Overview

The roles of popes, saints, and crusaders were inextricably intertwined in the Middle Ages: papal administration was fundamental in the making and promulgating of new saints and in financing crusades, while crusaders used saints as propaganda to back up the authority of popes, and even occasionally ended up being sanctified themselves. Yet, current scholarship rarely treats these three components of medieval faith together. This book remedies that by bringing together scholars to consider the links among the three and the ways that understanding them can help us build a more complete picture of the working of the church and Christianity in the Middle Ages.

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9789089647764

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The editors have set themselves the ambitious, and important, task of bringing together scholars studying three aspects of the medieval Church which are usually treated separately. . . . Overall, the quality of the contributions is high, with each casting new light on its subject. Moreover, the essays in each thematic strand complement each other well. . . . One of the major advantages of this book is that it showcases the various methodologies available to medievalists, bearing witness to the value of quantitative analysis, a micro-historical approach, charting the development of a theme over the longue duree, a close reading of the motifs and content of individual texts, a comparative study of several narratives, and of situating a series of events like the Swedish 'crusades' within a broader contextual framework. . . . Those interested in papal administration, saints and hagiographies, and crusade and mission on the fringes of Christendom will find much food for thought here. -- Medieval Review

The editors have set themselves the ambitious, and important, task of bringing together scholars studying three aspects of the medieval Church which are usually treated separately. . . . Overall, the quality of the contributions is high, with each casting new light on its subject. Moreover, the essays in each thematic strand complement each other well. . . . One of the major advantages of this book is that it showcases the various methodologies available to medievalists, bearing witness to the value of quantitative analysis, a micro-historical approach, charting the development of a theme over the longue duree, a close reading of the motifs and content of individual texts, a comparative study of several narratives, and of situating a series of events like the Swedish 'crusades' within a broader contextual framework. . . . Those interested in papal administration, saints and hagiographies, and crusade and mission on the fringes of Christendom will find much food for thought here. --Medieval Review

Author Information

Kirsi Salonen is professor of European and World History at the University of Turku, Finland. She is specialist of medieval ecclesiastical history and history of law. Her most recent monograph in English is Papal Justice in the Late Middle Ages (Routledge, 2016). Sari Katajala-Peltomaa is a research fellow at the School of Social Sciences and Humanities at the University of Tampere

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