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Paper 12 The Middle Ages on Film: medieval violence and modern identities

Taught by: Dr Nora Berend (nb213) and Prof. Liesbeth van Houts (emcv2)

Course description

Through films, we shall investigate how modern identities incorporate medieval

history. Our primary focus will be the relationship between religion and violence, and

their role in identity formation. Our seven topics from the history of medieval Europe

c. 1000-c. 1450 were made (in)famous by their representation on film, but are also

firmly grounded in the medieval source material (available in English translation).

Why do modern film-makers turn to medieval topics? What has been the relevance of

the Middle Ages in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries? What is the relationship

between historical authenticity and effective (visual) narrative? Can history be useful

for propaganda, ideological and other, only through distortion and the ‘abuse’ of

history? We shall discuss in detail how each film uses its medieval subject-matter, in

what ways each is an authentic portrayal of medieval events and thought and in what

ways and why each changes, distorts or manipulates. In order to do that, we shall read

the medieval sources and some historical studies on the medieval events represented.

We shall then talk about the modern historical context of each film, which will allow

us to highlight fundamental questions about both the process of identity formation,

and the changing meanings of religious violence.

Course structure and mode of teaching

The course will consist of 24 lectures and three two-hour classes spread over two

terms. After two introductory lectures, we will have 3 lectures on each film, with one

concluding lecture at the end. In the classes, we shall develop themes based on several

of the films, allowing students to compare and contrast across a number of films. We

shall assign presentations to the students, who will also be expected to hand in written

work. We expect the students to watch the films in their own time. All films are

available at the Seeley Library, and most are inexpensive and can be purchased by

students if they wish to do so. A Moodle site will support the lectures and

supervisions: it will provide lecture hand-outs, synopses of films, supervision

questions, bibliographies and film clips.

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Four individual or small-group supervisions will give students the opportunity to

study both individual films (with their medieval and modern contexts) and themes.

As far as the examination is concerned, students will have to respond to one question

on a film-topic, one on a theme, and can choose the third freely. Our expectation is

that students will discuss themes with reference to all the relevant films in their

medieval and modern contexts, and respond to questions on film-topics drawing on a

substantial knowledge of the medieval and modern sources and secondary literature.

Students will not be able to take the exam on the basis of simply watching one or two

of the films.

Maximum number of students: 16

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Bibliography

A. The films and their context

1. Gábor Koltay, István a király [King Stephen I of Hungary] (1984)

A film version of a rock opera on Stephen I (c. 1000-1038) the first Christian king of

Hungary, depicting a clash of Christianity versus paganism, building on national

myth-making in order to create national identity.

Bibliography:

N. Berend, tr. ‘Hartvic’s Life of St Stephen of Hungary’, in T. Head, ed. Medieval

Hagiography: An anthology (New York, 2000), 375-98

N. Berend, ‘The Medieval Origins of Modern Nationalism? Stephen of Hungary and

el Cid of Spain’ in The Creation of Medieval Northern Europe, ed. L Melve and S.

Sønnesyn (Oslo, 2012), 219-245.

N. Berend, J. Laszlovszky, B. Zs. Szakács, ‘Hungary’, in N. Berend, ed.

Christianization and the Rise of Christian Monarchy: Scandinavia, Central Europe

and Rus’ c. 900-1200 (Cambridge, 2007), 319-68

P. Engel, The Realm of St Stephen: A history of medieval Hungary (London, 2001)

Gy. Györffy, King St Stephen of Hungary (Highland Lakes, NJ, 1994)

G. Klaniczay, Holy Rulers and Blessed Princesses (Cambridge, 2000), chapter 3 Rex

iustus: the saintly institutor of Christian kingship

L. Veszprémy, ‘The invented 11th century of Hungary’ in P. Urbanczyk, ed., The

Neighbours of Poland in the 11th century (Warsaw, 2002), 137-54

L. Kontler, A history of Hungary (Palgrave, 2002)

I. Lázár, Hungary: A brief history 4th edn (Budapest, 1997)

M. Molnár, A Concise History of Hungary (Cambridge, 2001)

Peter F. Sugar, Péter Hanák, Tibor Frank, eds, A History of Hungary (Bloomington,

IN, 1990)

G. W. White, Nationalism and territory (Oxford, 2000), chap. 4, ‘Hungary and the

Hungarians’

G. Bisztray, ‘The image of history in modern Hungarian cinema,’ East European

Quarterly 34 (2000)

M. Zeidler, Ideas on Territorial Revision in Hungary: 1920–1945 (Boulder, CO,

2007)

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Film: István a király, dir. Gábor Koltay, written by Levente Szörényi and János

Bródy, 1984, 100 mins. In Hungarian: students will receive an English translation of

the text.

