This article argues that during the years in which he was Archbishop of York, 1514 to 1530, Thomas Wolsey monopolised the patronage of the city of York's governing institution. Unlike previous patrons, Wolsey's status as both the prelate of the archdiocese and the most prominent Crown minister and favourite of Henry VIII, gave him an unprecedented position in the city's quest for securing royal favour. The mayor and commonalty of York were not only aware of Wolsey's pre-eminent standing, but sought to exploit their perceived special connection with him for the city's economic benefit. It was York's governors who initiated and strived to maintain a continual patron-client relationship with Wolsey. In doing so, they deviated from the typical pattern of clientage among sixteenth-century urban governments by forsaking multiple ties with other local and regional notables. Brokers formed the channel through which patronage and clientage were transmitted. These were both men associated with Wolsey through archidiocesan administration and resident locally, and men situated in Wolsey's London household at York Place. By examining patronage and clientage in the context of the city's most pressing issues, this article sheds light on urban-Crown relations in the early Henrician period under Wolsey's supremacy.     

Honouring Saint Louis in a small town

The cult of Saint Louis of France has traditionally been regarded as largely limited to royal shrines and aristocratic patronage, but two documents published here provide some tentative evidence that patronage may have been wider. Evidence of this sort may be rare not because non-aristocratic patronage was rare but because so few records of parish church endowments have survived.     

The “Warrior of the Lords”: Smbat Bagratuni at the Center and Periphery of Late Sasanian Iran

The Armenian general Smbat Bagratuni's remarkable rise to military and political preeminence in the late sixth- and early seventh-century Sasanian Empire presents a fascinating historical question: how did a liminal figure, a Christian from a frontier region, become the “Joy of ?usrō” and “Warrior of the Lords” of king ?usrō II Aparvēz (590–628 CE)? This essay argues that Bagratuni's accomplishments were rooted in Sasanian patterns of political decentralization, provincial regionalism and strategic politics. The Sasanians were ethnically Persian, but Parthian and Armenian aristocrats from the periphery of the empire played a central role in upholding the regime. Granting titles, wealth and personal support, the king sought to turn aristocratic families against each other to enhance royal authority. Simultaneously, regional aristocrats like Smbat Bagratuni used royal patronage to advance their local interests, often at the expense of the royal center. The life of Smbat Bagratuni illustrates how complex negotiations of individual and collective identity shaped relations of “center” and “periphery” in Sasanian Iran.     

Reviews of Books

Abstract

Responding to the relatively sparse literature on choir stall canopies, this article concentrates on the micro-architectural canopies of the Lincoln, Chester and Nantwich stalls of the late 14th century. At Lincoln, a new three-dimensional polygonal canopy design appears, the precedents and sources for which include the York Minster chapter-house stalls, tombs, bishops' thrones and the Stratford monument in Canterbury Cathedral. The circumstances of the commissions of the Lincoln, Chester and Nantwich stalls are explained, with reference to patronage and architectural projects. Ambitious patrons commissioned stalls which broke with the tradition of double-screen construction in order to create impressive tabernacle canopies.     

Margaret Beaufort,Royal Tapestries,and Confinement at the Tudor Court

The English royal household ordinances document the important role tapestries played in Tudor court ceremony. This paper re-examines one specific aspect of the 1493 ordinances: whether or not Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII, dictated the textile practices surrounding royal childbirth. Once widely believed to have done so, scholars have abandoned the idea for lack of evidence. The issue is more complicated than it seems, in part because of longstanding bibliographic error and also because texts associated with two events involving Margaret — the birth of Princess Margaret and the publication of William Caxton’s Blanchardyn and Eglantine — suggest that she was highly attuned to the importance of royal spectacle as mandated by the household ordinances.     

