Pope Nicholas I and John of Ravenna: The Struggle for Ecclesiastical Rights in the Ninth Century

1980 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 262-272 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Joseph Belletzkie
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
The West ◽  
Correct Judgement

On 24 February 861 Pope Nicholas I excommunicated and deposed one of Italy's most powerful prelates, John VIII, archbishop of Ravenna. This papal action, prompted by a number of transgressions on the archbishop's part, was taken with the consent of a council of bishops at Rome. John immediately turned for aid to Louis II, king of Italy and emperor in the West. A delegation from Louis, however, failed to deter Nicholas who insisted that John come to Rome for adjudication. Moreover, the pope journeyed to Ravenna at the invitation of its citizens, and there personally rectified the situation which John's abuses had created. As Nicholas advanced, John retreated to seek Louis's intercession at Pavia again, but this time his reception was less cordial. The Pavians, led by their bishop, shunned the excommunicate and his retinue and Louis, who would not even grant John an audience, advised him through an intermediary to “humble himself to such a pontiff to whom we and the entire Church bow.” When a second delegation, gained only by John's repeated pleas, was again unsuccessful in bargaining with the pope, the archbishop had no choice but to submit. At the Roman synod which met from 16 to 18 November 861, John acknowledged the charges against him and was restored to his see on conditions laid down by the synod. According to the Vita Nicolai, the proceedings concluded with a standing ovation for the pope from the bishops who proclaimed three times:The correct judgement of the supreme pontiff, the just ordering of the pastor of the whole Church, the generous settlement of the disciple of Christ is pleasing to all. We are all of one voice, one mind, one judgement.

Assyrian sacred trees in the Brooklyn Museum

Iraq ◽  
1994 ◽  
Vol 56 ◽  
pp. 123-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pauline Albenda
Keyword(s):  
Present Author ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Palm Tree ◽  
The West ◽  
Individual Tree ◽  
Sacred Tree ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Trees ◽  
Brooklyn Museum ◽  
Tree Type

The Brooklyn Museum houses twelve stone slabs with carved decoration from the Northwest Palace of Ashurnasirpal II. The motif of a stylized tree — the so-called Sacred Tree (see Figs. 1, 4, 6) — appears on seven of those slabs which come from rooms F, I, L, S, T of the ninth century palace at Nimrud. These tree renderings are representative of the sacred tree-type found in ten rooms of the royal residence and the west wing. Approximately 96 sacred trees, in two-register arrangement, appeared on the pictorial decorations in room I; the same motif occurred about 75 times in one-register arrangement on the reliefs of the other rooms. The abundance of the sacred tree motif on the wall decorations of the Northwest Palace attests to the significance of this plant. Its design deserves investigation; in Layard's words, “the tree, evidently a sacred symbol, is elaborately and tastefully formed.”In his study of the Ashurnasirpal II reliefs in American collections, Stearns did not attempt to list the sacred trees, because “variations in the sacred tree occur only in minor details,” and “the tree in itself is rarely useful in identifying the location of the reliefs.” These statements make clear Stearns' belief that the sacred trees were nearly alike. Other scholars, notably Weidner and Reade, have pointed out that on a number of slabs now in American and European museums are carvings of matching half trees, therefore indicating that when paired, these trees belonged to adjoining slabs originally. In trying to match half trees, one finds that individual sacred trees do differ in the rendering of specific details. Bleibtreu, in her analysis of the sacred tree-type, lists three variants of the flower found on the palmette-garland framing the individual tree on three sides. The present author, after examining the sacred trees carved on the slabs in The Brooklyn Museum, concludes that the design of the tree-type is more varied than heretofore presumed, and that its construction is more complex than indicated in previous descriptions of the subjects. An analysis of the Assyrian sacred tree-type may lead to possible conclusions regarding its intended image: a stylized palm tree, a cult object, an emblem of vegetation or “tree of life”, an imperial symbol, or a combination of those forms. In addition, one may consider to what extent the rendering of individual trees was the consequence of artistic inventiveness.

The Cult of Relics in the Letters and ‘Dialogues’ of Pope Gregory the Great: A Lexicographical Study

Traditio ◽  
1976 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 145-184 ◽  
Author(s):  
John M. McCulloh
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Human Remains ◽  
The West ◽  
Early Middle Ages ◽  
Gregory The Great

Late antiquity and the early Middle Ages witnessed a change in the Christian attitude toward the remains of the saints. Holy bodies came to be treated less and less as normal corpses, worthy of special veneration but still subject to many of the laws and customs which had regulated the treatment of human remains in pagan Antiquity. They came rather to be viewed as cult objects which could be moved or even divided up according to the demands of religion with little regard for earlier prohibitions of these practices. This change occurred relatively early in the Greek, eastern portion of the Roman Empire. In the mid-fourth century the Caesar Gallus translated a saint's body from one tomb to another, and less than two centuries later Justinian asked Pope Hormisdas for portions of the bodies of the apostles. Despite some outstanding exceptions such as the translations performed by St. Ambrose, the Christians of the West were more conservative in these matters. Nevertheless, by the ninth century at the very latest, western Christians had followed the lead of the eastern church in both translating and dismembering holy bodies.

