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This thesis focuses on the Celestine monks of France, a largely neglected and distinctive reformed Benedictine congregation, at their apex of growth (c.1350-1450). Based largely within the kingdom of France, but also including key houses in the contiguous territories of Lorraine and the Comtat, they expanded significantly in this period, from four monasteries to seventeen within a hundred years. They also gained independence from the mother congregation in Italy with the coming of the Great Western Schism (1376-1418). The study aims view the French Celestines against the backdrop of a vibrant culture of 'reform' within both the monastic estate (the Observants) and the Church as a whole, as well as the political instability and war in France. It will reveal a congregation alive with the passions of their times and relevant within them. Following an introductory section, chapter 1 will discuss the previously unstudied Vita of the leading French Celestine Jean Bassand (d.1445) in depth and introduce the key themes of the subsequent chapters. Chapter 2 will examine their Constitutions, in the process providing perspective on their hyper-scrupulous understanding of sin and the relation of their statutes to the Christian idea of 'reform'. Chapter 3 will look to anecdotal evidence concerning the quality of their observance in practice, as well the spiritual and moral writings of Pierre Pocquet (d.1408), another important Celestine leader. Chapter 4 will begin to establish how and why the order grew, examining records of benefaction (contemporary martyrologies and charters) as well as taking view of the financial (and in the end, moral) difficulties brought by war through the documents concerning the reductions of founded masses at the Paris and Sens houses. Chapter 5 will look at monumental and anecdotal/literary evidence, as well as the works of Jean Gerson, a friend of the order, to further define the cultural impact of the monks.

The work The Image of Jan Hus in the Early Modern Czech Literature tries to map different ways of description of this Czech preacher in selected literary texts from 15th to 18th century, to capture the changes which his image underwent. The chosen authors come from different countries and use different languages, represent different environments, social classes and opinion groups, they also have different education and religion. Individual literary works were assessedby means of comparing the key episodes that are either repeated in the texts, or the author intentionally did not use them. To understand the image of Jan Hus as a whole, also contemporary iconography was taken into account , which in some cases has been taken from other literary texts than those which were compared, so that the image of Hus whereas complete as possible. The comparison of the texts and iconography showed, how accurate the observation of the described scheme was and how the image of Jan Hus was gradually changing. The combination of written and iconographic material from specific time intervals allowed us to observe the gradual change of conceptions of the personality of Jan Hus and events connected with him, because the authors represent the opinion of their ethnic group and time. The image of Jan Hus is therefore very...