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Articles

A Hierophany Emergent: The Discursive Reconquest of the Urban Landscape of Jerusalem in Latin Pilgrimage Accounts from the Twelfth Century

Pages 725-749 | Received 10 Dec 2014, Published online: 10 Jan 2020
 

Notes

1. The three major long‐distance pilgrimages for Latin Christians during the medieval period were treks to the Holy Land, to Rome, and to Santiago de Compostela. The logistical difficulty and physical danger of traveling to these sites only heightened the perceived value of pilgrimages to such locales of unparalleled sanctity (see Aryeh Graboïs, Le pèlerin occidental en Terre sainte au Moyen Âge, Brussels: Taylor & Francis, 1998, 11).

2. Suzanne M. Yeager, Jerusalem in Medieval Narrative, Cambridge: Taylor & Francis, 2008, 2–3; Chiara Frugoni, A Distant City: Images of Urban Experience in the Medieval World, trans. William McCuaig, Princeton, NJ: Taylor & Francis, 1991, 4. See as well Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane: the Nature of Religion, trans. W.R. Trask, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1959, 42–45; Donald R. Howard, Writers and Pilgrims: Medieval Pilgrimage Narratives and their Posterity, Berkeley, CA: Taylor & Francis, 1980.

3. Robert of Reims' attribution to Pope Urban II, as cited in W. Müller, Die heilige Stadt, Roma quadrata, himmlisches Jerusalem und die Mythe von Weltnabel, Stuttgart: Taylor & Francis, 1961, 53: “umbilicus terrarum … in orbis medio posita.” For contemporaries, the pope's words would have rung with familiarity, as they are scriptural in origin (see Ezek. 38:12, New Revised Standard Version [NRSV]).

4. For a discussion concerning the moral topographical hierarchies of urban landscapes, see Keith D. Lilley, “Mapping Cosmopolis: Moral Topographies of the Medieval City,” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 5, 2004, 681–698.

5. Eliade, Sacred, 37.

6. Rev. 21:1–27 NRSV. Aryeh Graboïs notes that the conception of the Heavenly Jerusalem emerged in the second century of the current era, following the destruction of the Second Temple (see Graboïs, Pèlerin occidental, 76–77). In a certain sense, the “Heavenly” Jerusalem was a spiritual construct which was intended to replace the cult of the Temple.

7. Keith D. Lilley, “Cities of God? Medieval Urban Forms and Their Christian Symbolism,” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 3, 2004, 296–313: 299–300.

8. For a useful compilation of such accounts, see John Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrims Before the Crusades, Warminster, UK: Taylor & Francis, 2002.

9. Sabine Maccormack, “Loca Sancta: The Organization of Sacred Topography in Late Antiquity,” in Robert Ousterhout, ed., The Blessings of Pilgrimage, Urbana, IL: Taylor & Francis, 1990, 7–40: 14–6, 20–9.

10. For the relevant scriptural references, see 2 Chron. 24:20–2 NRSV; Matt. 23:35 NRSV.

11. Bordeaux Pilgrim, “Itinerarium,” in P. Geyer and O. Cuntz, eds, Corpus Christianorum Series Latina, vol. 175, Turnhout: Taylor & Francis, 1965, 1–26: 15–6.

12. Piacenza Pilgrim, “Itinerarium,” in P. Geyer, ed., Corpus Christianorum Series Latina, vol. 175, Turnhout: Taylor & Francis, 1965, 127–174: 140.

13. Egeria, “Itinerarium,” in Aet. Franceschini and R. Weber, eds, Corpus Christianorum Series Latina, vol. 175, Turnhout: Taylor & Francis, 1965, 29–103: 67–90, 89.

14. Aryeh Graboïs perhaps does not overstate the case when he claims that such pilgrimage accounts contained little of value concerning the contemporary geographic realities of Palestine (see Graboïs, Pèlerin occidental, 39, 43, 104). It is, however, an overstatement to make the same claim about John of Würzburg's account from around 1170, as I will be arguing in this paper (see Aryeh Graboïs, “Le pèlerin occidental en Terre sainte à l'époque des croisades et ses réalités: la relation de pèlerinage de Jean de Wurzbourg,” in Études de civilisation médiévale, Ixe—XIIe siècles: mélanges offerts à Edmond‐René Labande, Poitiers: Taylor & Francis, 1974, 367–376).

