Lucy C Barnhouse | Arkansas State University (original) (raw)

Teaching Documents by Lucy C Barnhouse

Syllabus for an upper-level history elective with no prerequisites, taught online and asynchronously

Catalogue Description: Worldwide survey of medicine, disease, and health from prehistoric times t... more Catalogue Description: Worldwide survey of medicine, disease, and health from prehistoric times to the present.

Course Description: The study of medicine is a currently expanding field, but one that took a long time to form. Modern ideas about what medicine is, and about what premodern eras were, have often been at odds. Moreover, particularly in the modern period, class, race, and gender have all affected how medicine is conceptualized and accessed. We will be examining these tensions, and attempting to resolve them in our own work.

This M.A. seminar examines the ways in which medieval societies understood the body, and the ways... more This M.A. seminar examines the ways in which medieval societies understood the body, and the ways in which understandings of the body shaped medieval societies. This will include engagement with relevant current debates in the field of medieval studies, e.g., on the concept of race in the Middle Ages. We will also look at medieval constructions of gender, disability, and disease, and how these affected individuals and communities.

Syllabus for graduate (M.A.) seminar. This course examines the Middle Ages as they have been imag... more Syllabus for graduate (M.A.) seminar. This course examines the Middle Ages as they have been imagined by subsequent generations as a subject for scholarly attention. It has been argued that the medieval always occupies a paradoxical dual role, both that of the simpler past that is desired, and that of the barbaric and chaotic society from which modernity must escape, or which must be transcended in order for modernity to emerge. We will analyze such constructions of the medieval, and the purposes that such depictions have historically served. The uses and misuses of the “medieval” in our contemporary moment, and contemporary trends in scholarship on the Middle Ages, will both occupy us.

Student Learning Outcomes Describe patterns in the history of women in the early world (final ex... more Student Learning Outcomes

Describe patterns in the history of women in the early world (final exam, weekly reflections)
Debate the significance and interpretations of evidence (class discussion, response paper, weekly refl)
Articulate, using terms and concepts specific to the course, the broad and various ways in which we are shaped by a diversity of cultural elements (final essay)
Conduct original research, and demonstrate competence in accessing, analyzing, and citing primary and secondary sources (response paper, independent project)
Demonstrate basic cultural competence skills (i.e., awareness of the non-universality of cultural patterns and assumptions; and use of language and approaches that are respectful and inclusive) through a summative assignment (final essay)

Framing Questions

How do women exercise agency?
How are social expectations of women shaped by wealth/class?
What patterns do we see in attitudes towards the nature of women?
Where and how do we find evidence of women’s attitudes?

This course goes beyond the cliché of chanting monks to look at how everyday people in the Middle... more This course goes beyond the cliché of chanting monks to look at how everyday people in the Middle Ages celebrated, questioned, and experienced religion. We'll look at how religious beliefs were crafted through cultural contacts. The people, places, and things associated with medieval popular religion range from saints on pillars to a holy greyhound, from holy wells in England to shrines in Jerusalem, and from healing herbs to cursed lettuce. The course will engage with histories of gender, art, and literature as well as religion, as we explore how medieval people crafted meaning around birth, death, and everything in between.

This assignment was created to be part of a scaffolded research project in a historical methods c... more This assignment was created to be part of a scaffolded research project in a historical methods course for second-year history majors (first taught Fall 2019)

Syllabus for a core methods course taken by history majors in their second year.

Syllabus for a 200-level undergraduate course without prerequisites

The study of medical history is a currently expanding field, but one that took a long time to for... more The study of medical history is a currently expanding field, but one that took a long time to form. Modern ideas about what medicine is, and about what premodern eras were, have often been at odds. Moreover, particularly in the modern period, class, race, and gender have all affected how medicine is conceptualized and accessed. We will be examining these tensions, and attempting to resolve them in our own work. Any historians--including, now, us--looking at medicine are faced with methodological difficulties, as for much of history, medical texts were not grouped or defined as such. In this course, we shall engage with such questions as: How do we define medicine? How do we talk about medicine? How do we decide, as individuals and societies, when to take it and how to give it? We shall also consider how illness and health are defined, and how they define the lives of the sick. We shall examine the ways in which medicine is shaped by social structures, cultural norms, and religious values.

Syllabus: Global Medieval History

The thousand-year period often known as the Middle Ages (roughly 500-1500 C.E.) was a period of v... more The thousand-year period often known as the Middle Ages (roughly 500-1500 C.E.) was a period of vibrant life and sometimes violent change. In diverse societies, people worked to understand their place in the world, and how they might best live in it. Many questions medieval people asked--for instance, how religious belief should relate to social order--are questions we are still asking and answering today. Through lectures, readings, and most of all through class discussion, we will explore topics in political, religious, social, economic, and gender history. Because our learning is a shared endeavor, you will be expected to attend and participate in class regularly.

Syllabus for an undergraduate course without prerequisites.

Taught as an introductory survey for mostly non-majors.

Prehistory to the premodern, taught as part of an introductory world civilizations sequence.

Thematically organized 200-level syllabus.

Syllabus for a 200-level course. Medieval European beliefs in the afterlife were diverse and dyn... more Syllabus for a 200-level course.

Medieval European beliefs in the afterlife were diverse and dynamic. Uncertainty about the nature of what came after death is reflected in the written output of the period. In this course, we will look not only at major literary works like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Poor Heinrich, but also at chronicles in which zombies and priests meet in churchyards, and tales in which the dead haunt the living. We will be engaging with the answers found within the medieval European world to universal questions about life and death.

Taught as an upper-level history requirement for students without background in medieval history.

So You Say You Want A Revolution? European History 1789-1989.

The primary goal of this course will be to gain a basic understanding of, and appreciation for, t... more The primary goal of this course will be to gain a basic understanding of, and appreciation for, the period of history known as the Middle Ages. This course will center on the Eurasian landmass, and cover roughly the years from 500-1500 C.E. Through lectures, discussion, and most of all through the reading of primary sources, this course will treat topics in political, religious, social, economic, and gender history. Students will be expected to attend class regularly; more than two unexcused absences will result in a lowered grade. This class will also fulfill the goals of the core history requirement, as follows (adapted from the General Education guidelines):

Syllabus for an upper-level history elective with no prerequisites, taught online and asynchronously

Student Learning Outcomes Describe patterns in the history of women in the early world (final ex... more Student Learning Outcomes

Framing Questions

Syllabus for a core methods course taken by history majors in their second year.

