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In a fundamental essay published in 1991 on the significance of religious women’s communities in early and high medieval Saxony, the late Michel Parisse called for a comparative perspective on the political, social and religious conditions of the conspicuous density of women's communities in Saxony. In doing so, he referred to his home region of Lorraine, for which he – amongst others – used the term Lotharingia to describe its early medieval reality. In terms of sheer numbers, Lotharingia is indeed closest to the Saxon situation, but chronologically its monasteries also refer back to earlier times. Examples of this are the Merovingian foundations of Remiremont in the Vosges and Sainte-Glossinde and Saint-Pierreaux- Nonnains in the Carolingian lieu de mémoire Metz. Women's monasteries like these combined stabilising power in the Carolingian core lands with supra-regional influence within the framework of the Frankish regnum and imperium. For areas such as Saxony, which were integrated comparatively late into the Frankish sphere of influence, the politico-religious structures of the ancient parts of the Frankish realm provided a framework of tradition and reference far into the post-Carolingian period. In this contribution – not least as an expression of gratitude to one of my academic teachers – I would like to take up Parisse's observations. I do not aim at a similarly broad investigation, especially since a comparative approach in a broad thematic perspective would go beyond the scope of the contribution as well as of this volume, even though recent studies on women's religious communities in Saxony and Lorraine invite us to do so. The focus is rather on a partial aspect: the textual and ideological relations between liturgy and hagiography in the tenth and early eleventh centuries. Such an approach is complementary to studies in which the importance of relics and hagiographical texts as vectors of communication, the transfer of ideas and the spatial integration of new secular and ecclesiastical structures of power were elaborated – again primarily for the Carolingian period. Following on from these studies, the observations in this article concentrate on religious and monastic aspects of these genres and raise questions about the shared significance of liturgy and hagiography for the definition and mediation of traditional as well as new ascetic and monastic models of life in the tenth century. The debates which shaped these models are part of monastic and broader religious transformations traditionally labelled as the reform of the tenth and early eleventh century.
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En dialogue avec des recherches récentes menées sur les identités multiples des chrétiens de l’Antiquité tardive, cette contribution propose un cas d’étude sur les sermons adressés au peuple de l’évêque gaulois Césaire d’Arles (vers 470-542), plus précisément sur ceux dans lesquels Césaire aborde les pratiques de ses contemporains face à l’abondance d’enfants et l’infertilité, leurs pratiques de guérisons et leurs cultures festives en lien, notamment, avec les fêtes des saints. Miroirs de situations communicationnelles précises, ces sermons permettent de saisir, malgré leur aspect rhétorique, les tensions existant entre le discours épiscopal de Césaire traitant des enjeux de pastorale et de pouvoir épiscopal d’une part, et l’adhésion des chrétiens à des pratiques sociales, jugées incompatibles avec une identité chrétienne d’autre part. Ces sermons montrent en filigrane l’existence d‘une opposition entre deux modèles d’organisation de références identitaires : un modèle pyramidal qui classe toutes les références identitaires par rapport à la seule christianité versus un modèle latéral de ces mêmes références qui suppose qu’en fonction de situations quotidiennes concrètes, la christianité revêtait, pour les croyants, une importance variable. Ce cas d’étude ne permet pas seulement de souligner l’importance d’un regard scientifique équilibré sur les croyances et les pratiques, mais aussi les limites d’une classification de pratiques jugées tantôt religieuses, tantôt sociales.
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Historiography of ancient monastic trends has been deeply renewed during the recent years thanks to several conferences which put forward comparative and interdisciplinary approaches, some of them being specifically dedicated to female forms of religious life. Henceforth, scholars dissuade us to read the history of monasticism trough 'Benedictine glasses'. They invite us to take into account every type of sources - written, archaeological, iconographic, epigraphic. The interpretation of the written sources - monastic rules, but also hagiographical and diplomatic sources - has been nowadays deeply renewed. These recent works agree to give to early 'monasticism' a wider definition, taking into account the extreme diversity of the community forms of religious life attested in the West during this period. These works deserve to be continued further through comparative studies focused on precise problematics. This research project aims to explore how some communities tried to reconcile the practice of a monastic life with the service of an important sanctuary, and also how some ancient communities succeeded in holding firm through centuries, often with the support of powerful protectors.