15. Egeria, “Itinerarium,” 51–54, 60, 63.

16. Piacenza Pilgrim, “Itinerarium,” 144–145, 147, 150.

17. Bernard the monk, “Itinerarium,” in T. Tobler and A. Molinier, eds, vol. 1, Itinera Hierosolymitana, Geneva: Taylor & Francis, 1879, 307–320: 311–12, 314.

18. Bernard the monk, “Itinerarium,” 314–316. According to Michael McCormick, evidence such as the inclusion of the hostel amid the personnel inventory of the Sepulchre grounds in Charlemagne's Inventory Memorandum suggests that this hostel, which may have been founded by Charlemagne himself and which was no longer extant by the twelfth century, was situated on the Sepulchre complex (see Michael Mccormick, Charlemagne's Survey of the Holy Land, Washington, DC: Taylor & Francis, 2011, 81–91).

19. See the discussion in Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrims, 18–19.

20. Adomnan (arculf), “De Locis Sanctis,” in L. Bieler, ed., Corpus Christianorum Series Latina, vol. 175, Turnhout: Taylor & Francis, 1965, 175–234: 186–7: “Quae omnia nunc a nobis sunt praetermittenda, ut estimo, exceptis eorum edificiorum structuris quae in locis sanctis, crucis videlicet et resurrectionis, mirificae fabricata sunt.” That Adomnan himself was interested in conveying contemporary social realities in Jerusalem is questionable: For the argument that even Adomnan's contributions to the account are intended to speak more to the contemporary concerns of ecclesiasts in Iona, which existed at the edge of Latin Christendom, see Thomas O'loughlin, “Perceiving Palestine in Early Christian Ireland: Martyrium, Exegetical Key, Relic and Liturgical Space,” Ériu 54, 2004, 125–137: 126–7.

21. Such an objective holds true for both pilgrimage narratives and pilgrimage guide books: According to John Wilkinson, the distinction between guides and pilgrimage accounts is, in terms of their content, tenuous, and in this article, I have opted to follow Wilkinson's analysis in avoiding such a categorical differentiation (see John Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrimage 1099–1185, London: Taylor & Francis, 1988, 2).

22. Graboïs, Pèlerin occidental, 14–15; Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrimage, 83. Sabine MacCormack links this process with the early Christian project to appropriate pagan modes of venerating sacred spaces (see Maccormack, “Loca Sancta,” 7–20).

23. John Wilkinson has noted the formative role which the early accounts of the Bordeaux Pilgrim and of Egeria played in shaping this expositive tradition (see John Wilkinson, Egeria's Travels, third ed., Warminster, UK: Taylor & Francis, 1999, 6–8).

24. Yeager, Jerusalem, 4. See also Mary Carruthers and Jan M. Ziolkowski, eds, The Medieval Craft of Memory: An Anthology of Texts and Pictures, Philadelphia, PA: Taylor & Francis, 2002.

25. One may question to the usage of the word “profane” here, given that the concept of the “terrestrial” vis‐à‐vis the “heavenly” would seemingly be more appropriate here. However, as my subsequent theoretical framework will make apparent, there are particular insights to be gained by conceiving of the earthly milieu as the profane vis‐à‐vis the sacred rather than merely the terrestrial vis‐à‐vis the heavenly. For the most recent discussion of medieval contemporaries' understanding of the sacred, from which the profane or the secular is delineated, see Barbara Newman, Medieval Crossover: Reading the Secular Against the Sacred, Notre Dame, IN: Taylor & Francis, 2013.

26. For a new translation of these texts, refer to: Denys Pringle, Pilgrimage to Jerusalem and the Holy Land 1187–1291, Farnham, UK: Taylor & Francis, 2012.

27. Burchard of Mount Sion, “A Description of the Holy Land,” in Palestine Pilgrims' Text Society, vol. 12, London: Taylor & Francis, 1896, 1–111: 43, 55–7, 66, 71, 102–11; Anonymous, “The City of Jerusalem,” in Palestine Pilgrims' Text Society, vol. 6, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1971, 1–21. For commentary upon the former source, see Aryeh Graboïs, “Christian Pilgrims in the Thirteenth Century and the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem: Burchard of Mount Sion,” in B.Z. Kedar, H.E. Mayer, & R.C. Smail, eds, Outremer: Studies in the History of the Crusading Kingdom of Jerusalem: Presented to Joshua Prawer, Jerusalem: Taylor & Francis, 1982, 285–296.

