Auteur: Secretariaat VWM

European Urban History Conference 2014 Lisbon, Portugal (3-6 September 2014)

To this day, relatively little is known about the functioning of religious spaces in late medieval European cities and how this changed in the Reformation and Counter-Reformation era. Yet, much suggests that the churches of the urban parishes and the various ecclesiastical institutions are important constituents of the socio-cultural organization of the medieval and post-medieval city. On the one hand, churches and churchyards were a cornerstone for urban community building. Together with markets, they formed the primary locus of the urban public sphere and collective religious experiences were closely linked to the ideology of the city as a spiritual community sanctioned by God. On the other hand, churches also functioned as the stage for individual actions that were charged with religious and social meaning, ranging from individual prayer over the establishment of a private altar or funerary monument to the disputes on the seating order during mass. Through a combination of papers from various disciplines, this session would contribute to the charting of both the complementarity and the tension between the use of church spaces for individual and communal enterprises in the cities of Western Europe.

During the fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the European urban network formed the stage of far-reaching transformations, in which some cities rose and others declined, and in which opportunities for upward social mobility shifted from one urban group to another. The first aim of this session would be to assess how and to what extent those social dynamics were negotiated within the spatial setting of the urban church. Secondly, there is the equally important issue of continuities and discontinuities in the uses of sacral spaces in the Reformation and Counter-Reformation era, not only in the light of the theological discussions on the validity and functioning of ecclesiastical infrastructure, but also in relation to the changing conceptions about the social order in the Early Modern Era and the processes of inclusion and exclusion it engendered.

Both lines of enquiry would be pursued through the perspective of material culture studies. First, attention would go to “embodied piety,” that is, devotion as an individual experience that was mediated to physical objects (e.g. the lighting of candles, the kneeling for religious diptychs and statues). Secondly, special attention would go to commemorative monuments as attempts to imprint the public sphere in a durable manner (e.g. funerary monuments, memorial plaques).

This session encourages a wide range of contributions from various disciplines (social and cultural history, religious history, archaeology, art history, material culture studies and so on). Possible questions that are relevant to this session are:

1. How and to what extent did the various urban ecclesiastical spaces – parish churches, cloisters, hospitals, chapels and so on – function as arenas for social mobility and the structuring of social hierarchies?
2. To what extent was the use of those religious spaces by individuals, families or networks for representational strategies compatible with the idea of religious spaces as cornerstones for community building, and how did this change over time? Tied to this, is the present-day conceptual repertoire of scholars adequate to interpret the various functions of those spaces as attested in the textual and material sources?
3. How was the urban church as a material space shaped and reshaped with the rise of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation and the recalibration of the relations between religious institutions and the urban authorities as well as the princely government?
4. Which trajectories of change can be distinguished for the outlined questions within Western Europe and which factors explain those processes of differentiation and their timing?

Organizers

Frederik Buylaert (Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium)
Anne-Laure Van Bruaene (Ghent University, Belgium)
Koen Goudriaan (Vrije Universiteit van Amsterdam, The Netherlands)

Submission of papers

Please submit an English-language abstract of maximum 300 words on the website of the European Association for Urban History: http://www.eauh2014.fcsh.unl.pt)

Deadline: October 15, 2013

The participants will be notified about their paper proposal by December 15, 2013.

LITURGY IN HISTORY

International Study Day

CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS

We are delighted to announce a call for participants for ‘Liturgy in History’, an international study day for graduate students and early career researchers at Queen Mary’s Centre for Renaissance and Early Modern Studies.

Liturgy in History:  a full-day workshop exploring liturgy in practice in
the medieval and early-modern periods.

When: Tuesday 19th November, 9:30 – 17:00 (lunch provided)
Where: Queen Mary, Mile End Campus, room tbc

Three speakers – Professor Nils Holger Petersen (University of Copenhagen), Professor Emma Dillon (King’s College London) and Dr. Beth Williamson (University of Bristol) – will guide participants through the structure and formulae of liturgical sources. The musical, visual, architectural and performative aspects of the liturgy will all be carefully considered and approaches to liturgy re-interrogated. The day will culminate in a trip to a nearby renaissance church which will help situate them in their context. We would be delighted to welcome international participants and students from diverse disciplines, to
reflect the multidisciplinary focus of the day itself.

