Search

Resumen: Este artículo tiene por objetivo mostrar a través del análisis de dos textos de dos místicas neerlandesas del siglo XIII, Beatrijs van Nazareth y la beguina de Amberes Hadewijch, los nuevos caminos emprendidos por la mística femenina del siglo XIII que llevan a la fusión de la escalera de las virtudes, los itinerarios de perfección y las formas de encuentro amoroso con la divinidad. Frente a una topografía ascensional que transcurre por un cierto número de grados, propia de las imágenes tradicionales de la escalera, se recurre aquí a la imagen del caleidoscopio para comprender el carácter circular de las nuevas aproximaciones y la necesidad de entender los itinerarios de perfección en concordancia con las nuevas prácticas espirituales de la mística amorosa.

This chapter aims to address the sense of touch within the sphere of the sacred, starting from the hypothesis that touch is the sense that most radically introduces a life-oriented female horizontality. Touch is the only sense that implies reciprocity, because it is always a shared ‘contact’. This work explores the role played by touch within the framework of the five spiritual senses, from devotional practices to mystical union. The first part analyses the devotional, spiritual, and apotropaic uses of the sacred object, understood as possessing a potential for haptic transfer, as well as the evangelical models of tactile experience. The second part studies touch in female mysticism, discussing the contact with the divinity as a loving experience through some examples and the texts of Hadewijch and Mechthild von Magdeburg.

ITALIANO: Il volume raccoglie i contributi di un buon numero di studiose e studiosi provenienti da universita italiane, spagnole, portoghesi e tedesche e da istituti di ricerca coinvolti nel progetto "Claustra. Atlante della spiritualita femminile". L’obiettivo principale di questo progetto e stato ed e quello di rendere visibile il ruolo importante del monachesimo femminile nelle trasformazioni della spiritualita tra il XII e il XVI secolo nei regni peninsulari iberici e nel Mezzogiorno italiano. In questo quadro generale, il libro si occupa, in particolare, dell'analisi del paesaggio religioso contrassegnato dalle comunita di clarisse e di domenicane. I diversi contributi consentono un approfondimento della struttura territoriale dei vari regni attraverso cinque linee di ricerca: l'ampliamento della conoscenza di aree che avevano importanti lacune nella topografia monastica femminile; la comprensione delle dinamiche fondazionali che illustrano il ruolo delle comunita di mulieres religiose; la dinamica dell'impianto urbano e i processi di comunicazione e di azione, creatori del paesaggio monastico nel contesto del rapporto tra il monastero e i suoi dintorni; l'importanza del mecenatismo e del patrocinio femminile in molti dei modelli fondazioanli e della promozione artistica e culturale; infine, l’analisi delle pratiche devozionali e della cultura materiale delle comunita monastiche femminili in un contesto funzionale, spaziale e performativo. / ESPANOL: El presente volumen recoge las aportaciones de un buen numero de estudiosas y estudiosos procedentes de universidades e instituciones de investigacion espanolas, italianas, portuguesas y alemanas implicadas en el proyecto "Claustra. Atlas de espiritualidad femenina". El objetivo principal de este proyecto ha sido y es hacer visible el importante papel del monacato femenino en las transformaciones de la espiritualidad entre los siglos XII y XVI en los Reinos Peninsulares y en el sur de Italia. Dentro de este marco general, en el presente libro se aborda en concreto el analisis del paisaje religioso marcado por las comunidades de clarisas y dominicas. Los diferentes trabajos permiten profundizar, desde esta estructura territorial por reinos, en cinco grandes campos de estudio: la ampliacion del conocimiento de areas que contaban con importantes lagunas en la topografia monastica, especialmente femenina; la comprension de dinamicas fundacionales que muestran el papel de comunidades de mulieres religiosae de previa existencia; las dinamicas de implantacion urbana y los procesos de comunicacion y accion creadores de paisaje monastico en el contexto de la relacion entre el monasterio y su entorno; la importancia del mecenazgo y patronazgo femenino en muchos de los modelos fundacionales y de promocion artistica y cultural; y finalmente el analisis de las practicas devocionales y la cultura material de las comunidades monasticas femeninas en un contexto funcional, espacial y performativo. / ENGLISH: This volume contains the contributions of a good number of scholars from universities and research institutions in Spain, Italy, Portugal and Germany involved in the project Claustra. Atlas of female spirituality. The main objective of this project is, and was, to make visible the important role of female monasticism in the transformations of spirituality between the 12th and 16th centuries in the Iberian Kingdoms and in southern Italy. Within this general framework, the present book deals specifically with the analysis of the impact of the communities of Poor Clares and Dominicans in the religious landscape. The different contributions allow to dwelve into five main fields of study, always from the aformentioned territorial structure by kingdoms: the expansion of the current knowledge of areas that had important gaps in their monastic topography, especially female; the understanding of foundational dynamics that show the role of the communities of mulieres religiosae of previous existence; the dynamics of urban implantation and the processes of communication and action that created monastic landscapes in the context of the relationship between the monastery and its surroundings; the importance of female patronage in many of the founding models and in artistic and cultural promotion; and finally the analysis of the devotional practices and the material culture of the female monastic communities in a functional, spatial and performative context.

