Medieval Performance

This unit we will be discussing performance, drama, and theatre in the Middle Ages. But what do we mean by “medieval theatre?” We are talking about a time period that spans approximately 1000 years. These are theatrical or dramatic activities that exist in more than a dozen languages and a variety of genres. In this unit, we will learn about some of these genres and discuss two plays: Hrotsvit of Gandersheim’s Dulcitius and the French farce Cooch E. Whippet.

Religious Plays: Corpus Christi and Cycle Plays

The types of performance in the Middle Ages can be roughly separated into two categories: religious plays and secular plays. Religious plays could arise from existing spectacle, pageantry, and ceremony, such as the Corpus Christi pageant. Corpus Christi is a Christian feast in honor of the Eucharist as the blood and body of Christ and was established in 1264. The Mass on the Feast of Corpus Christi is typically followed by a procession of the Blessed Sacrament, or the body and blood of Christ in the form of blessed bread and wine, which is displayed in an ornamental vessel called a monstrance. Most Protestant denominations do not recognize the Feast of Corpus Christi, but the feast day is still celebrated by the Catholic Church.

The Feast of Corpus Christi was associated with cycle plays. Cycle plays began as biblical dramatizations – the earliest example was Quem quaeritis, or “Whom do you seek?” from 925 – but evolved into a series of plays featuring significant stories from the Old and New Testaments, such as the Creation and the Last Judgement. In 1210, the pope forbade the clergy from performing onstage, so secular guilds took control of organizing and putting on these town-wide cycle plays.

The cycle plays of York are one of approximately four extant cycle plays that were performed on the Feast of Corpus Christi. Traditionally each guild would be responsible for one play. For example, the fishers would perform the story of Noah and the Ark, the butchers would perform the Mortification and Burial of Christ, and the carpenters would perform the Resurrection. There were a total of 48 plays spanning from Creation to the Last Judgement. The cycle plays in York were suppressed after King Henry VIII split from the Catholic Church and established the Anglican Church in the 1530s, but there have been several modern revival movements and performances of these cycle plays.

Other medieval religious plays included hagiographic plays, which dramatized the lives of saints. As we will see in the next section, and as you read for the primary source readings for this unit, Hrotsvit of Gandersheim’s Dulcitius draws heavily from the Christian hagiographic tradition.

Secular Plays: Farce

Religious plays were not the only plays performed in the Middle Ages. Farces were secular (i.e. non-religious) plays which focused on the daily lives of peasants and domestic situations. These plays were characterized by bawdy, slapstick humor and absurd situations. In particular, emphasis was placed on sex and bodily functions, so the texts are full of innuendos and double entendres.

As a specific genre of comedy, farce plays had a set of stock characters and themes. For example, a shrewish wife, cuckold husband, and lustful priest (as we saw in Cooch E. Whippet) were common character types in farces. Similarly, themes of trickery, adultery, marital authority, absurd bets, misogyny, and sexual violence were common throughout the genre. The farce was not solely for entertainment: these often obscene and ridiculous stories answered, in a humorous way, some of the most controversial questions of the Middle Ages including questions about politics, religious, class structure, and authority between men and women.

Jody Enders, the translator of several farce plays, suggests that The Farce of Martin of Cambray answers the questions about what a woman should do “about that dolt of a husband who’s always locking you up inside the house” (Enders 3). The farce is based on a famous proverb about Martin de Cambray who was a cuckold who was mocked for being “belted at the ass.”

It is important to note that the style of translation Jody Enders attempts is very non-traditional. She calls her translation “anything-but-literal” and translates for sense and is not translating the text literally. This is why you will see references to American popular culture and slang pop up throughout the text.

Education in the Middle Ages

 Hi everyone! I hope you all are having a good week. Just wanted to remind everyone that your next assignment that is due is your Source Analysis 4 that’s due tonight at 11:59PM. Additionally, Essay Two is due Tuesday April 6, so keep that on your calendars. Anyhow, today we will be discussing Education in the Middle Ages.  

 

For background, here’s what a traditional Roman education looked like. Ancient Rome had a bit of public education for something like elementary school. However, there was also tutoring and private school afterwards for people who had enough money – which was a decent chunk of Roman society, actually. They didn’t have to pay out the wazoo for a good education. All of these options were available to boys and girls, and one can assume that most free people in the Roman Empire had some kind of formal education.  

 

Cassiodorus was a very important figure in terms of advancing knowledge for the Romans, and his thoughts were carried well into the Middle Ages. Cassiodorus was the son of a fifth-century Roman provincial governor. For a while he was employed by Visigothic kings in Italy, but as you remember from the beginning of the semester, those were turbulent times and kings kept getting deposed. So, he decided to turn his attention elsewhere and learn a bunch of stuff instead. He attempted to found a Christian school in Rome, and failed, but what he did manage to do was bring together a bunch of monks and establish a library of Christian literature. His Institutes of Divine and Human Readings set out a plan of both sacred and secular studies, and books to support these studies. It was a distinctive mix of Roman school texts and early Chrisian authors, and this mix became the predominate basis for most curriculum in medieval education. 