28. For example, Francis Peters recognizes a categorical shift in the manner in which travelers to Jerusalem conceived of the city, but his approach toward elucidating the shift conflates many of the twelfth‐ and early thirteenth‐century accounts in a fashion which, albeit useful, neither fully illuminates the gradual changes which are transpiring nor the reasons for why such a shift is occurring (see Francis E. Peters, Jerusalem: the Holy City in the Eyes of Chroniclers, Visitors, Pilgrims, and Prophets from the Days of Abraham to the Beginnings of Modern Times, Princeton: Taylor & Francis, 1985, 295–330). Focusing on the immediate aftermath of the First Crusade (1095–99), Norman Housley has observed that several theological productions in western Europe had begun to emphasize the literal Jerusalem in seeking to articulate the idea of crusade; nevertheless, he suggests that the conceptual expansion of “crusading” as any activity in defense of the Christian church, irrespective of the theater of operation, as well as the increasing association of holy war with monasticism rather than necessarily pilgrimage, heralded “a renewed anagogical treatment of Jerusalem.” (Norman Housley, “Jerusalem and the Development of the Crusade Idea, 1099–1128,” in B.Z. Kedar, ed., The Horns of Hattin, Jerusalem: Taylor & Francis, 1992, 27–40: 39). As we will see below, however, the “literal” Jerusalem does come to predominate the narratives of pilgrims to the holiest of cities over the course of the twelfth century as a whole.

29. Sarah Hamilton and Andrew Spicer have cautioned against drawing a rigid dichotomy between sacred and profane spaces, as such boundaries are fluid, negotiable, and variant, based on the observer (see Sarah Hamilton and Andrew Spicer, “Defining the Holy: the Delineation of Sacred Space,” in A. Spicer and S. Hamilton, eds, Defining the Holy: Sacred Space in Medieval and Early Modern Europe, Aldershot: Taylor & Francis, 2005, 1–23: 4–5). Although I concur with this sentiment, I find that the categorical differentiation is still useful as an analytical heuristic when handled critically, as I hope to do here. After all, these categories appear to have remained terms in which contemporaries conceived of their world, however inconsistently or paradoxically that might occasionally have been.

30. Twelfth‐century contemporaries appear to have situated “crusade” within the conceptual framework of pilgrimage. Indeed, no specific word yet existed for a a crusader; rather, those who had taken the cross were identified as mere pilgrims, albeit ones bearing arms, until the thirteenth century. Even twelfth‐century canon law did not differentiate between the ritual vow undertaken by individuals intending to embark upon an armed pilgrimage as opposed to an unarmed pilgrimage. It has, thus, become convention among modern scholars of the crusades to understand twelfth‐century crusading as ultimately a sort of armed, penitential pilgrimage (see Jonathan Riley‐smith, The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading, second ed., London: Taylor & Francis, 2009, 22–23; James Brundage, Medieval Canon Law and the Crusader, Madison, WI: Taylor & Francis, 1969, 30–39; C.J. Tyerman, “Were There Any Crusades in the Twelfth Century?,” English Historical Review 110, 1995, 553–577). This is not to suggest, however, that there are not important detractors with regard to framing “crusade” as pilgrimage. To be sure, several disparate ideas, such as those pertaining to holy war, appear to have merged with the notion of pilgrimage, arguably creating something categorically novel if not yet linguistically distinct; see, for instance, Jean Flori, “Pour une redéfinition de la croisade,” Cahiers de civilisation médiévale 47, 2004, 329–350. As concerns what Pope Urban II might have thought concerning the enterprise which he inspired at Clermont in 1095, see Alfons Becker, Papst Urban II (1088–1099), vol. 2, Stuttgart: Taylor & Francis, 1988, 376–413. In any case, as this article will evince below, there is analytical utility in treating as a separate sociological category those individuals who bore no arms, completed their pilgrimage, returned to Latin Europe, and then produced texts describing their journey to occidental audiences, for the reception of these texts was to serve particular purposes in the twelfth‐century Latin west.