Syllabus for a 200-level undergraduate course without prerequisites

Syllabus: Global Medieval History

Syllabus for an undergraduate course without prerequisites.

Taught as an introductory survey for mostly non-majors.

Prehistory to the premodern, taught as part of an introductory world civilizations sequence.

Thematically organized 200-level syllabus.

Syllabus for a 200-level course. Medieval European beliefs in the afterlife were diverse and dyn... more Syllabus for a 200-level course.

Taught as an upper-level history requirement for students without background in medieval history.

So You Say You Want A Revolution? European History 1789-1989.

Women's History Review

The identities and roles of women known as beguines in late medieval Europe have long been the su... more The identities and roles of women known as beguines in late medieval Europe have long been the subject of scholarly debate. Classic studies argued that beguines troubled a binary of heretical and orthodox movements, and that they were the object of clerical and lay suspicion. Recent work on medieval religious women has done much to enrich understandings of how diverse their roles could be. The records for the beguines of the central Rhineland, however, have not been the focus of examination in some decades. This paper draws on unpublished and understudied documents to examine how beguines were agents and catalysts of regional movement, and how their symbolic and physical emplacement in urban environments was understood. In doing so, it employs mobility theory, a lens heretofore little used by premodernists. This paper argues that the beguines of Mainz were neither exceptional nor marginal. Rather, they cultivated a distinctive identity while remaining integrated in local social and religious networks.

Women's History Review

Open Library of the Humanities, 2023

This essay explores how the films Becket (1964) and The Lion in Winter (1968), both starring Pete... more This essay explores how the films Becket (1964) and The Lion in Winter (1968), both starring Peter O’Toole as Henry II, can start conversations about medieval sexuality, politics, and religion in the undergraduate classroom. All three of these topics are frequently imagined by students as monolithic in the medieval period; sex and sexuality, for example, can be reduced to heterosexual practices joylessly regulated by church law. Insofar as students have a conception of medieval political systems, these are usually imagined as both strictly hierarchical and inescapably oppressive. Medieval religion — usually Christianity — is also often imagined as an instrument of oppression and control. All these negative assumptions can be productively interrogated using these films. This essay explores how the films — colorful, tightly scripted, and featuring arguably some of the twentieth century’s most celebrated actors — are useful teaching tools, both in an undergraduate course on the Middle Ages in cinema, and in a general medieval survey course. Becket, with its characteristically Anouilhian theme of realism vs. idealism, is a good starting point for discussing the complexities of medieval law, church politics and the church’s social functions with students. The films also help to start useful conversations on the visibility and invisibility of medieval women in film. Finally, both films depict queer sexualities in ways that are at odds with much popular medievalism. Whether in The Lion in Winter’s multiple transgressive sexual relationships, or in the visually explicit erotic tension between Burton’s portrayal of Becket and O’Toole’s Henry II, this essay examines how these films challenge students’ preconceptions and create opportunities for analyzing relevant primary sources. As such, this essay discusses both pedagogical strategies and assignment options related to the two films. I argue that both films can encourage analysis of the Angevin Empire and its afterlives in popular culture, and that this analysis is broadly relevant to popular medievalisms.

Medieval Disability Sourcebook, 2020

Quidditas, 2021

In her influential History Matters: Patriarchy and the Challenge of Feminism, Judith Bennett aske... more In her influential History Matters: Patriarchy and the Challenge of Feminism, Judith Bennett asked “Who’s afraid of the distant past?” Fifteen years after this book’s publication, the question remains relevant. Teaching the history of women and gender in the premodern world presents linked pedagogical challenges. Most students enter college with little to no background in premodern history. Many find premodern primary sources, when taught with the same pedagogical scaffolding as modern sources, inaccessible due to real or perceived strangeness. These challenges can be compounded by the challenges of teaching women’s and/or gender history. This roundtable addresses strategies for productive pedagogy — in both curriculum design and student engagement — in areas of history that may be doubly unfamiliar to undergraduates.

Disease and the Environment in the Medieval and Early Modern Worlds, 2022

Medieval Feminist Forum, 2018

Medieval People: Social Bonds, Kinship, and Networks

This essay examines the social and economic roles of individuals who entered into relationships w... more This essay examines the social and economic roles of individuals who entered into relationships with Mainz’s hospitals, in order to elucidate their positions in local economic, social, and religious networks. As the evidence from Mainz and other cities in the central Rhineland bears out, donors and tenants cultivated relationships with hospitals that were multilayered, and often intimate. Account books and charters—and the annotations made on them by generations of hospital staff—reveal that hospitals’ use of resources was responsive not only to the needs of the sick, but also to the changing needs of their tenants and donors, who might in turn become their residents. Like monastic houses, hospitals provided diverse spiritual services for the laity, including the performance of memorial Masses. Those who benefited from and gave donations for such spiritual services were often known only by diminutives of descriptors, appearing fleetingly in the written record as valued and active me...

Leprosy and Identity in the Middle Ages: from England to the Mediterranean, 2021

As François-Olivier Touati has observed, views of the leper as Other within medieval societies ... more As François-Olivier Touati has observed, views of the leper as Other within medieval societies has been closely bound up with the Other-ing of medieval society itself. It is the aim of this paper to contribute to the work of illuminating the diverse social realities of those viewed as lepers in medieval Europe. Leprosy, I argue, did not erase previous social identities, as has sometimes been claimed. Rather, medieval lepers derived their identity from where they lived, and the communities of which they were a part. In addition to examining leper hospitals, which conferred religious status on their residence, I look at informal communities of lepers, often located near crossroads. Such groups have not yet been the subject of analysis, due to a dearth of sources. An examination of the distinctive vocabulary applied to such communities has allowed me to draw some tentative conclusions about how they lived and were perceived. Drawing on multiple source types allows me to more clearly see where the rhetoric or priorities of a genre may distort our picture of how medieval lepers lived, and how they were perceived. The vocabulary used for lepers, both in and outside hospitals, reveals not only a variety of responses to lepers, but a variety of ways in which those designated as lepers could choose to live. In attempting to reconstruct the ways of life available to lepers in the late medieval Rhineland, my chief source base has consisted of charters preserved in the archives of Mainz and Darmstadt. I have also used the internal records of hospitals; the chartularies and account books of the leper hospitals of Mainz, Worms, and Speyer document how their residents, healthy and sick, participated in the socioeconomic networks of late medieval cities. A comparison of the hospital statutes of leprosaria and multipurpose hospitals in the cities of Mainz, Worms, and Speyer indicates that such regulations were primarily affected by hospitals’ legal status as religious institutions, rather than by attitudes towards lepers. Particularly in order to find references to informal communities of lepers, I have also drawn on the account books of monastic houses. Lastly, I have examined the fifteenth-century letters of diagnosis created by the physicians of Frankfurt responsible for the examination for leprosy, the Lepraschau. These letters, not hitherto the subject of close analysis, reveal both the individual and collective agency of lepers, as well as a range of social responses to them. These letters also demonstrate that medical diagnosis and what I call social diagnosis—the response of medieval communities to lepers or putative lepers—were not consistently correlated. The experiences of those seeking a medical verdict often show that their social relationships affected how, and why, they came before Frankfurt’s Lepraschau committee.

