1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910781883603321

Autore

Griffiths Fiona J

Titolo

The garden of delights [[electronic resource] ] : reform and renaissance for women in the twelfth century / / Fiona J. Griffiths

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Philadelphia, : University of Pennsylvania Press, c2007

ISBN

1-283-21167-X

9786613211675

0-8122-0211-2

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (390 p.)

Collana

The Middle Ages series

Disciplina

271/.90094309021

Soggetti

Monastic and religious life of women - Germany - History - Middle Ages, 600-1500

Women in Christianity - Germany - History - Middle Ages, 600-1500

Christian women - Religious life - Germany - History - 12th century

Germany Church history 843-1517

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Introduction -- 1. Reform and the Cura monialium at Hohenbourg -- 2. The Hortus deliciarum: A Book for Reform and Renaissance -- 3. A Bee in the Garden of the Lord -- 4. From Nectar to Honeycomb: Constructing the Hortus -- 5. The Tree of Knowledge -- 6. The Pleasure Garden of Learning: Reading the Hortus -- 7. Reforming Women in the Garden of Delights -- Conclusion: A Book for Women? -- Appendix: Latin Texts and Translations -- Abbreviations -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index -- Acknowledgments

Sommario/riassunto

In The Garden of Delights, Fiona J. Griffiths offers the first major study of the Hortus deliciarum, a magnificently illuminated manuscript of theology, biblical history, and canon law written both by and explicitly for women at the end of the twelfth century. In so doing she provides a brilliantly persuasive new reading of female monastic culture. Through careful analysis of the contents, structure, and organization of the Hortus, Griffiths argues for women's profound engagement with the spiritual and intellectual vitality of the period on a level previously thought unimaginable, overturning the assumption that women were



largely excluded from the "renaissance" and "reform" of this period. As a work of scholarship that drew from a wide range of sources, both monastic and scholastic, the Hortus provides a witness to the richness of women's reading practices within the cloister, demonstrating that it was possible, even late into the twelfth century, for communities of religious women to pursue an educational program that rivaled that available to men. At the same time, the manuscript's reformist agenda reveals how women engaged the pressing spiritual questions of the day, even going so far as to criticize priests and other churchmen who fell short of their reformist ideals.Through her wide-ranging examination of the texts and images of the Hortus, their sources, composition, and function, Griffiths offers an integrated understanding of the whole manuscript, one which highlights women's Latin learning and orthodox spirituality. The Garden of Delights contributes to some of the most urgent questions concerning medieval religious women, the interplay of gender, spirituality, and intellectual engagement, to discussions concerning women scribes and writers, women readers, female authorship and authority, and the visual culture of female communities. It will be of interest to art historians, scholars of women's and gender studies, historians of medieval religion, education, and theology, and literary scholars studying questions of female authorship and models of women's reading.