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2. Anthony Mann, El Cid (1961),

A film on one of the early adventurers of the Iberian peninsula, Rodrigo Díaz de

Vivar (c. 1043-99), who was subsequently turned into a Christian hero fighting

against Muslims in the The Spanish ‘Reconquest’.

Bibliography:

P. Such – J. Hodgkinson, The poem of my Cid 2nd ed (Warminster, 1991)

S. Barton – R. Fletcher, tr. and annotated, The World of El Cid: Chronicles of the

Spanish Reconquest (Manchester, 2000)

S. Barton, ‘El Cid, Cluny, and the Medieval Spanish Reconquista,’ English Historical

Review 2011, 517-543.

R. Fletcher, The Quest for El Cid (Oxford, 1991)

B. F. Reilly, The Medieval Spains (Cambridge, 1993)

Joseph O’Callaghan, Reconquest and Crusade in medieval Spain (Philadelphia, 2003)

P. Linehan, History and the Historians of Medieval Spain (Oxford, 1993)

S. Barton, Conquerors, Brides and Concubines: Interfaith Relations and Social

Power in Medieval Iberia (Philadelphia, 2015)

chapter in: Richard Burt, Medieval and Early Modern Film and Media (New York-

London, 2008)

C.P. Boyd, Historia Patria: Politics, History and national identity in Spain 1875-

1975 (Princeton, 1997)

A. García-Sanjuán, ‘Rejecting al-Andalus, exalting the Reconquista’ Journal of

Medieval Iberian Studies (2016)

https://www.academia.edu/30761405/Rejecting_al-

Andalus_exalting_the_Reconquista_historical_memory_in_contemporary_Spain

H. Kamen, Imagining Spain: Historical Myth and National Identity (New Haven,

2008)

P. Preston, Franco (London, 1993)

A. Al Tuma, ‘Moros y Cristianos: Religious Aspects of the Participation of Moroccan

Soldiers in the Spanish Civil War’ in B. Agai, et al, ed. Muslims in interwar Europe

(Leiden – Boston, 2016), 151-177.

E. Bolorinos Allard, ‘The Crescent and the Dagger: Representations of the Moorish

Other during the Spanish Civil War’ Bulletin of Spanish Studies 2015

DOI: 10.1080/14753820.2015.1082811

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Film: El Cid, dir. Anthony Mann, 1961, 182 mins.

3. Peter Glenville, Becket (1964)

The film addresses the relationship between Thomas Becket(c. 1118-1170), archbishop

of Canterbury, and King Henry II of England (1154-89). What started as a close male

friendship resulted in a dramatic fall-out that ended with Becket’s murder. The

narrative (based on a play by Jean Anouilh) serves as an excellent introduction for

the debate on the ever present tension between Church and State.

Bibliography:

The Lives of Thomas Becket. Selected sources, trans. and annot. M. Staunton,

Manchester Medieval sources series, (Manchester, 2001)

The correspondence of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, ed. and trans. A.

Duggan (Oxford,2000), 2 vols

A.Duggan, Thomas Becket (2004)

-------------, ‘Henry II, the English church and the Papacy 1154-76’, in: Henry II. New

Interpretations, ed. C. Harper-Bill and N. Vincent (Woodbridge, 2007), 154-83

F. Barlow, Thomas Becket (London, 1986)

Felice Lifshitz, ‘Ethnicity, Gender and Sexuality in Mid-Century Medievalist Film;

The example of Becket (1964)’, Quaestiones Medii Aevi Novae 19 (2014) special

issue Women and Femininity

B. Smalley, The Becket Conflict in the Schools (Oxford, 1973)

W. L. Warren, Henry II (Berkeley, 1973)

Hugh M. Thomas, ‘Shame masculinity and the death of Thomas Becket,’ Speculum 87

(2012), 1051-88

-----------, The Secular clergy in England 1066-1216 (Oxford, 2014) esp chapter 9 ‘Violence,

Clerical Status and the Issue of Criminous Clerks’

Film Reviews:

R.M. Hodgens, ‘Review: Becket,’ Film Quarterly Vol. 17 No. 4, 1964

‘Review: Becket,’ Monthly Film Bulletin, London 31.360, 1964

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Film: Becket, dir. Peter Glenville, 1964, 148 mins.

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4. Sergei Eisenstein, Alexander Nevsky (1938)

A film focusing on the military successes of Alexander Nevsky (1220-63), Grand

Prince of Novgorod and Vladimir, who defeated the Mongols and the Teutonic

Knights when they attacked his principalities.

Bibliography:

‘Tale of the Life and Courage of the Pious and Great Alexander’, in Medieval

Russia’s Epics, Chronicles, and tales ed. S. A. Zenkovsky (Harmondsworth,1974),

224-36

J. Martin, Medieval Russia 980-1584 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 2008)

J. Fennell, The crisis of medieval Russia 1200-1304 (London – New York, 1983)

S. Franklin, ‘The Invention of Rus(sia)(s) in A. P. Smyth, ed. Medieval Europeans

(London – New York, 1998), 180-195.