The terms “leprosy” and “lepers” warrant special attention. As has been widely observed, it would be misleading to treat Hansen’s Disease and medieval leprosy as identical; I argue that it is also inappropriate to assume monolithic medieval attitudes towards conditions identified as “leprosy.” Medieval vocabulary for the disease and those deemed to be afflicted with it was varied and labile. In Latin, lepra and elephantiasis were both used; sometimes, it is only context that tells us infirmi were thought to be suffering from this disease. Misellus/a bled into European vernaculars as mesel, and variations thereon. In Middle High German, the leprous could be Aussätzige or Maledern, but were often simply referred to as die armen Siechen, the poor sick, or, still more ambiguously, die armen Kinder Gottes, the poor children of God. The latter term was frequently used for informal communities established at crossroads. While the membership of such communities may have been fluid, the assemblies themselves were acknowledged as at least semi-permanent. The residents of leper hospitals, in the central Rhineland, were collectively known as “guden leuden,” good people; it is under this name that they most often appear as recipients of gifts and managers of property.

The disease of leprosy, so easily recognizable in the stylized form given to it by the authors of literary sources, often defied precise classification by those charged with medical diagnosis. The lives and identities of lepers, were, moreover, not exclusively shaped by this facet of their identity. How leprosy affected individuals was determined to a significant extent by the response of their communities, a process I have termed social diagnosis. The agency of lepers themselves is revealed in the fact that they might seek, instead, to live in smaller groups, without the privileges of religious status, but also without its restrictions. The lepers of the Rhineland appear not only in groups, but as individuals: seeking or disputing medical diagnosis, receiving gifts or receiving care, wandering about or doing their shopping: good people, poor sick, and active participants in late medieval communities.

Quidditas, 2021

Medieval Feminist Forum, 2020

Debates over the identity of women’s religious communities have exercised historians no less than... more Debates over the identity of women’s religious communities have exercised historians no less than late medieval canonists and officials. Even as the legal regulation of such communities increased, so, paradoxically, did the diversity of forms that such communities took. Although these trends have been the subject of much historical attention, the division of mixed-gender hospital communities which occurred across Europe in the thirteenth century has not hitherto been integrated into such studies. I attempt to redress this lacuna by examining the contested religious identity of the hospital sisters of Mainz. Forced to leave the mixed-gender staff of the city’s Heilig Geist Spital in 1259, these women resisted the joint attempts of municipal and religious authorities to see them incorporated into an existing Cistercian house. Their attempts to establish an independent community were met with lay protest; in response, the women appealed to Mainz’s archbishop for confirmation of their rights as religious women, and to prelates from all over Europe for support of their new community. I argue that the women saw themselves primarily as hospital sisters, and that in order to maintain this identity, they were willing to challenge externally-defined boundaries of acceptable conduct for religious women. My analysis of the vocabulary applied to the women over the course of the thirteenth century reveals that hospitals were clearly perceived as religious institutions by ecclesiastical officials, lay elites, and hospital staff alike; but these groups each held different notions about the criteria for religious identity.

New Approaches to Disease, Disability, and Medicine in Medieval Europe, 2018

Bodleian MS Laud Misc. 237 contains, alongside religious and hagiographical texts, a remarkable c... more Bodleian MS Laud Misc. 237 contains, alongside religious and hagiographical texts, a remarkable collection of medical texts. These ancient and medieval treatises (not all previously identified, and heretofore unexamined as a group) were commonly used in medieval university curricula. Although the texts were not all originally bound together, it is clear from their marginalia that they were used by the same community. This community was probably in the Middle Rhineland, using the manuscript in the fourteenth century; the marginalia, in Middle High German and Latin, are richly suggestive concerning the needs of the texts’ users. The texts are tabbed for easy access, supporting the theory that they were used as a compendium. Familiarity with the compendium is clear through wear, as well as through textual annotation. The marginalia serve to clarify, to amplify, and to instruct, indicating active engagement with the manuscript objects in diverse ways, by a variety of users. Latin and the vernacular appear side by side, used in the same generation. In two cases, glossaries—for the names of body parts and medicinal plants—are provided. Moreover, the copied-out medical recipes show a translation of theoretical knowledge—the language of expertise—into the language of experience. Everyday analogies are used to describe the stages of making medicines. Languages interact with each other in the margins, facilitating communication between practitioner and patient, and between the ancient authorities and the users of the texts. I suggest that the texts were used in a hospital; recipes copied on the bindings and margins indicate that medicines were expected to be concocted by those with little knowledge of the medical theory expounded in the classical texts. They may even have belonged to the Benedictine women’s house for which a vernacular Rule, surviving in the same miscellany, was fashioned. In this selective edition of the Rule, all the chapters concerning the care of the sick are retained, and in some cases amplified. The users of the treatises were particularly interested in treatments for common infirmities, and therapeutic measures through diet. Copied around the Aphorisms of Hippocrates are prayers invoking the name of Christ as therapy and prophylactic. Wherever the treatises were used, it was clearly in a context where academic and practical medicine interacted, with Latin and the vernacular working side by side to translate medicine.

