This master thesis aims at portraying the living and dead body in Roma monastery at the island of Gotland through archaeological and osteological analyses. The osteo-archaeological material from Roma analysed consists of two individuals from coffin burials in the chapter-house and possibly four individuals from a chamber in the cloister. The main question in this thesis is to investigate the relationship between these individuals and the understanding of the religious body in the Cistercian order, especially in respect to the Rule of Sankt Benedict. Manual and spiritual work have been two important factors in Cistercian houses, and this could be seen in the osteo-archaeological material. Through osteological analysis degenerative changes in the spine and knees of the individuals were detected. These changes indicate that the individuals were active workers during a period of their life, and thereby lived according to the Rule. By means of an isotopeanalysis and a study of the dental status it is argued that the buried individuals were omnivores. The two burials from the chapter house are interpreted as abbot burials. It is also argued that all the interments studied in terms of burial practice display a high degree of liturgical expertise within the congregation of Roma monastery. The living had a will and a need to provide physical and spiritual care for their dead in line with the Rule of Sankt Benedict. / Romaprojektet

Scholars including Christine Fell, Pauline Stafford and Catherine Cubitt have tried to explain the status of women in Late Anglo-Saxon England in a variety of ways. Some, such as Fell, have framed the earlier Anglo-Saxon period as a golden Age which saw greater freedoms; others, like Stafford, Cubitt and Patricia Halpin, have argued for a more complicated reading, one that acknowledges the impact of the tenth-century monastic reform and the changes in types of religious life open to women. Occasionally studies draw on the art of the period to demonstrate their claims, but none foreground the visual evidence in the exploration of women's status in Late Anglo-Saxon England. Art historical studies, such as Catherine Karkov's examinations of Junius 11 and the Old English Illustrated Hexateuch, which include discussion of the portrayal of women tend to examine the images in relation to various concepts ranging from the manuscript's audience to issues of female speech, as well as in isolation from the extant corpus of images of women known from Late Anglo-Saxon England. This study will focus on three distinct, yet related, case studies that typify the ways in which women are presented to different Late Anglo-Saxon audiences. These case studies emerge through a statistical analysis and survey of patterns of representation of over twenty illustrated manuscripts. The first focuses on the miniature of St Æthlthryth in the Benedictional of Æthelthryth, exploring how the image of Æthlthryth was utilised to communicate ideals, such as virginity, key to Æthelwold's view of reformed English monasticism. The second case study focuses on the Old English Illustrated Hexateuch and the ways in which women were utilised in demonstrating (un)righteous behaviours. The differences between the manuscripts while seeking to demonstrate how personifications, like the historical and biblical women of the first two case studies, can reveal the ways in which women were conceived in Late Anglo-Saxon society. Ultimately, this study will show that when women were portrayed in the art of the period, it is with specific ideals in mind that speak to acceptable behaviour, religious constructs, and the place and function of the woman in contemporary society.

Humboldt-Univ., Habil.-Schr.--Berlin, 2004.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--UCLA, 2009. / Vita. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 269-287).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 283-291). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (M.A.P.S.)--Catholic Theological Union at Chicago, 2003. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves [63]-64).

Not available / text

published_or_final_version / Architecture / Master / Master of Architecture

The medieval historian engaged with the systems of power and authority that surrounded him. In his account of the Peasants' Revolt in late medieval England, the ecclesiastical historian Henry Knighton (d. 1396) both reinforced and challenged the traditional order. This thesis explores the ways in which his ideological perspectives shaped his understanding of the events of June 1381 and how this understanding was articulated through the structure, language, and cultural meaning of the historical text. The reconstruction of authorial intention and reclamation of both Knighton and the medieval reader as active participants in the creation of history challenge a historiography that has long disregarded Knighton as an unremarkable historical recorder. Instead, they reveal a scholar whose often extraordinary approach to the rebels and traditional authorities expresses a great deal about the theory, practice, and construction of power and authority in late medieval England.

This dissertation studies adaptations of monastic literary culture between the first decades of the fifteenth century and the beginning of the English Reformation. My discussion focuses on the writings of John Whethamstede, John Lydgate, Richard Whitford and Thomas More. I argue that, while these authors aim to satisfy readers’ desires for elaborate and authoritative forms of piety, they actually provide models of reading and patterns of disciplined living that restrict lay piety within orthodox boundaries. I begin with an introductory chapter that situates this adaptation of monastic reading within broader literary and cultural developments, such as the growing popularity of humanist reading and Protestantism, in order to demonstrate that monastic ideals remained culturally relevant throughout this century. This chapter also aims to prompt a further reassessment of the division that is often created between the medieval and early modern periods. Chapters Two and Three focus on the use of monastic reading practices within a Benedictine context. Chapter Two examines the historiographic poetry and prose of John Whethamstede in which the abbot both positions himself at the forefront of contemporary Latin literature and, at the same time, signals the differences that set the cloistered reader apart from his secular counterpart. Chapter Three examines Lydgate’s incorporation of monastic devotional culture into the Life of Our Lady through the depiction of the Virgin as living out an exemplary religious vocation and through the arrangement of the text to facilitate calculated meditative responses from readers. Chapters Four and Five then shift to the first decades of the sixteenth century. Chapter Four examines Richard Whitford’s orthodox programme of monastic and social reform that aimed not only to meliorate the individual’s ethical life but also to revitalize Catholicism and engage directly with Protestantism. Finally, Chapter Five looks back two decades to investigate More’s borrowings from different elements of religious life in his Life of Pico and Utopia that seek to manage the spiritual aspirations of the laity and to depict a society in which, much as in a monastery, the desires of the individual are shaped by and subordinated to the ideals of the community. / Thesis (Ph.D, English) -- Queen's University, 2009-10-30 11:56:09.669