Paper -a:
This paper seeks to examine the full range of the Carolingian response to the threat of adoptionism in the Spanish March. Usually examined either as a purely theological controversy, I would like to argue that adoptionism structured the shape of the Carolingian reform in very fundamental ways. The teachings of Elipandus of Toledo and Felix of Urgell provided a foil against which the doctors of the Carolingian world sought to define themselves as defenders of the church and shaped monastic reform, liturgical practice, and innovations in Carolingian devotion.
Paper -b:
In 453, episcopal authority was forcibly restored in Palestine following twenty months of violent rebellion involving the region's principal monasteries. Initially organised in opposition to their bishops' acceptance of the Council of Chalcedon, many local ascetics remained in defiance of the episcopate during the decades that followed. This paper will consider the history of the 'independent' monasteries active in Palestine in this period. It will seek to examine whether the common characterisation of their members as Christological extremists may be challenged, and whether an enduring tradition of aristocratic religious patronage may be seen to have influenced their grievance.
Paper -c:
This paper explores the clashes between the English missionary Boniface and the Franks among whom he worked. Boniface is sometimes characterized as a reformer who sought to impose his own 'English' brand of Christianity upon the Frankish church. The paper first examines the complaints against the Frankish Christians mentioned in letters and other documents associated with Boniface and his circle, and then turns to Frankish sources in order to tease out whether these complaints point to cultural differences between the 'ethnic churches' of England and Francia, or conflict lines of another nature. It argues that some of his complaints do reflect differences between the church in which Boniface was brought up and that in which he worked, but others simply reflect the gap between reality and ideals shared with Boniface by his Frankish counterparts.
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