31. Eliade, Sacred, 10–11, 20–3. The distinction which I am making between space and place is standard in sociological theories of space/place. “Place, at a basic level, is space invested with meaning in the context of power” (Tim Cresswell, Place: A Short Introduction, Oxford: Taylor & Francis, 2004, 12). To be sure, the semantic boundaries between the two categories can be blurry, especially in the unique context of Jerusalem, wherein everything serves some manner of relevant purpose. However, the utility of maintaining these categories is evident in analyzing how the various spaces of Jerusalem seem to be reconfigured by Latin pilgrims into a new sort of place explicitly imbued with certain meanings of power during the twelfth century.

32. Frugoni, Distant City, 13.

33. From Isidore of Seville's Etymologiarum Libri 15.2.1, as cited in Frugoni, Distant City, 3.

34. Frugoni, Distant City, 10.

35. For a broad discussion of the matter with useful historiographical references, see David Nicholas, Urban Europe 1100–1700, New York: Taylor & Francis, 2003, 24–61.

36. Anonymous, “Qualiter Sita Est Civitas Ierusalem,” in T. Tobler and A. Molinier, eds, Itinera Hierosolymitana, vol. 1, Geneva: Taylor & Francis, 1879, 345–349: 347; Anonymous, “Ottobonian Guide,” in Jerusalem Pilgrimage 1099–1185, trans. John Wilkinson, London: Taylor & Francis, 1988, 92–93: 92.

37. Anonymous, “Extract from Gesta Francorum Iherusalem Expugnantium,” in S. de Sandoli, ed., Itinera Hierosolymitana Crucesignatorum (saec. XII–XIII), vol. 1, Jerusalem: Taylor & Francis, 1978, 148–154: 150. With regard to the relationship between the extract and the rest of the aforementioned Gesta, see Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrimage, 11.

38. Saewulf, “Peregrinatio,” in S. de Sandoli, ed., Itinera Hierosolymitana Crucesignatorum (saec. XII–XIII), vol. 2, Jerusalem: Taylor & Francis, 1980, 1–31: 12.

39. Saewulf, “Peregrinatio,” 22. With regard to several places which are guarded by walls, such as the altar denoting the spot of Christ's ascension on Mount Olivet, Saewulf notes there to be protective walls (see Saewulf, “Peregrinatio,” 20).

40. Anonymous, “De Situ Urbis Iherusalem,” in de Sandoli, ed., Itinera Hierosolymitana, vol. 2, 74–78: 74. There is some debate as to the exact date of this account's composition (compare Wilkinson, Jerusalem Pilgrimage, 11–15, and Graboïs, Pèlerin occidental, 212).

41. Nikulas de Vera, “From Rome to Jerusalem: An Icelandic Itinerary of the mid‐Twelfth Century,” trans. Joyce Hill, The Harvard Theological Review 2, 1983, 175–203: 180.

42. John of würzburg, “Descriptio Terrae Sanctae,” in de Sandoli, ed., Itinera Hierosolymitana, vol. 2, 225–295: 238.

43. Theodoric, “Libellus de Locis Sanctis,” in de Sandoli, ed., Itinera Hierosolymitana, vol. 2, 309–390: 317.

44. Tim Cresswell, In Place/Out of Place: Geography, Ideology, and Transgression, Minneapolis, MN: Taylor & Francis, 1996, 165.

45. Theodoric, “Libellus,” 317–318, 348.

46. Theodoric, “Libellus,” 318: “Domus, in altum operosa maceria porrectae …”.

47. Eliade, Sacred, 37.

48. Anonymous, “Qualiter,” 348; Anonymous, “Ottobonian Guide,” 92. Denys Pringle has observed that visitors to the Holy City would sometimes confuse the Beautiful Gate with the Golden Gate on the eastern side of the Temple Mount (see Denys Pringle, The Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, vol. 3, Cambridge: Taylor & Francis, 2007, 104). This is, in fact, the confusion which appears to have beset the anonymous author of the Ottobonian Guide. It is not the Beautiful Gate which leads eastward into the Valley of Jehoshaphat; it is the Golden Gate. However, the Golden Gate may offer even less of a liminal potential for profane‐sacred interconnectivity, for the gate exemplifies a uniquely messianic rather than a functional temporal significance in the Latin Christian tradition; Christ once entered Jerusalem from this gate, and it is there that the figure described in Ezekiel 40.4 will appear (see Peters, Jerusalem, 33–34).