The community of Heiligkreuz, outside Mainz, is little studied despite its medieval prosperity. I... more The community of Heiligkreuz, outside Mainz, is little studied despite its medieval prosperity. Its first internal records testify to a community “at the church of the Blessed Virgin in the fields outside the walls of Mainz.” This has been characterized as a canonry replacing an earlier, informal community of lepers on the same site. I argue that, rather, the 1440 codex containing the “customs and oaths” of the house testifies to a process of formalizing religious observance and affirming religious status that can be seen in other leprosaria in the region throughout the later fifteenth century. Based on the internal records of the canonry, and mentions of Heiligkreuz in local archival documents, I believe that the scant scholarship on Heiligkreuz has seen a rupture where there was none. The oaths for canons, deacons, and clerks all contain a pledge of loyalty to the place, as well as to its residents. This suggests an invocation of continuity with the community of the leprous that had long been identified with Heiligkreuz. Secondly, the oaths contain a pledge of “service to the persons residing there,” a formula resembling hospital rules’ inclusion of the sick. Finally, the statutes were written down “to avoid perils” that might otherwise befall the members of that community. Given the efforts of the archbishops of Mainz to exercise more direct control over hospitals in the mid-fifteenth century, I believe these records testify to an attempt at guaranteeing stability, rather than changing uses of a religious house.

The spread of hospitals in medieval Europe occurred at the same time as the rise of a number of s... more The spread of hospitals in medieval Europe occurred at the same time as the rise of a number of saints’ cults for men and women, recently deceased, often laypersons, whose service of the sick was a key signifier of their holiness. Recent scholarship has called for more critical examination of how the examples of saints pursuing hospital work might have inspired staff and donors alike. This paper examines how images of saints, dedications to them, and the circulation of texts about their lives, constituted part of the landscape of charity in late medieval Central Europe. Mainz, a hub of both religious power and economic exchange, developed a religious and civic topography with the care of the sick-poor at its heart. Donations to Mainz’s hospitals designated for Martin’s feast day indicate that charity for those whom the hospital served was seen as central to the saint’s veneration. Elizabeth of Hungary is the saint whose service of the sick-poor is most widely commemorated in the regions under study. In accounts of her life, both her work in the hospital she founded, and the care which she offered to the injured and impaired, are consistently highlighted. Like Elizabeth’s, Hedwig of Silesia’s life spanned multiple regions of Central Europe; and like Elizabeth, Hedwig was commemorated after death for her works of charity and self-denial. The proliferation of art and text extolling such work — often with surprising realism — offers insight into how late medieval hospital care was conceptualized and performed.

The private founding of Warsaw’s hospital of the Holy Spirit, one of the oldest in Polish territo... more The private founding of Warsaw’s hospital of the Holy Spirit, one of the oldest in Polish territory, was not a one-time event, but a process that lasted over several decades. The documents surrounding the hospital's foundation as an independent institution reveal the interplay between canon law regulations and the needs and desires of local communities. Somewhat unusually, the donations are confirmed by multiple royal charters, as well as letters from episcopal and papal representatives. The legal language of the documents emphasizes rights and exemptions applicable across Christendom. But they also suggest an environment where these legal stipulations faced local opposition. Although the official founding date for the hospital is usually given as 1442, I argue that two royal letters from 1436 and 1437 also pertain to its institutional origins. In the 1440s, multiple confirmations of the rights of the hospital and its staff were sought from a papal legate. In parallel cases in western and central Europe, such activity is characteristic of moments when the legal privileges of a hospital as a religious institution were under threat from local interest groups. Warsaw’s case is distinctive in the emphasis it lays on the agency of hospital staff, suggesting that the Augustinian friars who were responsible for managing the hospital were also engaged in the legal processes leading to document creation. A charter issued by Warsaw’s city council, in 1454, is suggestive of ongoing contestation of the hospital’s legal rights under canon law.

The Decretals of Gregory IX, or Liber Extra, constitute one of the most famous and influential co... more The Decretals of Gregory IX, or Liber Extra, constitute one of the most famous and influential commentaries of medieval canon law. From their 1234 creation onwards, they circulated widely, becoming in themselves a subject of commentary and debate. Schlossbibliothek Aschaffenburg MS Perg 11, as a copy of the Liber Extra annotated by its user, is not ipso facto a rarity. But the nature and scope of its marginalia point with unusual specificity to the contexts in which it was used, and to the priorities of its user. In this paper, I argue that the manuscript’s owner was involved with managing a hospital, and that his notes on the applications of the Liber Extra can help us to understand the social impact and social understandings of this influential text. The anonymous manuscript owner, creator of his own commentaries, was clearly learned in canon law. His marginalia, however, are not primarily of the character one would expect if he had used it as a study text. His notes are not evenly distributed, but center around the dual poles of medical and religious concerns. How the user engages such questions — actively making notes on vows, habits, and infirmity — speaks to how hospital communities negotiated their status as religious institutions in the thirteenth century. These paratextual notes show what meanings could be found beneath the surface of the Liber Extra by its readers, outside the legal and academic contexts in which the work is most familiar.

Letters to and from the physicians appointed by the city of Frankfurt to examine for leprosy in t... more Letters to and from the physicians appointed by the city of Frankfurt to examine for leprosy in the late fifteenth century are a hitherto underused source for the social experiences of late medieval leprosy. The medical expertise of these physicians was held in high regard, but their professional honor could come into conflict with the personal honor of their female examinees, as surviving letters show. Of the two dozen surviving fifteenth-century letters, three are written on behalf of women. Gender is not identified by the physicians as a variable in the ways the women’s bodies were affected by leprosy. However, women’s experience of the diagnostic process was clearly gendered. Two of the three women were accompanied by men. An impoverished kitchen maid from a nunnery was escorted by Brother Hans, from the same community. He may or may not have had medical knowledge himself, but he was chosen by the abbess and provost as her companion, and advocate to the committee. In another case, a woman suspected of having leprosy appears with her husband. His presence would have provided social and legal protection, as well as emotional support. The widow who appeared alone before the physicians subsequently failed a complaint; distraught, she asserted that they “uncovered her womanly weakness.” The physicians, in turn, created a detailed rebuttal of her claims. The experiences of these women reveal physical and emotional vulnerability, and a variety of social and medical responses to leprosy and those diagnosed with it.

