1. ANSELM OF CANTERBURY: TEXTS & STUDIES

 

R.W. Southern, St. Anselm: A Portrait in a Landscape (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990) paperback, $30.   Anselm probed the great question: if Christ saved humankind, then what did he save us from and how did his dying actually save us?  Anselm’s soteriological theories have profoundly influenced later understandings of the meaning of Christ and his cross.  Anselm’s life and thought are brilliantly examined in this study by R.W. Southern, one of the great medieval scholars of the 20th century.  Detailed, thorough, yet lucid and readable.

 

Brian Davies & Gillian Evans, trans., Anselm of Canterbury: The Major Works, Oxford’s World Classics (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998) paperback, $12.  Good translation by two leading medievalists.

G.R. Evans, Anselm, Outstanding Christian Thinker Series (Wilton, CT: Morehouse Publishing, 1989) paperback.  A fine introductory survey.

G.R. Evans, Anselm and Talking about God (Oxford: Clarendon / Oxford University Press, 1978) hardcover.

Jasper Hopkins, A Companion to the Study of Saint Anselm (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1972).

Benedicta Ward, “Anselm of Canterbury,” Christian Spirituality I: Origins to the Twelfth Century (New York: Crossroad, 1986), 196-205.

Benedicta Ward, ed., The Prayers and Meditations of Saint Anselm (New York: Penguin Books, 1973) paperback, $12.

 

 2. HILDEGARD OF BINGEN: TEXTS & MUSIC

 

Critical editions of Hildegard’s Latin texts are steadily being edited and published in the Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Medievalis (CCCM); for an older, complete version, see Hildegardis opera omnia, in J.-P. Migne, Patrologia Latina, vol. 197.

 

Hildegard of Bingen, Scivias, Classics of Western Spirituality, trans. Columba Hart and Jane Bishop (New York: Paulist Press, 1990) paperback, $28.  Hildegard of Bingen was one of the most brilliant and original women of the Middle Ages.  She was a polymath: an abbess, a visionary mystic, a poet and playwright, one of the earliest known composers in the history of Western music, perhaps the only medieval woman given official papal sanction to preach publicly.  This is her best known work, giving an account of her visions, together with her commentary.  Hildegard’s disciples commissioned artists to paint the visions she describes.  This edition, unfortunately, only has black-and-white versions of these paintings.  To see these in all their rich color, see the edition by Schipperges listed below.  For the Latin text: see Hildegardis Bingenis Scivias, ed. Adelgundis Führkotter and Angela Carlevaris, CCSM 43-43A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1978).

 

Sequentia, director: Barbara Thornton, Hildegard von Bingen: Canticles of Ectasy (Deutsche Harmonia mundi, 1994) CD, $18.  The early music group Sequentia has been steadily recording Hildegard’s music.  This CD is a fine introduction to Hildegard’s remarkable talents as a composer.  See also Sequentia’s 2 CD version of Hildegard’s complete Ordo Virtutem (Deutsche Harmonia mundi, 1982; remaster, 1998) and Voices of the Blood (Deutsche Harmonia mundi, 1995).

 

Anonymous 4, 11,000 Virgins: Chants for the Feast of St. Ursula (Harmonia mundi, 1997).  CD.

Gottfried & Theodoric, The Life of Holy Hildegard (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1995).

Hildegard of Bingen, Selected Writings, Penguin Classics, trans. Mark Atherton (London: Penguin, 2001) paperback, $13.

Hildegard of Bingen, The Book of the Rewards of Life (Liber Vitae Meritorum), trans. Bruce W. Hozeski (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997) paperback, $16.

Hildegard of Bingen, Explanation of the Rule of Benedict (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2000) paperback, $14.

Joseph L. Baird & Radd K. Ehrman, ed., The Letters of Hildegard of Bingen, 2 vol. to date (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994 & 1998), vol. 1 in paperback, $20.

Barbara Newman, ed., Hildegard of Bingen: Symphonia: A Critical Edition of the Symphonia Armonie Celestium Revelationum, rev. ed. (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998) paperback, $17.

Anna Silvas, ed., Jutta & Hildegard: The Biographical Sources, Brepols Medieval Women Series (University Park, PA: Penn. State University Press, 1998) paperback.

 

 3. HILDEGARD OF BINGEN: STUDIES

 

Barbara Newman, ed., Voice of the Living Light: Hildegard of Bingen and Her World (Berkeley: University of California, 1998) paperback, $20.  A fine collection of essays tracing each aspect of Hildegard’s remarkable talents and career: abbess, poet, reformer, composer, physician, visionary.