49. Anonymous, “Qualiter,” 348.

50. Saewulf, “Peregrinatio,” 12, 18; Anonymous, “Extract,” 148, 152.

51. See Anonymous, “De Situ Urbis Iherusalem,” 74.

52. Anonymous, “Descriptio Terrae Sanctae,” in S. de Sandoli, ed., Itinera Hierosolymitana Crucesignatorum (saec. XII–XIII), vol. 3, Jerusalem: Taylor & Francis, 1983, 77–83: 78.

53. Anonymous, “Descriptio,” 78.

54. Anonymous, “Descriptio,” 78. One of the relevant scriptural references here is John 12.12–15 NRSV.

55. Anonymous, “De Situ Urbis Iherusalem,” 74: “… a meridie est portaque vocatur de monte Syon, perquam exitur apud Sanctam Mariam de monte Syon.”

56. John of würzburg, “Descriptio,” 244: “In descensu majoris plateae est porta magna, qua patet introitus in illud latum atrium templi.”

57. John of würzburg, “Descriptio,” 270: “In praefata platea de porta vallis Josaphat itur per directum versus illam plateam, quae ad portam, sancti Stephani ducit, a qua deinde a septentrione versus plateas illas triplices … ad frontem majoris sancti sepulcri ecclesiae dirigitur.”

58. Theodoric, “Libellus,” 328–330.

59. Theodoric, “Libellus,” 356: “Per ipsam quoque viam cum aliquamdiu transiveris, ad sinistram viam carpens.”

60. Anonymous gallicus, “L'estat de la cité de Iherusalem,” in de Sandoli, ed., Itinera Hierosolymitana, vol. 2, 415–421: 418.

61. Some of the examples which follow are reminiscent of earlier accounts. However, the end point of illustrating laypersons in the profane urbanscape of Jerusalem is novel.

62. Other pilgrims, however, do occasionally crop up in the narrative. Yet, they do so either very briefly or outside the environs of Jerusalem. As evidence of the former, see Anonymous, “Qualiter,” 347. As evidence of the latter, see Saewulf, “Peregrinatio,” 10–12, 28–30. Saewulf reflects with sorrow upon pilgrims who had died while still harbored in the port of Jaffa when a storm hit. Fortunately, he had managed to be the recipient of divine revelation which had encouraged him to disembark before the tempest appeared. Fellow surviving pilgrims are then absent from the narrative as Saewulf discusses his experience of visiting Jerusalem. Following the completion of his pilgrimage, when Saewulf finds himself again beyond the sacred spaces of the Holy Land, fellow pilgrims reappear, this time along with pirates and daring adventure on the high seas.

63. Anonymous, “De Situ Urbis Iherusalem,” 74.

64. Nikulas de Vera, “Rome,” 180.

65. Anonymous, “Icelandic Guide,” in Jerusalem Pilgrimage 1099–1185, trans. John Wilkinson, London: Taylor & Francis, 1988, 220–222: 221.

66. Theodoric, “Libellus,” 320, 330.

67. John of würzburg, “Descriptio,” 290; Theodoric, “Libellus,” 318.

68. John of würzburg, “Descriptio,” 270: “… diversarum rerum venalium.”

69. Anonymous gallicus, “L'estat,” 418–420.

70. Theodoric, “Libellus,” 318–320, 348.

71. Frugoni, Distant City, 112.

72. John of würzburg, “Descriptio,” 270.

73. Nicole Chareyron, Pilgrims to Jerusalem in the Middle Ages, trans. W. Donald Wilson, New York: Taylor & Francis, 2005, 91; Graboïs, Pèlerin occidental, 12.

74. John of würzburg, “Descriptio,” 238.

75. Ibid., 262.

76. Ibid., 262–264.

77. Randall Studstill, “Eliade, Phenomenology, and the Sacred,” Religious Studies 2, 2000, 177–194: 189–91.

78. Pierre André Sigal, Les marcheurs de Dieu: pèlerinages et pèlerins au Moyen Age, Paris: Taylor & Francis, 1974, 95; Diana Webb, Pilgrims and Pilgrimage in the Medieval West, London: Taylor & Francis, 1999, 27. See as well Speros Vryonis, The Decline of Medieval Hellenism in Asia Minor and the Process of Islamization from the Eleventh through the Fifteenth Century, Berkeley, CA: Taylor & Francis, 1971, 69–142.

79. Hans Eberhard Mayer, The Crusades, trans. John Gillingham, second ed., Oxford: Taylor & Francis, 1988, 77. This date reflects the year of papal recognition and subsequent expansion. The military order itself appears to have existed in some form since 1120.