Eva Gertrud Neumann’s classic study of beguines in the Rhineland characterized scholarship on beg... more Eva Gertrud Neumann’s classic study of beguines in the Rhineland characterized scholarship on beguines as having “diverse theories and no clear conclusions.” Although clear conclusions on beguines remain elusive, recent work on these women has clarified the terms of debate and provided useful questions to ask. Working with charters, necrologies, and other unpublished records from late medieval Mainz, I here address the question of what it meant to be known as a beguine. In doing so, I use Georg Simmel’s mobilities paradigm, productively employed in medical history by Graham Mooney, to move beyond the spatial turn and ask how mobility affects how individuals interact with spaces and places. This theoretical approach resists simplified notions of boundedness—notions that, as many scholars have found, are particularly difficult to apply to medieval religious women. Applying it to beguines, their houses, and donations made to and by them facilitates analysis of the movement of people and objects, and of the localization of ideas.

Letha Böhringer has called for more studies comparing the presences and activities of beguines, hospitals, and other religious communities of minor orders. This paper compares beguine houses to houses legally defined as loca religiosa in their locations and the ways they appear in the documentary record. It also compares beguines to permanently vowed religious persons in their known economic activities, and in their mobility within the city, insofar as this can be reconstructed. The connections of Mainz’s beguines to religious houses have been noted as exceptional in their number and type; this paper undertakes an analysis of them. Beguines’ connections to the city’s hospitals are unsurprising; less expected are the commemorations of beguines in canonries. In Mainz, unusually, the beguines did not have close ties to the mendicant orders.

The notion of place encompasses both location and the sense of its significance. Practices of place in the changing medieval city were constantly performed, perpetually unfinished articulations of topography. Thus, the places which beguines inhabited influenced the ways in which they acted/interacted in urban spaces, and these places in turn were shaped in communal imagination by the fact that beguines lived there. I argue that the shared and changing use of beguine houses can show us things about not only about how space was used, but about how it was understood. Because they are named as beguines in successive generations, this suggests that their occupation of the space was seen as significant in some way, more than a chance tenancy. Social types—such as beguines—are thus understood as being defined by the reactions and expectations of others. In synodal legislation, we see tensions arising from the ecclesiastical hierarchy’s disapproval of how the laity perceived beguines, and how religious persons treated them. In the 1220s and 1230s, the archbishops of Mainz tried to limit the independence and narrow the definition of these religiously-living women.

The socio-spatial location of hospitals—including leper hospitals—in late medieval cities was a m... more The socio-spatial location of hospitals—including leper hospitals—in late medieval cities was a matter of concern to both the hospitals and their neighbors. The significance of these locations has been much debated, especially for leper hospitals. I aim to show that hospitals’ strategies of acquiring and administering property were influenced by their status as religious houses. These strategies, in turn, affected hospitals’ relationships with civic and ecclesiastical authorities. Hospitals’ legal status meant that they were embedded in complex networks of ecclesiastical authority and influence. In Mainz, as in many other European cities in the thirteenth century, the city’s acquisition of political independence was associated with a transfer of the hospital from archiepiscopal to civic administration. When the hospital sisters attempted to establish a new community on a central marketplace, members of the laity fought their efforts to occupy this location at a hub of urban trade. Mainz’s leper hospital, while located outside the walls, also managed a satellite house inside the city. All of Mainz’s hospitals managed their properties attentively, ensuring a reliable supply of food, drink, and other medicinal necessities for the sick-poor they served. Using comparative evidence from Worms and Speyer, I argue that late medieval hospitals’ relationships with their neighbors and donors were affected by their places in the religious and physical landscapes of their cities.

In popular culture and in some scholarship, medieval lepers and leper hospitals have often become... more In popular culture and in some scholarship, medieval lepers and leper hospitals have often become symbols for an approach to healthcare assumed to have been based on fear, and a lack of hygienic understanding or infrastructure. In late medieval canon law, however, leper hospitals (leprosaria) were but one category of hospital among several. Moreover, documents of practice from the cities of Mainz, Worms, and Frankfurt demonstrate that lepers were provided with care outside the hospital walls, as well as inside them. Lepers could reside in leprosaria, or appear alongside poor scholars as the recipients of food, shoes, and clothing, as in the records of Mainz. The vocabulary of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century hospital charters suggests that lepers might have chosen seasonal residence in hospitals, begging in the surrounding territory at other times. When lepers are directly visible, it is customarily in pragmatic exchanges. Donations from the burghers of Mainz and Worms to the cities’ hospitals reveal considerable knowledge of the needs of the sick, indicating that hospitals, although often positioned on the urban periphery, remained integrated with city life. The stories of the men and women who sought diagnoses from the doctors of Frankfurt also reveal a range of late medieval responses to leprosy, from the sick and their communities. This most infamous of medieval diseases provides me with a starting point for reexamining the provision of care for the sick in late medieval cities.

The question of how lepers and leprosy were perceived in medieval society has long been haunted b... more The question of how lepers and leprosy were perceived in medieval society has long been haunted by modern perceptions of the Middle Ages. Medieval ways of knowing leprosy have often been dismissed as characterized by medical ignorance and religious condemnation. This paper offers a corrective to such narratives. Lepers could function symbolically as the embodiment of the suffering Christ, or of the threat of sin. An investigation of relevant legal, historical, and hagiographical writings collected in the Monumenta Germaniae Historica suggests, however, that this was a consequence of leprosy’s visibility, not of attitudes towards those who suffered from it. When religious authors relate stories of those smitten with leprosy as divine judgment, the lesson drawn is not that leprosy must be a punishment, but that sin marks the soul as leprosy marks the skin. Archival records relating to leper hospitals in the ecclesiastical province of Mainz provide the chief source base for a reassessment of how lepers lived and were treated in the later Middle Ages. Letters of inspection for leprosy provide glimpses of how the suspicion of the disease affected the sick, and how its diagnosis was undertaken. The disease was understood to be almost always terminal; but this did not preclude dedication to treatments focused on soothing the skin and balancing bodily humors. Medical manuscripts include comprehensive regimens of care for leprosy patients in hospitals, which were classified as religious institutions. Fifteenth-century leper hospital rules from Mainz, Worms, and Strasbourg show that concern for hygiene was not identical with the desire for segregation. Rather, these statutes are directed towards assuring order within the hospital walls, and safe interactions between lepers and non-lepers in public spaces. Even as legal regulations for hospitals tightened, lepers were not ipso facto condemned as sinful, or treated as outcasts.

