This thesis is concerned with the monastic rules that were written in seventh century Iberia and the relationship that existed between them and their intended, contemporary, audience. It aims to investigate this relationship from three distinct, yet related, perspectives: physical, literary and philological. After establishing the historical and historiographical background of the texts, the thesis investigates firstly the presence of a monastic rule as a physical text and its role in a monastery and its relationship with issues of early medieval literacy. It then turns to look at the use of literary techniques and structures in the texts and their relationship with literary culture more generally at the time. Finally, the thesis turns to issues of the language that the monastic rules were written in and the relationship between the spoken and written registers not only of their authors, but also of their audiences. This is concluded with an investigation into the employment of Latin synthetic passive and deponent verb forms in the texts and its implications for the study of language change and language use in early medieval Iberia.

This thesis is the first scholarly attempt to examine the veneration that Mary’s parents – and her mother Anna in particular – enjoyed in Byzantium. The four pillars upon which this examination will be based are topography, texts, relics and iconography. The topography of Constantinople is examined in relation to that of Jerusalem in order to bring to the surface new ideas on the development of Constantinopolitan topography. I also look at the motives behind the construction of the first church dedicated to St Anna in Constantinople and its relation to the topography of the Holy Land. In terms of textual production, I show that until the eighth century Mary’s parents and their story recounted in the second-century apocryphal Protevangelion of James, were intentionally ‘ignored’ because of the non-canonical nature of the text. But from the eighth century onwards the situation dramatically changes with the emergence of Byzantine homilies and Ι will explore the reasons that triggered this change as well as the way Mary’s parents are presented in this genre. Finally, I discuss the problematic around Anna’s relics, her association with iconophilia, demonstration of Orthodoxy, healing and protection of childbirth. Last but not least, the examination of iconographical evidence will uncover the visual impact of Anna’s cult and will complete the study of her veneration in Byzantium.

This study explores the Anglican Church in a particular locality, namely the Forest of Arden region of Warwickshire, from the Restoration to 1740. This thesis is in sharp contrast to those histories that have depicted the Church of England as a moribund institution. It is contended that Anglicanism was a vibrant and accepted part of the lives of a considerable proportion of the laity, providing the focus of the communal and social life of the parish. What is more, the church and its clergy successfully served the needs of the people. In addition, it played a significant role in the spiritual, educational and moral discipline of the lower orders. This study shows that there was a high level of clerical commitment to the good of the people and that there was a considerable amount of lay participation in all aspects of church life. Evidence is also presented that there was a general Anglican commitment to harmony between those of differing religious views.

This study explores how Protestant writers during the period 1538-1553 dealt with the threats and opportunities that were offered to Protestant reform in England by the Royal Supremacy. Though initially propagandists for Henry VIII's new authority as Supreme Head of the English church, many polemicists were forced into religious and political marginalisation by the king's imposition of a theologically Catholic settlement of the English church in 1539. As a result during the later Henrician period, Protestant writers constructed an alternative ecclesiology for the Protestant community. This offered historical justifications for their own theological creeds. Just as importantly, this new ecclesiology legitimised the status of Protestant dissidents as a separate church from the king's official church. In addition Protestant writers constructed a biblical rhetoric within which they concealed and discussed the precise relationship of their theological creeds to the political authority that had rejected them. This ideology redefined both the nature of kingship and the king's religious role according to a series of biblical images. These images encapsulated and conveyed to the reader a series of associative ideas. The ideological assumptions behind these typological images were formative influences upon the nature of official religious reform during the Edwardian period (1547-53). The basis of this ideological sympathy was a close patron-client relationship between Edward's government and the Protestant writers. This allowed an iconoclastic destruction of traditional mediaeval religion but it also enabled the construction of a positive theological alternative to the Roman Catholic sacramental system. Protestant polemicists were at the centre of the formation of this new theological identity for the English church, and of the campaign which imposed it. However by the early 1550s the alliance of the governing elite and the Protestant polemicists began to break down. The means used to destroy the Catholic religious system had been acceptable to both oligarchy and Protestant writers, but it became obvious that their ends, unlike their means, did not agree. As a result the polemical heritage of criticism, that had been used against their Catholic opponents, was turned by Protestant writers against their ostensibly Protestant patrons. In the final part of the work the way that the polemicists' anti-government criticism influenced their providential explanations for the succession of Queen Mary is traced, and the greater significance of the polemical heritage of this period is assessed.

