| Abstract | Paper -a:
Stephen White has enlightened our understanding of medieval violence. He also stressed the social and cultural trends at work in peacemaking rituals. But sometimes, they failed. That is what happened in Much Wenlock, in 1164, as the monks of the Cluniac priory faced an uprising from the local community. Not only they were challenged in court, not only oaths they sponsored were broken, but even the hope of a miraculous victory was deceived when the show of power they staged with their relics turned to street riot. The Wenlock affair is all the more striking as not much is known of its context, and none of its aftermath. Yet it is a case in point to address the issue of violence and failed rituals.
Paper -b:
'Day of wrath, day that will dissolve the world in ashes, David being witness along with the Sibyl.' The text of this hymn is attributed to the Franciscan Thomas of Celano (c.1190-c.1260); it has 18 rhymed stanzas. Parts of the melody have most likely been borrowed from the responsory Libera me. Later, the chant has been used as a sequence in the Latin Requiem mass. This chant has had from the beginning an ambivalent position, linked to the Apocalypse and most prominent representative of the memorial liturgy. Because of its violent text and the angry image of God, it has been removed of the mass ordinary by Vatican II. But how was this chant interpreted in the 13th century by Franciscans and Dominicans ? Why was it used and re-interpreted for so many centuries? We try to retrace its origin and its reception until the Concile of Trent (1545-1563). Interrelations of text and melody, as well as variants will be studied from different manuscript sources coming from various Franciscan and Dominican communities over the 13th to the 16th centuries and put in context with selected predication or meditation texts from the two orders, new insight into this topic via the juxtaposition of text, meaning, and music(al performance).
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