 

Ian D. Bent & Marianne Pfau, “Hildegard of Bingen,” in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, eds., Stanley Sadie and John Tyrell.  2nd ed. (2001), vol. 11:493-499.

Charles Burnett & Peter Dronke, eds.  Hildegard of Bingen: The Context of Her Thought and Art, The Warburg Colloquia.  London: The University of London, 1998.

Audrey Ekdahl Davidson, ed., The Ordo Virtutum of Hildegard of Bingen: Critical Studies. Early Drama, Art, and Music Monograph Series 18. Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 1992.

Peter Dronke, Women Writers of the Middle Ages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984.  [See pp. 144-201, for key autobiographical texts in both English and Latin, as well as a valuable analysis.]

Sabina Flanagan, Hildegard of Bingen: A Visionary Life, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 1998) paperback, $19.

Alfred Haverkamp, ed. Hildegard von Bingen in ihrem wissenschaftlicher Kongreß zum 900 jährigen Jubiläum, 13.-19. September 1998, Bigne am Rhein (Mainz: Verlag Philipp von Zabern, 2000).  [See especially the essays by Peter Dronke and Bernard McGinn].

Patricia A. Kazarow, “Text and Context in Hildegard of Bingen’s Ordo Virtutum,” in Ulrike Wiethaus, ed., Maps of Flesh and Light: The Religious Experience of Medieval Women Mystics (Syracuse University Press, 1993), pp. 127-151.

Anne H. King-Lenzmeier, Hildegard of Bingen: An Integrated Vision (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2001) paperback, $30.

Barbara Newman, Sister of Wisdom: St. Hildegard’s Theology of the Feminine (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987) paperback.

Barbara Newman, “Hildegard of Bingen: Visions and Validation,” Church History 54 (1985) 164-175.

Heinrich Schipperges, The World of Hildegard of Bingen: Her Life, Times, and Visions, trans. John Cumming (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1999) hardcover, $35.  Excellent plates.

Ingeborg Ulrich, Hildegard of Bingen: Mystic, Healer, Companion of the Angels (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1993).

 

 4. POPULAR MEDIEVAL SPIRITUALITY

 

R.N. Swanson, Religion and Devotion in Europe, c.1215-c.1515, Cambridge Medieval Textbooks (New York:  Cambridge University Press, 1995) paperback, $18.  This fine study focuses not on church structures like popes or religious orders, but on the ordinary religiosity of the average medieval layman.

 

Jacques LeGoff, The Birth of Purgatory, trans. Arthur Goldhammer (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984) paperback, $22.  A brilliant case-study in the development of Catholic doctrine and spirituality.  LeGoff gives lengthy excerpts from hard-to-find sources—including  entertaining examples of medieval visions and dreams of purgatory. LeGoff claims purgatory was “invented” between 1150 and 1200.

 

Sarah Jane Boss, ed., Mary: The Complete Resource (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007) hardcover, $99.  NEW.

Caroline Walker Bynum, Resurrection of the Body in Western Christianity, 200-1336 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995) paperback, $20.

Caroline Walker Bynum, Holy Feast and Holy Fast: the Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987) paperback, $20.  A path-breaking study.

Caroline Walker Bynum, Fragmentation and Redemption: Essays on Gender and the Human Body in Medieval Religion (Cambridge, MA: Zone Books, 1992) paperback, $20

Caroline Walker Bynum, ed., Last Things: Death and the Apocalypse in the Middle Ages (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000) paperback, $25.

Steven Chase, ed., Angelic Spirituality: Medieval Perspectives on the Ways of Angels, Classics of Western Spirituality (New York: Paulist Press, 2002) paperback, $30.

Celia Chazelle, The Crucified God in the Carolingian Era: Theology and Art of Christ’s Passion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001) hardcover, $70.

Giles Constable, The Reformation of the Twelfth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998) paperback, $25.

Jacques Dalarun, Robert of Arbrissel: Sex, Sin, and Salvation in the Middle Ages, trans. Bruce L. Venarde (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2006) paperback, $30.  NEW.

Richard K. Emmerson & Bernard McGinn, ed., The Apocalypse in the Middle Ages (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992).

Patrick J. Geary, Living with the Dead in the Middle Ages (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995) paperback, $17.

Patrick J. Geary, Furta Sacra: Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990) paperback, $13.

Fiona J. Griffiths, The Garden of Delights: Reform and Renaissance for Women in the Twelfth Century (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007) hardcover, $65.  NEW.

Thomas Head, Hagiography and the Cult of the Saints: the Diocese of Orleans, 800-1200 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990).

David Keck, Angels and Angelology in the Middle Ages (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998) hardcover, $45.

