I WONDER why the author chose this title? Saints have certainly had an influence on history, and sinners have become saints, notably Augustine. But how their sins have had such an effect is beyond me, and I was no wiser when I came to the end of the book.
It is, in fact, mainly a traditional survey of the political and ecclesiastical history of Europe from the late Roman Empire to the Reformation, focusing chiefly on the West, with some attention to Byzantium and a little to the Arabs, Ethiopia, the Mongols, and the early exploration of the Americas. The Celtic regions, Russia, and Iberia are largely absent.
The work is based on secondary sources rather than original research, apart from some analysis of English saint cults in chapters ten to 11. Its claim of originality lies in showing how saints and their devotees had a presence in the chronology and activities of the Middle Ages. That is hardly innovative, however, since any decent history of the kind will include Augustine, Gregory, Thomas Becket, Francis, Thomas Aquinas, and so on, in their due places.
My problem with the book is the author’s arguments that things are new or significant when further research would show that they are not. I will take three examples from his special thesis: the importance of saints. He locates their “golden age” in the 12th century and afterwards. Why not in the Roman era, since the apostles and martyrs of that era were by far the most influential and venerated figures of the Middle Ages? They were remembered and celebrated in every church, and had devotees at all their images.
Then, a saint in this later period is said to become “no longer a mere idol”, but to take on “a new role as an active leader”. But saints were more than “mere idols” long before that. Land was given to them individually — Mary or Peter. They personally owned and protected their churches and followers. Nor did bishops “rise to prominence” as saints after 1100. What about Clement, Martin, Patrick, Cuthbert, Wilfrid, Swithun, and others? And I don’t understand how anyone can talk about “the medieval psyche” who has fully studied the Middle Ages with their great variety of opinions.
There are no references; so nothing can be checked. The “Further Reading” contains several items without identifying the edition or date. I would have expected the author to know of and recommend books, on the early centuries, for example, by Peter Brown, Chris Wickham, John Blair, and R. W. Southern (as well as his Anselm); by John Boswell on sexuality; and David Farmer’s admirable Oxford Dictionary of Saints. Despite the enthusiastic blurbs, there are better histories, more carefully researched and considered, of the medieval world.
Dr Nicholas Orme is Emeritus Professor of History at Exeter University. His latest book is The History of England’s Cathedrals (Yale, 2024).
Medieval Saints and their Sins: A new history of the Middle Ages through saints and their stories
Luke Daly
Pen and Sword History £22
(978-1-3990-5062-3)
Church Times Bookshop £19.80
This post was originally published on here