P. Jackson, The Mongols and the West (Harlow, 2005)

William Urban, The Teutonic Knights: A Military History (London, 2003)

Eric Christiansen, The Northern Crusades, 2nd ed (London, 1997), ‘The War on the

Schismatic’ from chap. 5.

James Goodwin, Eisenstein, Cinema and History (University of Illinois Press, 1993)

Richard Taylor, The Eisenstein Reader (London, 2008)

P. Kenez, Cinema and Soviet Society 1917-1953 (Cambridge, 1992)

C. Merridale, Ivan’s War: The Red Army at War 1939-45 (Faber and Faber, 2006)

V. Grossman, A Writer At War: Vasily Grossman with the Red Army 1941-1945,

A. Beevor and L. Vinogradova tr. (London, 2006)

S. Davies and J. Harris, eds, Stalin: A new history (Cambridge, 2005)

Film: Alexander Nevsky, dir. Sergei Eisenstein, 1938, 112 mins.

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5. S. Schiffman Le moine et la sorcière (1987)

The film is based on an exemplum by Stephen of Bourbon (cc. 1190-c. 1261), inquisitor,

who wrote a large collection of sermon material. Amongst it is the story recounting

how Stephen found that in Lyons a cult had grown up around a greyhound called

Guinefort who could cure sick children. The script for the film, based on Stephen of

Bourbon’s exemplum, was written by a professional historian-medievalist.

Bibliography:

Tractatus de diversis materiis predicabilibus, ed. J. Berlioz and J-L. Eichenlaub, vols

1 and 3 published in 2002, 2006; the rest in preparation. For English translation of

De supersticione, see The Medieval Source Book

(http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/guinefort.html)

Texts and the Repression of Medieval Heresy, ed. C. Bruschi and P. Biller

(Woodbridge, 2003) Introduction

Heresy and Inquisition in France 1200-1300, ed. and trans. John H. Arnold and Peter

Biller, Manchester Sources in Translation (Manchester 2016), no. 17 (on Stephen de

Bourbon)

J. C. Schmitt, Holy Greyhound, St. Guinefort, Healer of Children since the Thirteenth

Century, trans. M. Thom (1982)

J. Berlioz, Saints et damnés. La Bourgogne du moyen Age dans les récits d’Etienne de

Bourbon, inquisiteur (1190-1261) (Dijon, 1989)

B. Hamilton, The Medieval Inquisition (London, 1981)

J. Given, Inquisition and Medieval society: Power, Discipline and Resistance in

Languedoc (New York -London, 1997)

Catherine Rider, ‘Elite and popular superstitions in the exempla of Stephen de

Bourbon,’ Studies in Church History, 42 (2006), pp. 78-88

---------------------, Magic and Impotence (Oxford, 2006)

A.Vauchez, Sainthood in the Later Middle Ages, trans. J. Birrell (Cambridge, 1997)

Film: Le moine et la sorcière (The Sorceress), dir. S. Schiffman, 1987, 97 minutes; in

French with English subtitles.

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6. Ingmar Bergman The Seventh Seal (1957)

A film combining a variety of medieval topics such as The Plague, crusades, popular

religious beliefs and chess, in order to investigate the meaning of life and death.

Bibliography:

O. J. Benedictow, The Black Death 1346-1353: The Complete History (Woodbridge,

2004)

A. Classen, ed. Death in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Times: The Material and

Spiritual Conditions of the Culture of Death (Berlin, 2016)

S. K. Cohen, The Black Death Transformed: Disease and Culture in Early

Renaissance Europe (London, 2002)

R. Horrox, The Black Death (Manchester, 1994)

J. Riley-Smith, The Crusades: A Short History (London, 1990 and reprints)

N. Housely, The Later Crusades (Oxford1992), chap. 1 (The Loss of the Holy Land)

R. N. Swanson, Religion and Devotion in Europe (Cambridge, 1995 and reprints)

E. E. DuBruck, and B. I. Gusick, eds. Death and Dying in the Middle Ages (New

York, 1999)

P. Binski, Medieval Death: Ritual and representation (London, 1996)

J. M. Clark, The Dance of Death in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance (Glasgow,

1950)

E. Gertsman, The Dance of Death in the Middle Ages: Image, Text, Performance

(Turnhout, 2011)

I. Bergman, Images: My Life in Film (New York, 1994), 231-42

J. Kalin, The films of Ingmar Bergman (Cambridge, 2003)

Melvyn Bragg, The Seventh Seal (London, 2008)

Film: The Seventh Seal, dir. Ingmar Bergman, 1957, 96 mins, in Swedish with

English subtitles.

