of the paper The goal of the submitted work is to compare extensively the first hagiographical concerning the process of Christianization in the Central Europe. By paralleling these texts across the national rounds and comparing their image with the current state of the historical research the author tries to understand the role of legend in the Christianization and in particular their possible use as a source for this period. The hagiographical image of paganism, the baptism of the state units, of the ruler and the usual way of the institutional spread of the faith with regard to the image of the lower social classes in the process are all examined in the thesis. Further, attention is paid to the coherence of the Central-European area observable in the typology and the content of examined hagiography.

The aim of this PhD thesis is to investigate the political role of Adelheid of Burgundy in tenth-century Europe. Adelheid was certainly one of the central figures of the Ottonian dynasty during her years as empress and during her widowhood. The systematic study of the diplomas in which she acted as mediator alongside Otto I, Otto II and Otto III was an attempt to understand the basis of her political relevance. The result of the diplomatic research was analyzed through the method of social network analysis, which offered a new and global point of view on the issue and allowed to better focus on the various actors that composed the network of relationships of Adelheid during her life. / Lo scopo della presente tesi di dottorato è l’analisi del ruolo politico di Adelaide di Borgogna nell’Europa del secolo X. Adelaide fu certamente una figura di spicco all’interno della dinastia ottoniana sia in qualità di imperatrice al fianco di Ottone I sia negli anni della vedovanza. Lo studio sistematico dei diplomi in cui la sovrana venne indicata come mediatrice presso il marito, il figlio e il nipote ha rappresentato il punto di partenza per indagare le basi e le motivazioni della sua rilevanza politica. In particolare, il risultato della ricerca diplomatica è stato esaminato attraverso la metodologia della social network analysis che ha offerto un punto di vista nuovo e globale sulla questione e ha permesso di individuare più chiaramente i vari attori che composero la rete di relazioni dell’imperatrice nell’intero corso della sua vita.

The thesis deals with the development of Central Europe in the period of the long 10th Century, trying to describe in general the change of that region in the given epoque. The comparison and interpolation of the phenomena such as the Christianisation, the emergence of the political and economic power and the general transformation of the society aims to define a new view of the whole problem. The preferred vision is the economic and political development of the elites, separated from the existing socio-political formations and constructing its own apparatus of power, that will only slowly and eventually confront and merge the pre-stat formation in the form of an Early Medieval Christian state.

Al-Māturīdīyya are those who followed the teachings of Abū Mānṣūr Muḥammad b. Muḥammad al-Māturīdī who was in his turn a follower of the Īmān Abū Ḥanīfa. The school of al-Māturīdī, along with that of al-Ashʻarī, made a great impact on Islamic thought and together they upheld and defended Sunnism from the 4/10 century onwards. In the first part of this thesis, an endeavour will be made to get to know this scholar and other topics to be studied will include the period during which this school emerged, the position of Samarqand as the headquarters of the Māturīdītes, the teachers of al-Māturīdī and the students who studied directly under him and their contribution to Islamic thought. The second part of the thesis will be devoted to an introduction to al-Ḥakīm as-Samarqandī's work, As-Sawād al-aʻẓam. Al-Ḥakīm was the first student to study under al-Māturīdī and together they planted the first seeds of this school. In another section of this part a comparison between the teacher al-Māturīdī and the student al-Ḥakīm will be presented and this part will be ended by a translation of As-Sawād al-aʻẓam which embodies the early dogmatic thinking of the Māturīdīte school. The last part of the thesis is an appendix which deals with a mas'ala ascribed to Abū-l-Layth as-Samarqandī entitled: Is Īmān created or uncreated, Hal al-Īmām Makhlūg aw Ghayr Makhlūq?

