AMAD
"Archivum Medii Aevi Digitale - Specialized open access repository for research in the middle ages"To submission
| Date: | 2015 |
| Title: | Performative Rituals for Conception and Childbirth in England, 900-1500 |
| Author: | Jones, Peter Murray Olsan, Lea T |
| Description: | This study proposes that performative rituals—that is, verbal and physical acts that reiterate prior uses—enabled medieval women and men to negotiate the dangers and difficulties of conception and childbirth. It analyzes the rituals implicated in charms, prayers, amulets, and prayer rolls and traces the circulation of such rituals within medieval English society. Manuscript records from the Anglo-Saxon period to the late Middle Ages offer evidence of the interaction of oral and written means of communicating these rituals. Certain rituals were long-lived, though variants were introduced over time that reflected changing religious attitudes and the involvement of various interested parties, including local healers, doctors, and medical practitioners, as well as monks, friars, and users of vernacular remedy books. Although many of those who recommended or provided assistance through performative rituals were males, the practices often devolved upon women themselves, and their female companions or attendants. ; This research was supported by Wellcome Trust grant 088708. ; This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from Johns Hopkins University Press via http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/bhm.2015.0076 |
| URI: | https://www.amad.org/jspui/handle/123456789/73651 |
| Other Identifier: | https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/247511 |
| AMAD ID: | 566388 |
| Appears in Collections: | BASE (Bielefeld Academic Search Engine) General history of Europe |