This paper aims to present two projects carried out within the Digital Humanities field and related to the study of medieval feminine spirituality: the Atlas CLAUSTRA and the SPIRITUAL LANDSCAPES project. Both headed by the University of Barcelona, in collaboration with researchers at a large number of internationally renowned universities and research centres, they aim to study the medieval spiritual landscapes. The first does so through the creation of an Atlas and Catalogue of female spirituality spaces in Mediterranean Europe between the 11th and 16th centuries, and the second, through the study of the territorial impact of the foundation of monasteries on rural and urban landscapes during the Middle Ages. All this is based on the design, implementation and development of two powerful digital platforms that constitute a shared work space, scientific study tool, and instrument for the dissemination of the knowledge gained through the research

This article considers the devotional practices inside the female religious houses of the Crown of Aragon between the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and the sacralisation of monastic space through the relationship between body and space. First, we will analyse the conception of space and the dialectic ‘inside / outside’ in the enclosed female monastic life. Based on specific examples from different types of community (Hospitallers, Cistercians, Dominicans, and Poor Clares) in Catalonia, Aragon, Majorca, and Valencia, we will undertake a tour of the different monastic spaces: church, choir, cloisters, etc., focusing on the performative expression of the religious women who do, or do not, interact with these spaces and the devotional objects within them. In this way we will explore the sensual universe of female religious communities and the ways which religious women filled the spaces which they inhabited with meaning.

Almeria was a significant seaport both before and after the Genoese and their allies attacked it in 1147. In the early Middle Ages it achieved a symbiosis with the partly Jewish city of Granada. Stagnation was visible around the mid-twelfth century, as a result of wider changes in the Islamic world, including transformations in the trade routes tying the port to the Iberian interior. This bond was reinforced in the thirteenth century when Granada re-emerged as the capital of the Nasrid state. The Genoese made use of Almeria because it gave access to the interior. In the mid-fourteenth century, Malaga assumed many of its functions and Almeria retained a particular importance as a centre of piracy. The article lays emphasis on the role of Almeria as part of a dual city, combining the port itself with the inland capital at Granada.

Abordar el estudio de las formas de comportamiento de la nobleza feudal catalana obliga a sumergirse en el constante y empecinado mutismo de las fuentes jurídicas, en la fórmula enquilosada y en el secreto de lo dado por supuesto. Los avances de la hermenéutica aplicada a los textos medievales han paliado en parte este problema y, hoy, una lectura receptiva de los mismos es capaz de ofrecer sentido a conceptos hasta ahora sumidos en el silencio. Un tipo de documentación diplomática, inscrito en el marco de las prácticas judiciales, se presenta especialmente adecuado para esta clase de análisis: se trata de los inventarios de quejas, las llamadas querimoniae en la documentación catalana de la época. Estos documentos se encuentran a veces insertos en el mismo texto de un juicio, pero frecuentemente sólo se los menciona bajo la cláusula «post multas querimoniae...», haciendo así referencia a las controversias que motivaron y antecedieron el juicio y la sentencia, pero sin especificarlas. Las querimoniae de las que disponemos para Cataluña no están recogidas exhaustivamente en este trabajo, las aquí presentadas pertenecen prácticamente todas al archivo de la Corona de Aragón y al de la Catedral de Barcelona.