If you would like to join us please email Hetta Howes (h.howes@qmul.ac.uk). Attendance will be free of charge, but places are limited to ensure discussion and participation, so it is essential that you book your place.

http://liturgyinhistory.wordpress.com/

Afgelopen vrijdag is tijdens het symposium ‘Praten als Brugman, schrijven als Herp. Minderbroeders-observanten en het culturele leven in de laatmiddeleeuwse Lage Landen’ de gelijknamige webtentoonstelling geopend. Voor wie de vrijdag de tentoonstelling heeft gemist, of alles nog eens rustig wil bekijken en lezen, volgt hier de link naar de webtentoonstelling.

De leden van de organiserend comité, Anna Dlabacova en Daniëlle Prochowski, wensen u alvast veel leesplezier.

International Conference
The Ten Commandments in medieval and early modern culture
Ghent University, Belgium
April 10-11, 2014

Key note speakers: Robert J. Bast (University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
Uta Störmer-Caysa (Johannes Gutenberg-Universität, Mainz)

Call for Papers
The Department of Literature at Ghent University is pleased to announce that it will host an international conference on the Ten Commandments in medieval and early modern culture on April 10-11, 2014. We kindly invite paper proposals exploring this theme from any field of medieval and early modern studies. Selected papers will be published in a volume to be included in the peer-reviewed series Intersections. Interdisciplinary Studies in Early Modern Culture (Brill Publishers).

The rise to prominence of the Ten Commandments dates back to the 12th century. In that period exegetes such as Hugh of Saint Victor emphasized the importance of the Decalogue as a list of moral principles. A century later the Ten Commandments permeated scholastic learning as well as catechetical teaching. They became a useful instrument for the examination of conscience in preparation for the mandatory annual confession introduced by the Fourth Lateran Council (1215). By the second half of the 15th century, the Commandments were omnipresent in religious culture. Their diverse textual and visual manifestations were found in a variety of media, from manuscripts and printed books, to wall paintings and wooden panels. The prominence of the Decalogue continued amongst the Protestants, albeit with a different emphasis than in Catholic teaching.

The heterogeneity of the preserved Decalogue material inspires numerous research questions, many of which are vital and yet largely unexplored. It also poses methodological challenges to scholars who seek to explore and understand the role of the Ten Commandments within a broader context of medieval and early modern culture. Bearing this in mind, we would like to invite papers that elaborate on various aspects of textual – both Latin and vernacular – and visual manifestations of the Decalogue in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period. It is particularly important that the proposed papers put emphasis on the broader cultural context in which the Decalogue functioned, as well as on the methodological and theoretical aspects of the discussed piece of research. Possible topics include, but are not limited to:

• The relationship (or lack of it) between scholastic and vernacular writings on the Ten Commandments. Recent research has shown that some vernacular writings on the Ten Commandments contain elaborate theological content. Which themes found their way from academic to vernacular theology? Were there independent developments within the vernacular writings on the Decalogue? In which milieus were the ‘learned’ vernacular treatises written and what was their audience?
• The Ten Commandments in various textual genres. The typological diversity of writings on the Decalogue is astonishing. These Old Testament tenets were explored in scholastic summae, catechetical mirrors and sermons, put into simple rhymes, combined with images and even interwoven into stage plays. How did different genres treat the Commandments? Was there any genre-specific emphasis on certain aspects of the exegesis of the Decalogue?
• The Ten Commandments in visual arts. The act of breaking or obeying the precepts was depicted in diverse media. Did the iconography and/or function of the Ten Commandments scenes change depending on the medium? Did the Reformation and Counter-Reformation affect the iconography of the Decalogue-scenes?
• The Decalogue in medieval and early modern popular culture. The Ten Commandments, like other tenets, penetrated popular (religious) culture. How did the abundantly preserved Decalogue rhymes, some of which could in fact be sung, and cheap prints containing a combination of text and image function? Who used them?
• The Ten Commandments in early modern theology. The Decalogue played a vital role in Protestant theology. Did the reformers postulate any major shifts in the interpretation of the Old Testament precepts? If so, did it cause any reaction by the catholic theologians?

Papers should be given in English and should be 20-25 minutes long. Please submit an abstract (max. 300 words) accompanied by a brief CV before October 1, 2013 by e-mail to Marta Bigus (marta.bigus@ugent.be). Successful applicants will be notified by November 1, 2013.
We look forward to receiving your abstracts, and to a productive meeting on April 10-11, 2014. We hope that you will support our efforts by notifying your colleagues and students about the conference. You are most welcome to contact the organisers for further details.