The Politics of Insurgency in Collapsing States

The phenomenon of failed states might be expected to lead to the development of mass–based social movements to address the typically ensuing social problems. This article explores the general failure of reformist insurgencies to develop in failed states, using analyses of Nigeria’s Bakassi Boys and Oodua People’s Congress, and references to other armed groups. The cause of this failure is found in the legacy of patronage politics, especially the strategies of rulers who monopolized economic opportunities as a way of controlling people. As centralized patronage networks fragment, popular movements develop to challenge this control. Local political entrepreneurs, however, continue to dominate local markets, including clandestine ones, and use this social domination to buy off members of mass movements. As their new patrons give them access to weapons and protection against rivals, the organizational position of members who pursue individual economic interests is enhanced, while the people with more overt ideological agendas are marginalized.     

Jean Lemaire de Belges's Rhetorical Masks in L’Amant Vert and “Les Regretz de la Dame Infortunée”

A prominent feature of the poetry of Franco-Burgundian poet and rhetorician Jean Lemaire de Belges (1473–1524) is his use of a rhetorical mask—a persona—through which to proffer his utterances and assert his identity. Because the early sixteenth-century court poet's financially and politically subservient position vis-à-vis powerful aristocratic patrons demands an encomiastic rhetoric that leaves little room for the poet's self-assertion within the body of the poetic text, Lemaire must employ the indirect means of a narrative mask to assert his own existence and concerns. This article examines first the narrative mask of the parrot-lover in the 1505 Epîtres de l’Amant Vert, through which Lemaire is able to voice concerns about his precarious position as a writer almost entirely at the mercy of his patron's good health and good will. A discussion of “Les Regretz de la Dame Infortunée” (1506) follows, in which Lemaire takes an intriguing narratological stance that unites his voice to that of his patroness, Margaret of Austria (1480–1530), ultimately forging an authorial je that speaks for both poet and patron. This nearly mystical union of narrative voices allows Lemaire to express his own concerns about the volatility of the patronage system while concomitantly giving voice to Margaret's mourning at the death of her brother, Philip the Handsome (1478–1506).     

Does Patronage Still Drive Politics for the Rural Poor in the Developing World? A Comparative Perspective from the Livestock Sector

Is the analysis of patron–client networks still important to the understanding of developing country politics or has it now been overtaken by a focus on ‘social capital’? Drawing on seventeen country studies of the political environment for livestock policy in poor countries, this article concludes that although the nature of patronage has changed significantly, it remains highly relevant to the ways peasant interests are treated. Peasant populations were found either to have no clear connection to their political leaders or to be controlled by political clientage. Furthermore, communities ‘free’ of patron–client ties to the centre generally are not better represented by political associations but instead receive fewer benefits from the state. Nonetheless, patterns of clientage are different from what they were forty years ago. First, patronage chains today often have a global reach, through trade, bilateral donor governments and international NGOs. Second, the resources that fuel political clientage today are less monopolistic and less adequate to the task of purchasing peasant political loyalty. Thus the bonds of patronage are less tight than they were historically. Third, it follows from the preceding point and the greater diversity of patrons operating today that elite conflicts are much more likely to create spaces in which peasant interests can eventually be aggregated into autonomous associations with independent political significance in the national polity. NGOs are playing an important role in opening up this political space although at the moment, they most often act like a new type of patron.     

The Ins and Outs of Iranian Industrial Resilience under Sanctions

This paper draws on export data from four of Iran’s key trade partners—the European Union, China, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Turkey—to examine the robust and positive correlations between the export of parts and machinery to Iran and Iran’s industrial output, as measured by production index data published by the Central Bank of Iran for industrial enterprises with over 100 employees. The period of analysis is 2000 to 2017. It may seem intuitive that the output of Iranian manufacturers depends on the ability of companies to source intermediate goods such as parts and machinery. However, the imposition of sanctions on Iran is shown to have temporarily decoupled the relationship between European industrial exports to Iran and the Iranian industrial production index—the index remained stable even as European exports fell. An analysis of trade data for the other three trade partners included in this study quantitatively substantiates reports noting that in order to sustain the industrial production index, Iran engaged in processes that can be collectively described as “import reflection.” This entails substituting European intermediate inputs with Chinese inputs while also circumventing sanctions pressures on trade by sourcing European inputs via re‐export from the UAE and Turkey. These processes were fundamental to Iran’s economic resilience in the face of multilateral sanctions and have played a central role in Iran’s defense of its industrialized economy and particularly its non‐oil exports as the administration of US President Donald Trump pursues a new unilateral campaign of “maximum pressure” sanctions.     