In Scotland, no less than in England, the late Victorian era was one of transition. Industrialisation and urbanisation created new social problems, while other forces - most importantly the railway - worked to undermine the national comprehensiveness of Scotland. Even Scottish religion, until now protected both by distance and the different polity entertained, fell under the sway of English influence. This thesis considers one particular aspect of English influence upon the Church of Scotland - Tractarianism. There is clear evidence to prove that in liturgical and architectural expression, in church furnishings and arrangement, in ritual and in doctrine, and even in the development of a library of historical research, there was manifest by some a deliberate attempt to reform the Church of Scotland through a thorough-going application of Tractarian definitions, ideals, and symbolic expressions. In particular the thesis investigates the personal influence of the Reverend Professor James Cooper in this endeavour, for he was one of the principal figures in changing the face of the Kirk. He was a medievalist, tinctured with Jacobitism. Although there were some in the Church with more profound learning, and others with a broader vision of the social and ecclesiastical requirements of the new age, Cooper combined within himself many of the aims, the ideals, and the foibles commonly associated with Victorians. As the representative spokesman for the Scoto-Catholic party, he held a unique place in the life of the Scottish Church, for the scoto-Catholics, though always few in number, were not without significant influence. It was they in particular who perpetrated the “Tractarian" reform in the Church of Scotland. In the introduction the historical background to the Scottish Church in 1882 is sketched. Part I provides a background survey of the Oxford Movement in England and Scotland. Part II considers the Broad Church attempt at reform, and the liturgical developments associated with the Church Service Society. Part III deals with the emergence of Scoto-Catholicism, and Part IV with Ecclesiological and Ritualistic movements. Part V looks at the attempt to defend and advance Catholic doctrine - the programme of the Scottish Church Society, and also traces Cooper's influence on the "Articles Declaratory” of the constitution of the Church of Scotland. Part VI investigates the attempt to defend and advance Catholic authority in the Scottish Church through a restatement of the Tractarian doctrine of Apostolic Succession. Of necessity it also considers the matters of ordination and "valid Orders". It is shown that by means of a "historiological mythos" the Scoto-Catholic position in this, as in other matters, was advanced. There are several appendices, the first of which traces a connection between the Catholic Apostolic Church - which itself was not without significant liturgical and doctrinal effect upon the Church of Scotland - and the Oxford Movement.

Caricatured as the Arch Vandal, William Dowsing (bap. 1596-1668) was a farmer and a soldier who entered into history as a radical figure in the English Civil War between Charles I and the Long Parliament. The Earl of Manchester commissioned Dowsing to tear down ‘pictures and superstitious images’ in the name of God and a parliamentary ordinance of 1643. The commission grew out of a series of puritan reform measures which aimed to overthrow the ‘popish innovations’ implemented in part by Archbishop William Laud in the 1630s. Dowsing’s iconoclastic campaign resulted in controversial visitations to churches, colleges and chapels throughout Cambridgeshire and Suffolk in 1643-44. This thesis engages with previous scholarship on William Dowsing and makes a distinct contribution by constructing a series of dialectics that framed the rationale for his iconoclasm. Much of the research on William Dowsing is predominately historical, cultural, or political because scholars have typically considered Reformed iconoclasm ‘from above’ as a phenomenon that occurred during times of religious upheaval. This project offers a historical/theological treatment of Dowsing and his civil war iconoclasm. The objective is to penetrate the puritan movement and to explore iconoclastic thought ‘from within’. The thesis accomplishes this goal through indirect and direct methods. The indirect approach involves an examination of Dowsing’s ‘puritan’ culture in Suffolk (Chapter Two) and attitudes relative to images within Reformed Orthodoxy in England in the mid-seventeenth century (Chapter Three). Several key primary sources sustain the more direct approach. Trevor Cooper’s recent edition of Dowsing’s journal, in which Dowsing recorded events from his campaign, paved the way for a new assessment of iconoclastic thought. This thesis examines the journal for its theological implications (Chapter Four) rather than attempting to restate the narrative of Dowsing’s itinerary. While the journal is crucial to a proper understanding of Dowsing’s rationale, the most direct category of evidence emerges from a study of Dowsing’s habits of reading and annotation (Chapter Five). Dowsing heavily annotated his six-volume collection of sermons preached to the Long Parliament between 1640-46. This study delineates the competing realities perceived by puritan preachers in the 1640s, as picked up by William Dowsing’s annotations (Chapter Six). In many ways, the preachers believed that iconoclasm played a tactical role in the overall strategy to secure a favorable outcome for the ‘godly’. Their sermons envisaged idealized religious conditions juxtaposed with the threat of divine retribution for idolatry in England. The iconoclast’s annotations show that the preachers’ doctrines echoed beyond the House of Commons to resonate within the houses of common people like Dowsing. This research is important because it highlights the often neglected area of lay engagement with the corporate puritan rationale for Reformation in the civil war period.

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This thesis explores the ways in which people in early Stuart England understood the place of music in worship, its effect on the auditor, and the task of determining what was appropriate music for the task. Central to this is the task of exploring the validity of the trend in current historiography to assign to the ‘Laudian’ movement a polemically and practically distinctive view of music in worship. Part One deals with the published and manuscript discussions of the nature and role of music. It contends that in the 1630s music became associated with one of the two rival conspiracy theories of Popish tyranny and Puritan profanity and subversion (chapters 1 and 2). In subsequent chapters (3-7), it examines the common language in which music was discussed; the use of Biblical, patristic and continental authorities; and continental and broader philosophical understandings of music. It is concluded that no clear theologies of church music can be attributed to church parties as identified in the historiography to date. In Part Two, the thesis considers the surviving musicological evidence of practice in cathedral and collegiate churches from 1603 onwards, to attempt to discern any patterns of distinctive usage in ‘Laudian’ institutions. It examines the use of musical instruments (ch.9), the incidence of various anthem texts (ch. 11), the singing of parts of the liturgy, and the incidence of compositions in various styles (ch. 12). It is argued that much ‘Laudian’ practice was indistinguishable from that in non-Laudian cathedrals, and that the habit of the scholars to extrapolate a ‘Laudian’ style from the work of John Cosin is a misleading one. Overall, it is then concluded that the necessary place that church music has been given in the Laudian experiment is not a tenable one, either in theory or practice. There was no necessary relationship between Laudian churchmanship and elaborate church music.

No description available.

No description available.