Medieval Disney

I am not ashamed, and proud to state that I love Disney cartoons. Maybe the fact that I am well acquainted with Disney is the reason that I see references to the cartoons even when there are none. In either case when studying Middle Ages I tend to find many medieval themes best shown and battled with in Disney cartoons. 

For example this is how J.Y.Gregg describes the medieval male attitude towards women

'As both the object and stimulus of sexual desire, women presented a ubiquitous peril. Like the devil, drawing men to their spiritual death under a variety of ingenious or pleasant guises, woman appeared to a celibate clergy as a perverse, demonic paradox.' (Gregg 1997:99)

Now compare it with the lyrics of “Hellfire’ From Hunchback of Notre Dame 

The idea of ‘The Other’ plays an important role in medieval studies. In essence the other was anyone who was not a white Christian male in other words ‘The Other’ was not of the same type as the dominant human ‘not like us’. I still believe that the idea and its consequences are best summed up in these two songs from Pocahontas.

I have to admit that this fascination with Disney and bringing everything to Disney found its way in to one of my essays where I talked about hybridity and ended up comparing this:

Abraham’s vision, St John’s Psalter (England, c. 1270-80)

Cambridge, St John’s College, MS K.26, fol. 9

With this

And here is that conclusion:

The artist who made the illumination for St John’s Psalter did not intend for the Trinity to look monstrous, the image is pleasant and if the three heads are ignored its physiognomy is that of the perfect human. However Vultus Trifon is a very explicit type of deformity, as the whole form rather than a detail is distorted. Besides without a context it can be interpreted as good or evil. Interestingly the idea that the good and the evil should have completely different forms is still manifest today. A parallel can be drawn with contemporary children’s cartoons where the representations of good and bad characters should be noticeably different to help the young viewers. For example in Disney’s Little Mermaid the negative character is the only one to have an octopus’ lower body, this distinguishes her from the positive merpeople. Her dark colour palate further emphasises the difference and intensifies her evil nature. This parallel can be further extended by the observation that in the cartoon both the good and the bad are hybrids. Hybridity in itself is not bad, as was already mentioned angels in essence are hybrids, hybridity helps intensify the divinity, and create a feeling of wonder. However the same form cannot be used to represent both ultimate good and ultimate evil, for God and for the Devil.

And again I feel obliged to conclude that Disney makes everything better and it is everywhere.

Once Upon a Sermon.

"in the time of Valencia there was a lovely maiden named Thais [sounds like a fairy tale doesn't it? In a second it will go horribly wrong] whose mother put her out to be a prostitute at a young age."

Marginal prostitution scene, Psalter (Ghent, c.1320-1330), Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Douce 6, fol. 160v (detail)

Medieval sermons are starting to scare me, they all start out nice a cherry and then go horribly wrong but the author never acknowledges it, and continues talking in the same sing song voice (or at least that's the voice I use in my head when reading those sermons). And by the end of the sermon I end up sitting and staring at the page thinking 

 Maybe its because I am used to contemporary literary genres that the medieval sermons come across as completely random and unpredictable. for example there is one where a pilgrim asks in for a night and while sitting by the fire with his host and son he randomly throws the kid in to the fire where he is burnt alive. It turns out that the pilgrim was the devil.

Another one, though understandable when considering the medieval concerns of chastity sounds extremely misogynistic to the 21st century reader. In the sermon the father locks his son away and when the boy grew up he sees women for the first time:

"And when young women and maidens came before him and he saw them, he asked eagerly what they were. And those who were there answered and said, "These are the devils that beguile men."" 

In the end we find out that the fathers plan to keep the son chaste miserably failed and he probably raised a womanizer, the sermon concludes with the kid saying:

"father, truly nothing  else but the devils that deceive men, for on them above all others is my heart set."

Of course there are multiple sermons about the females staying chaste thought they are more politically correct and more about suicide and self mutilation.

For example one sermon tells about a nun who had beautiful eyes and a nobleman fell in love with her because of her eyes to keep herself chaste she tore her eyes out and gave them to him.

Eyeless in Col Alto, 1994, Sally Mann

But my favorite one is The Virgin Defends a Matron against the Devil [ a story so wrong that the Devil comes across as having a moral high ground]
And here is the story in full:

p.s. As for the girl Thais everything ended well for her.

Book of the day: J.Y.Gregg, Devils, Women and Jews: Reflections of the Other in Medieval Sermon Stories, (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997). Sermons which appeared in this post are sermons W31, D5, W23, W29, W35.

A woman, a child, a dragon :random imaginations

Jacob Elsner, Wild woman, Gradual ('Geese Book'), (Nuremburg, 1507), New York, Morgan Library, MSM. 905, f.122.

I cannot emphasize enough how much I like this image, I thinks on of the greatest visual works I have ever seen because it makes my imagination run wild. I keep imagining what events could have possibly happened to lead to this scene.

We have a Wild woman catching a dragon by the tail and raising her club, and a female dragon holding a baby. Notice that she is holding the baby gently almost playfully with no seeming intention to devour it. Here are the scenarios I came up so far:

Scenario 1: a crazy wannabe mommy.

The dragon is one of those crazy females that try to steal babies from hospitals. So while the wild woman was not looking she nicked the kid and now the mother wants her baby back.

Scenario 2: Wild Flintstones.

Do you remember that cartoon? And how the cavemen family had a pet Dino? Maybe this is the medieval version? The Wild Family has a pet dragon Draco and she wanted to play with the child because this is what pets do, and the mommy decided to join in to the fun time.