The Chronology of the Last Scandinavian Kings of York,AD 937–954

Abstract

The Cistercian Abbey of Holm Cultram was a twelfth-century royal foundation of Prince Henry, son of King David I when this part of northern England was under Scottish control. The abbey developed a successful network of benefactors spanning both sides of the Border. It was also effective in developing positive relationships with key ecclesiastical figures including Bishop Christian of Whithorn and bishops of Glasgow. The economic strength of the abbey was derived from wool, salt and fish production. In 1193, a daughter house named Grey Abbey was founded in Ulster. The benefits of the frontier location were cut short with the onset of the wars in the 1290s. Holm Cultram Abbey found itself on the path of the marching armies and had to provide supplies and lodgings. When the estates of the abbey and the precinct were attacked by the Scots on several occasions in the fourteenth century, the community turned to the English kings for compensation. On other occasions the abbots did not hesitate to pay ransom to prevent damages to the abbey. Not only the economic difficulties brought by the war, but also loss of contact with the mother house of Melrose and Scottish benefactors more generally, altered the character of Holm Cultram, which became a much more English institution when the cross-Border networks were cut off.     

'Ladies are often very good scaffoldings': Women and Politics in the Age of Anne

The age of Anne saw unprecedented politicisation of society, the expansion of patronage and the election of ten parliaments between 1695 and 1715. If, as has been argued for the second half of the 18th century, such factors facilitated women's political participation, then the prerequisites for women's political involvement, at least at the level of the political elite, existed in the age of Anne. Yet we still know surprisingly little about the shape and extent of women's political participation beyond the dynamics of the Augustan court. This article encourages historians of women and politics to return to the age of Anne and consider women's political participation writ large. Was this period, which has often been seen as a political watershed, also a watershed for women's political involvement? Through an examination of Elizabeth Coke's involvement in the Derbyshire election of 1710, where she served as her brother's political agent, this article calls historians' attention to the activities of one group of politically-active Augustan women – those who served as intermediaries and agents. It argues that politics could be one aspect of a broader familial agency, one which saw women step in and out of family, household, estate and political management, as necessary. Nor, it argues, should these women be seen as mere Swiftian 'scaffoldings'– as means to an end for politically-ambitious men. As agents and intermediaries, women as well as men played recognized political roles, in similar ways, in campaigns across the country; their involvement requires closer examination.     

Compton Castle

Abstract

One of the perennial problems in the study of medieval architectural sculpture is the lack of identifiable patrons. At the church of St Michael, Horwood (North Devon), however, the north aisle and chapel of c. 1400 can be firmly associated with the patronage of the Pollard family, in particular John Pollard and his wife Emma. This includes the north arcade of five bays with its four freestanding and two engaged columns, all of which bear carved capitals. It is likely that the building of this extension was intended to establish the Pollard family at Horwood as well as to commemorate the patrons. Thus the work carries a funereal/monumental air that is reflected in the choice of sculptural imagery which includes a skull, angels and hybrid monsters. This context provides new insight into the ways in which architectural images were perceived and used in the later Middle Ages, particularly with regards to the image of the mermaid.     

D/Escribiendo lo sagrado: texto y contexto de las dos primeras crónicas marianas de América

Abstract

Mercedarian friar Luis de Cisneros wrote a chronicle on Our Lady of Remedios, first patroness of Mexico City that was published in 1621. Significantly, that same year Augustinian friar Alonso Ramos Gavilán's history on Our Lady of Copacabana, patroness of Peru and Bolivia, was printed in Lima. This paper compares these two founding accounts, not only in their literary structures, but also their patronage, and reception. It also ponders how both cults aimed to integrate both Spaniards and Indigenous peoples under one symbolic figure—the mother of God—as a key element for the consolidation of colonial society, not by coincidence, one of the key goals of the local Church councils that took place in the 1580s.     

