IMC 2026: Sessions

Session 539: Canons and Their Books, I

Tuesday 7 July 2026, 09:00-10:30

Organiser:	Diane J. Reilly, Department of Art History, Indiana University, Bloomington
Moderator/Chair:	John Glasenapp, Saint Meinrad Seminary & School of Theology, Indiana
Paper 539-a	A Common Spirituality for All Canons?: Reimbald of Liège's Treatise De vita canonica, c. 1120 (Language: English) Robin Moens, Onderzoeksgroep Middeleeuwen, KU Leuven Index terms: Ecclesiastical History, Religious Life, Theology
Paper 539-b	The Customary and the Calendar: The Self-Identification of St Pierremont's Regular Canons in Two 13th-Century Manuscripts (Language: English) Femmianne Vermaak, Vakgroep Geschiedenis, Universiteit Gent Index terms: Manuscripts and Palaeography, Monasticism, Religious Life
Paper 539-c	Canons as Collectors: The Hague, KB, 70 E 4 and the Liturgical Interests of the Canons of Tongeren (Language: English) Innocent Smith, Department of Theology, University of Notre Dame Index terms: Liturgy, Manuscripts and Palaeography, Religious Life
Paper 539-d	Canons as Priests: Rethinking Clerical Roles in the Context of Their Books (Language: English) Bastiaan Waagmeester, Friedrich-Meinecke-Institut, Freie Universität Berlin Index terms: Ecclesiastical History, Manuscripts and Palaeography, Religious Life
Abstract	These sessions explore the physical books created by and for secular and regular canons, but also their art, texts, music, and liturgy, the ways that they were used, library lists and library history, and provenance and collecting. One session includes papers that address books and their contents from a variety of contexts (for instance the cathedral chapters of Liège and Tongeren, and the Augustinian Abbey of Saint-Pierremont) or were made by cathedral canons for use in parishes by priests. These books and texts establish expectations for the canonical life, describe its spiritual path, and provide the tools to achieve it. The second of the two sessions focuses on a festive evangeliary made for an as-yet unidentified group of regular canons and today in Remiremont. By bringing together scholars who work on canons across a broad geographical and chronological spectrum, both regular and secular, we hope to learn more about how canons used their books, where they obtained them, what they contained, and where they went.