HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor
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HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor

HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor

juliano.multiculturas.com
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21.07.2015 Views

DYNASTIC HISTORY 245So, although the French genealogies show a consciousness of family,they seem to arise not from that family self-consciousness but,rather, from political situations, and the existence of some genealogiesseems to have prompted the creation of other histories takinga dynastic or genealogical form. The precociousness of these formsof history in northern France and Flanders, well before they appearin Germany, 125 may reflect not so much the greater degree of nobleself-awareness in that region as the more rapid coalescence of territorialprincipalities and the identification of both monastic communitiesand princely administration with these principalities and theirrulers.The work that has been done on German genealogical materialpoints in the same direction. For each genealogical work, a specificset of political and religious circumstances can often be educed whichconditioned the creation of the work and the form the work took,that is, the individuals who were actually conceived of as being partof the family or dynasty. What is striking about the German materials,however, is that the ‘dynasty’ is often not a biological dynasty,that is, there are breaks and interruptions, in which new familiesappear. In consequence, these dynastic genealogies appear muchmore focused on the control of a particular piece of property thanon a biological lineage. In the case of the fourteenth-century Welfgenealogical table, the genealogy begins with Hermann Billung, nota Welf forebear at all, although founder of Saxony. 126 While thegenealogy did serve Welf political goals, it was not “genealogical” atall in the most fundamental sense, that a family was commemorated.What the German genealogies make clear is that many genealogiesand genealogical histories were the work of a “professional” whoestablished the genealogy through “research”, and that frequentlythese works were compiled not at the prompting of the family butat the instance of an institution. 127Varying historical purposes could lie below the genealogical form,so that, in a sense, to concentrate on the “natural” form of biologicalsuccession obscures as much as it reveals. The Lignages d’Outremer(begun in 1268) are an interesting case. They are part of a larger125van Caenegem (1973), 73 and n. 16.126Moeglin (1995), 524–25.127Althoff (1988).

246 LEAH SHOPKOWwork, the Assises de Jérusalem, which was a collection of lost lawsredrawn in the thirteenth century from memory at the court ofCyprus, composed by several authors, which survive in thirty-someoddmanuscripts and which was translated from the original Frenchinto other languages. 128 The Lignages never are found alone, and, infact, the text explicitly situates itself with reference to the Assises.Even in the earliest versions, it is clear that it was a companion text.From the prologue, the relationship between these rather disparatetexts appears to be that both are ways to describe a geographical,social, and political region, a land, its laws and its people. 129 Thework is divided into chapters, each of which deals with a noble familyand its descendants, but in the first edition, the family in whosecircle the text was composed, that of Jean d’Ibelin, who was theredactor of one of the legal components of the Assises, is given prideof place. Noble pride in family is assuredly expressed here, but it isa pride connected to a particular polity—the kingdom of Jerusalem—and a particular service—the family’s participation in the governanceof the kingdom—and also at a particular time—the time when thatkingdom had essentially slipped out of existence and the location ofOutremer had shifted. It commemorated only the original familiesstill in existence at the time of redaction and also added some familieswho were newcomers (such as the de Montforts). Once again,the existence of the tradition permitted a later writer to direct thetext to new ends. This redactor, less interested in the Ibelin familyand more in the structure of the kingdom, reorganized the textaround 1309 to put the most important families first (the Lusignans,the kings, had been at the end in the first redaction). The text wasreworked again around 1369, when its interest was purely historical. 130128See Nielen-Vandevoorde (1995).129“Since you have heard and listened to the laws and customs of the realm ofJerusalem, and of those who first established them, it is proper that we enumeratefor you the heirs who have descended and come from that good folk and by whomthe land was inhabited”. Venice, Biblioteca Marciana, Fr. app. 20265 (annex, no.2) quoted in Nielen-Vandevoorde (1995), 108 (translation mine). Thus laws, country,and people all come together as one entity, suggesting again a community,rather than isolated noble families.130Nielen-Vandevoorde (1995).

246 LEAH SHOPKOWwork, the Assises de Jérusalem, which was a collection of lost lawsredrawn in the thirteenth century from memory at the court ofCyprus, composed by several authors, which survive in thirty-someoddmanuscripts and which was translated from the original Frenchinto other languages. 128 The Lignages never are found alone, and, infact, the text explicitly situates itself with reference to the Assises.Even in the earliest versions, it is clear that it was a companion text.From the prologue, the relationship between these rather disparatetexts appears to be that both are ways to describe a geographical,social, and political region, a land, its laws and its people. 129 Thework is divided into chapters, each of which deals with a noble familyand its descendants, but in the first edition, the family in whosecircle the text was composed, that of Jean d’Ibelin, who was theredactor of one of the legal components of the Assises, is given prideof place. Noble pride in family is assuredly expressed here, but it isa pride connected to a particular polity—the kingdom of Jerusalem—and a particular service—the family’s participation in the governanceof the kingdom—and also at a particular time—the time when thatkingdom had essentially slipped out of existence and the location ofOutremer had shifted. It commemorated only the original familiesstill in existence at the time of redaction and also added some familieswho were newcomers (such as the de Montforts). Once again,the existence of the tradition permitted a later writer to direct thetext to new ends. This redactor, less interested in the Ibelin familyand more in the structure of the kingdom, reorganized the textaround 1309 to put the most important families first (the Lusignans,the kings, had been at the end in the first redaction). The text wasreworked again around 1369, when its interest was purely historical. 130128See Nielen-Vandevoorde (1995).129“Since you have heard and listened to the laws and customs of the realm ofJerusalem, and of those who first established them, it is proper that we enumeratefor you the heirs who have descended and come from that good folk and by whomthe land was inhabited”. Venice, Biblioteca Marciana, Fr. app. 20265 (annex, no.2) quoted in Nielen-Vandevoorde (1995), 108 (translation mine). Thus laws, country,and people all come together as one entity, suggesting again a community,rather than isolated noble families.130Nielen-Vandevoorde (1995).

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