This thesis takes the hagiographical texts written in the diocese of Liège between approximately 700 and 980 and examines them in their political, social and cultural context. It analyses the texts by paying particular attention to how the authors expressed their concerns about issues that were important to them through the medium of hagiography and the saints' cults, the purposes for which the texts were employed and how these aims were reflected in the retelling of saints' legends. By taking this approach, analysing a substantial body of valuable but under-studied source material over a period of 3 centuries, for an important region, it provides a new perspective on a range of issues, significant people and places. The regional approach helps to show the close interconnectedness between many of these people, places and texts, including those connections that exist over a period of centuries as well as those networks vital to early mediaeval society that existed between contemporaries. Close examination of the body of texts highlights the importance of the cult of saints at all levels of society and demonstrates the value and versatility of hagiography as a means of storytelling.

St Cuthbert's literary cult was conceived in the late seventh and early eighth century with the production of three vitae, most importantly Bede's prose Vita sancti Cuthberti. Over the ensuing centuries, the cult stimulated the production of a great wealth of hagiographic material: this thesis analyses the key Cuthbertine works that were written by his Church during a turbulent but also prosperous time, between the ninth century and the end of the twelfth. Each chapter takes as a specific focus one of these texts, using it as a basis for exploring a number of themes pertaining to the cult of St Cuthbert, wider developments in the cult of the saints, and the changing and variable uses of hagiographic and historical writing. The first chapter takes the Historia de sancto Cuthberto as an example of a text combining property records with miracles, and written episodically over a period spanning more than a century, establishing the thesis'€™ triumvirate of themes: the fluidity of texts and of the representation of saints, and the enduring power of the Cuthbertine Church. Chapter Two explores the multifaceted identity that the Cuthbertine Church sought to convey for itself in Symeon of Durham’s Libellus de exordio. The third and fourth chapters focus on two highly flexible and manipulated texts, Capitula de miraculis sancti Cuthberti and Brevis relatio de sancto Cuthberto, which appear in manuscripts together, and often amalgamated: they are used to examine how a saint's image could be changed, and to question our often static notion of a text'€™s identity. The final chapter takes Reginald's Libellus de admirandis beati Cuthberti virtutibus to compare the miracle profiles of all the Cuthbertine texts, contextualising them with formative studies in the cult of saints such as the work of Sigal (1985) and Vauchez (1981). The thesis ends by suggesting that Cuthbert's cult was still thriving at the end of the twelfth century, and continued to do so, in the semi-independent socio-political and cultural sphere of northern England and southern Scotland. The discussions in these chapters are supplemented by four appendices: a table giving detailed synopses and a thematic breakdown of Reginald's Libellus, and a table categorising and comparing the miracles that appear in all these Cuthbertine works provide the basis for exploring Cuthbert'€™s changing miraculous persona; a map charting the locations pertinent to Reginald's Libellus shows the vibrant geographical extent of Cuthbert'™s cult; a table of manuscripts illustrates the various permutations into which these texts may be worked.

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Doctorat en philosophie et lettres / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished