Objective How did medieval monastic leaders assert control over their communities? This project proposes an innovative way to approach to this often-considered question: through the rites of passage into ascetic groups in Late Antiquity (fourth-seventh centuries CE). Late-antique sources emphasise five membership rituals as particularly significant: rigorous testing; ceremonial cleansing; the offering of stability pledges; the renunciation of possessions; and the donning of uniform attire. These rites were meant to bind novices to their new lives, efface their prior identities, and enforce obligation to their abbots and abbesses. Although the scholarship on medieval monasticism is extensive, the relationship between ascetic authority structures and the aforementioned five ceremonies has received little recent substantial attention. This project proposes to investigate this relationship from the first appearance of monastic groups in the fourth century to their widespread multiplication across the Mediterranean by the seventh century. To do so, I will focus on laws, monastic rules, church canons, hagiographies, and provincial documents, five types of source which are not often brought together but represent contemporary attempts to assert control over ascetic rites of passage. My research will use a comparative, interdisciplinary framework of diachronic, transcultural and -regional, and socio-historical analysis to achieve the project’s three core goals: 1) to explore how and why these ceremonies changed; 2) to analyse how these rites supported or challenged late-antique discourses about monastic obligations and identities; and 3) to investigate how these rituals were related to other analogous rituals and processes. Furthermore, this project will contribute to the increasing scholarly interest in medieval monastic perspectives beyond the Benedictine and also pave the way for epistemological reconsiderations of authority, identity, and obligation, even into the modern day. Fields of science humanitieshistory and archaeologyhistoryancient historyhumanitieslanguages and literatureliterature studiesliterary genressocial scienceslaw Programme(s) HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Main Programme Topic(s) HORIZON-MSCA-2021-PF-01-01 - MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2021 Call for proposal HORIZON-MSCA-2021-PF-01 See other projects for this call Funding Scheme HORIZON-AG-UN - HORIZON Unit Grant Coordinator FREIE UNIVERSITAET BERLIN Net EU contribution € 173 847,36 Address Kaiserswerther strasse 16-18 14195 Berlin Germany See on map Region Berlin Berlin Berlin Activity type Higher or Secondary Education Establishments Links Contact the organisation Opens in new window Website Opens in new window Participation in EU R&I programmes Opens in new window HORIZON collaboration network Opens in new window EU contribution No data