In "Private Rights and Public Health," I argue for a concept of public health that was both holis... more In "Private Rights and Public Health," I argue for a concept of public health that was both holistic and practical, although decoupled from a central system of regulation. Peregrine Horden, Carole Rawcliffe, and François-Olivier Touati are but a few of the historians who have explicated the holistic view of health in late medieval societies. This concept has, however, usually been associated with coherent centralized policies of public health, whether in England, Italy, or prosperous imperial cities such as Nürnberg. The records of Mainz, Worms, and Speyer reveal that conceptual links between moral and physical well-being did not necessarily result in centralized infrastructure, even when urban communities were prosperous and stable. Each of these cities of the Upper Rhineland had a different set of customs and laws determining how matters of public health were negotiated. I examine how health and its maintenance were discussed in legal codes and penitentiary records, as well as charters and the decisions of municipal officials. In doing so, I hope to encourage reassessment of how “public health” was conceived of and valued by medieval communities which lacked centralized public health policy.

In 1236, Archbishop Siegfried III of Mainz authorized the transfer of the Heilig Geist Spital fro... more In 1236, Archbishop Siegfried III of Mainz authorized the transfer of the Heilig Geist Spital from the cathedral immunity to a building on the boundaries of the growing city. The needs of the sick provided the ostensible impetus for the change. That this transfer was the result of struggles between civic leadership groups, however, is suggested by the inclusion of the hospital in the charter of 1244 in which the archbishop granted Mainz its civic freedom. Besides establishing the respective rights of the archbishop, council, and citizens of Mainz, the charter transferred the administration of the Heilig Geist Spital from the cathedral chapter to the citizens and newly-created council. Subsequent developments suggest that the new location and administration made it difficult for the hospital to retain its legal privileges as a religious institution. The early 1250s saw the departure of the female staff to found the Cistercian nunnery of St. Agnes, and thereafter, their own hospital. The first decades of St. Agnes were anything but smooth; lay protests led to another relocation for the sisters, who repeatedly petitioned ecclesiastical authorities for financial support. I use the documents of the Heilig Geist Spital and St. Agnes, as well as municipal and episcopal charters, to evaluate how the identities of these institutions and their residents were negotiated in relation to civic and religious ones. This elucidates how and why Mainz’s hospitals were regulated by municipal and ecclesiastical authorities during a time when civic identity was rapidly evolving.

Through the fourteenth-century records of the St. Georg hospital in Mainz, this paper reexamines ... more Through the fourteenth-century records of the St. Georg hospital in Mainz, this paper reexamines the realities of how leper hospitals were embedded in, and interacted with, their communities. The sick themselves are neither fetishized as ideal sufferers, or treated as prototypical outcasts. On the occasions when they are directly visible, it is in pragmatic exchanges. Covering the lepers is the institutional aegis of the hospital. Unexpectedly prominent are the servants who act as hospital representatives. Despite their low individual status, they speak for the community as a whole. The charters of St. Georg describe elaborately performative legal rituals, with texts often being used and invoked as symbols of power. These records also reveal legal negotiation which was shaped by communal, orally transmitted knowledge, and reliant on the mediation of members of the community, as well as the texts themselves. Multiple voices emerge, revealing a legal culture with interdependent networks of communication and authority. The actions and words of those involved, often ritually specific, are recorded as crucial components of the making of legal agreement. This enables me to reexamine both the relation of oral to written authority in late medieval legal proceedings, and the relation of leper hospitals to their donors and neighbors. Instead of treating legal interactions as bilateral exchanges where hospitals either received charity or defended their privileges, I will use them to explore the diverse ways in which leper hospitals could exercise power and negotiate their place within their communities.

Medieval Feminist Forum

Review of Laura Kalas's "Margery Kempe’s Spiritual Medicine: Suffering, Transformation a... more Review of Laura Kalas's "Margery Kempe’s Spiritual Medicine: Suffering, Transformation and the Life-Course" by Lucy Barnhouse.

Central European History, 2023

The English Historical Review

Bulletin of the History of Medicine

Reviews in History, 2018

Both Mulder-Bakker's study and, especially, the edition and translation of the Life of Gertrude R... more Both Mulder-Bakker's study and, especially, the edition and translation of the Life of Gertrude Rickeldey, promise to be valuable resources for those studying the lives of lay religious women in the later Middle Ages. The text itself engages with intersecting questions of the legal and social identities of such women, and of their roles in urban communities. Having such a work available in English translation is a great asset for undergraduate and postgraduate teaching. The relevant historiography, needless to say, is overwhelmingly vast. Mulder-Bakker selects thoughtfully from it, and the notes demonstrate a familiarity with the most recent studies on women's religious life (1), although somewhat fuller references or fuller explanations of how she frames her own methodological choices relative to other scholarship might have been helpful. A case in point is her decision to avoid the contentious prefixes quasi-or semi-when discussing Gertrude and Heilke, and those like them. Mulder-Bakker's positions appear to be informed by close investigation of primary texts and secondary literature alike, but are incompletely elucidated. This is particularly true for her apparent distinction between those women who took religious vows and those who did not. She claims that Gertrude and Heilke, 'unlike nuns, did not take vows or renounce their possessions. They did not abandon their own decision-making power. Instead, they were mistresses of their own lives and developed into theologians and ethicae of stature' (p. 2). This seems to suggest a problematic dichotomy, especially in view of the scholarship on how vowed women shaped their communities and external relationships.(2) Mulder-Bakker does not fully explain the ways in which she understands the text as the women's 'own view into their ways of living and thinking' (p. 3). The fact that the life is crafted as a textual self-presentation to the world is of course significant. Tantalizingly, the text does offer rare opportunities to approach elusive answers to many questions about the lives of late medieval religious women. From my

Speculum

Students in twelfth-century Paris held slanging matches, branding the English drunkards, the Germ... more Students in twelfth-century Paris held slanging matches, branding the English drunkards, the Germans madmen and the French as arrogant. On crusade, army recruits from different ethnic backgrounds taunted each other's military skills. Men producing ethnography in monasteries and at court drafted derogatory descriptions of peoples dwelling in territories under colonisation, questioning their work ethic, social organisation, religious devotion and humanness. Monks listed and ruminated on the alleged traits of Jews, Saracens, Greeks, Saxons and Britons and their acceptance or rejection of Christianity. In this radical new approach to representations of nationhood in medieval western Europe, the author argues that ethnic stereotypes were constructed and wielded rhetorically to justify property claims, flaunt military strength and assert moral and cultural ascendance over others. The gendered images of ethnicity in circulation reflect a negotiation over self-representations of discipline, rationality and strength, juxtaposed with the alleged chaos and weakness of racialised others. Interpreting nationhood through a religious lens, monks and schoolmen explained it as scientifically informed by environmental medicine, an ancient theory that held that location and climate influenced the physical and mental traits of peoples. Drawing on lists of ethnic character traits, school textbooks, medical treatises, proverbs, poetry and chronicles, this book shows that ethnic stereotypes served as rhetorical tools of power, crafting relationships within communities and towards others.

Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 2022

Reviews in History, 2018

Review article of Ruling the Spirit: Women, Liturgy, and Dominican Reform in Late Medieval German... more Review article of Ruling the Spirit: Women, Liturgy, and Dominican Reform in Late Medieval Germany, Claire Taylor Jones, and The Dedicated Spiritual Life of Upper Rhine Noble Women, Anneke B. Mulder-Bakker

The Medieval Review, 2021

Medieval Feminist Forum, 2018

Published in Comitatus 46 (2015): 265-68

Aestimatio, 2014

Review of 2013 publication edited by Laurinda Abreu and Sally Sheard.

2014 talk given for history graduate students on the process of archival research.

Given at colloquium hosted by the New York Botanical Garden: "The Healing Properties of Plants: A... more Given at colloquium hosted by the New York Botanical Garden: "The Healing Properties of Plants: Art, Culture, Science"

From the twelfth through the fifteenth centuries, as hospitals developed as independent institutions, they were seen by external authorities, by donors, and by residents as distinctively defined by the therapeutic care they offered. And a significant part of this care was provided through the hospital environment itself: through the olfactory and visual stimuli provided by gardens even before their plants were turned into powders and decoctions; and through the visible and spiritual consolations of art.

For Fordham University's History Day, 2015, a discussion of how disease was understood, combated,... more For Fordham University's History Day, 2015, a discussion of how disease was understood, combated, and coped with in the later Middle Ages, using evidence from cities in the Rhineland in the 13th-15th centuries.

Dancer, swordsman, court favorite, and popular celebrity in late 17th-century England, Jeffrey Hu... more Dancer, swordsman, court favorite, and popular celebrity in late 17th-century England, Jeffrey Hudson was distinguished not chiefly by his achievements, but by his size. Born with dwarfism, Hudson was known as “Lord Minimus.” His diminutive stature and social ableism meant that his court career was dependent in some ways on his novelty. A favorite of Queen Henrietta Maria, Jeffrey Hudson was painted by Van Dyck, and frequently figured in court entertainments. This podcast looks at his life, and what it can tell us about disability in early modern England.

How did Ivanhoe become a wildly popular school text? And what happened to the interpretation of t... more How did Ivanhoe become a wildly popular school text? And what happened to the interpretation of the text when it did? Across the Anglophone world, Scott’s medieval England became reified as a time and place of chivalric adventure, despite the novel’s often ironic tone and often pointed social criticisms. This episode examines how Sir Walter Scott’s imagined past became something very different as it was reinterpreted in popular culture, in sometimes sinister ways.

There are some things that almost any Hollywood film set in the Middle Ages can count on. It will... more There are some things that almost any Hollywood film set in the Middle Ages can count on. It will be set in England. There will be a lot of forests. The Norman nobility will oppress the Saxon peasantry. Other things are optional but frequent. There may be a tournament or a siege. There may be a reference to the Crusades. Robin Hood may turn up. There may be a trial for witchcraft. Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe contains all of these things, and since its publication in 1819, this runaway bestseller has helped to shape Anglophone ideas of the Middle Ages.

John Dee has been variously described as a visionary, a philosopher, and a “real-life Gandalf.” ... more John Dee has been variously described as a visionary, a philosopher, and a “real-life Gandalf.” Internationally renowned, he served at the Elizabethan court as a consultant on matters worldly and otherworldly. The possessor of a legendary library, Dee himself was a legend in his own day, and has remained so ever since. Scholar and scientist, he was also convinced that he could talk to angels. This episode attempts to disentangle fact from fiction.

Notorious eccentrics, esteemed researchers, loose-cannon diplomats: this podcast looks at the his... more Notorious eccentrics, esteemed researchers, loose-cannon diplomats: this podcast looks at the histories of the British women who were travelers and archaeologists in the Middle East and India in the early twentieth century. As women, their accomplishments were often assessed by British audiences in terms of respectability. As British women, however, they often reinforced imperial control and imperial ideas.

Podcast episode based on research done for a hagiography course, on the life and ministry of Bl. ... more Podcast episode based on research done for a hagiography course, on the life and ministry of Bl. Fr. Rupert Mayer S.J.

The First World War was, infamously, a source of both transformation and trauma. In this episode,... more The First World War was, infamously, a source of both transformation and trauma. In this episode, Lucy and Elizabeth find evidence of the ways in which the War to End all Wars influenced some of the greatest British mystery novels of the mid-20th century, especially how experiences of WWI were normalized, memorialized, or condemned within their pages.

From the beginning of Queen Victoria’s reign in the 1830s, to her death in 1901, the social lands... more From the beginning of Queen Victoria’s reign in the 1830s, to her
death in 1901, the social landscape of Britain was profoundly changed.
The evolution of hospitals’ form and function was not the least of
these. Under the influence of social reformers, innovative architects,
and, not least, medical practitioners themselves, the theory and
practice of hospital care were adapted to changing ideas about
physical and moral hygiene. This podcast focuses on the development of
one such institution: the General Infirmary in the industrial
powerhouse of Leeds, which expanded along with the city’s population.
Its buildings, designed by George Gilbert Scott, represented the most
up-to-date medical theory--and most grand architectural invention--of
late Victorian Britain, and served as a monument to how this
prosperous society desired to see itself.

Sherlock Holmes is not only the world's only private consulting detective, he's also arguably the... more Sherlock Holmes is not only the world's only private consulting detective, he's also arguably the world's longest-running pop culture phenomenon. Pastiches, parodies, and fanfic have multiplied from the 1890s onwards. Holmes films have been around almost as long as the technology itself. This week, we look at some of the factors in the great detective's immense--and immensely versatile--presence in pop culture beyond the canon.