Scenario 3: Wild woman to the rescue.

What I find confusing is the child being hairless. It may be that it is a human child and that the dragon kidnapped it and the Wild Female is trying to rescue the baby.

Jenny



The Luttrell monsters

Yesterday in the stupid hours of the night I literally stumbled across a facsimile of the Luttrell psalter in the library. [when I say stumble I mean it, somebody left it on the floor where they were sitting and I tripped over it]

I will not go in to detail about the manuscript as it is ridiculously famous (especially for its marginalia) and its easy to find information about it on the web and in any library. The manuscript itself was created for Geoffrey Luttrell around 1325-1335.

Geoffrey Luttrell with his wife and daughter in law. Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 202 v.

I have seen a couple of images from the psalter before and to tell the truth because they were mostly the peasant/farming scenes I never felt inclined to search it out and study. Yet after it tripped me over and I was searching for an excuse to procrastinate I decided to give it a go. 

It is one of the most exquisite awesome things I have ever seen. There are no full page illuminations but the marginalia images are to die for. So bright, so humorous, so colourful! So imaginative! Seriously contemporary imagination is put to shame compared to the craziness that is happening on Luttrell borders. I applaude the workshop that had such extensive imagination to create so many hybrids with no two similar. I can probably sing praises for another few paragraphs so I will stop writing here and just upload the the images for them to be judged in their own right.

And we shall start with two UNICORNS!!!

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 15 r.

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 179r.

I have no idea what it is but I think its cute.

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 24r. 

The Martyrdom of St Bartholomew

The martyrdom of St Bartholomew. Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 103v.

This image still give me the chills thought to be fair the skinned Bartholomew is probably scarier in Michelangelo's image, but this one is more graphic in that it shows the actual process of skinning.

Michelangelo, Last Judgment, 1531-1541, Fresco, Sistine Chapel, Vatican (Detail)

 I really like this hybrid bunny.

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 156v.

 Bunny Hill! 

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 176v.

 The two bunnies on the top remind me of South Park's Christmas Critters. 

South Park Christmas Critter

nom nom!

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 192r.

More funnzies

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 145r.

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 148r.

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 38r.

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 64v.

This one I find very flirty, its as if she is playfully posing. I can almost see it fit well on the contemporary red carpet, (compared to Lady Gaga I dont thing anyone will even notice it)

Luttrell Psalter, Diocese of Lincoln, c.1325-1335, London British Library, Add MS 42130, fol 81r.

In the end all I can say is I found my new favourite procrastination book, if only it was less heavy.


Jenny


Book of the day: M.P. Brown, Luttrell Psalter/; a facsimile, London : British Library, 2006.  

Like Johnny

Sitting in the library with greasy hair and hipster glasses, looking at medieval manuscript illuminations: I feel like Johnny Depp in 9th Gate.

I feel like Donestre

I do have some weird fascination with monsters; I still throw a glance at my wardrobe to make sure that there is no Boogieman before going to sleep. 

The Boogieman found on the Madrid Fashion Week 2009 catwalk.

 The word ‘Monster’ is believed to come from the Latin monstro meanings ‘to show’, ‘to demonstrate’, the idea being that monsters show outside themselves. Maybe it is because they are meant to be signs that they are so easy to relate to. Despite the almost 1000 year gap between the scribe of Marvels of the East manuscript and me and the fact that the monsters and concerns of 21^st century are different from 1050, I found myself relating to this guy:

Donestre devouring a traveler (bottom right) and crying over the dismembered head (bottom left) from Marvels of the East (Anglo-Saxon, c. 1050)
London, British Library, MS Cotton Tiberius B. v., fol. 83v.

Donestre weeping over the head, Notice the look of pity and guilt.

 Donestre were believed to be multilingual and when travelers came across them they would greet foreigners in their language. Once they gained the travelers trust they devoured their body. And then in a radical display of consciousness they would weep over the disembodied head. 

I find this story touching and right now Donestre can be the symbol of my day, no not because I devoured someone. Well I did devour far to many sweets and now I am sitting surrounded by wrappers stirring in my own guilt. So Donestre can be a symbol of everyone who regrets eating too much too soon.  

Another reason is that I was really looking forward to studying today as I have an awesome book to read, yet after switching on the computer I spent half of the day procrastinating. and now I keep looking at the time, the book and the computer guilty of my laziness. And I know that while its weeks till the exam I will be happily procrastinating ( Donestre devouring the body) once its down to days I will feel guilty and spend the rest of the time until exam blaming myself ( Donestre crying over the head). 

Jenny

Book of the day: Debra H. Strickland, Saracens, Demons and Jews, Princeton, N.J. ; Oxford : Princeton University Press, 2003.

The Cathedral car trip: East Coast of England

In less than a month my exams end and I will be celebrating this with a car trip from Glasgow to London through the churches on the East coast of England.

So far the stops are as follows:

1) Rosslyn chapel (yes the lovely 15th century church that was mentioned in the-book-that-should-not-be-named)

2) Jedburgh abbey

3) Hexham Abbey

4) Corbridge (has Roman ruins)

5) Newcastle

6) Durham

7) Fountains Abbey (the abbey I am dying to see since second year)

8) Harrogate

9) York

10) Gimsby (a church closely connected with Lincoln cathedral by a legend)

11) Lincoln

12) Norwich

13) Ely

14) Canterbury

15) London

Jenny