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Revivalism and Populism in the Franciscan Observance of the Late Quattrocento

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

Gary Dickson
Gary Dickson*
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh
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Extract

Revival, as this volume shows, has had many different meanings within Christian history, and has taken many different, forms. Institutional revitalization, for example, is one thing; popular revivalism is another. Of course, they may be intertwined, as they were in the case of the Franciscan Observance of the late Quattrocento. The ‘re’ of ‘revivalism’ is usually taken in a retrospective sense -that which previously existed is brought to life once more. Renaissance classicism is an obvious instance. With the Franciscan Observance, it is true, one does get a sense of the desire to restore, to re-institute, the idealized primitive poverty of the order in the days of St Francis. For the Observants, pristine Franciscanism would have been the equivalent of the early Church in the eyes of the Protestant reformers. Yet ‘revivalism’ can also be thought of as pertaining to remarkable occasions of religious intensity, moments of collective enthusiasm, moments, as Emile Durkheim puts it, of ‘general effervescence.’ But champagne is too light-headed and celebratory to do justice to the phenomenon. A better symbol of ‘revivalism’ would be the flames of Pentecost. Here I shall attempt to show how the Observance rose to prominence, and eventually triumphed within the Franciscan order, through the raging fires – creative as well as destructive – of popular, indeed populist revivalism.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 44: Revival and Resurgence in Christian History , 2008 , pp. 62 - 76
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 2008

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References

1 My teacher at Edinburgh, the late Denys Hay, teaches me still; and my former doctoral student, also at Edinburgh, now at the Warburg Institute, Clare Lappin, has kept me up-to-date bibliographically with the Observance, on which she wrote her fine thesis, The Mirror of the Observance: Image, Ideal and Identity in Observant Franciscan Literature, c.1415–1528’, unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Edinburgh, 2000.

2 Durkheim, Emile, The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, trans. Swain, J.W. (New York, 1915), 241 Google Scholar.

3 On medieval revivalism, see Dickson, Gary, ‘Revivalism as a Medieval Religious Genre’, JEH 51 (2000), 473–96 Google Scholar. Also, idem, ‘Medieval Revivalism’, in Daniel Bornstein, ed., Medieval Christianity, A People’s History of Christianity 4, gen. ed. Denis R. Janz (Minneapolis, MN, 2008 forthcoming).

4 See Dickson, Gary, ‘The Crowd at the Feet of Pope Boniface VIII: Pilgrimage, Crusade and the first Roman Jubilee (1300)’, Journal of Medieval History 25: 4 (1999), 279–307 Google Scholar, here at 294–6, and ‘Medieval Christian Crowds and the Origins of Crowd Psychology’, Revue d’Histoire Ecclésiastique 95: 1 (2000), 54–75.

5 A short selection from an extensive literature would include: Moorman, John, A History of the Franciscan Order (Oxford, 1968)Google Scholar; Hay, Denys, The Church in Italy in the Fifteenth Century (Cambridge, 1977)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Il Rinnovamento del Francescanesimo: L’Osservanza (Società Internazionale di Studi Francescani, Convegni, 11) (Assisi, 1985); Nimmo, Duncan, Reform and Division in the Franciscan Order, 1226–1538 (Rome, 1987)Google Scholar; Lappin, Clare, ‘Mirror of the Observance’Google Scholar.

6 Moorman, , Franciscan Order, 371–4, 506 Google Scholar.

7 Of the many, and more recent, studies devoted to Bernardino da Siena, the most readable – if perhaps too affectionate – portrait remains the one drawn by Origo, Iris in The World of San Bernardino (New York, 1962)Google Scholar.

8 Vol. 2 (Rome, 1962; repr. 1983), col. 1288–1321.

9 Moorman, Franciscan Order, 523. Muzzarelli, Maria Giuseppina, Pescatori di uomini: predicatori e piazze alla fine del Medioevo (Bologna, 2005)Google Scholar, ch. 3, ‘Bernardino da Feltre’, 193–265.