80. For a general discussion concerning the raison d'être for the Knights Templar, see James W. Brodman, “Rule and Identity: The Case of the Military Orders,” The Catholic Historical Review 3, 2001, 383–400: 398–400.

81. The first military acquisition of the Hospitallers was the fortified settlement of Bethgibelin in 1136, bestowed by King Fulk of Jerusalem (see J. Delaville le roulx, Cartulaire Général de l'Ordre des Hospitaliers de S. Jean de Jérusalem (1100–1310), vol. 1, Paris: Taylor & Francis, 1894, 97–98, no. 116). The Hospital subsequently received several fortresses, including Krak des Chevaliers and Ba'rin, located alongside the eastern frontier of Tripoli between 1142 and 1144 (ibid., 116–118, no. 144). The donation by Count Raymond II of Tripoli is confirmed in 1145 (ibid., 130, no. 160).

82. Although it is not until the Statutes of 1206 that the first mention of Hospitaller brothers‐at‐arms is made, modern historians concur that such a mention vastly postdates the first instance of an armed member of the Hospital. According to Rudolf Hiestand, for instance, rhetoric present in some papal correspondence indicates that the papacy may have recognized the presence of brothers‐at‐arms in the Order of St John as early as 1166 (see Rudolf Hiestand, “The Military Orders and Papal Crusading Propaganda,” in V. Mallia‐milanes, ed., The Military Orders, Volume 3: History and Heritage, Aldershot: Taylor & Francis, 2008, 155–165: 158). It can, thus, be inferred that the Hospital militarized at some previous point. As to the exact time when this occurred, scholars have only been able to speculate, though the leading authorities on the matter agree that the process of militarization began in either the 1130s or 1140s (see Helen Nicholson, The Knights Hospitaller, Woodbridge, UK: Taylor & Francis, 2001, 13; Jonathan Riley‐smith, A History of the Crusades, second ed., New Haven, CT: Taylor & Francis, 2005, 80; Alan J. Forey, The Military Orders: From the Twelfth to the Early Fourteenth Centuries, Toronto: Taylor & Francis, 1992, 18–19).

83. William of tyre, vol. 2, Chronique, vol. 2, ed. R.B.C. Huygens, Turnhout: Taylor & Francis, 1986, 681–682.

84. John Pryor, Geography, Technology, and War: Studies in the Maritime History of the Mediterranean, 649–1571, Cambridge: Taylor & Francis, 1988, 115–124.

85. Ronnie Ellenblum, Frankish Rural Settlement in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, Cambridge: Taylor & Francis, 1998, 14–19.

86. For a recent overview of such matters, see Abbès Zouache, Armées et combats en Syrie de 491/1098 à 569/1174: Analyse comparée des chroniques médiévales latines et arabes, Damascus: Taylor & Francis, 2008.

87. Although there was an increase in pilgrimage to the Holy Land during the eleventh century, pilgrimage was not yet a “popular” phenomenon; the vast majority of pilgrimages remained small‐scale enterprises, usually of groups of elite churchmen or of secular lords (see Matthew Gabriele, An Empire of Memory: The Legend of Charlemagne, the Franks, and Jerusalem before the First Crusade, Oxford: Taylor & Francis, 2011, 89–90). For an examination of the penitential motivations inspiring some secular lords to undertake pilgrimage, see Bernard S. Bachrach, “The Pilgrimages of Fulk Nerra, Count of the Angevins, 987–1040,” in Thomas F.X. Noble and John C. Contreni, eds, Religion, Culture, and Society in the Early Middle Ages: Studies in Honor of Richard E. Sullivan, Kalamazoo, MI: Taylor & Francis, 1987, 205–217.

88. Anonymous, “Qualiter,” 347; Anonymous, “Ottobonian Guide,” 92; Anonymous, “Extract,” 150; Saewulf, “Peregrinatio,” 12.

89. For a brief discussion of processual symbolic analysis, refer to Victor Turner and Edith Turner, Image and Pilgrimage in Christian Culture: Anthropological Perspectives, New York: Taylor & Francis, 1978, 243.

90. Webb, Pilgrims, 235–246.

91. For a recent discussion of patristic responses to Christian pilgrimage, see Brouria Bitton‐ashkelony, Encountering the Sacred: The Debate on Christian Pilgrimage in Late Antiquity, Berkeley, CA: Taylor & Francis, 2005.

