medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (3. May) is the feast day of:
1) Philip and James (the Less), apostles (d. 1st cent.). P. comes fifth in lists of the apostles in the synoptic gospels and at Acts 1:13. Early tradition made him the evangelist of Phrygia, martyred at Hieropolis (today's Pamukkale in Turkey). J. is the James "cousin of the Lord" and, in Western tradition (for the most part), the son of Alpheus/Clopas (Eusebius and others distinguish these two, making the first the bishop of Jerusalem martyred in 62 and the second the apostle). He has a prominent position in Acts and is the traditional author of the Epistle that bears his name.
P. and J. have had a joint Western feast in early May since the sixth century. Until 1955, this fell on 1. May. Rome's much rebuilt church of the Santi Apostoli was built in the pontificates of Pelagius I (556-61) and John III (561-74) and was initially dedicated to P. and J. Herewith some perhaps less familiar dedications to them (sometimes as J. and P.):
The perhaps originally eleventh-century church of J. and P. at Ossuccio (CO) in the island of Comacina in the Lago di Como in Lombardy:
http://tinyurl.com/57xq37
An illustrated, Italian-language account of this church:
http://www.romanicomo.it/ossuccio.htm
The chapel of P. and J. in the remains of the royal pleasure place (twelfth-century; restored, 1990) of Maredolce at Favara on the outskirts of Palermo:
Plan:
http://tinyurl.com/2jebgu
Views:
http://tinyurl.com/34b6r9
http://tinyurl.com/363zjb
http://tinyurl.com/2rpnmp
http://tinyurl.com/39qol9
A brief, English-language introduction to the site:
http://tinyurl.com/3cxmrs
Another former chapel dedicated to P. and J. is their originally twelfth-century church at Castellina (PT) in Tuscany, once serving a now vanished castle:
http://www.castellinadiserravalle.it/storia%20castelina.htm
From slightly later in the twelfth century is the church of P. and J. (also J. and P.) at Montecastelli Pisano (SI), another castle church in Tuscany:
http://www.incontro-montecastelli.it/Montecastelli.html
http://tinyurl.com/3vq82a
There's a brief account of it in Italian here:
http://tinyurl.com/3dy2tc
In this aerial view, it's just to the left of center:
http://tinyurl.com/23zkzv
More views here:
http://tinyurl.com/3zfomu
The later thirteenth-century church of J. and P. at Andora (SV) on the Riviera Ligure in Liguria:
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/4763084
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9251209@N06/2389521122/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9251209@N06/2388693137/
Several views here, on a page devoted to the adjacent castle:
http://tinyurl.com/4nmb3h
The originally eleventh-century old church of P. and J., rebuilt from 1389 onward, at Verzuolo (CN) in Piedmont (there's a new one as well, from the early eighteenth century):
http://www.ghironda.com/saluzzo/mista/mist3-04.jpg
http://tinyurl.com/6kuu6k
http://tinyurl.com/6h5tvo
http://tinyurl.com/5o35xb
http://tinyurl.com/6hveft
The church of P. and J. in Naz-Sciaves (TN; German: Natz-Schabs) in the South Tirol, consecrated in 1208 to Sts. Philip and Walburga and rebuilt in the fifteenth century:
http://tinyurl.com/37grlz
2) Alexander (I), Eventius, and Theodulus (d. ca. 115). A. was the first pope of this name. He has a wholly legendary Passio (BHL 266) which exists in many versions. E. and T. are his companions in martyrdom in some of these as well as in his entries in the _Liber Pontificalis_ and the (pseudo-)Hieronymian Martyrology. All three are said in the Passio to have been buried at their place of execution at the seventh milestone on the Via Nomentana. The LP and the (ps.-)HM repeat this location, where in the seventh century the _Itinerarium Malmesburiense_ told readers they still reposed.