How Pre-modern State Rulers Used Marriage to Reduce the Risk of Losing at War: A Comparison of Eight States

Approaching warfare in pre-modern states from the perspective of risk reduction, we see that royal marriage was one strategy rulers used to reduce the probability that they would lose a war. Judicious marriage exchanges intensified and prolonged patron-client relations between rulers or between rulers and societal elites. Clientelism could affect the size and composition of their armies. The more warriors and troops one could field, the greater the chance of not losing a war (Otterbein 2004; LeBlanc 2006). Examination of eight pre-modern states suggests that their rulers used the same patterns of wife exchange even though most states developed independently. Marriage secured long-term patron-client relationships, which they used to support their military efforts. When rulers married their kin or married them to rulers outside the system (“foreigners”), they did not gain military support. Analysis of these marriage-military patterns reveals several characteristics of pre-modern states. First, marriage alliances helped rulers form networks of support that helped them win wars. Therefore, marriage—and by extension, royal women—is a key component to the study of warfare and a critical mechanism of network formation, as Blanton et al. (1996) write. Second, alliances were based on a different organizing principle from Levi-Strauss’ tribal societies, for rulers selected main wives (for themselves or their kin) based on relative rank rather than particular kinship ties. Third, marriage alliance reveals an important difference between alliance and patron-client relationships, a distinction that is often blurred in the archaeological literature.     

On the Seclusion of Women in Antiquity

Summary: The study of the feminine in ancient Iran is an area which deserves much greater attention than it has thus far received. By utilizing a number of primary sources, textual and otherwise, a few observations are offered here which concern the rites of women through the centuries. These evolving rites, which are described by the doctors of the then-dominant religion of Zarathustra, deal with the preservation of purity through seclusion of women in a world which is under constant attack from the demonic, polluting forces. Throughout the essay, the different means of fighting this battle are explored and suggestions for further research in the field are made.     

Recent Books in the Field of Medieval Literature

The main objective of this article is to analyze the relationship between the novísimos poets—Pedro Gimferrer, Luis Antonio de Villena, Leopoldo María Panero, and Guillermo Carnero, among others—and the avant-garde movements in Spain. If during the forties the garcilasismo opposed the avant-garde, in the seventies, with the novísimos, the -ismos returned to be considered not as a radical change but as one more stage in the evolution of Spanish poetry. The -ismos are now considered not as a subversive departure from the past, but as part of Spanish artistic heritage and tradition, thus reconciling tradition and modernity or even converting the vanguard into literary tradition. The -ismos are described not as an absolute novelty but simply as a process of innovation in the same way, with their own poetic precedents, as the garcilasistas and the neoromantics of the past.     

Senators and social mobility in sixth-century Gaul

In the historical and hagiographical writings of Gregory of Tours and in the poetry of Venantius Fortunatus we encounter a group of men who make the claim that they are descendants of the Roman senators of an earlier time. This paper sets out to examine the status of this group in the light of the suggestion by Frank D. Gilliard that in the imprecise Latin of Gregory of Tours the word senator was often used to denote someone who was merely a large landowner. Since Gilliard has suggested that the blanket term senator may mask the parvenus in sixth-century society, discussion of the status of sixth-century senators has here been set in the wider context of social mobility in Merovingian church and state. It is the suggestion of this paper that it was a claim to senatorial family background, rather than the possession of wealth or land, that qualified one, in Gregory's eyes as a senator. Further, there is such ample evidence of upward social mobility, to positions of power and prestige outside the senatorial ranks, and often in royal service, that the conclusion is drawn that for the ambitious in Merovingian society, the patronage of the Frankish kings may have come to mean more than the much vaunted illustrious descent of the senators.