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7. Robert Bresson, Le procès de Jeanne d’Arc (1962)

The story of Joan of Arc (c. 1412-31), a girl of modest background through voices and

visions learned that she ought to free France from the English during the later part of the

s0called Hundred Years War. She led an army but eventually died after a trial (instigated by

the English who captured her) as a heretic at the stake. A transcription of her trial has

survived. The story combines themes of religion, gender, warfare and ecclesiastical

persecution.

Bibliography:

Joan of Arc. La Pucelle trans. and annot. C. Taylor, (Manchester Medieval sources

series, 2006)

The trial of Joan of Arc: being the Report of the Proceedings from the Orleans

Manuscript, ed. W. Scott (London, 1956)

‘The Tale of Joan of Arc’, ed. and trans. R. Blumenfeld-Kosinski, in: The Selected

Writings of Christine de Pizan (New York, 1997), 252-62

A.Curry, The Hundred Years War (Basingstoke, 1993)

Larissa J. Taylor, The Virgin Warrio. The Life and death of Joan of Arc (2009)

Helen Castor, Joan of Arc, a History ( London, 2014)

R. Pernoud and M-V. Clin, Joan of Arc: her Story, trans. J. duQuesnay (New York,

1999)

K. Sullivan, The interrogation of Joan of Arc (Minnapolis, 1999)

B. Wheeler and C. T. Wood, eds Fresh Verdicts on Joan of Arc (New York, 1996)

J. Aberth, A Knight at the Movies: Medieval History on Film (New York, 2003),

chapter 6, 257-98

R. Blaetz, Visions of the Maid. Joan of Arc in American Film and culture

(Charlottesville, 2001)

N. Margolis, Joan of Arc in History, Literature and Film: A select Annotated Bibliography

(New York, 1990)

Tony Pipolo, Robert Bresson, A Passion for Film (Oxford, 2010), chapter 4, pp. 153-

81

Film: Le procès de Jeanne d’Arc, dir. Robert Bresson, 1962, 90 minutes, in French with

English subtitles.

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B Themes

History and Film

W. Guynn, Writing History in Film (New York, 2006)

D. Herlihy, ‘Am I a camera? Other reflections on Film and History’, American

Historical Review 93 (1988), 1186-92

M. Hughes-Warrington, History goes to the Movies (London, 2007)

R. Rosenstone, ‘History in Images/History in Words: Reflections on the possibility of

really putting history on film’, ibidem, 1173-85

P. Sorlin, The Film in History: Restaging the Past (Oxford, 1980)

M. Ferro, Cinema and History, trans. N. Greene (Detroit, 1988)

Screening the Past. Film and Representation of History, ed. T. Barta (Westport, 1998)

Medievalism (modern use of the Middle Ages)

Michael Alexander, Medievalism: the Middle Ages in modern England (New Haven,

2007)

Studies in Medievalism; journal since 1979, 17 vols. so far

Medievalism in the Modern World, ed. Richard Utz, Tom Shippey (Turnhout, 1998)

Medievalism and the Modernist Temper, ed. R. Howard Bloch, Stephen G. Nichols

(Baltimore, MD, 1996)

D. Matthews: Medievalism: A Critical History (Cambridge, 2015)

Middle Ages and Film

John Aberth, A Knight at the Movies: Medieval History on Film (New York:, 2003)

S. Airlie, ‘Strange eventful histories: the Middle ages in the cinema,’ in The

Medieval World, ed. P. Linehan and J.L. Nelson (London, 2001), 163-83

S. Aronstein, Hollywood Knights: Arthurian Cinema and the Politics of Nostalgia

(New York, 2006)

A.Bernau and B. Bildhauer (eds), Medieval Film (Manchester, 2009)

R. Burt, Medieval and early Modern Film and Media (London-New York: Palgrave,

2008)

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special issue of Exemplaria on ‘Movie Medievalism’, 19.2. (Summer 2007), co-

edited by Richard Burt and Nickolas Haydock

Davis, N. Z., Slaves on Screen: Film and Historical Vision (Cambridge, MA: Harvard

University Press, 2000)

Martha Driver, ‘Medieval Period in Film’, Film and History 29 (1999) nos 1-2, pp. 1-

90 and nos. 3-4 1-100 special issues on topic

Martha W. Driver, ‘Teaching and Learning Guide for: Teaching the Middle Ages on

Film: Visual Narrative and the Historical record’, History Compass 6/3 (2008), 1000-

9

Martha Driver, ‘Teaching the Middle Ages on Film: Visual Narrative and the

Historical Record’, History Compass 5/1 2007, 146-161

Martha W. Driver and S. Ray (eds), The Medieval Hero on Screen: Representations

from Beowulf to Buffy (Jeferson, NC – London, 2004)

A. Francois de la Bretèque, L’imaginaire médiévale dan s le cinéma occidental (Paris,

2004)

L.A. Finke and M.B. Schichtman, eds, Cinematic Illuminations. The Middle Ages

on Film (Baltimore, 2010)

Paul Halsall, Medieval History in the Movies Online list of over 200 movies depicting

Medieval history. From the Internet Medieval Sourcebook.