Organising committee:
Marta Bigus, MA (marta.bigus@ugent.be)
Prof. dr. Youri Desplenter (youri.desplenter@ugent.be)
Prof. dr. Jürgen Pieters (jurgen.pieters@ugent.be)

Call for papers European Urban History Conference 2014 Lisbon, Portugal (3-6 September 2014)

Charity, poor relief and the sense of community, ca. 1200-1900

Charity, mutual aid and poor relief have all figured prominently in research on late medieval and early modern cities. Major transformations have been exposed, for the sixteenth century and the end of the ancien régime in particular. These transformations have moreover been attributed to a wide variety of, often interrelated, causal factors. Specifically, proletarianization and the disciplining of workforce, religious transformations such as the Reformation, confessionalization and secularization, and state formation and the growing importance of market forces are all considered to have transformed the structures, institutions and practices of charity, mutual assistance and poor relief. However, while all these factors potentially affect the mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion involved, the community building capacity has seldom been tackled head on.

Practices of charity and alms giving as well as the organization of poor relief or mutual assistance always imply a sense of ‘community’. All assistance and relief was in one way or another reserved for a specific group considered ‘deserving’, be that co-religionists, fellow townsmen, members of a particular guild, confraternity or quarter, etc. When allocating aid or relief to one specific group, the inside group is tightened as well as its boundaries sharpened to outsiders. But, while the mechanism as such may be virtually universal, the actual definition and delineation of communities changed considerably over time and across regions and contexts. This is particularly relevant for cities, which may up to a certain degree be considered a single community from the perspective of public aid, but in reality consisted of different communities within (and indeed across) the city.

This session wants to gain deeper insight in the community building capacities and the related exclusionary mechanisms of charity, mutual aid and poor relief mechanisms in late medieval and early modern cities. Which communities were implied or shaped by the organization of public assistance and poor relief, who had access to relief systems, and what community thereby served as a frame of reference? Did the boundaries created coincide with the city, a parish, families or urban ‘corpora’ such as guilds and fraternities? Did poor relief strengthen the idea of a civic community or rather a confessional one? And last but not least: how did this change in the long run and why?

We welcome case studies cases from all over Europe and beyond, so as to get a grip on both long term transformations and a wide variety of contextual factors.

Please submit an abstract of maximum 300 words on the EUHC2014 website before 15 October 2013. More information on the European Urban History Conference 2014 and paper proposals: www.eauh2014.fcsh.unl.pt.

Hadewijch Masure
PhD in History
Centre for Urban History
University of Antwerp
S.R-A-111, Rodestraat 14
2000 Antwerpen
Belgium
T: +32 3 265 40 67
E: hadewijch.masure@ua.ac.be

Professor Steven King
Professor of Economic
and Social History
School of Historical Studies
3/5 Salisbury Road
University of Leicester
Leicester LE1 7SR
T: 0116 252 2760
E: sak28@le.ac.uk

Op dinsdag 27 augustus 2013 wordt aan de UGent een workshop georganiseerd over het onderwijs van historische Nederlandse letterkunde (middeleeuwen en vroegmoderne periode). De uitnodiging vindt u hierbij samen met een vragenlijst rond de organisatie van dit onderwijs aan de Vlaamse en Nederlandse universiteiten.

Deze studiedag is gratis; inschrijven kan tot vrijdag 5 juli 2013 via het volgende mailadres: Veerle.Uyttersprot@ugent.be. De ingevulde vragenlijst mag eveneens naar dit adres worden gestuurd. De binnengekomen antwoorden zullen worden gebruikt bij de uitwerking van de gespreksonderwerpen.

Colloque organisé par François Menant, professeur à l’ENS, et Diane Chamboduc de Saint-Pulgent, ATER à l’ENS avec le soutien de l’École française de Rome

ENS – Paris, salle Dussane. Jeudi 20 et vendredi 21 juin 2013 

Présentation 

Ce colloque sera l’aboutissement du séminaire « Les sociétés européennes au Moyen Âge : modèles d’interprétation, pratiques, langages » (http://www.histoire.ens.fr/-Histoire-medievale-.html), dirigé depuis trois ans par François Menant, professeur d’histoire médiévale à l’ENS, avec la collaboration de Diane Chamboduc de Saint-Pulgent, ATER d’histoire médiévale à l’ENS.