 

During the Early Middle Ages, little formal education was taking place during this period, and most of it occurred within monasteries. The definition of monastery provided in your readings packet is given to you on the slide as well. See, in order to read and understand the Bible in its entirety, you need a whole lot of background knowledge: history, geography, poetry, etc. So, with the absence of schools and the increasing number of child oblates, children who were given into the care of the monastery to become monks, monks kind of became the de facto teachers. Benedict’s Rule, for example, organized learning around the liturgical calendar (annual cycle of the Christian church, focusing on major Catholic holidays such as Easter and Christmas) which lead to increased reading and education in monasteries. The aim of monks educating secular folk is to change them into men and women who would honor God and help them serve as examples to other Christians. This idea of imbuing daily, regular people actions with more spiritual significance is called conversatio.  

 

During the Carolingian Age, Charlemagne established a palace school and a fancy library at his capital at Aachen. He helped internationalize education and learning since both scholar and books from Spain, Italy, Ireland, and England came together at his capital here. This event is known as the Carolingian Renaissance. The director of Charlemagne’s school was Alcuin of York. This is the guy that helped develop the handwriting Carolingian miniscule, which we mentioned during our Carolingian lecture earlier in the semester. It was much easier to read than older styles of handwriting, which meant that the scribes were more likely to copy down manuscripts correctly. This style was standardized across the empire, which meant that people from different regions could read it, which reduced confusion and errors in texts. 

Charlemagne passed laws to enforce his emphasis on education. 

• Epistola de litteris colendis mandated reform and underscored the public utility of learning, also focused on literacy of monks and priests. Poor literacy could cause preachers to interpret the Bible incorrectly.  

• Admonitio generalis outlined the rudiments of an educational program and required monasteries and cathedrals to establish schools to educate boys to read and write.  

Education made the Bible more accessible, which encouraged conversion. Schools would also teach religious music, singing, and psalms to encourage the spread of faith. 

A map of medieval universities. 

As we all know, the Carolingian Empire did not last forever and with the fragmentation of the empire, the spread of education was stunted, but continued to exist within the books and the schools that the Carolingians had already founded throughout Europe.  

Chistian humanism became very big during this period. Humanism is the optimistic outlook which emphasizes the goodness of humanity. Previously, European Christians mostly viewed humanity as sinful creatures who needed to be constantly mindful of their souls. However, with the rise of Christian humanism, there was a newfound emphasis on the goodness of God’s creation and the talents and skills that God granted humanity.  

Another rising style of learning was scholasticism. Cassiodorus would have loved this, as scholasticism is based on the conjunction of faith and reason, the combination of biblical wisdom and ancient Greek philosophy. Basically, it’s the idea that reasoning and logic will reveal spiritual truth and answer theological problems.  

Universities were the hot new thing to hit the medieval period and they were similar to both a monastery and a guild. Everyone was living together in this community with a set schedule and had a common purpose, and universities definitely carried a religious vibe to them too, especially since most early universities were for religious clerics. However, they weren’t just for monks and people wanting to enter into a religious career. They also studied the arts, medicine, civil and canon law. They made sure to codify their curricula, degree requirements, fees, examinations, etc. Much like we do today. These European universities were surprisingly stable and absorbed Greek and Arabic learning into the Christian tradition, and they were significant contributors to contemporary political and theological debates. The main universities and dates you need to know: University of Paris 1150, University of Bologna 1158, University of Oxford 1167. These were the first three and are still around today!  

 

The core of the medieval university education system was the Seven Liberal Arts. This comes from their ancient roots, where “liber” means “free;” the liberal arts were the pursuits that only free men could engage in, while slaves or “low born” people had to become farmers, cobblers, butchers, bakers, candlestick-makers, painters, or sculptors.  

• The trivium is the basic elementary curriculum. It focuses on communication and argumentation: 

• Grammar: the study of language and literature 

• Rhetoric: the study of oratory and law 

• Dialectic: the study of logic 

• The quadrivium teaches advanced thinking, derived from Pythagoras who believed that everything could be understood with math-: 

• Arithmetic: the study of numbers 

• Geometry: the study of numbers in space 

• Music: the study of numbers in time 

• Astronomy: the study of numbers in space and time 

You had to learn the first three before you could even begin to think about learning the quadrivium. It was only for advanced learners. If you managed to master all seven, only then could you go on to learn about science and proper philosophy.