Paganism and Christianity, Part 4

Although Christianity was replacing paganism all over Europe, pagan cultural influences inevitably lingered, and we can see this everywhere. The days of the week, and even the idea of a seven-day week, did not originate with Christians or the Bible. Pagan Romans had a seven-day week, and the modern English names come from Anglo-Saxon pagans and their Norse deities:

• Sunday = Sun-day
• Monday = Moon day
• Tuesday = Tyr's day (god of war)
• Wednesday = Woden's day (Odin, father of gods)
• Thursday = Thor's day (thunder god)
• Friday = Frigge's day (goddess of love)

Many pagan figures were turned into Christian saints because their stories were compelling. The saints Barlaam and Josaphat were decreed to be early saints, although they are from a much older Buddhist story. Some scholars doubt the historicity of St. Brigid of Kildare, suggesting that she was a re-purposing of the Celtic goddess Brigid, a member of the Tuatha.

Although the Bible does not mention the word or idea of a halo, Christian art puts it on the heads of religious figures as a standard indication of divinity. It is a much earlier image, however, appearing with Buddha, with Krishna, and the Egyptian sun-god, Ra.

The image of the Good Shepherd seems to come from the Bible, and was painted on Christian and Jewish tombs in the Roman catacombs, but it was previously used for pagan tombs as well. Jesus may be depicted as an adult with a beard, but the earliest Good Shepherd motif is of a beardless youth wearing Roman clothing from before the Common Era.

Other images in Jewish and Christian art that are predated by pagan use are found in the catacombs: woman praying with upright hands (so-called Orant figures), Winged Victories and cupids are seen throughout the catacombs, figures eating grapes, seven steps leading to a tomb, pairs of peacocks, scrolls—are all parts of pagan art that were adapted to Christian symbolism.

C.S.Lewis, after converting to Roman Catholicism, was happy to explain these borrowings as important parallels:

preparatio evangelica, a divine hinting in poetic and ritual form at the same central truth which was later focused on and (so to speak) historicized in the Incarnation... [from the essay "Myth Became Fact and Religion without Dogma"]

Of course the more deliberate adaptation of pagan-to-Christian culture is when Pope Gregory sent Augustine to convert Britain, telling him to appropriate their holy places and customs, or when St. Boniface cut down a sacred oak and used the timber to build a church. Gregory's re-defining certain words tells a similar story.

The Christianization of Europe kept advancing, but like the Renaissance it did not happen all at once. There was a country on the Baltic Sea that is considered the last country to become officially Christian. Curiously, its capital city of Vilnius had such a large and thriving Jewish population that it was called Yerushalayim D'Lita (the "Jerusalem of Lithuania"). Tomorrow we talk about (not for the first time) Lithuania.

Courtly Love

"Courtly love" is the phrase used to describe a set of "rules" expressed in medieval literature about the relationship of a man (usually a knight) with a woman (usually a noblewoman). First appearing in continental French stories, it became (for some) a way to conduct oneself in a relationship, especially one outside of marriage.

First, a few facts. The phrase "courtly love," the English translation of the French amour courtois, was not routinely used until the late 19th century (introduced by a French philologist). (To be fair, the phrase cortez amors appears in a single Provençal poem in the 12th century.) C.S.Lewis in The Allegory of Love defined it as "love of a highly specialized sort, whose characteristics may be enumerated as Humility, Courtesy, Adultery, and the Religion of Love."

Also, the focus of the practice was not so much about the behavior of the knight as the privilege of the woman. Eleanor of Aquitaine is credited with bringing the courtly love ideals from her home to England when she married Henry II. Eleanor's daughter Marie, Countess of Champagne (by Eleanor's first husband, Louis VII), spread it to the court of Champagne. Troubadours popularized the ideas in their poems and songs.

Courtly love was expressed as a form of feudalism, where the man acts as a vassal of the lady. Addressing her in poetry as his "lord" served two purposes: it showed his willingness to serve, and it hid the lady's name. Courtly love was often a secret love, because it was adulterous: the lover pined for the love of a highborn lady who was often married to his real feudal lord. This "forbidden love" did not stop him from expressing g the utmost courtesy and humility toward her.

Many noble marriages were political arrangements rather than loving unions, and given the daily lives of many noble couples, who hardly spent time together, there were opportunities to see the lady without her husband present, although the presence of ladies-in-waiting precluded consummating physical love.

Andreas Capellanus in the late 12th century wrote De amore ("Concerning Love"), also known as De arte honeste amandi ("The Art of Loving Virtuously"). In it he lists several rules that became entwined with the courtly love idea:

1. Marriage is no real excuse for not loving.
6. Boys do not love until they arrive at the age of maturity.
8. No one should be deprived of love without the very best of reasons.
13. When made public love rarely endures.
14. The easy attainment of love makes it of little value; difficulty of attainment makes it prized.
20. A man in love is always apprehensive.
30. A true lover is constantly and without intermission possessed by the thought of his beloved.

Was this a real practice in anyone's life? Did real people engage in these "poetic" affairs (sexuality rarely comes into the subject of courtly love)? Hard to say, although it seems entwined with some of the very real chivalric ideals that were expected behavior on the part of the knight.

That single instance of cortez amors I mentioned was by a poet named Peire d'Alvernhe, who was prolific enough in his time and obscure enough in ours that he is a perfect subject for this blog...next time.

That's "Positively Medieval!"

It is not uncommon for the term "medieval" to be used negatively, to connote an action or opinion that is primitive or uncivilized, or that displays outright savagery. There is, of course, much discussion among medievalists who feel this does a disservice to a time that, to borrow from C.S. Lewis, was "not a matter of having no manners, as having different manners."*

There is a recent story in the U.S. political realm, however, whose medieval roots are difficult to ignore. It's time, therefore, to take a brief look at some early law books at the beginning of Western Civilization to see if we can explain some of the modern attitudes that some of us would call "positively medieval."

Fleta was published not earlier than 1290, and probably shortly after. It is a 557-page Latin book of English laws found in the Cotton Library. It seems to be largely a re-write of the De Legibus et Consuetudinibus Angliæ (On the Laws and Customs of England) of Henry Bracton (c.1210-1268). Fleta contains some early laws that support ideas that are still with us. For instance, in one place, it says:

Those who have dealings with Jews or Jewesses, those who commit bestiality, and sodomists, are to be buried alive after legal proof that they were taken in the act, and public conviction.**

It should be noted that the penalty of burial alive is not known to have been carried out at any time. Fleta also contains the following clause while discussing rape, which has become a very popular topic this week:

If, however, the woman should have conceived at the time alleged in the appeal, it abates, for without a woman's consent she could not conceive.

The claim is that if a woman conceives during intercourse, she cannot claim rape. The belief was that part of the mechanism for conception of a child was the love between the husband and wife, and their enjoyment of the act. If the pleasure were missing, conception could not occur.

I mention Fleta because it is being quoted this week in public forums. In fact, more than one compendium of laws existed early on. One of them, called Britton, was contemporaneous with Fleta. Britton was written in French, was very similar to Fleta (having drawn from the same sources), was more organized and codified, and was probably turned to more over time because French was a more accessible language to a majority than Latin. Like the U.S. Constitution, which denied equality to women and blacks, these works are interesting historical documents that deserve to be discussed but need to be amended if we expect to actually apply them to the modern world.

*From That Hideous Strength, when describing the eating methods of the recently-revived 6th century Merlin.
**The 1290 date can be surmised because that is the year Jews were declared "outlaw" in England, and given the choice of Expulsion or conversion and a kind of "house arrest" in the London "Converts' Inn." Prior to this, "dealings with Jews" would have been typical.