IMC 2014: Sessions

Paper -a:
In 1369, Pedro I was killed outside of Montiel, and Enrique II, his half-brother, consolidated his power as king of Castile. While contemporary writers agree on this, they differ wildly about how he died and the event's significance. Pero López de Ayala, the author of the only contemporary Castilian version, presents a dramatic account of Enrique II killing Pedro I with his own hands. By comparing this version against other contemporary accounts - for instance, those by Geoffrey Chaucer, Jean Froissart, and Pere III of Catalonia - my paper will illuminate how López de Ayala’s account fit into his larger ideological program.

Paper -b:
During the late Middle Ages, England underwent severe external and internal insecurity. Being situated in this contemporary turmoil, the Tale of the Sankgreal not only parallels the situation of 15th-century England, but serves to alleviate the national uneasiness. By associating the Sankgreal to St Joseph of Arimathea and the implication of the Crusades, Malory discloses the political forces underlying a seemingly religious story, characterizing his romance as an attempt on social maintenance and the consolidation of an Empire. This paper investigates how Malory's Grail story is contextualized to explain the operation of power, probing into the mechanism of control by adopting Foucault's model of discipline, confession, and Panopticon.

Paper -c:
Written for Pope Clement V in 1307, the Flos historiarum terrae orientis by the Armenian Hayton of Korykos soon became one of the texts about the East most widely known in Western Europe, gaining an enormous popularity from the 14th to the 16th century. The medieval circulation and long-lasting popularity of this treatise are well documented by over 30 manuscript copies and numerous early modern printed translations. The multi-layered character of the Flos was the reason for the inclusion of this text in different typologies of miscellaneous volumes.

This paper highlights how the reception of the Flos historiarum noticeably changed over time. The composition and material characteristics of a selection of manuscripts reveals that whereas Hayton's contemporaries used the text in order to promote the organization of a new Crusade, later readers rather appreciated Haython's contribution to historical and ethnographic knowledge about the East. The reception of Hayton changed in the 15th and 16th centuries. Whereas the argument in favor of the crusade immediately lost attractiveness and timeliness, Early Modern readers compared the text with geographical and ethnographic reports on recently discovered lands. Reading Hayton, one could satisfy a literary fascination and curiosity for exotic lands and populations. In spite of the changing viewpoints of the readership, the Armenian Hayton was responsible for bringing to the West a completely new and long-lasting body of knowledge about the East.