Kevin Madigan, The Passions of Christ in High-Medieval Thought: An Essay on Christological Development, Oxford Studies in Historical Theology (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007) hardcover, $65.  NEW.

Colin Morris, The Sepulchre of Christ and the Medieval West: From the Beginning to 1600 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005) hardcover, $99.

Jaroslav Pelikan, Mary Through the Centuries: Her Place in the History of Culture (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996) paperback, $14.

Ellen M. Ross, The Grief of God: Images of the Suffering Jesus in Late Medieval England (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997) hardcover, $50.

Miri Rubin, Corpus Christi: the Eucharist in Late Medieval Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991) paperback, $22.

Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Heaven: The Singing Silence (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997) paperback, $15.

André Vauchez, The Laity in the Middle Ages: Religious Beliefs and Devotional Practice (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1997) paperback, $18.

Benedicta Ward, Miracles and the Medieval Mind (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 1987) paperback, $20.

 

 5. GOTHIC CATHEDRALS

 

Lindy Grant, Abbot Suger of St.-Denis: Church and State in Early Twelfth-Century France (London: Longmans / Addison-Wesley, 1998), paperback, $35.  Suger was, in many respects, the inventor of the Gothic cathedral.  This is the first book-length study of his career.

 

Otto von Simson, The Gothic Cathedral, expanded edition (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988; reprint of 1964 edition) paperback, $16.  The classic study of the rise of the Gothic style, focusing on Suger’s abbey church at St. Denis and on the great cathedral of Chartres.  He shows that the key feature of Gothic is not the pointed arch or the flying buttress, but the use of light.  Some background in art history is helpful to appreciate his analyses.

 

Georges Duby, The Age of the Cathedrals: Art and Society, 980-1420, trans. Barbara Thompson (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1983) paperback, $16.  A valuable social perspective.

John Fitchen, The Construction of Gothic Cathedrals (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997) paperback, $13.

Richard Keickhefer, Theology in Stone: Church Architecture from Byzantium to Berkeley (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004) hardcover, $40.

Sumner McKnight Crosby, The Royal Abbey of Saint-Denis: from Its Beginnings to the Death of Suger, 475-1151 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 199_).

Hans Jantzen, High Gothic: the Classic Cathedrals of Chartres, Reims, Amiens (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984).

Émile Mâle, The Gothic Image: Religious Art in France in the 13th Century (New York: Harper & Row, 1972; reprint of 1913 edition).  A classic, but dated.

E. Panofsky, Abbot Suger on the Abbey Church of St. Denis and Its Art Treasures (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1946).  Translations of key texts from Suger & commentary by a great art historian.

 

 6. MEDIEVAL MUSIC

 

Gerald Abraham, ed., The New Oxford History of Music (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980s-   ).  The most thorough and up-to-date study.  Two volumes are relevant:

• Vol. 2: Richard L. Crocker & David Hiley, ed., The Early Middle Ages to 1300 and Vol. 3: Ars Nova and the Renaissance (1300-1540) (1990)  The most thorough and up-to-date study.

• Vol. 3: Anselm Hughes & Gerald Abraham, ed., Ars Nova and the Renaissance (1300-1540) (1986).

Denis Arnold, ed., The New Oxford Companion to Music (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994).

Gulio Cattin, Music of the Middle Ages I, trans. Steven Botterill (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984).

Donald Jay Grout & Claude V. Palisca, A History of Western Music, 4th ed. (New York: W.W. Norton, 1988).  The best textbook survey of the history of Western music.

John Harper, The Forms and Orders of Western Liturgy from the Tenth to the Eighteenth Century: A Historical Introduction and Guide for Students and Musicians (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991).

Richard H. Hoppin, Medieval Music, Norton Introduction to Music History (New York: W.W. Norton, 1978).

Andrew Hughes, Medieval Music: The Sixth Liberal Art (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1980).

Stanley Sadie, ed., The New Grove Dictionary of Music & Musicians, 20 vol., revised ed., (London: Grove, 1995).  The standard reference work.

 

Performances of Medieval Music: There are a number of fine musical ensembles that offer performances of medieval music: Joel Cohen & the Boston Camerata; Anonymous 4; the Martin Best Medieval Ensemble; and Sequentia.  An older, but brilliant set of performances is by David Munrow & the Early Music Consort of London; these include: The Art of Courtly Love (2CDs, Virgin Records, $19), The Art of the Netherlands (2CDs, Virgin Records, $19), Music of the Crusades (1CD, London Classics, $12), Music of the Gothic Era (1CD, Archiv, $16); and The Medieval Experience (4CDs, Archiv Records, $25).

 

 

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Revised: December 15, 2007

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