The tenth-century German bishop was more than just a spiritual leader, he was also a territorial lord with secular power. These bishops also lived in an environment where violence was sometimes a way of life. His culture contained a social dynamic that saw violence as a tool for defending and maintaining honor and as a mechanism for dispute resolution. Therefore, some bishops behaved violently, either to defend their diocese from threats or to serve their own political intrigues. In some instances bishops were said to be more skilled in warfare than secular lords. However, while some clergy participated in warfare and violence, others sought to limit it through application of canon law and peacemaking. With some clergy participating in violence and others decreeing that it be banned, there were mixed messages regarding clerical violence in this era. The bishop's role in warfare and violence, especially in Germany, has only been partially addressed by modern scholars. This deficit is part of an overall shortage of medieval German military scholarship. Furthermore, the historiography on bishops in the central Middle Ages (c. 900-1200) has generally covered two narratives: the bishop as a territorial lord or his role as a church reformer. This leaves a gap in scholarship that describes how an individual bishop justified or rationalized clerical participation in violence and warfare, including his own. This paper addresses that need by reporting how one German bishop, Thietmar of Merseburg (b. 975, 1009-18), reflected on and portrayed clerical violence and warfare in his Chronicon. Thietmar's attitudes towards violence were as complex as the times in which he lived, and were influenced by his secularism and religiosity. When it came to his justifications for clerical violence and warfare, Thietmar was more concerned about the clergyman's ability to perform as a military leader, and whether or not the violent actions were justified on their own merits. While he sometimes conveyed unease with some acts of clerical violence, and at times was careful to note distinctions between secular and spiritual realms, nevertheless he did not criticize a member of the clergy for violence on the basis of his religious station nor spiritual beliefs. Indeed, Thietmar was a torn individual, struggling with his religious convictions while living in a world where violence was habitual, and where he saw it as his duty to protect his flock. In this regard Thietmar should be considered a realist.

Coins of the 9th and 10th centuries in archaeological discoveries from the Czech lands and their contribution to the beginning phase of the Czech history. The dissertation is focused on coins of the 9th and 10th centuries found on the territory of the Czech lands. Their archaeological context and detailed numismatic description bring new data, which can help to complete and precise our knowledge of the early medieval phase of the Czech history. Number of coins dating to the period before production of the first issues in the Czech lands (i.e. the coins of the 9th century and the first half of the 10th century) discovered on the mentioned territory increased. Their chronology is the following: the Old- Bohemian phase, the Old-Moravian phase and the Early Přemyslid phase, which is described in the first chapter of the dissertation - Coin finds before the beginning of the coinage in the territory of the Czech lands. The text brings results pointing to different monetary development of Bohemia and Moravia of that period. The new finds indicate a specific role of Bohemia in relationship with the Bavarian centre of the Frankish Empire. This situation culminates in production of the first coins in the Czech lands during the first half of the 960s. The second chapter of the dissertation - Beginning of the coinage...

The northern Iberian Bishopric of Calahorra was re-founded in 1045 by Garcia 111 of Navarre. Between that date and the death of its eighth post-restoration bishop in 1190 all or part of its diocesan territory changed hands seven times between the Kingdoms of Navarre, Leon-Castile/Castile, and Aragon, as they competed over the riojan frontier- zone on which it was located. The position of the diocese on such a volatile secular frontier had consistently profound, but also steadily changing, effects on its political and institutional development. In the initial phase of Calahorra's restoration, its bishop was enormously empowered by his central role in the consolidation of Navarre's southern and western frontiers, but was held back from establishing a centralized diocesan administration by the insecurities inherent in the borderland condition of his see. Following a change of political regime in the Rioja in 1076, the bishopric suffered the severe consequences of its total identification with a defeated secular power when its embryonic diocesan structures were comprehensively dismantled and its bishops subjected to a dominant and hostile crown that effectively undermined their diocesan authority. The debilitation of royal authority in the Rioja and the region's political marginalization between 1109 and 1134 provided the context for the emergence of the see's independent political stance and its notably autonomous and rapid development of a strong cathedral. When Leonese-Castilian regional dominance was forcefully reasserted between 1134 and 1157, the Bishops of Calahorra were able to put the forceful currents of canonical reform that emanated from an increasingly comprehensive and emphatically territorial secular ecclesiastical hierarchy to use in combining their centrality to the north-eastern border politics of the Crown of Leon-Castile with the independent pursuit of a specifically diocesan agenda. When Castile ceased serving Calahorra's territorial interests towards the end of the twelfth century, the see used the political leverage it gained by its inclusion in the Aragonese Metropolitanate of Tarragona to distance itself from Castilian politics, thus revealing its maturity as a frontier power in its own right.

