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medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture Dear Laura, You might try Dunbar H. Ogden's _The Staging of Drama in the Medieval Church_, U of Delaware Press, 2002. Best, Erick Kelemen On Friday, October 14, 2005, at 11:15 AM, Laura Jacobus wrote: > medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and > culture > > Dear John, > > I don't know the answer to your question, but if a reference comes to > light maybe I'll get back to you. The 'gradually' bit is sloppy and I > should definitely get rid of it. I do remember going to a talk by > Johannes Tripps where he mentioned how one German monastery was > compelled to put on a public performance of its drama only because the > crowd was practically rioting at the gates. There are also early-ish > church dramas (egs from Young include 13thC officium stellae, ordo > rachelis) where the rubrics make it clear that the action went on at > least in part in the nave. The whole notion of a line of > chronological development, gradual or otherwise, from performance in > choir to performance in nave is probably not useful given the huge > regional variations and difficulties in dating texts. But still, I > need to know if it's fair to say that 'most (or even 'many') early > church dramas were originally perfomed by and for the clergy in the > privacy of their choirs'. Or does anyone think they weren't? > > all best > > Laura > ----- Original Message ----- From: "John Dillon" > <[log in to unmask]> > To: <[log in to unmask]> > Sent: 14 October 2005 16:29 > Subject: Re: church dramas > > >> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and >> culture >> >> Dear Laura, >> >> I can't help you with the reference, but I do have a question >> about "the only gradually" part of your oversimplification. >> >> The earliest church dramas we have from today's Italy that are of any >> substantial length (i.e., longer than the very brief exchanges of the >> _Quem quaeritis_ trope) are all of the twelfth century. Two of these >> are relatively brief and also poorly dated: a version of the Easter >> play _Peregrinus_ and the _Officium stellae_, an Epiphany play of >> Herod. The provenance of both of these is Sicilian and, if memory >> serves, from cathedral liturgies; they're entirely in Latin. >> >> From the middle of the same century, though, we have, from south >> central Italy, the incompletely preserved _Montecassino Passion Play_, >> whose surviving text, hitherto entirely in Latin, breaks off in the >> initial lines of a _planctus Mariae_ in _volgare_. And from late in >> the same century we have the _Greater Carmina Burana Passion Play_, >> now >> thought most likely to have come from a monastery in the vicinity of >> Bressanone (Brixen) in the South Tirol; this has many lines in German. >> >> It seems quite possible that, in monastic communities in some parts of >> Europe, church plays partly accessible to the non-Latinate laity >> developed _rapidly_. But these parts of Europe may have been >> latecomers to the overall development of this genre. Was the gradual >> shift of which you were speaking already taking place in the late >> eleventh and very early twelfth centuries? >> >> Best, >> John Dillon >> >> On Friday, October 14, 2005, at 8:36 am, Laura Jacobus wrote: >> >>> In the course of somethng I'm writing at the moment, I blithely >>> wrote that 'most early church dramas were originally perfomed by >>> and for the clergy in the privacy of their choirs, only gradually >>> becoming accessible to the laity in the nave'. Something of an >>> oversimplification I know, but now I cannot find any reference to >>> this idea, though I'm sure I haven't just made it up! I thought I >>> got it from Young's Drama of the M/E Church, where I thought it >>> was coupled with the idea was that the dramas could be understood >>> as a form of participatory devotion- but can't find it there >>> now! Does this idea ring any bells? >>> >>> Laura >> >> >> ********************************************************************** >> To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME >> to: [log in to unmask] >> To send a message to the list, address it to: >> [log in to unmask] >> To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion >> to: [log in to unmask] >> In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: >> [log in to unmask] >> For further information, visit our web site: >> http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html > > ********************************************************************** > To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME > to: [log in to unmask] > To send a message to the list, address it to: > [log in to unmask] > To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion > to: [log in to unmask] > In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: > [log in to unmask] > For further information, visit our web site: > http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html > ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME to: [log in to unmask] To send a message to the list, address it to: [log in to unmask] To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion to: [log in to unmask] In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: [log in to unmask] For further information, visit our web site: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html