Violence and miracle in the fourteenth century : private grief and public salvation

As war, pestilence, and famine spread through Europe in the Middle Ages, so did reports of miracles, of hopeless victims wondrously saved from disaster. These "rescue miracles," recorded by over one hundred fourteenth-century cults, are the basis of Michael Goodich’s account of the miraculous in everyday medieval life. Rescue miracles offer a wide range of voices rarely heard in medieval history, from women and children to peasants and urban artisans. They tell of salvation not just from the ravages of nature and war, but from the vagaries of a violent society—crime, unfair judicial practices, domestic squabbles, and communal or factional conflict. The stories speak to a collapse of confidence in decaying institutions, from the law to the market to feudal authority. Particularly, the miraculous escapes documented during the Hundred Years’ War, the Italian communal wars, and other conflicts are vivid testimony to the end of aristocratic warfare and the growing victimization of noncombatants. Miracles, Goodich finds, represent the transcendent and unifying force of faith in a time of widespread distress and the hopeless conditions endured by the common people of the Middle Ages. Just as the lives of the saints, once dismissed as church propaganda, have become valuable to historians, so have rescue miracles, as evidence of an underlying medieval mentalite. This work expands our knowledge of that state of mind and the grim conditions that colored and shaped it. -- Provided by publisher

As war, pestilence, and famine spread through Europe in the Middle Ages, so did reports of miracles, of hopeless victims wondrously saved from disaster. These rescue miracles, recorded by over one hundred fourteenth-century cults, are the basis of Michael Goodich's account of the miraculous in everyday medieval life.

Rescue miracles offer a wide range of voices rarely heard in medieval history, from women and children to peasants and urban artisans. They tell of salvation not just from the ravages of nature and war, but from the vagaries of a violent society-crime, unfair judicial practices, domestic squabbles, and communal or factional conflict. The stories speak to a collapse of confidence in decaying institutions, from the law to the market to feudal authority. Particularly, the miraculous escapes documented during the Hundred Years' War, the Italian communal wars, and other conflicts are vivid testimony to the end of aristocratic warfare and the growing victimization of noncombatants.

Miracles, Goodich finds, represent the transcendent and unifying force of faith in a time of widespread distress and the hopeless conditions endured by the common people of the Middle Ages. Just as the lives of the saints, once dismissed as church propaganda, have become valuable to historians, so have rescue miracles, as evidence of an underlying medieval mentalite. This work expands our knowledge of that state of mind and the grim conditions that colored and shaped it.

Contents Preface 1 Cult and Miracle in the fourteenth Çentury Çlerical Control of the Miracle The Raw Material of Miracle and Cult Notarial Procedure and Miracles Ecclesiastical Procedures The Universal Appeal of the 0aint The Çultic Procession 2 The Church as Mediator and Victim The Need for Divine Intercession Clerical and Divine Mediation Çlerical Victims 3 Crime and Punishment Theft and Brigandage Execution 4 The Vagaries of family Life Çhristian Marriage, (Sexuality, and (Social (Stability The {Saints and the {Solution of family Woes Infamy and (Sexuality Male Änger and Violence Possession by the Devil and Mental Disorder Insanity Despair and jSuicide 5 Children as Victims The (Survival of Infants Çhildhood Drowning 6 The Violence of Nature fear of Nature The Perils of the Deep Forest Dangers Domestic Dangers The Plague 7 The Ravages of War Assistance in Wartime The Vagaries and Inequity of War Ä Cult Revived in france: Martial of Ljmoges Ä Çontcmporary Saint: Çharlcs of Blois 8 Conclusion Miracle and Nature Unity and Dissent Notes Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Sight Cults Cited Index As war, pestilence and famine spread through Europe in the Middle Ages, so did reports of victims wondrously saved from disaster. These "rescue miracles", recorded by over 100 14th-century cults, are the basis of this account of the miraculous in everyday medieval life.