The armies of the Ṣaffārids

1968 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 534-554 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. E. Bosworth
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
The South ◽  
The West ◽  
Islamic World ◽  
North West ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Core ◽  
The North ◽  
Frontier Region ◽  
Short Time

It is not too much to describe the Ṣaffārids of S‚stān as an archetypal military dynasty. In the later years of the third/ninth century, their empire covered the greater part of the non-Arab eastern Islamic world. In the west, Ya'qūb. al-Laith's army was only halted at Dair al-'Āqūl, 50 miles from Baghdad; in the north, Ya'qūb and his brother 'Arm campaigned in the Caspian coastlands against the local 'Alids, and 'Amr made serious attempts to extend his power into Khwārazm and Transoxania; in the east, the two brothers pushed forward the frontiers of the Dār al-Islām into the pagan borderlands of what are now eastern Afghanistan and the North-West Frontier region of West Pakistan; and in the south, Ṣaffārid authority was acknowledged even across the persion Gulf in ‘Umān. This impressive achievement was the work of two soldiers of genius, Ya'qūub and 'Amr, and lasted for little more than a quarter of a century. It began to crumble when in 287/900 the Sāmānid Amīr Ismā'īl b. Aḥmad defeated arid captured ‘Amr b. al-Laith, and 11 years later, the core of the empire, Sīstān itself, was in Sāmānid hands. Yet such was the effect in Sīstān of the Ṣaffārid brothers’ achievement, and the stimulus to local pride and feeling which resulted from it, that the Ṣaffārids returned to power there in a very short time. For several more centuries they endured and survived successive waves of invaders of Sīstān—the Ghaznavids, the Seljūqs, the Mongols—and persisted down to the establishment of the Ṣafavid state in Persia.

THE CAROLINGIAN CUP FROM THE VALE OF YORK VIKING HOARD: ORIGINS OF ITS FORM AND DECORATIVE FEATURES

2020 ◽  
Vol 100 ◽  
pp. 86-108
Author(s):  
Barry Ager
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
The West ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
Viking Period

In 2007, near Harrogate, in North Yorkshire, a Viking-period hoard was discovered with a Carolingian silver-gilt cup. This article examines this cup, highlighting Oriental, Central Asian and classical parallels in both metal and pottery for the cup’s form and decoration. The overall significance of the cup’s iconography has already been thoroughly discussed by Professor Egon Wamers, who proposed that the scenes on the cup are paralleled in the early ninth-century Stuttgart Psalter. This article proposes that Oriental forms and decorative elements in metalwork were channelled to the West through diplomatic contacts and trade by way of a complex of routes by land and sea, as well as possibly by refugees from Islamic conquests.

The Ninth-Century Polychrome Decoration at St Mary's Church, Deerhurst

2008 ◽  
Vol 88 ◽  
pp. 109-164 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Gem ◽  
Emily Howe ◽  
Richard Bryant
Keyword(s):  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Technical Analysis ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
The West ◽  
Special Regard ◽  
Original Scheme ◽  
The Church ◽  
Contemporary Context

This paper presents the results of a detailed analysis of surviving paintwork on the chancel arch, the carved animal heads and the figurative panel in the west porch at the Anglo-Saxon church of St Mary, Deerhurst, Gloucestershire, UK. The context of the polychromy in relation to the ninth-century fabric of the church is assessed. The detailed results of the technical analysis are presented. The original scheme of painted decoration is described, including the newly discovered plant scroll painted on the arch. The results of the examination are evaluated, setting the polychrome decoration of the ninth-century church into its contemporary context in England and on the Continent, with special regard to both the technical and the artistic aspects.

scholarly journals ENSEMBLE OF CONSTRUCTIVE TECHNIQUES IN THE CASTLE OF RICOTE (MURCIA, SPAIN)

2020 ◽  
Vol XLIV-M-1-2020 ◽  
pp. 1011-1016
Author(s):  
I. Almela ◽  
L. Martínez
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Complete Analysis ◽  
Rammed Earth ◽  
The West ◽  
Lime Mortar ◽  
Stratigraphic Analysis ◽  
Construction Techniques ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Village