International audience; The daughters of the Catholic Monarchs were the objects of their parents' matrimonial policies, and all left to marry European sovereigns. These marriages in the four corners of Europe gave rise to tragic fates. The Romantics of the 19th century wrote about them and contributed to the creation of an imaginary world around these figures, which we still live with today. These marriages did not all have the same characteristics: some princesses stayed in southern Europe, while others left to marry princes in the north. Without downplaying the cultural differences between two European areas - since it is well known that the princely courts were in contact with each other - it is interesting to look back at the movements of these princesses, all of whom became queens, in order to dispel a historiography that has long been steeped in "black legends".By comparing the last four Trastamare sisters, we can give a more accurate account of the events that led to their marriages being considered 'successes' or 'failures'. Beyond the political rhetoric, whether positive or negative, the actual facts need to be put into perspective to understand why they did what they did. By starting from their point of departure, i.e. a Castile with changing patterns under the reign of Isabel the Catholic, and taking into account the cultural, political and geographical aspects of their point of arrival, it is possible to grasp the maladjustment of their behaviour, rather than assuming their madness, sadness or other psychologising diagnoses.Although these princesses were educated to exercise power in foreign lands, it cannot be said that Portuguese marriages represented the same risks of maladjustment as English or Flemish marriages. This Europe, with its connections between the different courts, was still subject to the technical problems associated with travel at the time, reinforcing particularities. Wouldn't women becoming queens in another country be a way of gauging the misunderstandings that still existed at the time? However, it is also important to qualify the image of territories with cultural and political habits that are supposedly set in stone, since they themselves were undergoing major changes at the end of the fifteenth century and the beginning of the sixteenth. These shocks, which we describe as due to these different habits in different territories, could also be induced by the changes that Europe was undergoing at the dawn of modernity. What's more, these changes were not happening at the same time, nor in the same way, in the different European kingdoms. Through their exceptional destinies, which sealed the fate of the Iberian peninsula, could these princesses, educated by the "reborn" queen of Spain, not allow us to grasp another order of shocks, like temporal shocks, when they joined their husbands?; Les filles des Rois Catholiques ont été les objets de la politique matrimoniale de leurs parents et partent toutes épouser des souverains européens. Ces mariages aux quatre coins de l’Europe ont donné lieu à des destins tragiques. Les Romantiques du XIXème siècle les ont mis en récit et ont participé à la création d’imaginaire autour de ces figures, dont nous sommes encore tributaires à l’époque contemporaine. Ces mariages ne possèdent pas tous les mêmes caractéristiques : certaines princesses sont restées dans le Sud de l’Europe alors que d’autres sont parties épouser des princes du Nord. Sans pour autant essentialiser les différences culturelles entre deux espaces européens -, puisqu’il est connu que les cours princières se trouvaient en contact les unes avec les autres, - il se révèle intéressant de revenir sur les déplacements de ces princesses, toutes devenues reines, afin de défiger une historiographie longtemps imprégnée de « légendes noires ».La mise en comparaison des quatre sœurs, dernières Trastamare, permettrait d’offrir une voix plus juste aux évènements qui ont fait que leurs mariages aient pu être considérés comme des « réussites » ou des « échecs ». Au-delà des discours politiques, mélioratifs ou péjoratifs, les faits avérés mériteraient à être remis en perspective pour comprendre le pourquoi de leurs actions. En partant de leur point de départ, c’est-à-dire une Castille aux modèles changeant sous le règne d’Isabelle La Catholique, et en prenant en compte les aspects culturels, politiques et géographiques de leur point d’arrivée, il est possible de saisir l’inadaptation de leur comportement, plutôt que de supposer leur folie, leur tristesse ou d’autres diagnostiques psychologisants.Bien que ces princesses soient éduquées pour exercer le pouvoir au sein de territoires étrangers, il n’est pas possible d’affirmer que les mariages portugais représentent les mêmes risques d’inadaptation que le mariage anglais ou flamand. Cette Europe, en connexion entre les différentes cours, demeure encore soumise aux problèmes techniques liés aux déplacements de l’époque, renforçant, ainsi, des particularismes. Ces femmes devenant reines dans un autre pays ne seraient-elles pas des moyens de mesurer les incompréhensions qui pouvaient encore demeurer à cette époque ? Pourtant, il convient également de nuancer l’image des territoires possédant des habitus culturels et politiques, soi-disant figés, puisqu’eux-mêmes sont en pleine mutation à la fin du XVème siècle et au début du XVIème siècle. Ces chocs, que nous qualifions comme dus à ces habitus différents selon les territoires, pourraient également être induits par les changements qui traversent l’Europe aux portes de la modernité. Qui plus est, ces changements ne se passaient pas dans le même temps,ni de la même façon, selon les royaumes européens. Par leurs destins exceptionnels, scellant celui de la péninsule ibérique, ces princesses éduquées par la reine « renaissante » d’Espagne, ne nous permettraient-elles pas de saisir un autre ordre de chocs, lorsqu’elles font leur entrée auprès de leurs époux ; comme des chocs temporels ?