Monastic Life and Venerated Spaces

Medieval Institute Publications

A cloister garden, with a fountain, hedges, and a variety of flowering plants growing within a courtyard formed by stone walls with complex Gothic tracery and windows. — "Pandhof next to the Dom Church." Photo by Bart van Leeuwen / Flickr (cropped from original). CC BY 2.0.

This series examines monastic movements amid broader religious and cultural traditions. It explores the everyday life of monastic individuals, the collective experience of religious communities, and the nature of asceticism and monasticism, as well as monastic institutions, patronage, and spaces and landscapes central to ascetic traditions, including sites of veneration. The series also welcomes research on monastic and ascetic communities and traditions from around the world during the period 500-1500 CE.

Keywords: Monasticism, asceticism, sacred landscape, sacred space, mysticism, veneration sites

Geographical scope: Global

Chronological scope: 500-1500 CE

Editorial Board

Aneilya Barnes, Coastal Carolina University
Jacob Abell, Baylor University

Submissions

To submit a proposal or completed manuscript to be considered for publication by Medieval Institute Publications or to learn more about Monastic Life, please contact Tyler Cloherty or Emily Winkler, the acquisitions editors for the series.

All Books in this Series

Hiberno-Latin Saints’ ‘Lives’ in the Seventh Century: Writing Early Ireland

Hiberno-Latin Saints' 'lives' in the Seventh Century book cover image

Hiberno-Latin Saints’ ‘Lives’ in the Seventh Century: Writing Early Ireland

John Higgins

As part of the historicizing corpus of seventh-century Irish writing, the Lives framed the narrative of the early saints as an effective weapon in contemporary political and ecclesiastical conflicts. Cogitosus’s Life of Brigit, Muirchú’s and Tírechán’s accounts of Saint Patrick, and Adomnán’s Life of Columba created the understanding of the history of early Ireland that has endured to this day. How did the writers accomplish this through their literary choices?

The authors of Irish saints’ Lives used the literary form of hagiography (Christian biography), miracle stories, and an elaborate rhetorical style to present the words and actions of their subjects. These Lives created a narrative of early Irish history that supported the political/ecclesiastical elites by showing that their power derived from the actions of their patron saints.

The Cistercian Monastery of Zaraka, Greece

Edited by Sheila Campbell

An archaeological study of the monastery of Zaraka in Greece, built and developed by Cistercian monks for forty years during the Frankish Crusader period.

Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Dom Edmond Obrecht Collection of Gethsemani Abbey

Edited by Susan M. B. Steuer and E. Rozanne Elder

This catalogue describes an American manuscript collection owned by the Trappist abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani in Kentucky (the house of Thomas Merton) the eclectic collection includes medieval manuscripts as well as materials of interest for the study of the French Revolution.

Medieval Institute

International Congress on Medieval Studies

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