L’objet initial du séminaire était d’examiner les méthodes d’analyse applicables à l’étude des sociétés médiévales, en puisant largement dans les modèles offerts par d’autres sciences sociales ou d’autre périodes historiques. La réflexion s’est progressivement focalisée sur les groupes populaires urbains des XIIIe-XVe siècles, objet de la recherche de plusieurs des participants, et le thème des années 2011-2012 et 2012-2013 s’intitule “Comment étudier les milieux populaires urbains de la fin du Moyen Âge ?“. L‘étude de ces milieux a connu une certaine désaffection chez les médiévistes à la fin du siècle dernier, mais elle est en plein renouvellement.

On a cherché au cours de ces deux années à faire converger des approches des milieux populaires qui sont à la fois :

• sociales : formes de domination et clivages sociaux
• économiques : consommation et culture matérielle comme indices de classement social, formes économiques et laborieuses de la dépendance comme le crédit et le salariat, pauvreté
• politiques : formes de culture politique et leur circulation, notion d’appartenance, conditions et perception de la prise de parole politique des milieux dominés, rapports avec les autres milieux dans le gouvernement des villes
• culturelles : culture pratique, professionnelle et juridique, expertise.

Ces approches se situent au carrefour d’orientations de recherche largement pratiquées ces dernières années par des médiévistes français et étrangers, comme le salariat, l’expertise ou la dette. Les travaux des historiens modernistes et contemporanéistes et ceux des ethnographes et sociologues des milieux populaires actuels offrent des sources d’inspiration importantes pour explorer ces thèmes, notamment sur les questions d’identités collectives, de parcours individuels, de transformation des appartenances sociales et de leurs représentations, de répartition des rôles en fonction du genre.

Sous tous ces aspects, les milieux populaires médiévaux se présentent comme très hétérogènes. Le titre du colloque des 20-21 juin exprime ce qui apparaît comme leur trait commun majeur : la domination qu’ils subissent. Pour définir l’objet de la rencontre, les organisateurs ont préféré les notions de disparités et de clivages sociaux à celle de stratification, qui aurait pu fournir le cadre d’une réflexion un peu différente, appuyée sur les niveaux de vie ou les statuts personnels.

Le colloque se répartira en quatre demi-journées :

• la première s’attachera à la définition de différents modes de domination et de classement social, en reprenant le titre du colloque : « Clivages sociaux et modes de domination dans les villes européennes des XIIIe-XVe siècles». Il sera en particulier question de justice et de crédit.
• une deuxième demi-journée sera consacrée au travail, facteur déterminant des situations de domination : « Le travail entre autonomie, contrôle et conflictualité ».
• la troisième demi-journée s’intitule « Travail, genre, cadre familial ». Elle abordera la place des femmes et le rôle de la cellule familiale dans l’économie des milieux populaires et dans leurs représentations collectives.
• la dernière demi-journée sera centrée sur un cas majeur, celui de Rome, éclairé récemment par des travaux importants.

Chacune des grandes thématiques autour desquelles s’organiseront les demi-journées a fait l’objet de renouvellements historiographiques importants ces dernières années, et le colloque vise précisément à les prendre en compte. Les travaux des médiévistes anglais, américains et italiens tiendront une place particulière, à côté de ceux des Français, et on cherchera à situer ces recherches dans les perspectives plus larges des sciences sociales telles qu’elles se pratiquent aujourd’hui.

Contacts : dchamboduc@gmail.com ; menant@ens.fr

Programme 

Jeudi 20 juin 2013, 9 h 30-13 h 

Introductions 

Présentation : François Menant

• Approche sociologique : « Clivages sociaux et modes de domination » : Stéphane Beaud, prof. sociologie, ENS.

Demi-journée 1 : 

« Clivages sociaux et modes de domination dans les villes européennes des XIIIe-XVe siècles». 

Présidence : Claude Gauvard, prof. émérite univ. Paris-1, IUF

• Diane Chamboduc de Saint-Pulgent : « Formes de domination au travail ».
• Jean-Louis Gaulin, prof. univ. Lyon-2 : « Le crédit comme forme de domination sociale, à travers la restitution des biens mal acquis (male ablata) ».
• Dan Smail, prof. univ. Harvard : « Justice et violence à Lucques et Marseille entre XIVe et XVe s.».

