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This article proposes to read Robert de Clari's account of Constantinople through the lenses of vibrant materiality, orientalism and the ethics and affects of colonial pursuit. Why was his account so different from Geoffroy de Villehardouin's? Why was he so focused on objects, on materials, and marvels? If we position his text, one of the first vernacular prose histories in French, in its relation to romance, to broader narratives of empire and the "Saracen" other, and in regard to the politics of colonial logic, we see that his version of events reflects broader logics and legacies of the Crusades and their attempts to colonize, rationalize, and interpret the "Other" through orientalist, racist, and marvelous lenses. Clari's account justifies the sacking of a sister empire—a Christian empire—due to the wealth of the relics conquered and the affective power therein, thus rationalizing the imagined end of Christendom at the borders of Byzantium. Clari thus uses the affective power of relics to imagine a united Christendom, united against a foreign, pagan/"Saracen" other, and to participate in the prophesy that, vaticinium ex eventu, Constantinople was always marked for conquest by the "French" and never for truce with the "Saracens." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stories involving lost items, sick or missing birds and animals, and the strange behaviour of objects such as coins, candles and relic containers are frequently encountered in high medieval miracle collections, with the 'jokes' of St Foy of Conques being a well-known example. Such miracles, in which saints were thought to incongruously exercise their powers on 'minor' or 'trifling' matters, provoked a range of reactions, from laughing delight to unease and outright dismissal. This essay argues that the 'trifling' miracle would be a useful addition to typologies of medieval miracles, and contrasts the ways in which two late twelfth-century monks at Canterbury, Benedict of Peterborough and William of Canterbury, worked to integrate and explain stories like these in their collections of the miracles of Thomas Becket. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: In the early 840s, Archbishop Amolo of Lyons wrote to one of his suffragan bishops about extraordinary miracles reportedly taking place at Dijon in the wake of the arrival of mysterious new relics. Re-examining the complex interaction of these relics with pre-existing social and political processes in the region and locally, this article also explores other aspects of Amolo’s letter which have been less discussed, notably its manuscript transmission and the insights it offers into structures of religious organisation. Finally, it argues that the way issues treated together in the letter tend to be separated or even opposed in the historiography points to the need for renewed, critically reflexive attention to the specificities of the Carolingian church reforms. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This article sketches the origins of the veneration of relics in the early Church through the Middle Ages to a new approach to them in western Europe after the sixteenth century. They had been seen as a living link between heaven and earth, but new questions transferred them from a symbolic universe to an analytic sphere. The new question was 'how' did this work, about mechanics, not about meaning, the 'why' question, 'What is in it for me now?' How can we value relics today in our scientifically orientated world? Changes in thought are suggested together with ways to return to a serious appreciation of relics. I want to suggest that we can appreciate relics as part of a mutual dependence here and now between ourselves, the living, and the dead who are alive in Christ. This would underline for us a sense of the goodness of the flesh, as well as the accessibility of the living saints in relation to us in Christ. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The Franks incorporated Saxony into the Carolingian empire through a long, brutal struggle coupled with forced conversion. When Saxons themselves began to write a few decades afterwards, they had to make sense of this history and of their role and identity in their contemporary Carolingian world. In contrast to the portrayal of Saxons in writers such as Einhard and Rudolf, three ninth-century Saxon accounts of relic translations — those of Vitus, Pusinna and Liborius — reinterpreted history to claim a place for the Saxons as a distinct group equal to the Franks within the populus Christianus under the Carolingian monarchs. As a key part of their literary strategies, these authors attempted to salvage from the story of their defeat and forced Christianisation an account of God''s sovereignty, native agency and virtue (especially fidelity) as a foundational element of Saxon identity. These texts prefigure the debates about post-conquest Saxon identity which would underlay the later and better-known Ottonian triumphal self-conceptions. Moreover, the concerns of these authors led them to remarkable hagiographical innovations in grappling with paganism, conversion, miracles, social class and faith. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]