10 Ibid., 210–13.

11 Bughetti, Benvenuto, ‘Documenti perugini intorno al B. Bernardino da Feltre,’ Studi Francescani 14 (1942), 32–41 Google Scholar, here at no. 16, 36.

12 See Cuthbert, Father, Life of St. Francis of Assisi (London, 1927), 435 Google Scholar.

13 Nimmo, Reform and Division, 408.

14 For an introduction, edition, and translation of the Vita beati fratris Egidii, see Scripta Leonis, Rufini et Angeli, ed. and trans. Rosalind B. Brooke (Oxford, 1970), 307–49.

15 See Dickson, M. G., ‘Patterns of European Sanctity: the Cult of Saints in the Later Middle Ages (with Special Reference to Perugia)’, unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Edinburgh, 1974, 496 Google Scholar.

16 On San Bernardino in Perugia, see Dickson, Gary, ‘Encounters in Medieval Revivalism: Monks, Friars, and Popular Enthusiasts’, Church History 68: 2 (1999), 265–93, at 290–1 Google Scholar. On his peacemaking activities throughout Italy, including Perugia, see Polecritti, Cynthia L., Preaching Peace in Renaissance Italy: Bernardino of Siena and his Audience (Washington, DC, 2000)Google Scholar.

17 Nimmo, , Reform and Division, 592 Google Scholar.

18 Dickson, , ‘Patterns of European Society’, 481–2 Google Scholar.

19 See the Bernardino, Oratorio San in Sand, Francesco, Perugia, guida storico artistica (Perugia, 1950), 94–9 Google Scholar.

20 The most reliable chronology is provided by Bughetti, ‘Documenti’.

21 On San Bernardino and the Jews, see Mormando, Franco, The Preacher’s Demons: Bernardino of Siena and the Social Underworld of Early Renaissance Italy (Chicago, IL and London, 1999), ch. 4, 164–218 Google Scholar.

22 Raymond de Roover considers him one of medieval Europe’s two great economic thinkers; see his Bernardino of Siena and Sant’Antonino of Florence (Cambridge, MA, 1967), ‘What was Usury’, 27–3 3.

23 Poliakov, Léon, Jewish Bankers and the Holy See, trans. Kochan, Miriam (London, 1977), 142 Google Scholar, citing Bernardino’s sermon forty-three, Opera omnia, vol. 4 (Florence, 1955), 377–87.

24 Todeschini, Giacomo, ‘Teorie economiche francescane e preserrza ebraica in Italia (1380–1462 e.)’, in Il Rinnovamento del Francescanesimo, 195–227, at 213 Google Scholar, citing Bernardino’s sixth sermon from his Quadragesimale de Christiana religione, Opera omnia, vol. 3 (Florence, 1955), 101–2.

25 See Langmuir, Gavin I., Towards a Definition of Antisemitism (Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA, 1990)Google Scholar, especially part 4, ‘irrational fantasies’. Note also the medieval essays, including a contribution by Langmuir, Gavin, in Wood, Diana, ed., Christianity and Judaism, SCH.S 29 (Oxford, 1992)Google Scholar.

26 Mormando, , The Preacher’s Demons, 176, 178 Google Scholar.

27 For general background, see Poliakov, , Jewish Bankers, ch. 4Google Scholar.

28 Bernardino da Feltre was ‘the most effacacious instrument of the preached word to induce the foundation of Monte di Pietà’: Maria Giuseppina Muzzarelli, II denario e la salvezza: l’invenzione del Monte di Pietà (Bologna, 2001), 13.

29 Muzzarelli, , Pescatori, 231 Google Scholar.

30 For the iconography of the respective saints, note the Bibliotheca Sanctorum, vol. 2, and George Kaftal’s Saints in Italian Art, vols. 1–4 (Florence, 1952–85).