Abstract. The Castle of Ricote, also known as Los Peñascales, is a fortification on a steep hill of the Ricote Valley overlooking the Vega Media of the Segura River, to the east, and the village of Ricote to the west. According to written sources, the history of this castle dates back from the ninth century. However, its military and administrative weight persisted even after the Christian conquest, when it became the headquarters of the Order of Santiago, until the fifteenth century. Despite its poor state of repair, the use of the castle overtime can be established on the site by means of a rather complex sequence of phases and a very heterogeneous set of construction techniques. Although it has been hard to accomplish a complete analysis, in this paper we have attempted a stratigraphic analysis and a synthesis of the techniques used in the medieval interventions, which are highly relevant due to their diversity and special features. Among them, the following have been covered: stonework with lime mortar built through shuttering, rammed earth, and lime-crusted rammed earth. In addition, the two main phases detected, and their respective techniques will also be underlined, since they are present consistently throughout the whole castle.

scholarly journals Armonización de calendarios en el mundo islámico primitivo como se refleja en Elementos de astronomía de al-Farghānī

2021 ◽  
pp. 203-217
Author(s):  
Razieh S. Mousavi ◽  
Jannis Niehoff Panagiotidis
Keyword(s):  
Central Government ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
The West ◽  
Detailed Report ◽  
Centralized Management ◽  
Lunar Calendar ◽  
El Sistema ◽  
Careful Exploration ◽  
Taxation System ◽  
Early Islamic

This paper seeks to shed more light on calendrical knowledge in the first centuries of the Islamic era in which different administrative traditions fell under the control of a central government. Astronomy as a court-sponsored discipline in the Abbasid dynasty (132-656 AH/750-1258 CE), undertook the pivotal task of identifying and mastering various calendrical disciplines under the reign of the caliphs to make a centralized management feasible. In the first two centuries, the domination of the Arabic lunar calendar, whose significance lies in governing the Islamic yearly festivals and occasions, led to drastic disagreements with the annual planting cycles that were followed by the farmers. Accordingly, the official taxation system faced serious problems. The solution to which was the development of a well-established solar calendar. The large concern of the ninth-century Muslim astronomers for calendrical computations, acknowledges their integral participation in this executive challenge. The present study follows these practices through the lens of a ninth-century Arabic astronomical text, written by Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. Kathīr al-Farghānī (Alfraganus in the west), known mainly as the Elements of Astronomy. The careful exploration of this text helps us achieve a broader image of time-keeping accounts in the early Islamic era and the need for calendrical conversions. Moreover, the author’s detailed report of the five existing calendars of the time (Arabic, Syriac, Byzantine, Persian and Egyptian) and their systems of nomenclature, opens an early window to the linguistic investigation of time-reckoning in the Islamic world. Este artículo pretende arrojar luz sobre los conocimientos calendáricos en los primeros siglos de la era islámica, en los que diferentes tradiciones administrativas quedaban bajo el control de un gobierno central. La astronomía, como disciplina patrocinada por la corte en la dinastía abasí (132-656 /750-1258), emprendió la tarea fundamental de identificar y dominar varias disciplinas calendáricas bajo el reinado de los califas para hacer viable una gestión centralizada. En los dos primeros siglos, el dominio del calendario lunar árabe, cuya importancia radica en la regulación de las fiestas y ocasiones anuales islámicas, provocó drásticos desacuerdos con los ciclos anuales de siembra que seguían los agricultores. En consecuencia, el sistema fiscal oficial se enfrentó a graves problemas, cuya solución fue el desarrollo de un calendario solar bien establecido. La gran preocupación de los astrónomos musulmanes del siglo IX por los cómputos calendáricos reconoce su participación integral en este desafío ejecutivo. El presente estudio sigue estas prácticas a través de la atenta lectura de un texto astronómico árabe del siglo IX escrito por Ahmad b. Muhammad b. Kathīr al-Farghānī (Alfraganus en occidente), conocido principalmente como los Elementos de Astronomía. La cuidadosa exploración de este texto nos ayuda a conseguir una imagen más amplia de los relatos sobre el tiempo en la primera época islámica y la necesidad de las conversiones calendáricas. Además, el informe detallado del autor sobre los cinco calendarios existentes en la época (árabe, siríaco, bizantino, persa y egipcio) y sus sistemas de nomenclatura, abre una posibilidad para la investigación lingüística de la relojería en el mundo islámico.

scholarly journals Garments and Shrouds of Egyptian and Nubian Pilgrims from Qasr el-Yahud, Ninth Century CE

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Orit Shamir
Keyword(s):  
Ninth Century ◽  
Jordan River ◽  
The West ◽  
Balanites Aegyptiaca ◽  
Burial Practices ◽  
Islamic Period ◽  
Facial Disfigurement ◽  
John The Baptist ◽  
Burial Customs ◽  
Special Power