Kevin J. Harty, The Reel Middle Ages: American, Western and Eastern European,

Middle Eastern and Asian films about Medieval Europe, The first comprehensive

survey of films of the European Middle Ages. Over 900 films. (Jefferson, NC, 1999).

Nicholas Haydock, Movie Medievalism: The Imaginary Middle Ages (Jefferson NC,

2008).

N. Haydock and E. L. Risden (eds), Holywood in the Holy Land. Essays on Film

Depictions of the Crusades and Christian-Muslim Clashes (London, 2009)

C.Kiening and H. Adolf (eds), Mittelalter im Film (Berlin, 2006)

A.Lindley, ‘The ahistoricism of medieval film’, Screening the Past (online), 3

M. Meier and S. Slanicka, Antike und mittelalter im Film (Cologne, 2007)

L. T. Ramey and T. Pugh, Race, Gender and class in ‘Medieval’ cinema (New Middle

Ages series; Basingstoke, 2007)

David J. Williams, ‘Looking at the Middle Ages in the Cinema: An Overview’, Film

and History 29:1-2 (1999): 8-19.

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Identity, ethnicity, nationalism

Marcus Banks, Ethnicity: Anthropological constructions (London – New York:,

1996)

Robert Bartlett, ‘Medieval and Modern Concepts of Race and Ethnicity’, Journal of

Medieval and Early Modern Studies 31:1 (Winter 2001), 39-56

Claus Bjørn et al, eds., Nations, Nationalism and Patriotism in the European Past

(Copenhagen, 1994)

Rogers Brubaker – Frederick Cooper ‘Beyond identity’ Theory and Society 29 (2000):

1-47

Rogers Brubaker, Ethnicity without Groups (Cambridge MA, 2004)

Rogers Brubaker, Nationalism Reframed: Nationhood and the National Question in

the New Europe (Cambridge, 1996)

Simon Forde et al, eds, Concepts of National Identity in the Middle Ages (Leeds,

1995)

Patrick Geary ‘Ethnic Identity as a Situational Construct in the Early Middle Ages,’

Mitteilungen der anthropologischen Gesellschaft in Wien vol. 113 (1983): 15-26.

Reprinted in Folk Life in the Middle Ages, ed. Edward Peters, Medieval Perspectives

3 (1988) [1991], 1-17.

---, The Myth of Nations: The Medieval Origins of Europe (Princeton – Oxford, 2002)

Leah Greenfeld ‘Nationalism and modernity’ Social Research: An international

quarterly of the social sciences 63 (1996): 3-40

Caspar Hirschi, The Origins of Nationalism (Cambridge, 2011)

John Hutchinson – Anthony D. Smith, eds., Ethnicity (Oxford – New York, 1996)

Anthony D. Smith, National Identity (Harmondsworth, 1991)

Alfred P. Smyth, ed., Medieval Europeans: Studies in Ethnic Identity and National

Perspectives in Medieval Europe (London – New York, 1998)

Walter Pohl, ‘Conceptions of Ethnicity in Early Medieval Studies, ’ reproduced in

Lester K. Little – Barbara H. Rosenwein, eds., Debating the Middle Ages (Malden

MA – Oxford, 1998), 15-24

--- and Helmut Reimitz, Strategies of Distinction: The Construction of Ethnic

Communities, 300-800 (Leiden – Boston MA, 1998)

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Stefan Berger, Christoph Conrad, Guy P. Marchal, eds, Writing the Nation series

(Palgrave Macmillan 2008-2014) (includes the volumes: The past as history: national

identity and historical consciousness in modern Europe; Nationalizing the past:

Historians as nation builders in modern Europe; The contested nation: Ethnicity,

class, religion and gender in national histories; Writing the nation: a global

perspective; Disputed territories and shared pasts: overlapping national histories in

modern Europe; The uses of the Middle Ages in modern European states)

Warfare, Violence

Jim Bradbury, The Medieval Siege (Woodbridge, 1998)

---, The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare (London – New York, 2004)

Philippe Contamine, War in the Middle Ages (Oxford, 1991)

Maurice Keen, Medieval warfare: A History (Oxford, 1999)

Kelly DeVries, Medieval Military Technology (UTP Higher Education, 1992)

John France, Western Warfare in the Age of the Crusades 1000-1300 (Ithaca NY,

1999)

Nicholas Hooper, The Cambridge Illustrated Atlas of Warfare: The Middle Ages

(Cambridge, 1996)

Richard W. Kaeuper, Chivalry and Violence in Medieval Europe (Oxford, 1999)

Warren C. Brown, Violence in Medieval Europe (London, 2010)

Mark D. Meyerson, Daniel Thierry, Oren Falk, eds, ‘A Great Effusion of Blood’?