A. became a saint of the Regno sometime between 1075 and 1102, the period during which his mausoleum was constructed at today's Corfinio (AQ) in Abruzzo next to the cathedral of San Pelino. That was, and is, a co-cathedral of the diocese of Valva (now the diocese of Valva and Sulmona), whose bishop at this time was the powerful abbot of San Clemente a Casauria. If the the abbey could have the remains of a martyred early pope, why not the diocese? Some exterior views of the mausoleum, sandwiched between the Torre Sant'Alessandro and the cathedral proper:
http://tinyurl.com/2m59k2
http://tinyurl.com/64hdgo
http://tinyurl.com/326m2p
There's a brief, Italian-language description of the mausoleum here:
http://www.abruzzoheritage.com/magazine/2001_11/0111_a_it.htm
and a plan of both the cathedral and the mausoleum here:
http://tinyurl.com/5v8e2k
3) Juvenal of Narni (?). J. is the legendary protobishop of Narni (TR) in southern Umbria. According to his imaginative Vita (BHL 4614), he migrated to Italy from Africa and saved his city from North Italian invaders, descendants of previous occupants who had been driven out under Augustus. Their end is accomplished in truly spectacular fashion: not just rain, but also thunder and lots of lightning bolts, plus jets of water rising up from dry ground and, finally, the earth opening up and swallowing 3000 of them. Narni's originally twelfth-century cathedral is dedicated to J. Here's the Italia nell'Arte Medievale page on this structure, consecrated in 1145 and reworked in the fifteenth century:
http://tinyurl.com/6fokye
More views (not expandable) are here:
http://members.tripod.com/romeartlover/Narni2.html
And others (expandable) are in the top three rows here:
http://www.iviaggidellupo.it/narni.htm
Orvieto's chiesa di San Giovenale (begun in 1004) is thought to have been that city's former cathedral. Here's an Italian-language account with an expandable exterior view:
http://www.comune.orvieto.tr.it/accessibile/i/389FDC5A.htm
Another illustrated, Italian-language account with some views of the interior:
http://tinyurl.com/4gpqnz
Two other views:
http://tinyurl.com/2l7ag4
http://tinyurl.com/54g75b
The locality of San Giovenale near Blera (VT) in northern Lazio took its name from a medieval chapel dedicated to J., now a ruin. Herewith some views:
http://tinyurl.com/2vx3bd
http://www.speleoblog.it/img/cappella-san-giovenale.jpg
http://www.cinquantini.it/esperant/blera/epokoj/sangioch.jpg
Not at all a ruin is the San Giovenale Triptych (1422) in the pieve di San Pietro at Cascia di Reggello (FI) in Tuscany. Attributed to Masaccio, it is thought to have been commissioned for Florence's chiesa di San Giovenale. An English-language description with an expandable view of the object is here (J. at right, next to St. Anthony Abbot):
http://tinyurl.com/2kfmfz
A slightly larger view:
http://tinyurl.com/ywpgzx
A three-page, English-language discussion of the piece:
http://www.masaccio2001.it/cgi-bin/english/trittico.shtml
And an illustrated, Italian-language page (expandable views) on the church:
http://www.storiaecultura.it/cornucopia/plebati/plcascia.htm
4) Ansfried of Utrecht (d. ca. 1008). According to his brief, nearly contemporary Vita (BHL 0543; verse portion: BHL 0543d) by Alpert of Metz, A. (also Ansfrid; Latin: Ansfridus, Anfridus, Aufridus) was a count in Brabant and a man of great rectitude who was made bishop of Utrecht, lived a holy life, operated a few miracles, suffered blindness late in life, and bore that affliction with equanimity.
A. is credited with the founding of what became the imperial abbey of Thorn in today's Thorn (Limburg). An illustrated, English-language page on the former abbey is here (most of the views are at the bottom):
http://www.christusrex.org/www1/splendors/thorn/thorn.html
And a model of the abbey "as it once was" (thanks, Wikipedia, for that chronological precision!) is here:
http://tinyurl.com/484ckx
Best,
John Dillon
(Philip and James, Alexander, Eventius, and Theodulus, and Juvenal of Narni lightly revised from older posts)
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