IMC 2015: Sessions
Session 1028: Constructing the Crusades: Representation, Reinterpretation, and Memory, I - Narratives
Wednesday 8 July 2015, 09.00-10.30
| Sponsor: | Centre for the Study of Islam & the West, Queen Mary, University of London / Centre for the Study of the Middle Ages, University of Birmingham / Society for the Study of the Crusades & the Latin East |
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| Organisers: | Beth Spacey, School of History & Cultures, University of Birmingham Stephen Spencer, School of History, Queen Mary, University of London |
| Moderator/Chair: | Susan B. Edgington, School of History, Queen Mary, University of London |
| Paper 1028-a | Constructions of Divine Agency: The Marvellous and Miraculous as Legitimising Devices in Crusade Narratives (Language: English) Index terms: Crusades, Historiography - Medieval, Rhetoric |
| Paper 1028-b | Toxicum, Nocivum, and Venenatum: The Use of Poison as a Tool by Crusader Authors (Language: English) Index terms: Crusades, Medicine |
| Paper 1028-c | 'Like a Raging Lion': Representations of Richard the Lionheart's Anger in Chronicles of the Third Crusade (Language: English) Index terms: Crusades, Historiography - Medieval |
| Abstract | In recent years, Crusade historians have begun to question the extent to which crusade sources provide objective reflections of the crusading experience. Similarly, the assumption that the value of crusade sources lies only in the reconstruction of events has been challenged. Rather, it has been demonstrated that these sources represent significant cultural and literary artefacts that were influenced by the authors' own agendas and the social, cultural, and political contexts in which they were created. Alongside this, there has been a growing scholarly interest in the remembrance of crusading in literature, visual culture, and archaeology. The 'Constructing the Crusades' series of sessions extend these historiographical developments and offer new perspectives on the ways in which the crusades and crusading were represented, reinterpreted and remembered in the medieval period and beyond. The papers consider a wide range of themes, including the use of literary devices in crusade narratives, re-evaluations of events and sources, discourses of power, the evolution of crusade memory and its impact upon recruitment, and the performance techniques of vernacular literature. |