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Articles by Jonathan Greenwood

Espacio Tiempo Y Forma. Serie IV, Historia Moderna, 2023

The scholarship on the cult of the Jesuit missionary of Asia, Francis Xavier (1506-1552), has foc... more The scholarship on the cult of the Jesuit missionary of Asia, Francis Xavier (1506-1552), has focused primarily on India, Portugal, and the Italian Peninsula. Yet the veneration of Xavier through images was global in scope. This article assesses the full extent of his cult by considering the spaces and places of likenesses of Xavier first in Goa and then its worldwide expansion during and after his canonization cause. How and where did the devout interact with these images throughout the early modern world? The result reveals the broader geography of the cult of the new «Apostle of the East» in places overlooked in the field of research by examining the quotidian use of devotional objects that prefaces and postdates Xavier's canonization in 1622.

Journal of Early Modern Christianity, 2023

Roman engraver Francesco Villamena (ca. 1565–1624) produced a print in 1600 that illustrated the ... more Roman engraver Francesco Villamena (ca. 1565–1624) produced a print in 1600 that illustrated the life and miracles of Ignatius of Loyola (1491–1556), the founder of the Society of Jesus. It featured a conversion of a local Jew named Isaac described as the movement, possibly miraculously, of another’s heart by Ignatius. Villamena’s engraving, however, must be contrasted with lives of Ignatius written by Pedro de Ribadeneyra (1526–1611). A Jesuit of Jewish ancestry, Ribadeneyra’s accounts, like the Roman print, spoke of the conversion of Isaac. Its 1601 iteration, however, explicitly situated the event among the founder’s miracles. This article examines the place of persons of Jewish ancestry in conceptions of Early Modern sanctity. With this case study, I will compare the print cultures of Rome and Madrid as well as visual and written accounts of this conversion to help us better understand the role of religious minorities in the determination of Catholic sainthood.

Journal of Jesuit Studies, 2022

The reputation of Ignatius of Loyola (c.1491–1556), the founder of the Society of Jesus, as a mir... more The reputation of Ignatius of Loyola (c.1491–1556), the founder of the Society of Jesus, as a miracle-worker grew during the 1590s, which included his aid in childbirth through handwritten relics. This article examines obstetric miracles associated with Ignatius in the early modern world prior to his canonization in 1622. Through his letters and signature, Ignatius rescued women and their offspring during dangerous and near-fatal deliveries; delayed certain neonatal mortalities long enough for a baptism to occur; and allowed the delivery of a dead fetus to save the mother’s life. While the claims had no bearing on the official declaration of his sainthood, the attributed miracles are emblematic of the concentric and transoceanic nature of his cult. Information and material pathways contributed to the promulgation of the founder’s sanctity in the confines of women in labor and childbirth that had their own patron saints for centuries.

Archivum Historicum Societatis Iesu, 2019

Word & Image, 2019

A curious image appeared amid the celebrations of the beatification of Jesuit founder Ignatius Lo... more A curious image appeared amid the celebrations of the beatification of Jesuit founder Ignatius Loyola (c.1491–1556), in Seville, Spain, in February 1610. The different saintly founders of religious orders were represented as signs of the zodiac. Although no physical specimen survives, we can learn about the convergence of the secular with sacred imagery in early modern Catholicism. This representation is an example of typology, wherein varying registers, in this case, visual ones, are applied simultaneously to tie together disparate ideas and symbols. Although usually employed to contrast the Old and New Testament, typology had other uses in Catholicism as seen in Seville. This article thus helps one understand a different and more mundane imagining of early modern saints with the aid of representations of the zodiac, which has not yet been the subject of detailed study. This article attempts to rectify oversights in the scholarship with a case study involving the Society of Jesus and its founder, Ignatius, in Seville and the implementation of a typological representation produced for the beatification of Ignatius. This likeness sought to draw connections between religious and secular iconographies in order to articulate aspects of twelve founders from disparate periods in Christian history.

