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Micheline's Blog

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Micheline's Blog

Daily Archives: February 6, 2012

The Golden Legend: my Missing Paragraphs

06 Monday Feb 2012

Posted by michelinewalker in Myths

≈ Comments Off on The Golden Legend: my Missing Paragraphs

Tags

fantasy, Guercino, Jacques de Voragine, Jesus of Nazareth, myths as metaphors, The Golden Legend

Self-Portrait: Il Guercino,

Il Guercino*

*  Il Guercino: Giovanni Francesco Barbieri (8 February 1591 – 22 December 1666)

My Missing Paragraphs

For reasons I do not understand and will not investigate, the computer took three paragraphs away from my post on Jacques de Voragine (6 February), the author of The Golden Legend.  No, I will not investigate, but I must nevertheless give greater clarity to an incomplete blog.

The Golden Legend: the Bestseller in the Middle Ages

The blog was about an old book, The Golden Legend or La Légende dorée, the bestseller of the middle ages which went out of fashion as Renaissance humanism spread.

In one of the missing paragraphs, I had noted that “St George and the Dragon” was included in The Golden Legend and that, given The Golden Legend was a bestseller, St George must have become a famous hero, in an age where heroism was not quickly nor frivolously bestowed.  One had to qualify before being named a hero.

The Renaissance and the Fanciful or Fantasy

As for the other missing paragraph, it was a comment on the humanists who found fault with The Golden Legend.  It was fanciful.  It contained what the French call “le merveilleux chrétien.”  I have a great deal of respect for Erasmus, but if saints cannot perform miracles, how can we accept that there was a Minotauros, half bull half human, fathered by Pasiphaë and a bull, and that this Minotaurus was slaughtered by Theseus. Theseus also slaughtered Procrustes who stretched people to fit his bed, or cut off the limbs of tall victims so they could fit the very same bed.

Myths as Metaphors

Renaissance authors took an interest in ancient Rome and, particularly, in ancient Greece.  So, the point I wanted to make is that the lives of saints could not possibly be more fanciful than Greek mythology.  Obviously, the humanists were so impressed with the writings of Plato and Aristotle that their field of vision would not encompass ‘fanciful’ mythologies and myths. What would we do without the Procrustean bed?  We would lack a powerful metaphor.

St George as Dragon

The third paragraph had to do with the importance of such myths as the story of St George and the Dragon.  St George is no longer a saint.  That story is now looked upon as apocryphal.  However, we still have dragons and could use a St George to slay them.  But in our society, it seems it is St George we slay and not the dragon.

Christ with the Woman Taken in Adultery *

* by Il Guercino, 1621 (Dulwich Picture Gallery).

I had also spoken of Christ’s words regarding the punishment of the adulterous woman.  Jesus of Nazareth said:

Let He Who Is Without Sin Cast the First Stone. (John 8:7).

What would we do without this parable?  It is being ignored.  Nor have we got rid of the lex talionis.  It is still “an eye for an eye.”

But I must go or we may have too many paragraphs.

Ravel: Jeux d’eau (please click on title to hear music)

© Micheline Walker
6 February 2012
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Jacques de Voragine & the Golden Legend

06 Monday Feb 2012

Posted by michelinewalker in Literature, Medieval Bestiary

≈ Comments Off on Jacques de Voragine & the Golden Legend

Tags

best seller, Dominican Order, Goden Legend, Guelfs and Ghibellines, hagiography, incunabula, Jacobus de Voragine, St George and the Dragon, Varraze, William Caxton

Jacques de Voragine‘s Golden Legend,

Compared to the various versions of our peripatetic Reynard the Fox, Jacques de Voragine’s Golden Legend, which contained the story of “St George and the Dragon,” has not endured or is currently dormant.  Yet, it was the bestseller of the Middle Ages, a period during which hagiographies, i.e. lives of saints, St George in our case, were very popular.

The Renaissance

In the sixteenth-century, Renaissance scholars such as Erasmus (28 October 1466 – 12 July 1536) and Georg Witzel (b. at Vacha, Province of Hesse, 1501; d. at Mainz, 16 February 1573) found the Golden Legend too fanciful.  It therefore went out of fashion. But times have changed.

St George and the Dragon: the Story

* Caxton showing the first specimen of his printing to King Edward IV and Queen Elizabeth at the Almonry, Westminster

The English Golden Legend

Among incunabula (an incunabulum is a work printed before 1500), the Legenda aurea was printed in more editions than the Bible. It was one of the first books William Caxton (ca. 1415~1422 – ca. March 1492) printed in the English language. Caxton’s version appeared in 1483 and his translation was reprinted, reaching a ninth edition in 1527.  In 1481, two years before he translated and published the Golden Legend, William Caxton had translated and printed Reynard the Fox.

Voragine: biographical notes

Voragine (Italian: Giacomo da Varazze, Jacopo da Varazze (c. 1230 – 13 or 16 July 1298) was archbishop of Genoa, a chronicler and, more importantly, the author of the Golden Legend also entitled Legenda aurea (Golden Legend and Lombardica historia).

Jacopo became a Dominican in 1244.  He was the prior at Como, Bologna and later in Asti.  But his reputation as preacher and theologian soon led to his appointment as provincial of Lombardy (1267–1278 and 1281–1286).  He represented his province at the council of Ferrara (1290) where he was one of four delegates who conveyed Nicholas IV‘s desire for the deposition of Munio de Zamora.  Muno was deposed on 12 April 1291.

He travelled to Rome the following year to be named bishop of Genoa by Nicholas IV.  When he reached Rome the pope had died, but Jacopo was nevertheless consecrated as Bishop of Genoa.  According to Wikipedia “[h]e distinguished himself by his efforts to appease the civil discords of Genoa among Guelfs (pro-papal) and Ghibellines (pro-imperial).”[i]  There is a story according to which Pope Boniface VIII threw ashes in his eyes on the first day on Lent, saying:

 Remember that thou art a Ghibelline, and with thy fellow Ghibellines wilt return to naught.

Jacopo died in 1298 or 1299 and was buried in the Dominican church at Genoa.  He was beatified by Pius VII in 1816.  His feast day in the Dominican order is July 16th.

The Golden Legend  includes “events in the lives of Christ and the Virgin Mary, information about holy days and Season the whole arrange as readings (Latin: legenda) for the Church year. Immensely popular in the Middle Ages, it was translated into all western European languages and gradually much enlarged.”[ii]  Voragine kept enlarging it until 1260.

Voragine’s works also include sermons on Gospel readings, saints’ days, and the Virgin Mary, as well as a chronicle of Genoa.

It appears that Petrus Comestor’s History of Scholasticism was also a favorite among Medieval readers.  But the Golden Legend was the bestseller.

Sources and Resources

The Golden Legend : Fordham University

Dragon in Heraldry

Jules Massenet: Pieces for piano (please click on title to hear)

______________________

[i] “Jacobus de Voragine.” Wikipedia <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobus_de_Voragine>. 

[ii] “Jacobus De Voragine.” Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2012. Web. 05 Feb. 2012. <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/299131/Jacobus-de-Voragine>.

sans-titre

© Micheline Walker
6 February 2012
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