92. The classic article, offering a critical compendium of theological criticisms, is Giles Constable, “Opposition to Pilgrimage in the Middle Ages,” Studia Gratiana 19, 1976, 125–146 [reprinted in Giles Constable, Religious Life and Thought (11th–12th Centuries), London: Taylor & Francis, 1979].

93. Constable, “Opposition,” 126; Webb, Pilgrims, 246.

94. Translation and discussion may be found in Constable, “Opposition,” 126, 126n3.

95. Constable, “Opposition,” 145; Giles Constable, The Reformation of the Twelfth Century, Cambridge: Taylor & Francis, 1996, 151–152; Dee Dyas, Pilgrimage in Medieval English Literature, 700–1500, Cambridge: Taylor & Francis, 2001, 205–213. See also Jean Leclerq, “Monachisme et pérégrination du XIe au XIIe siècle,” Studia Monastica 3, 1961, 33–52.

96. Sylvia Schein, Gateway to the Heavenly City: Crusader Jerusalem and the Catholic West (1099–1187), Aldershot: Taylor & Francis, 2005, 126; Phyllis G. Jestice, Wayward Monks and the Religious Revolution of the Eleventh Century, Leiden: Taylor & Francis, 1997, 65–69, 199–200; Constable, “Opposition,” 131–142; Constable, Reformation, 266–267.

97. Of course, such tension between the ecclesiastical establishment and the institution of pilgrimage is not limited to the Middle Ages. As anthropologists have often noted, individualistic understandings of pilgrimage have often throughout Christian history set certain pilgrims at odds with the hierarchical structures and strictures of the church (see Turner and Turner, Image, 31–32; John Eade and Michael J. Sallnow, “Introduction,” in J. Eade and M.J. Sallnow, eds, Contesting the Sacred: The Anthropology of Pilgrimage, London: Taylor & Francis, 1991, 1–29: 2–3, 10). For fourteenth‐century criticisms of pilgrimage in the English context, criticisms which often echo many of the same concerns as in previous centuries, see Yeager, Jerusalem, 167–169.

98. Thomas A. Idinopulos, “Sacred Space and Profane Power: Victor Turner and the Perspective of Holy Land Pilgrimage,” in B.F. Le beau and M. Mor, eds, Pilgrims & Travelers to the Holy Land, Omaha, NE: Taylor & Francis, 1996, 9–19: 16.

99. John of würzburg, “Descriptio,” 238.

100. Cresswell, Place: Introduction, 10–11.

101. Eliade, Sacred, 57.

102. For thoughts concerning the relationship between space, place, and phenomenological experience, see the highly influential Yi‐Fu Tuan, Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience, Minneapolis, MN: Taylor & Francis, 1977, 67–84. For more recent reflections concerning how boundaries and even contemporary meanings of a place are often generated through the delimitation of internal or surrounding spaces, see Lloyd Edward Kermode, “Experiencing the Space and Place of Early Modern Theater,” The Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 1, 2013, 1–24: 4–5.

103. Pringle, Pilgrimage, 21–24.

104. John of würzburg, “Descriptio,” 252–256.

105. Anonymous, “Icelandic Guide,” 220. Later accounts, such as Theodoric, are more explicit, indicating, for instance, how many individuals can kneel within the Sepulchre's rotunda at any given time (the answer being “five”; see Theodoric, “Libellus,” 320).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Basit Hammad Qureshi

Basit Hammad Qureshi is a doctoral candidate in the Department of History at the University of Minnesota. He specializes in the political culture of western France and the Near East during the long twelfth century. His dissertation investigates developments in the exercise and understanding of power and authority in the medieval world as a function of the crusading phenomenon, ca. 1090–1150. His research has been supported through grants and fellowships from a variety of institutions, such as the Medieval Academy of America, the French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, and the US Department of State. He would like to thank the following individuals for their feedback on various drafts of this paper: Andrew Scheil, Michael Lower, Tiffany D. Vann Sprecher, Kathryn L. Reyerson, Cameron W. Bradley, and the participants of the Medieval and Early Modern Interdisciplinary Graduate Workshop at the University of Minnesota. An earlier version of this paper received the Phi Alpha Theta National History Honor Society's George P. Hammond Prize.

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