Interpreting Medieval Violence (Toronto, 2004)

J. Finch, ‘The Nature of violence in the Middle Ages: An Alternative Perspective’

Historical Research 70, 173 (1997), 243-68

Larissa Tracy, Torture and Brutality in Medieval Literature (Cambridge, 2012)

H. Skoda, Medieval Violence. Physical Brutality in Northern France 1270-1330

(Oxford, 2013)

J. Gillingham, ‘Women, children and profits of war,’ Gender and Historiography.

Studies in the earlier Middle Ages in Honour of Pauline Stafford, ed. J. Nelson, S.

Reynolds and S. M. Johns (London 2012), 61-74

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Christianization, conversion

Guyda Armstrong – Ian N. Wood, Christianizing Peoples and Converting Individuals

(Turnhout, 2000)

Diane Austin-Broos, ‘The Anthropology of Conversion: An Introduction,’ in Andrew

Buckser – Stephen D. Glazier, The Anthropology of religious conversion (Lanham,

2003), 1-12.

Nora Berend, ed., Christianization and the Rise of Christian Monarchy: Scandinavia,

Central Europe and Rus’ c. 900-1200 (Cambridge, 2007)

Peter Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom (Malden MA – Oxford, 1996 and

reprints)

Richard Fletcher, The Conversion of Europe: From Paganism to Christianity 371-

1386 (Hammersmith, 1997)

Kenneth Mills and Anthony Grafton, eds., Conversion: Old Worlds and New

(Rochester NY – Woodbridge, 2003)

James Muldoon, ed., Varieties of Religious Conversion in the Middle Ages

(Gainesville FL, 1997)

James C. Russell, The Germanization of Early Medieval Christianity: A

Sociohistorical Approach to Religious Transformation (Oxford – New York, 1994)

Ian Wood, The Missionary Life: Saints and the Evangelisation of Europe 400-1050

(Harlow, 2001)

Religiosity, medieval religious practices

John H. Arnold, Belief and Unbelief in Medieval Europe (London, 2005)

Lester K. Little and Barbara H. Rosenwein, eds., Debating the Middle Ages (Malden

MA – Oxford, 1998), Part IV: Religion and Society

Robert Bartlett, Trial by Fire and Water: The Medieval Judicial Ordeal (Oxford,

1986)

---, The Natural and the Supernatural in the Middle Ages (Cambridge, 2008)

---, Why can the dead do such great things? Saints and worshippers from the martyrs

to the Reformation (Princeton, 2013)

Peter Brown, The Cult of the Saints: Its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity

(Chicago, 1981)

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Gary Dickson, Religious Enthusiasm in the Medieval West (Aldershot, 2000,

Variorum Collected Studies)

Miri Rubin, ed., Medieval Christianity in Practice: Readings (Princeton , 2009)

A.Vauchez, The laity in the Middle Ages: religious beliefs and practices (Notre-Dame

IN,1997)

---------------, Sainthood in the Later Middle Ages, ed. J. Birrell (Cambridge, 1997)

Donald Weinstein and Rudolph M. Bell, Saints and Society (Chicago , 1982)

Religions in conflict, religious confrontation (Christians and Muslims)

‘AHR Conversation: Religious Identities and Violence’, The American Historical

Review, vo. 112, no. 5 (December 2007), 1433-81

Norman Daniel, Islam and the West: The Making of an Image rev. edn (Oxford, 1993

and reprints)

Richard Fletcher, The Cross and The Crescent: Christianity and Islam from

Muhammad to the Reformation (London, 2003)

Michael Gervers and James M. Powell, eds., Tolerance and Intolerance: Social

Conflict in the Age of the Crusades (Syracuse NY, 2001)

David Nirenberg, Communities of Violence: Persecution of Minorities in the Middle

Ages (Princeton, 1996)

Carol Hillenbrand, The Crusades: Islamic Perspectives (London, 1999)

James Turner Johnson, The Holy War Idea in Western and Islamic Traditions

(University Park PA, 1997)

Benjamin Z. Kedar, Crusade and Mission: European Approaches toward the Muslims

(Princeton, 1984)

Frederick H. Russell, The Just War in the Middle Ages (Cambridge, 1977)

John V. Tolan, Saracens: Islam in the Medieval European Imagination (New York:,

2002)

J. Malegam, The Song of Behemoth. Disputing Peace and Violence in Medieval

Eruope 1000-1200 (Ithace-London, 2013)

B. Nongbri, Before religion: A history of a modern concept (New Haven, 2013)

Speech/language

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J. R. E. Bliese, ‘Aelred of Rievaulx’s Rhetoric and Morale at the Battle of the

