The Christianization of Germanic peoples, and vice-versa, the
Germanicization of Christianity, is a complex subject well worth study
and thought. Debates over the survival of "paganism" into the
"Christian" era continue to range along a wide spectrum. At one end are
those who argue for a strong and continuous, sometimes underground,
practice of paganism despite the growth of Christianity. At the other
end are those who emphasize the success of Christianity's adaptation and
dominance, especially in the sources that remain to us.
A good deal of this debate centers on problems of definition. First
of all, "paganism" does not exist--it is a label used by medieval
Christian authors to speak of non-Christian peoples they described
pejoratively. It is nearly impossible to reconstruct these religions
from the Christian documentary sources themselves--Bede is particularly
suspect (many question whether he had any direct information on
so-called pagan practices). What we know of pre- or non-Christian
religious practices in Europe can be gleaned from a combination of
archaeological artifacts, the literature of late-converting peoples (eg
Scandinavians), and references in Christian sources (penitentials,
medical texts, condemnations in sermons, etc).
Second, what is "Christianity" is questioned as well: much of what
has been written about the survival of paganism concerns practices
accepted as Christian at the time by many people, even if they don't fit
our notion of "pure" Christianity (whatever that is). My own views on
this are in my book on elf charms (Popular Religion in Late Saxon
England: Elf Charms in Context).
I can suggest a few of my favorite books, and some with which I
disagree completely but represent arguments from one end of the spectrum
or the other:
Gale R. Owen, Rites and Religions of the Anglo-Saxons, and H. R.
Ellis Davidson, Myths and Symbols in Pagan Europe: Early Scandinavian
and Celtic Religions have good surveys of the non-Christian religions of
early British Isles and Scandinavia.
E. G. Stanley's The Search for Anglo-Saxon Paganism (Cambridge:
D.S. Brewer, 1975) was also published earlier as a series of articles in
Notes and Queries 11 (1964): 205-209, 242-250, 282-87, 324-31 and 12
(1965): 9-17, 203-07, 285-93, 322-27.
John van Engen, "The Christian Middle Ages as an Historiographical
Problem," American Historical Review 91 (1986), 519-52.
Peter Brown, anything by him, but try first: The Rise of Western
Christendom (1996), and Authority and the Sacred (1995).
Karras, Ruth Mazo, "Pagan Survivals and Syncretism in the Conversion
of Saxony, " Catholic Historical Review 72 (1986): 553-72.
Valerie Flint, The Rise of Magic in Early Medieval Europe
(Princeton, 1991).
see also a review article by Alexander Murray, "Missionaries and
Magic in Dark Age Europe," Past and Present 136 (1992), 186-205.
and Giselle de Nie, "Caesarius of Arles and Gregory of Tours: Two
Sixth-Century Gallic Bishops and `Christian Magic,'" in Cultural
Identity and Cultural Integration: Ireland and Europe in the Early
Middle Ages, ed. Doris Edel (1995).
Russell, James C., The Germanization of Early Medieval
Christianity: A Sociohistorical Approach to Religious Transformation
(Oxford, 1994). I didn't care for the sociohistorical approach.
Jeffrey Russell did a review of it, but I can't remember where.
The Pagan Middle Ages, ed. Ludo J. R. Milis. essays translated from
Dutch. uneven in quality and leaning toward the survival of paganism
side, but a nice one on archaeology by A. Dierkens.
I haven't had a chance to read it yet, but I also have Prudence
Jones and Nigel Pennick, A History of Pagan Europe (Routledge, 1995).
The dust jacket says that it pulls together "the fragmented sources of
Europe's native religions" to "establish the coherence and continuity of
the Pagan world vision" as a challenge to traditional Christian
history. In this sense, I think they are inventing "pagan" as a
contiuous tradition by broadening the definition of pagan in line with
post-modern religious sensibilities.
Sorry to go on at length with excessive readings!
Karen Jolly
--
Dr. Karen Jolly
Associate Professor, History
University of Hawai`i at Manoa
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http://www2.hawaii.edu/~kjolly
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