31 Moorman, , Franciscan Order, 529–30 Google Scholar; Muzzarelli, , Il denario, 18–20 Google Scholar.

32 Ibid., 11–12.

33 Hsia, R. Po Chia, Trent 1475: Stories of a Ritual Murder Trial (New Haven, CT, 1992), 25, 33 Google Scholar, and see n. 49 below. Poliakov, Léon, The History of Anti-Semitism, vol 1: From the Time of Christ to the Court Jews, trans. Howard, Richard (London, 1966), 148 Google Scholar.

34 The cult was papally abolished in 1965: Mormando, The Preacher’s Demons, 179.

35 See Toaff, Ariel, Gli Ebrei a Perugia, Fonti per la Storia dell’Umbria, 10 (Perugia, 1975), 80 Google Scholar.

36 General background: Heywood, William, A History of Perugia, ed. Douglas, R. Langston (London, 1910), 299–308 Google Scholar.

37 For this incident, Bernardino’s hagiographer Bernardino Guslino is cited by Muzzarelli, Pescatori, p. 22s; but the vivid account quoted here comes from O. Scalvanti, ‘Cronaca perugina inedita’, Bollettino della regia deputazione di Storia Patria per l’Umbria 9 (1903), 246.

38 Bughetti, ‘Documenti’, no. 6, 34 and n. 2.

39 Medieval equivalents for the sin of luxuria included fornicario and libido. See Bloomfield, Morton W., The Seven Deadly Sins (East Lansing, MI, 1952), 69, 77 Google Scholar.

40 Compare Besse, L. de, Le bienheureux Bernardin de Feltre et son oeuvre, 2 vols (Tours and Paris, 1902), 1: 182–3 Google Scholar, and Black, C F., ‘Politics and Society in Perugia, 1488–1540’, unpublished B. Litt. thesis, University of Oxford, 1966, 140–1 Google Scholar.

41 This is the view of Monaco, Michele, ‘Aspetti di vita privata e pubblica nelle città italiane centro-settentrionali durante il xv secolo nelle prediche del beato Bernardino da Feltre Francescano dell’Osservanza’, in L’uomo e la storia: Studi storici in onore di Massimo Petrocchi, Storia e letteratura, raccolta di studi e testi, 153 (Rome, 1983), 120 Google Scholar.

42 San Bernardino’s burning of the vanities in Perugia in 1425 is best described in the Cronaca del Graziani; the relevant passage of which is translated by Heywood, William in his Palio and Ponte (London, 1913), 154–5 Google Scholar.

43 Scalvanti, , ‘Cronaca perugina inedita’, 247–8 Google Scholar. I wish to thank Professor Jon Usher of Edinburgh for helping to clarify a point in this text.

44 Geertz, Clifford, ‘Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight’, in idem, The Interpretation of Cultures (London, 1993), 412–53 Google Scholar.

45 Older accounts of the Sant’Anello are not always free of pious legends; among them is Rossi, Adamo, L’Anello Sponsalizio di Maria Vergine che si venera nelle cattedrale di Perugia. Leggenda (Perugia, 1857)Google Scholar; another is a pamphlet, Ricci, Ettore, Storia del Sant’Anello (Perugia, 1942)Google Scholar. See also Webb, Diane, Patrons and Defenders: the Saints in the Italian City-Stales (London and New York, 1996), 227–30 Google Scholar.

46 Rossi, , L’Anello Sponsalizio, pp. 37–38, 88–98 Google Scholar. See Riccieri, A., ‘Indice degli Annali Ecclesiastici-Perugini’, Archiuioper la Storia Ecclesiastica dell’Umbria 5 (Foligno, 1921), 379–516, at 447–8, 457 Google Scholar. Scalvanti, , ‘Cronaca perugina inedita’, 83–5 Google Scholar. Note the brief account in Giovanna Casagrande, ‘Devozione e Municipalità: la Compagnia del Anello, S./Perugia, S. Giuseppe de (1487–1542)’, in Le Mouvement Confraternel au Moyen Âge, Collection de l’École Française de Rome, 97 (Rome, 1987), 155–83, at 159–60, n. 20 Google Scholar. Ricci, , Storia del Sant’Anello, 26 Google Scholar.