Qasr el-Yahud, situated on the west bank of the Jordan River nearby Jericho, features the Monastery of Saint John the Baptist, believed to be the traditional site of the Baptism of Jesus1 and has a centuries-long tradition of ‘washing of the lepers’. Byzantine and Medieval authors attributed the waters of the Jordan river a special power to heal lepers who bathed in them, especially at the spot where Jesus was baptized.After the site became sacred, traditions developed that were associated with the holy features of the water and its curative properties. When the emperor Constantius became ill, he asked to bath in the Jordan. In 1983 a rescue excavation at the site revealed thirty-four skeletons, probably representing a hospital population with cases of tuberculosis, leprosy and facial disfigurement. Such individuals travelled enormous distances, attracted to the site in the hope of washing away their illness. Anthropological evidence indicates that the individuals were probably Egyptian in origin, while structural analysis of the skulls proved that some were Nubian. They were buried in a Christian manner, lying on their backs, facing the rising sun. Some of the burial customs at this site, such as placing seeds from the Egyptian Balsam tree (Balanites Aegyptiaca) in the hands of the deceased, conform to Egyptian traditions.The arid climate of the Judean Desert helped to preserve 250 textiles, among them many examples comprising two different textiles or more sewn together or patched one on another. Radiocarbon dating of the textiles placed the date in the eighth to ninth centuries (787–877 CE).  The textiles are made of linen and cotton, sometimes decorated with wool tapestry, brocade and selfbands. They include many cut-to-shape tunics except one which is woven-to-shape, head coverings, bandages and shrouds. This research combines historic sources, anthropological and botanic evidence, burial practices with the textiles. The material is of great importance because it gives us idea about the burial costumes used by Christians at the late Islamic period. In addition, those are the only textiles from this period found in Israel.

‘God Wills It’: Signs of Divine Approval in the Crusade Movement

2005 ◽  
Vol 41 ◽  
pp. 88-98
Author(s):  
Bernard Hamilton
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Western Society ◽  
The West ◽  
First Crusade ◽  
Divine Inspiration ◽  
To Come ◽  
Papal States ◽  
The Church

Robert the Monk, who was present at the Council of Clermont in 1095 and heard Urban II preach the crusade sermon, reports that when he had finished speaking all who were there shouted: ‘God wills it. God wills it’. The pope, Robert tells us, saw in this unanimity a sign of divine inspiration: ‘I tell you that God has drawn this response from you to express the feeling which he has inspired in your hearts’. Yet although Urban’s arguments and eloquence convinced his audience at Clermont, reactions to the crusade were more ambivalent among some people in the West, even among some of those who took the cross. This was a legacy of the ambiguous attitude of Western churchmen towards violence and warfare. Western society in the early medieval centuries was very violent, and, as Guy Halsall has rightly pointed out, the Church helped to determine the norms of violence which Christian society found acceptable. No doubt churchmen viewed their intervention primarily as a limitation exercise. From the later ninth century onwards, as the Carolingian Empire declined, the popes intermittently called on the warriors of the West to come to their aid. Indeed, in some ways the campaign of the Garigliano, conducted by a league of Byzantine and Lombard forces organized by Pope John X, who himself took part in the fighting, and which achieved its objective of ridding the Papal States of bands of Muslim raiders who had settled there, was like a rehearsal for the First Crusade. The Church further tried to influence the behaviour of Christian fighting men by encouraging the Truce and Peace of God movements in the early eleventh century, and in some areas the liturgical blessing of swords was introduced. Consequently, by 1095 the fighting men in Western Europe were accustomed to the Church hierarchy’s calling on them for help.

From Worm to Wyvern

2021 ◽  
pp. 84-136
Author(s):  
Daniel Ogden
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Central Body ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
The West ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Christian Culture ◽  
Sea Monster ◽  
Classical Culture ◽  
The Devil

How did the classical dragon, essentially just a massive snake in form, a worm, evolve, in early Christian culture, into the very particular fantasy creature we know as a ‘dragon’ today in the West? It is argued that the dragon acquired its animalian head and more bulbous central body from another well-established creature of classical fantasy, the ancient sea-monster (kētos), this by virtue of the fact that, whilst dragon and sea-monster had remained largely distinct creatures in classical culture, they had been confounded by the Septuagint. Its wings, however, and probably too in effect its two legs (the latter placed in the position of the sea-monster’s front flippers), it derived rather from demons and the Devil, the latter being associated with snakes already in the Old Testament, and then spectacularly so in the New Testament’s Revelation. By the ninth century AD these two developments had crystallized in the wyvern-type dragon.

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