Dear Prof. Landes,
Thanks for replying to my query about the famine. Can you give me
citations from the Miracles of Benedict and Adhemar? I will duly check
these when I can get them here, but that will be a couple of weeks.
My problem with Glaber is that he in fact _does_ say the famine lasts three
years, but begins it in 1033: in 1033 all the celebrities die, and the
famine begins some time later, "sequenti itaque tempore." Glaber of course
has no problem telling us that a famine begins in 1033, lasts 3 years, and
ends in 1033, just as he has no problem conflating forty years of the peace
movement into one. So the question is whether we decide it begins in 1033,
or ends then. It's more important to Glaber to end it there ("Anno a
passione Domini millesimo, memorate cladis penurias subsequente, sedatis
nimborum imbribus" outweighs the vague "sequenti . . . tempore"), but since
he also begins it there, I was wondering what the general opinion of the
dates of the famine is, if such are possible. I'm wishing I had a copy of
your book here to sort this out.
Gratefully,
Patrick Nugent.
>At 04:07 PM 9/22/98 -0500, you wrote:
>>I need a quick answer to a question that I'd otherwise have to research by
>>getting a couple books from Inter-Library Loan, and I haven't the time --
>>so pardon my laziness by posing it here:
>>
>>What is the date (or do we know the date) of the famine Ralph Glaber tells
>>about with such relish in _Historiae_ 4.10 ff? The previous paragraph
>>notes the deaths of several clebrities in the year 1033, but the account
>>of the famine proper begins with an unhelpful "sequenti itaque tempore."
>
>according to him it was 3 years long, from 1030-33. we have corroborating,
>but not chronologically specific evidence on the length of it from both the
>miracles of st. benedict (loire valley) and ademar of chabannes (aquitaine).
>
>rlandes
>Richard Landes
>Boston University
>History Department
>617-353-2558 (of)
>617-353-2556 (fax)
>
>Center for Millennial Studies at Boston University
>704 Commonwealth Ave. Room 205
>http://www.mille.org/
>[log in to unmask]
>617-358-0226 (of)
>617-358-0225 (fax)
__________________________
Patrick J. Nugent
Department of Religion
Earlham College
Richmond, Indiana 47374 USA
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