From the late eighteenth century to the coming of the First World War, Europe's haute bourgeoisie... more From the late eighteenth century to the coming of the First World War, Europe's haute bourgeoisie looked to mineral waters (sipped or bathed in) as medication for their malaises and a cure for ennui. The architecture and economy of spa towns developed accordingly, creating an atmosphere for international communities to mingle socially, consume culture, and display their wealth. This podcast examines these phenomena...and the fascination they exercised for generations of literary giants.

In the early 19th century, ancient fossils formed the basis of cutting-edge discoveries. Geology ... more In the early 19th century, ancient fossils formed the basis of cutting-edge discoveries. Geology still hovered between amateur pursuit and scientific profession. Mary Buckland, married to the dinosaur-discovering William, participated in international research networks, and was a silent partner in creating some of the new discipline's most important works.

Käthchen Paulus was born in the late 1860s, in a German village where she supported her mother by... more Käthchen Paulus was born in the late 1860s, in a German village where she supported her mother by working as a seamstress. She died in the mid-30s in relative obscurity. But in between, she ran away with an adventurer, made and lost a fortune, became an international celebrity, an entrepreneur, a WWI military advisor, and an inventor of lasting influence.

How did a swashbuckling seventeenth-century opera singer become the heroine of a nineteenth-centu... more How did a swashbuckling seventeenth-century opera singer become the heroine of a nineteenth-century novel? What does this tell us about the performance and perception of gender in both eras? And did the mysterious Mademoiselle de Maupin really run away with a nun? This episode of Footnoting History looks at all that... and dueling!

Who were the pirates of the 17th and 18th centuries, and what enabled them to rise to power? In E... more Who were the pirates of the 17th and 18th centuries, and what enabled them to rise to power? In Europe, pirates could be treated as celebrities or tried as criminals. At sea, pirate crews made legal agreements covering not only the division of loot, but forms of health insurance and injury benefits. Contrary to the pirates of Hollywood, moreover, crews were often multiracial, with men (and sometimes women) from Europe, Africa, and the Caribbean working side by side. This episode looks at what made piracy attractive, what made its unusual degree of equality possible, and how pirate legends have endured and been used in subsequent centuries.

For much of the Middle Ages, King Arthur was Europe’s model king. His court could be a space for ... more For much of the Middle Ages, King Arthur was Europe’s model king. His court could be a space for heroism, for romance, and also for the uncanny. Often drawing on oral tradition, written for elite audiences, the Arthurian romances of the 13th and 14th centuries can be surprisingly revealing about cultural values and cultural debates. This week we'll be looking at Christmas feasts, sun-god figures, and complex debates about the morality of flirting.

In the 16th century, high taxes and fears of apocalypse went hand in hand, and from the fairly co... more In the 16th century, high taxes and fears of apocalypse went hand in hand, and from the fairly common practice of calling for church reform emerged a series of movements which have become known as the capital-R Reformation. This week we’ll be discussing insults to the Pope, the problem of identifying Lutherans, and how civic and ecclesiastical leaders accidentally created an agreement that was called the most important event in the history of the world.

In Don Giovanni, Wolfgang Amadeus and Lorenzo da Ponte created opera's most famous antihero. Find... more In Don Giovanni, Wolfgang Amadeus and Lorenzo da Ponte created opera's most famous antihero. Find out how Mozart and Da Ponte were influenced by the philosophical ideas and social concerns of their day in forging a tale of class conflict and libertinism, violence and seduction, private passions and public space... and find out why this opera without a genre had different endings in the two greatest cities of the Holy Roman Empire.

May 2013 podcast episode. Reactions to medieval lepers were often extreme. Medieval romance-write... more May 2013 podcast episode. Reactions to medieval lepers were often extreme. Medieval romance-writers depict them as not only disease-ridden but filthy, and morally suspect to boot. Saints, on the other hand, ran around kissing them. More ordinary people just asked lepers to pray for them. Why? And if you lived in thirteenth-century Chartres, why shouldn't you eat dinner with the leper next door?

March 2013 podcast episode. Why did commoners and kings in eleventh-century Germany keep seeing d... more March 2013 podcast episode. Why did commoners and kings in eleventh-century Germany keep seeing dead people? Why did a bunch of animated corpses decide to burn a priest alive? And why did a busy bishop write all this down?

Beyond Cadfael: Medieval Medicine and Medical Medievalism, 2023

Medievalism and medieval medicine are vibrant subfields of medieval studies, enjoying sustained s... more Medievalism and medieval medicine are vibrant subfields of medieval studies, enjoying sustained scholarly attention and popularity among undergraduates. Popular perceptions of medieval medicine, however, remain understudied. This book aims to fill that lacuna by providing a multifaceted study of medical medievalism, defined as modern representations of medieval medicine intended for popular audiences. The volume takes as its starting point the fictional medieval detective Brother Cadfael, whose observations on bodies, herbs, and death have shaped many popular conceptions of medieval medicine in the Anglophone world. The ten contributing authors move beyond Cadfael by exploring global medical medievalisms in a range of genres and cultural contexts. Beyond Cadfael is organized into three sections, the first of which engages with how disease, injury, and the sick are imagined in fictitious medieval worlds. The second, on doctors at work, looks at medieval medical practice in novels, films and television, and public commemorative practice. These essays examine how practitioners are represented and imagined in medieval and pseudo-medieval worlds. The third section discusses medicine designed for and practiced by women in the Middle Ages and today, with a focus on East Asian medical traditions. These essays are guided by the recognition that medieval medical practices are often in dialogue with contemporary medical practices that fall outside the norms of Western biomedicine.

Amsterdam University Press, 2023

From the mid-twelfth century onwards, the development of European hospitals was shaped by their c... more From the mid-twelfth century onwards, the development of European hospitals was shaped by their claim to the legal status of religious institutions, with its attendant privileges and responsibilities. The questions of whom hospitals should serve and why they should do so have recurred — and been invested with moral weight — in successive centuries, though similarities between medieval and modern debates on the subject have often been overlooked. Hospitals’ legal status as religious institutions could be tendentious and therefore had to be vigorously defended in order to protect hospitals’ resources. This status could also, however, be invoked to impose limits on who could serve in and be served by hospitals. As recent scholarship demonstrates, disputes over whom hospitals should serve, and how, find parallels in other periods of history and current debates.