Pilgrimage and Greek Identity in Byzantine and Norman Southern Italy (9th-12th Century) (original) (raw)
Saint Archangel Michael was and is perceived in the Orthodox Church as a very mighty, living, visible and invisible Saint and needs more scholarly attention than received so far. From the very beginning, the Archangel's veneration has been connected to specific landscapes and their features. A remarkable example in this respect is the miracle in the Phrygian places of Chonai and Kolossai in Asia Minor, which alludes to a spring (water) and a hole (funnel) in the miracle's narration. While some scholars argue that the Archangel's cult spread from Phrygia to Rhodes, Constantinople and Egypt, others contradict the notion of origin and diffusion from a single geographical point and emphasise that the veneration emerged out of multiple sites. The present article compares seemingly "incomparable" parts of medieval Europe, which have never been interconnected by such specific, joint research questions so far. We have identified two distinct areas of research, Byzantine Macedonia and the Kingdom of the Scots, from the 4th to the 15th centuries. The main research questions, which arise for the future, are, whether Michaeline religious sites have been built by local communities based on a common and transnational human perception of natural features in the landscape (e.g. the spring and the funnel)? Were these features, through which the Archangel was venerated, locally and independently connected to him by the local population? And if so, how may we explain, if at all, similarities in the perception of natural features in the landscape and sanctity between different medieval European societies? Crucial for our research questions are the underlying theoretical concepts of Hagiogeography, Sacred Geography and Hierotopy.