Standard, 1138’, in Albion, 20 (1988), 543-56

J. R. E. Bliese, ‘The courage of the Normans; a comparative study of battle rethoric’,

Nottingham Medieval Studies 35 (1991), 1-26

R. Burt, ‘Getting Schmedieval: of manuscript and film prologues, paratexts and

parodies’, Exemplaria 18 (2006), 1-22 and also chapter in Burt, Medieval and early

Modern Film and Media

M. W. Driver, ‘¨We band of brothers¨: rousing speeches from Robin Hood to Black

knight’, in R. Evans, H. Fulton and D. Mathews (eds), Medieval Cultural Studies:

Essays in honour of Stephen Knight (Cardiff, 2006), 91-106

R. Balzaretti, ‘Spoken narratives in ninth-century Milanese court records’, Narrative

and History in the early Medieval West, eds E. M. Tyler and R. Balzaretti (Turnhout,

2006), 11-38

C. O’Sullivan, ‘A time of translation: linguistic difference and cinematic

medievalism’, in Bernau and Bildhauer (eds), Medieval Film, 60-85

D. Salo, ‘Heroism and alienation through language in ‘The Lords of the Rings’’, M.

W. Driver and S. Ray (eds), The Medieval Hero on Screen: Representations from

Beowulf to Buffy, 23-37

Historical environment and landscape

P. Everson and T. Williamson (eds), The Archaeology of Landscape (Manchester,

1998)

G. Fournier, Les châteaux dans le France medieval: essai de sociologie momumentale

(Paris, 1978)

J. Grenvile, Medieval Housing, The Archaeology of medieval Britain (London, 1997)

P. Héliot, ‘Le Château-Gaillard et les fortresses des XIIe et XIIIe siècles en Europe

occidentale’, Château-Gaillard, 1 (1962), 53-74

John Howe and Michael Wolfe eds, Inventing Medieval Landscapes (Gainesville,

2002)

G. Meirion-Jones and M. Jones (eds), Manorial domestic buildings in England and

Northern France (London, 1993), 82-120

J.Mesqui, Châteaux forts et fortification en France (Paris, 1997)

N.J.G. Pounds, The Medieval Castle in England and Wales (Cambridge, 1990)

P. Rocolle, Les temps de châteaux forts Xe-XVe siécles (Paris, 1994)

R. Fish, Cinematic countrysides, Inside Popular Film (Manchester, 2007)

19

Emotions

Per Förnegard, Erika Kihlman, Mia Åkestam, Gunnel Engwell, eds. Tears, sighs and

laughter: expressions of emotions in the Middle Ages (Stockholm, 2017)

Gerhard Jaritz, ed., Emotions and Material Culture: International Round-Table

Discussion (Vienna, 2003)

C. Stephen Jaeger – Ingrid Kasten, eds., Emotions and Sensibilities in the Middle

Ages (Berlin – New York, 2003)

Simo Knuuttila, Emotions in Ancient and Medieval Philosophy (Oxford, Press, 2004)

Henrik Lagerlund – Mikko Yrjönsuuri, eds., Emotions and Choice from Boethius to

Descartes (Dordrecht – Boston MA, 2002)

William M. Reddy, The Navigation of Feeling: A Framework for the History of

Emotions (Cambridge, 2001)

Barbara H. Rosenwein, ‘Worrying about Emotions in History,’ The American

Historical Review 107.3 (2002), 821-45

---, ed., Anger’s Past: The Social Uses of an Emotion in the Middle Ages (Ithaca –

London, 1998)

---, Emotional Communities in the Early Middle Ages (Ithaca – London, 2006)

Jennifer C. Vaught, ed., Grief and Gender 700-1700 (New York, 2003)

Medieval biography

Writing Medieval Biography 750-1250. Essays in honour of Professor Barlow, eds D.

Bates, J. Crick and S. Hamilton (Woodbridge, 2006)

Lives for Sale; Biographical Tales, ed. M. Bostridge (London, 2004)

Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis, ed. Historiography in the Middle Ages (Leiden –

Boston: Brill, 2003), chaps 4. and 11, ‘Christian Biography: Foundation to Maturity’,

and ‘Biography 1000-1350’

S. Hamilton, ‘Review article: early medieval rulers and their modern biographers’,

Early Medieval Europe 9 (2000), 247-60

J. Le Goff, ‘The Whys and Ways of writing biography: the case of saint Louis’,

Exemplaria, 1 (1989) 207-25

20

R. Morse, ‘Medieval biography; a branch of literature’, Modern Language review 80

(1985), 257-68

J. L. Nelson, ‘Writing early medieval biography’, History Workshop Journal 50

(2000), 129-36

J. Rubenstein, ‘Biography and autobiography in the Middle Ages’, Writing Medieval

History, ed. N. Partner (London, 2005), 22-41

H. Summerson, ‘Problems of medieval biography: revising DNB’, Medieval

Prosopography 17 (1996), 197-222

M. W. Driver and S. Ray (eds), The Medieval Hero on Screen: Representations from

Beowulf to Buffy (Jeferson, NC – London, 2004)