The present work was written following a master thesis on the settlement and the shape of the early mediaeval agglomeration of Žatec in the 9th century. Subject of this dissertation is the processing of pottery from settlement features and from the 10th -century fortification. This enabled to study the development of the fortification system and changes of the settlement structure within individual settlement components. On the basis of excavations a relative chronology of the pottery and in accordance with the dendrochronological data a hypothesis on absolute dating has been presented. In view of this new chronology a new quantitative and qualitative analysis of information on the early mediaeval strongholds and hill-top settlements of the 9th and 10th century in the central and lower Ohře Region and in the Ore Mountain foothills was undertaken. A processing of the research on Drahúš stronghold has contributed substantially to this new perspective. The 1960s opinion on the affiliation of early mediaeval strongholds on the territory in question to the tribal territory of the Lučans, which should have been opposed to the Central Bohemian Přemyslid patrimony, based on the gathered information and its analysis could have been rejected. It was possible to comprise the evaluation of the excavation at...

Cette thèse se concentre sur l’iconographie des céramiques polychromes à pâte argileuse jaunâtre, connues sous le nom de buff ware et attribuées à Nishapur aux IXe-Xe siècles. Ces céramiques ont la particularité d’être décorées par des scènes à figures humaines, animales et d‘oiseaux souvent sur un fond jaune vif, peintes de couleurs vertes et noires et parfois rouges. Depuis leur découverte en 1935, l’iconographie de ces scènes est restée un sujet de débat parmi les chercheurs, sans réponse définitive. Cette recherche vise à apporter un regard complémentaire sur cette production originale de céramiques d’Iran oriental. Le but de cette étude est de revisiter les questions et les réponses existantes, et aussi d’aborder de nouvelles hypothèses. Les questions comprennent la connaissance, la production et l’iconographie de ces céramiques. La première partie de cette étude expose l’histoire et les différents aspects géographiques et socioculturels de la ville médiévale de Nishapur. Dans la deuxième partie sont étudiées la production, la distribution, la chronologie et la morphologie de ces céramiques afin de définir leurs caractéristiques. La troisième partie est consacrée à l’identification des scènes représentées sur les céramiques polychromes de Nishapur et à l’analyse de leur iconographie. Y sont proposées plusieurs hypothèses sur l’iconographie des scènes liée à la mythologie persane, aux traditions, aux légendes, aux croyances et aux rituels. Cette recherche est basée sur une étude approfondie de 30 céramiques principales, 139 céramiques complémentaires et 35 objets de comparaison, représentés dans un catalogue de trois corpus. / This dissertation focuses on the iconography of polychrome ceramics having a buff body, known as buff wares and attributed to Nishapur in the 9th-10th centuries. These ceramics were decorated with scenes of human, animal and bird figures, often on a bright yellow background and painted in green, black and sometimes red. Since their discovery in 1935, the iconography of these scenes has remained a subject of research with no definitive result. The research aims to provide a complementary fresh look at this original ceramic production of eastern Iran. The intention of this study is to revise the existing questions and answers, and to approach new hypothesis. The questions concern the characterization, the production and the iconography of these ceramics. The first part of this study exposes history and different geographical and sociocultural aspects of the medieval city of Nishapur. The second part of the study inquires the production, the distribution, the chronology and the morphology of theses ceramics. The third part focuses on the iconography of the scenes represented on Nishapur buff wares. It proposes a number of hypothesis on the iconography of the scenes related to Persian mythology, traditions, legends, beliefs and rituals. This research is based on a detailed study on 30 main wares, 139 complementary ceramics and 35 comparison objects, represented in a catalogue, which is completed by detailed drawings of the ceramics.