Lay religious cultures in the legend of St Julien, 1220-70
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Oxford
Department Name: History Faculty
Abstract
My DPhil project, 'Lay religious cultures in the legend of St Julien, 1220-70', is a historical exploration of the
legend of St Julien "The Hospitaller" funded by the OOC-AHRC-DTP in collaboration with the Clarendon
Fund and the Oxford-Richards scholarship at Wadham College, Oxford. Though the literary qualities of some
St Julien texts have proven fertile ground for academic debate, the legend of St Julien has heretofore remained
unexplored from historical perspective. With my DPhil research, I hope to bridge this scholarly gap for the
first time.
In 2021, Ogden called for a diversification of our hagiographical source materials in order to avoid
perpetuating one dominant 'single interpretative stance' (ecclesiastical misogyny) on female and gender
transgressive saints. My DPhil project is in part a response to this call, as through my research I hope to
provide historians interested in thirteenth-century lay religious cultures with a textured case study of a model
of sanctity alternative to the eremitic and monastic models otherwise dominant in this period. In the Julien
legend, sanctity is instead grounded in the institution of marriage and expressed within a lay community
context. I contend that the legend's explosion in popularity in France through 1220-70 thus provides a
valuable way-in to the religio-cultural preoccupations, interests and values of contemporary lay audiences.
My research project will draw on a range of closely contemporaneous images, texts and objects, all associated
with the Julien legend and produced between 1220-70. This includes the vernacular verse Vie de Saint Julien
(preserved in MS 3516, fos. 84r-96r of the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal), which was the subject of my MSt
research project, and related Julien texts such as the vernacular prose La Vie Saint Julien martir, and the
Legenda Aurea. I will also draw on stained-glass sequences of the legend, such as those displayed in the
cathedrals of Rouen and Chartres, and investigate other visual sources (e.g. the relief at 42 Rue Galande,
Paris), and related religious sites (e.g. churches of St Julien).
Through close-reading of these sources I hope to explore how interactions with other cultural codes - such as
those pertaining to gender and social grouping - shaped the articulation of piety in non-monastic settings.
The question of how one might live a holy life "in the world" (when so many contemporary hagiographical
examples were predicated on one's removal from it), for instance, is one to which the legend of St Julien is
poised to provide a range of potentially fruitful answers.
I also intend to unpack the significance of the figure of Clarisse, Julien's wife, whose present obscurity is a
consequence of her non-inclusion in the legend's nineteenth-century literary revival, and thus misrepresents
the legend's significance to thirteenth-century audiences. In correcting this distortion, my research will open
up further discussion of the legend's complex gendered and sexual connotations, and thereby help to enhance
our understanding of the religious role of laywomen in this region and period.
Though I am primarily interested in how contemporary interactions with this legend can be used to illuminate
questions of cultural-historical significance, my work sits in interdisciplinary dialogue with literary and
translation study scholarship, as well as with histories of religion, art, gender, and sexuality. It also takes
significant inspiration from the microhistorical tradition. My research methodologies will consequently
involve close-reading, an 'insistence on context' (Ginzburg:1993), a concern with the 'social embeddedness'
(Gagnier:1991) of historical agents, and the use of intersectional and intersubjective lenses of analysis
legend of St Julien "The Hospitaller" funded by the OOC-AHRC-DTP in collaboration with the Clarendon
Fund and the Oxford-Richards scholarship at Wadham College, Oxford. Though the literary qualities of some
St Julien texts have proven fertile ground for academic debate, the legend of St Julien has heretofore remained
unexplored from historical perspective. With my DPhil research, I hope to bridge this scholarly gap for the
first time.
In 2021, Ogden called for a diversification of our hagiographical source materials in order to avoid
perpetuating one dominant 'single interpretative stance' (ecclesiastical misogyny) on female and gender
transgressive saints. My DPhil project is in part a response to this call, as through my research I hope to
provide historians interested in thirteenth-century lay religious cultures with a textured case study of a model
of sanctity alternative to the eremitic and monastic models otherwise dominant in this period. In the Julien
legend, sanctity is instead grounded in the institution of marriage and expressed within a lay community
context. I contend that the legend's explosion in popularity in France through 1220-70 thus provides a
valuable way-in to the religio-cultural preoccupations, interests and values of contemporary lay audiences.
My research project will draw on a range of closely contemporaneous images, texts and objects, all associated
with the Julien legend and produced between 1220-70. This includes the vernacular verse Vie de Saint Julien
(preserved in MS 3516, fos. 84r-96r of the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal), which was the subject of my MSt
research project, and related Julien texts such as the vernacular prose La Vie Saint Julien martir, and the
Legenda Aurea. I will also draw on stained-glass sequences of the legend, such as those displayed in the
cathedrals of Rouen and Chartres, and investigate other visual sources (e.g. the relief at 42 Rue Galande,
Paris), and related religious sites (e.g. churches of St Julien).
Through close-reading of these sources I hope to explore how interactions with other cultural codes - such as
those pertaining to gender and social grouping - shaped the articulation of piety in non-monastic settings.
The question of how one might live a holy life "in the world" (when so many contemporary hagiographical
examples were predicated on one's removal from it), for instance, is one to which the legend of St Julien is
poised to provide a range of potentially fruitful answers.
I also intend to unpack the significance of the figure of Clarisse, Julien's wife, whose present obscurity is a
consequence of her non-inclusion in the legend's nineteenth-century literary revival, and thus misrepresents
the legend's significance to thirteenth-century audiences. In correcting this distortion, my research will open
up further discussion of the legend's complex gendered and sexual connotations, and thereby help to enhance
our understanding of the religious role of laywomen in this region and period.
Though I am primarily interested in how contemporary interactions with this legend can be used to illuminate
questions of cultural-historical significance, my work sits in interdisciplinary dialogue with literary and
translation study scholarship, as well as with histories of religion, art, gender, and sexuality. It also takes
significant inspiration from the microhistorical tradition. My research methodologies will consequently
involve close-reading, an 'insistence on context' (Ginzburg:1993), a concern with the 'social embeddedness'
(Gagnier:1991) of historical agents, and the use of intersectional and intersubjective lenses of analysis
Organisations
People |
ORCID iD |
| Leonie Bramwell (Student) |