Flores sanctorum (Flowers of the Saints, hereafter flowers) were a uniquely Iberian genre immerse... more Flores sanctorum (Flowers of the Saints, hereafter flowers) were a uniquely Iberian genre immersed in European efforts to collect the lives of saints and then arrange them according to the liturgical year. Although one of the first books printed in Spain, the genre went into decline by the mid-sixteenth century due to ongoing Inquisitorial censure. Flowers, however, grew again thanks to Alonso de Villegas and later Pedro de Ribadeneyra. This duo's use of the liturgy resulted in the differentiation between the saints in the Breviary and the extravagantes (wanderers), holy persons wandering outside of the official calendar prepared by the Roman Church. To cultivate their flowers, Villegas and Ribadeneyra relied on metaphrasis, a method started by Symeon Metaphrastes, a Byzantine cleric and wanderer from the tenth century. While thoroughly Iberian, flowers extended beyond the Peninsula to incorporate practices from the Catholic and Eastern churches.

Journal of Global History, 2018

This article argues that Flowers (flores sanctorum), collections of saints’ lives arranged by the... more This article argues that Flowers (flores sanctorum), collections of saints’ lives arranged by the
liturgical calendar, were the first genre of devotional literature to have a global reach during
the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. This article begins with the medieval origins of Flowers
before analysing their dispersion in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries by the Franciscans
and Jesuits. By taking a temporal long view and a transoceanic perspective, the article
contributes to the scholarship on early modern evangelization, translation, global networks,
and the historiographies of the Franciscans and Jesuits.

Book Reviews by Jonathan Greenwood

Journal of Jesuit Studies, 2021

Journal of Jesuit Studies , 2022

Global Intellectual History , 2022

Itinerario, 2019

The bulk of Mancall's text derives from lectures given at the University of Pennsylvania, which i... more The bulk of Mancall's text derives from lectures given at the University of Pennsylvania, which is clear in the structure of the work. At times the narrative is unnecessarily repetitive, and the chapters read more like standalone pieces rather than parts of a single tome. These caveats aside, the width and breadth of Mancall's history is clear throughout Nature and Culture in the Early Modern Atlantic. Additionally, there are over 50 black and white illustrations, plus a dozen richly-detailed colour plates, that greatly enhance the rich history offered here. Sure to be an essential volume, Mancall's work is a most welcome addition to studies of the Early Modern Atlantic World and beyond.

Call for Papers by Jonathan Greenwood

Pope Clement VIII (r. 1592-1605) distinguished candidates for canonization between those with a l... more Pope Clement VIII (r. 1592-1605) distinguished candidates for canonization between those with a long-standing local cult and the beati moderni (modern blesseds), holy exemplars of a more recent vintage. Despite much being made of the political and economic maneuvers involved in the advancement and success of canonization processes, the vital role of textual, visual and material hagiographies in the creation and promotion of saints' and would-be saints' cults warrants additional research, given the centrality of these narratives to holy persons' posthumous reputation and cultic prospects. These proposed RSA 2020 panels will complement another sponsored by the Hagiography Society and named for the Society's interdisciplinary book series "Sanctity in Global Perspective." The series of panels aims to foster novel conceptualizations and the possibility of crosspollination of ideas across traditions, geographical regions, and academic disciplines by bringing together papers to examine comparatively the intersections of visual, historical, and liturgical accounts of the concept of early modern sanctity in literary, artistic, ideational, and sociohistorical dimensions. New insights and research directions will illuminate the lives of saintly figures, the communities dedicated to those figures, and the material evidence of their cults. Papers taking up the issue of the questions of material culture, global exchange, comparison and entanglement, and emergent beati moderni cults are especially welcome. Please send a Word document (.doc or .docx) with the following to Jon Greenwood (jegreenwood@gmail.com) and Ruth Noyes (Ruth.Sargent.Noyes@natmus.dk):-Your name and academic affiliation-Paper Title (15-word maximum)-Abstract of 150 words-Abridged CV of 300 words Please submit your proposals by July 20, 2019. Presenters will need to be members of RSA by the time of the conference.

Papers by Jonathan Greenwood

This inventory is a supplement to my article "Miracles in Writing: Obstetric Intercessions, Scrib... more This inventory is a supplement to my article "Miracles in Writing: Obstetric Intercessions, Scribal Relics, and Jesuit News in the Early Modern Global Cult of Ignatius of Loyola," Journal of Jesuit Studies (forthcoming)

Book Chapters by Jonathan Greenwood

Imaging Jesuit Sanctity, 2024