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MEDIEVAL-RELIGION  February 1998

MEDIEVAL-RELIGION February 1998

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Subject:

Re: FEAST 12 February

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Date:

Mon, 16 Feb 1998 18:15:52 +0000

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> > * Julian the Hospitaller (no date)
> > - after accidentally killing his mother and father, he made
> > penance by constructing (with his wife) a hospital; popular
> > cult in the Low Countries and northern France
>
> St. Julian pops up a lot in medieval lit--Chaucer, Gawain-poet, et. al.
> He accidentally kills his mother and father due to mistaken identity, but
> does anyone know the details of this event?

He is quite fascinating, a sort of combination of St Eustace and
Oedipus. In one version (e.g. Golden Legend), like Eustace, Hubert,
etc., the young nobleman, Julian, had a cathartic experience while
out hunting, when a stag he was chasing turned around and addressed
him: "Are you tracking me to kill me, you who are going to kill your
father and mother?" Fearing this prophesy might come true, he
abandoned everything and secretly went off to a very remote region,
took service with a prince, who knighted him, gave him a noble widow
to wed, and a castle as dowry. (Another version has his
parents confiding him to the care of the prince, whom he served
faithfully, and after the death of the prince, Julian married
his widow.) Meanwhile, Julian's parents searched everywhere for him,
and eventually came to his very castle. As it happened, Julian was
away (at war, according to some versions), but his wife met them and
asked who they were, and upon hearing their story realized they were
her husband's parents. She welcomed them as honourably as she could,
giving up her and her husband's bed (Jacopus de Voragine, whose
account I am principally encapsulating, says simply "her husband's
bed") to her guests. Julian arrived home one morning, while his wife
was at church, and finding a couple in his bed, assumed they were his
wife and her lover, and slew them. Leaving the castle, he saw his
wife returning, and discovered the horrible truth. He immediately
decided to leave his wife and go off on a permanent pilgrimage of
penance, but his wife convinced him to take her, as well. They
wandered until they came to a dangerous river (St Christopher, here),
and set up a hospice and ferry service. One freezing night, the
exhausted Julian heard a voice outside calling his name and asking
for transport. Julian carried the infirm, leprous stranger inside,
and fearing that he might die, put him in his own bed. A short while
later, the stranger rose in splendour into mid-air and proclaimed:
"Julian, the Lord sent me to tell you that he has accepted your
penance, and that both of you will, in a little time, find rest in
the Lord." (Another version has Christ himself visiting the hostel.)
Julian and his wife duly died shortly thereafter.
Colette Manhes-Deremble, in her recent book Les vitraux narratifs de
la cathedrale de Chartres (Paris, 1993), comments that, although
Julian is not strongly represented in liturgical calendars, his cult
was quite widespread in the early 13th century, and there are several
surviving stained glass windows dedicated to him (Chartres, Rouen).
Among reasons for this popularity, she cites the fact that, again
like Eustace, he was a fairly rare example of a married saint, and
the themes of pilgrimage and penance in his vita were also important.
She connects the importance of marriage at this time with Philippe
Auguste's repudiation of Ingeborg and Innocent III's subsequent
pronouncements on the sanctity of marriage. She also points out,
however, that although his penance was about the only thing in the
vita to merit canonization, and although his wife, Basilisse, shared
in this with him, washing the feet of the poor and awaiting Christ
with a lighted lamp, she is never represented nimbed and was only
occasionally considered as a saint in her own right (how sexist!).
The St Julian window in Chartres Cathedral was given by woodworkers
of various sorts, presumably attracted to Julian because he built a
hostel; the donors are shown at the bottom of the window building a
house. Besides carpenters, Julian was also apparently popular amongst
innkeepers and "jongleurs". Manhes-Deremble lists in her
bibliography the following sources: Zur Legende vom heiligen
Julianus, A. Tobler, ed., Archiv fur studium der neueren Sprachen und
Litteraturen, CII (Braunschweig, 1899); Prosafassung (die) der
Legende vom heiligen Julian, R. Tobler, ed., Archiv fur studium der
neueren Sprachen und Litteraturen, VII [sic] (Braunschweig, 1901),
pp. 80-102; Vie de saint Julien, J.-P. Gilson (Newcastel, 1908); Fr.
Halkin, "La Passion ancienne des saints Julien et Basilisse",
Analecta Bollandiana, 98 (1980), pp. 5-17.
I've never quite managed to figure out why and at what time he was
considered a saint. He is certainly one of the odder medieval
saints.
Cheers,
Jim Bugslag


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