Gender, femininity and masculinity

K. Adler, R. Balzaretti and Michele Mitchell, ‘Practising gender history’, Gender and

History 20 (2008),1-7

Becoming Male in the Middle Ages, ed. Jeffrey Jerome Cohen and Bonnie Wheeler

(New York, 2000)

S. Edgington and S. Lambert (eds), Gendering the Crusades (Cardiff, 2001)

R. Mazo Karras, From Boys to Men: formations of masculinity in late medieval

Europe (Philadelphia, 2003)

Masculinity in Medieval Europe, D. M. Hadley (London, 1999)

K. M. Phillips, Medieval Maidens: Young Women and Gender in England, 1270-1540

(Manchester, 2003)

Singlewomen in the European Past, 1250-1800, ed. Judith M. Bennett and Amy M.

Froide (Philadelphia, 1999)

E. van Houts, Memory and Gender in Medieval Europe 900-1200 (Basingstoke,

1999)

D. Youngs, The Life Cycle in Western Europe, c. 1300-1500 (Manchester, 2006)

C. Miller-Avrich and V. Blanton-Whetsell, Medieval women in Film Subsidia series

Medieval Feminist Newsletter, Forum (2000 to order:

http://www.minotstateu.edu/mff/subsidia.shtml)

S. Neale, ‘Masculinity as spectacle; reflections on men and mainstream cinema’,

Screen 24 (1983), 2-16

21

L. Hunt, ‘What are the big boys made of? Spartacus, el Cid and the male epic,’ in: P.

Kirkham, J. Thumin, eds, You Tarzan. Masculinity, movies and Men (New York,

1993)

L. T. Ramey and T. Pugh, Race, Gender and class in ‘Medieval’ cinema (New Middle

Ages series; Basingstoke, 2007)

Rulership and power

J. M. Bak (ed.), Coronations. Medieval and early modern Monarchic Ritual

(Berkeley, 1990)

T. N. Bisson, (ed.) Cultures of Power: lordship, Status and Process in Twelfth-

century Europe (Philadelphia, 1995)

A.Classen, ‘The Cry-Baby kings in courtly romances: what is wrong with medieval

kingship?’, Studi Medievali 3rd s. 39 (1998), 833-63

Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis, ed. Historiography in the Middle Ages (Leiden –

Boston: Brill, 2003), chap 7. Dynastic History

A.Duggan (ed.), Kings and Kingship in Medieval Europe (London, 1993)

-----------------, Queens and Queenship in Medieval Europe (London, 1997)

J. Dunbabin, Captivity and Imprisonment in Medieval Europe, 1000-1300

(Basingstoke, 2002)

J. L. Nelson, ‘Kingship and Empire’, The Cambridge History of Medieval Political

thought c. 350-c. 1450, ed. J. H. Burns (Cambridge, 1988), 211-251

K. Pennington, The Prince and the Law, 1200-1600: sovereignty and rights in

medieval western legal tradition (1993)

S. Reynolds, Fiefs and Vassals. The Medieval Evidence reinterpreted (Oxford, 1994)

R. Schneider, Das spätmittelalterliche Königtum im europäischen Vergleich

(Sigmaringen, 1987)

B. Weiler, ‘Kingship, Usurpation and propaganda in twelfth-century Europe: the case

of Stephen’, Anglo-Norman Studies 23 (2000), 299-326

B. Weiler, ‘The rex renitens and the medieval ideal of kingship c. 950-c. 1250’,

Viator 31 (2000), 1-42

B. Weiler, ‘Tales of First Kings and the Culture of Kingship in the West, c. 1050-

1200,’ Viator (2015): 101-128.

Further readings in foreign languages are available on request.

22

Sample questions:

To what extent do modern gender interpretations allow us to understand Jeanne’s

male persona?

Contemporaries and modern commentators alike have found it difficult to account for

Jeanne’s military expertise. Why?

How do you account for the medieval and modern fascination with the life story of

Jeanne d’Arc?

Analyse the role of women in the cult of the greyhound.

What does King Stephen I represent to twentieth-century Hungarians?

Why and how does Bergman create a composite ‘Middle Ages’ in the Seventh Seal?

How do you account for the enduring ‘ethnic’ theme of Saxon versus Norman in the

film version of the conflict between Becket and Henry II?

What role, if any, can films play in recapturing medieval emotions?

How does film reflect historical reality?

Is medieval history more distorted when used in films conveying political messages

than in films about eternal questions such as the meaning of life?

‘Modern films on the Middle Ages can only be misleading’. Discuss

How does violence in the movies relate to medieval violence?

‘Modern representations place more emphasis on medieval personal rule than

medieval kings did.’ Discuss.

What does the representation of medieval religious violence tell us about modern

identities?