The Maid of Orleans and Crusading
The Maid of Orleans and Crusading: reflections on a colloquium La France et l’Orient au temps de Jeanne d’Arc. Idéaux pacifiques et réalités guerrières, Rouen, 29 May 2015 Meeting in the splendid surroundings of the Salle des États in Rouen’s recently opened ‘Historial Jeanne d’Arc’, the speakers at this colloquium gave their attention to a […]
A tale of three cities: Constantinople 1453, Belgrade 1456, Olomouc 1468
A tale of three cities: Constantinople 1453, Belgrade 1456, Olomouc 1468 In my essay ‘Giovanni da Capistrano and the crusade of 1456’, published in 2004 in Crusading in the Fifteenth Century, ed. Norman Housley, I briefly (pp. 112-13) made reference to a fresco in the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Olomouc. The church, which […]
Two fifteenth-century prelates and crusading – Piccolomini and Cusa
Two fifteenth-century prelates and crusading – Piccolomini and Cusa The Church produced some outstanding figures in the fifteenth century and none more so than Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini (1405-64), who became pope in 1458 as Pius II, and Nicholas of Cusa (1401-64), who was made cardinal in 1448. They make for an interesting comparison. Piccolomini hailed […]
The perils of performance management in fifteenth-century Germany
The perils of performance management in fifteenth-century Germany The Council of Constance (1414-18) is famous for bringing the Great Schism to an end and for burning the Czech reformer Jan Hus, precipitating the series of Hussite crusades (1420-31). But the council also called for the reform of Catholic Europe’s plethora of religious orders, and in […]
A Crusading Richard III ?
A crusading Richard III? In the spring of 1484 Richard III’s position on the throne of England was as secure as it would ever be. He had put down a rebellion against his usurpation a few months previously and was doing what he could to get Henry Tudor ousted from his exile in Brittany. […]
As the year ends … more 2013 anniversaries
As the year ends … more 2013 anniversaries An earlier entry to this blog pointed out that 2013 marks the 800th anniversary of the issue of Quia Maior, one of the key texts in the development of crusading. But there are other significant anniversaries to record before the last stroke of midnight on 31 December. […]
Crusading in Kraków, 18-19 November 2013
‘Holy war and cultural transformation in late medieval and early modern East-Central Europe’ The glorious medieval city of Kraków was the setting for this stimulating conference organised jointly by Mainz’s Johannes Gutenberg University and Kraków’s Jesuit University Ignatianum. It was fascinating to see how the themes explored at Kraków – in papers presented by colleagues […]
Eight centuries on: remembering the encyclical Quia maior 1213
Exactly 800 years ago, and irrespective of the host of problems they were already battling with – ranging from predatory aristocrats to failing harvests – the prelates of medieval Christendom had to find time to absorb the content and think through the implications of a remarkable encyclical that arrived from Rome. This was Quia […]
The 800 martyrs of Otranto, the Vatican and the Turks
‘As we venerate the martyrs of Otranto, let us ask God to sustain the many Christians who, today and in many parts of the world, now, still suffer from violence, and to give them the courage to be devout and to respond to evil with good’. Pope Francis, 12 May 2013 The Pope’s canonisation of […]
Creating Croatia
For further information on the symposium that I write about here, see: http://www2.le.ac.uk/departments/mrc/events/croatia-and-europe These are exciting times for Croatia. In June 1991 the country declared its independence from Yugoslavia, triggering that state’s demise. The founding fathers of the new Croatia were reasserting a sovereign status that their ancestors had lost as far back as 1102, […]
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