Jeudi 20 juin, 14 h 30 – 18 h 

Demi-journée 2 : « Le travail entre autonomie, contrôle et conflictualité » 

Présidence : Catherine Verna, prof. univ. Paris-VIII

• Introduction : Philippe Bernardi, DR CNRS
• Caroline Bourlet, IRHT, et Christine Jéhanno, MCF université du Littoral : « Le travail à Paris au Moyen Âge », compte-rendu du séminaire Paris au Moyen Âge 2012-2013.
• Franco Franceschi, prof. univ. Sienne : « Rapports de domination et de dépendance dans la production textile toscane au XIVe siècle ».
• Laure Gevertz, doctorante Paris-4 : « Rapports de domination dans les métiers londoniens ».

Vendredi 21 juin, 9 h 00-12 h 30 

Demi-journée 3 : « Travail, genre, cadre familial » 

Présidence : Anna Bellavitis, prof. univ. Rouen

• Introduction : Antoni Furió, prof. univ. Valencia
• Jeremy Goldberg, prof. univ. York : « Contextualising Family, Gender and the Economy in later Medieval England ».
• Matthieu Scherman, Ecole française de Rome : « Famille et travail à Treviso (1434-1500) ».
• Martha Howell, prof. Columbia univ. : « The gender of Europe’s commercial economy ».

Vendredi 21 juin, 14 h – 17 h 30 

Demi-journée 4 « Autour d’une étude de cas : Rome à la fin du Moyen Âge » 

Présidence : Patrick Boucheron, prof. univ. Paris-1

• Jean-Claude Maire Vigueur, prof. univ. Roma-2 : « Popolo et formes de domination à Rome à la fin du Moyen Âge ».
• Cécile Troadec, doctorante Paris-4 : « Des profils sociaux contrastés selon les quartiers de Rome. Une analyse de réseaux sociaux ».

Conclusions : François Menant et Diane Chamboduc de Saint-Pulgent

Hierbij vindt u het programma van het 6de Internationaal colloquium van het abdijmuseum Ten Duinen 1138 “Verloren Glans. Innovatief interdiciplinair onderzoek op archeologisch vlakglas in Noordwest Europa (10de-18de eeuw) – 02 tot 04 oktober 2013, Abdijhoeve Ten Bogaerde, Koksijde”. Posters kunnen ingezonden worden tot 01 augustus 2013. Voor meer info: www.tenduinen.be.

Op donderdag 6 juni organiseert de VWM in samenwerking met de KU Leuven de jaarlijkse doctorandidag, dit jaar rond het thema Autoriteit en Gemeenschapsvorming.

Acht doctorandi (Koen Vanheule, Jelle Lisson, Ortwin Huysmans, Xavier Baecke, Anke De Meyer, Valerie Vrancken, Renske van Nie en Soetkin Vanhauwaert) zullen die dag hun lopende doctoraatsonderzoek voorstellen en bediscussiëren onder leiding van referenten Arnoud-Jan Bijsterveld en Frederik Buylaert.

Belangstellenden zijn welkom na een seintje aan Tjamke.Snijders@UGent.be

Programma VWM Doctorandidag
Lokatie: KU Leuven, Erasmushuis, Blijde-Inkomststraat 21, lokaal 05.15

Conventus. Problemen van het religieus gemeenschapsleven in de hoge middeleeuwen

Conventus. Problems of religious communal life in the High Middle Ages

http://www.conventus.ugent.be

third annual round table

• 10u30 Verwelkoming en voorstelling van de deelnemers door Brigitte Meijns en Steven Vanderputten
• 11u00  Keynote lezing door Dr. David Defries (Kansas State University): “Historiography in the Mind’s Eye: Lotharingian Monastic Reform in Tenth-Century Flanders”, gevolgd door discussie
• 12u00-13u30 Lunch
• 13u30-14u30 Eerste paneldiscussie: Kloosters (chairs Georges Declercq en Alexis Wilkin)
• Bijdragen door: Helena Vanommeslaeghe, Koen Vanheule, Jérôme Verdoodt
• 14u30-15u00 Break
• 15u30-16u30 Tweede paneldiscussie: Bisschoppen (chairs Brigitte Meijns en Tjamke Snijders)
• Bijdragen door: Jelle Lisson, Sam Janssens, Pieter Byttebier, Ortwin Huysmans
• 16u30-17u00 Samenvattende opmerkingen door Steven Vanderputten, gevolgd door discussie

4/6/2013, 10u30-17u00

KULeuven

Decanenkamer van de Faculteit Letteren

Blijde Inkomstraat 21

3000 Leuven

Registratie: jelle.lisson@kuleuven.be