47 For the long diplomatic row between Perugia, Chiusi, and Siena, see Rossi, , L’Anello Sponsalizio, 44–119 Google Scholar, and Webb, , Patrons and Defenders, 227, 229 Google Scholar. On the link with the pilgrimage to Assisi, see Casagrande, ‘Devozione e Municipalità, 161–2.

48 Dusserre, Joseph, ‘Les origines de la dévotion à Saint Joseph’, extract from Cahiers de Joséphologie (Montreal, 1953–4), 82 Google Scholar.

49 See Seitz, Joseph, Die Verelirung des hi Joseph in ihrer gesichtlichen Entwicklung his zum Konzilvon Trent (Freiburg im Beisgau, 1908), 208–9 Google Scholar. Seitz’s work is the fundamental study.

50 Kellner, K. A. H., L’Anno Ecdessiastko e le Feste dei Santi nel loro svolgimento storico, trans. Mercati, A. (Rome, 1906), 241–2 Google Scholar.

51 Sermoni del Beato Bernardino Tomitano da Feltre, 3 vols, ed. C. Varischi, (Milan, 1963), ‘De sancto Joseph’ (Pavia, 1493), 1: 393–402, in which Gerson and St Bernardino da Siena (who ‘converted to and renewed the Christian life in all of Italy,’ 396) are lauded for praising St Joseph (396–7). The quoted passage appears on 398–9.

52 Compare, for example, the superannuated, humble image of Joseph in an early fifteenth-century German woodcut of the Holy Family in Brigitte Heublein, Der ‘verkannte’ Joseph zur mittelalterlichen Ikonagraphie des Heiligen in deutschen und niederlàndischen Kulturraum (Weimar, 1998), no. 76, with the vigorous, manly, middle-aged Joseph of Raphael’s Holy Family or Madonna of the Palm Tree, c1506–07 (National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh). For the latter, see Wilson, Carolyn C., St. Joseph in Italian Renaissance Society and Art: New Directions and Interpretations (Philadelphia, PA, 2001), 230, n. 250 Google Scholar. I wish to thank Michael Bury, historian of art, Edinburgh, for alerting me to this title, as he did to Rosso Fiorentino’s Marriage of the Virgin (1523), in which St Joseph, remarkably, appears as no older than Mary. Wilson, St. Joseph, 187, n. 99.

53 For an overview of his efforts in Perugia, note Seitz, Die Verehrung, 209–10.

54 See Bughetti, , ‘Documenti’, no. 17, 36–7 Google Scholar: ‘Provisio obtenta pro capella S. Ioseph fienda

55 Casagrande, , ‘Devozione e Municipalità’, 163–4; 168–76 Google Scholar.

56 Rossi, , L’Anello Sponsalizio, 221–2 Google Scholar. Matarazzo, Francesco, Chronicles of the City of Perugia, 1492–1503, trans. Morgan, Edward S. (London, 1905), 9 Google Scholar.

57 See Cronaca della Città di Perugia dal 1309 al 1491 nota col nome di ‘Diario del Graziani&’, ed. A. Fabretti, Archivio Storico Italiano 16: 1 (Florence, 1850), 671.

58 See Memorie di Perugia dal’anno 1457 al 1540, in Cronaca della Città di Perugia, ed. A. Fabretti, vol. 2 (Turin, 1888), 108.

59 Perugino’s ‘Marriage of the Virgin’ (completed 1503/4) was commissioned for the reliquary chapel in the Perugia’s cathedral of San Lorenzo in 1499; Raphael’s Sposalizio dates from 1504 (Città di Castello). Carolyn G Wilson, St. Joseph, 26–7 (and pi. 12).

60 A perfect example is the intimate, domestic view of the Holy Family, the Sagrada Familia ‘del pajarito’ by Murillo (c.1645–50), in which Joseph, no greybeard, is the right age for a family man. See Diego Anguilo Iñiguez, Murillo: su vida, su arte, su obra, 3 vols (Madrid, 1981), I: 283–4; 2: no.193, 175–6; 3: pl. 51.