IMC 2020: Sessions
Session 117: Violating Sacred Space in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, I: Speaking and Writing about Violence
Monday 6 July 2020, 11.15-12.45
| Sponsor: | Utrecht Centre for Medieval Studies, Universiteit Utrecht |
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| Organisers: | Kay Boers, Utrecht Centre for Medieval Studies, Universiteit Utrecht Rob Meens, Departement Geschiedenis en Kunstgeschiedenis, Universiteit Utrecht |
| Moderator/Chair: | Rob Meens, Departement Geschiedenis en Kunstgeschiedenis, Universiteit Utrecht |
| Paper 117-a | Literary and Spatial Topoi: Distortions of Truth in Relation to Sacred Space (Language: English) Index terms: Religious Life, Rhetoric, Social History |
| Paper 117-b | 'Emptying the Churches': Citizens, Exiles, and the Violent Transformation of City and Church in the 4th Century (Language: English) Index terms: Byzantine Studies, Historiography - Medieval, Mentalities, Rhetoric |
| Paper 117-c | The Slaughter of the Res publica: Civic Speech and the Rhetoric of Violence in 10th-Century Francia (Language: English) Index terms: Ecclesiastical History, Historiography - Medieval, Political Thought, Rhetoric |
| Abstract | In these sessions we investigate conflicts revolving around, or making use of the concept of sacred space, and in particular debates surrounding the violent intrusion of ecclesiastical space. In the Late Antique and Early Medieval worlds, churches were generally regarded as sacred and were meant to be kept free from any kind of pollution, and in particular, worldly violence. The shedding of blood within its enclosed confines was not only regarded as a serious violation of the sacredness of the church building, but it was also a transgression of the legal provisions of asylum. These norms, however, did not stop people from using violence in churches and sometimes killings took place even inside the church's most sacred areas. This peculiar type of violence not only created great scandal, it also produced highly charged debates extolling the victims and exonerating the perpetrators |