Long perceived as a time of unbridled violence, the year MIL is actually experiencing its own mechanisms of regulation and negotiation. Among these, the role of social control exercised by the saints and their relics, can be read as a vast story of support for the feudal system.
THE Miracles of Saint Foy, a compilation of miracles written in XIe century, reports the comic misadventures of a servant responsible for ringing the horn during the processions. Discovering that his instrument has been stolen, he demanded hardly the help of the saint, and now the COR begins to ring, unmask the thief (p. 163) ! This little one “ Holy Foy game “, Clean miracle accomplished to resolve an incident, is actually representative of the role fulfilled by the saints, which often make it possible to regulate social interactions, through a real” grammar Hagiography (p. 192).
It is to the analysis of this grammar that Dominique Barthélémy devoted here, by taking an interest in the stories of lives of saints, in the translation of their relics and the miracles they accomplish. They move away from scourges, help and heal the sick, promote an escape, or avenging wrongs. The choice of a partly chronological progression makes it possible to grasp how these miraculous interventions evolve in connection with social concerns.
The interest of these accounts, objects of study well known to the author and already exploited in some of his previous works, then ultimately does not reside so much in the miracle itself as in the context that surrounds it. The richness of certain descriptions, true “ Slices of Christian and feudal life »(P. 8), Book of valuable information on the Société de l’An Mil, making it possible to complete the sometimes laconic information provided by the charters and the chronicles.
The myth of terrors of the year millet
If the year Mil has long been described as a time of violence and misery, where the absence of public power would have delivered the peasants to the depredations of the feudal lords, Dominique Barthélemy contributed to nuance these terrors. He dismisses the thesis of a “ feudal change In the year MIL which would have been characterized, between 970 and 1050, by a withdrawal of justice and public institutions inherited from the Carolingian Empire, withdrawal accompanied by a rise in stately violence.
Dominique Barthélémy tried to show in several works that these violence “ were dramatized for excess (P. 14). The practice of feudal war between lords and vassals actually responds to implicit rules giving pride of place to regulatory and negotiation mechanisms, and therefore produce a system where violence alternates with compromise, and rivalries with alliances. He also contributed to qualifying the dependence of the serfs with regard to their Lord, as well as to attenuate the cleavage between this peasantry and a violent chivalry. Armed with these few reflections, the reader can thus perceive, in this context of feudal wars, the social utility of miracles stories which flourish in increasing number around the year Mil.
Healings and miraculous interventions
Healing power and the role of intercession of saints appears to be the very foundation of their popularity. Whether in Miracles of Saint Benoîtnine books written between IXe–XIIe century by nearly five different authors, as much as in Miracles of Saint Foywhose story started in the 1010s by the Clerc Bernard d’Angers was then chased by a monk of Conques. Both pay particular attention to miraculous cures and the fight against demons, either whether it is to repress demons, or to bring the demons out of those they have invaded. THE Miracles of Saint Benoît, thus evoke the case of a man named Maldebert, who is contorted so well that we believe it possessed (p. 40). We hinder him, we bring the priests to achieve exorcism, and we invoke the saints so that they intercede with God in favor of the deliverance of the man who ends up being healed. In addition to the role of intercessor of Saint Benedict, it is the struggle between demons and the saints that these miracles highlight.
But the help provided by the saints is not limited to these healings alone. In Miracles of Saint Foy We note, for example, the intervention of the saint in favor of the knights, prisoners or convicted. A captive knight at Castelpers urges the Saint to come and rescue him. Tired of being bothered, it helps him to escape in incredible circumstances. After three attempts, he jumps from the cliff and came out unscathed and then, to thank her, ends up going to deposit his broken irons in the Sanctuary of Conques (p. 170). In the background of this story, the historian can, with pragmatism, guess potential complicities or negotiations which could have led to the liberation of prisoners. Far from being anecdotal, these miraculous escapes are in reality representative of feudal interactions, and participate in this spirit of compromise and this effort of transaction between the Church and the lay powers, contravening the image of a millet year prey to unbridled violence.
Revenge miracles, moderation tool
However, the usefulness of “ Social regulation miracles “(P. 251) is above all noticeable through the cases of revenge operated by the saints, which are real justice tools to repair the wrongs-including those committed by knights themselves.
This is shown by cases of depredations suffered by monastic communities. If the monasteries are regularly granted lands and wealth by the aristocrats, in order to ensure their salvation, the conservation of these lands is not always easy: clerics frequently lament in the face of looting and abuses of which they are the victims. In these circumstances, a number of revenge stories see a knight be punctuated by a horseshoe or a “ fatal feast (P. 60), for having grabbed church goods. So it goes to the young lord of Sully-sur-Loire, Herbert, guilty of having looted monastic domains. The monks complain about the king of Francia, but nothing helps and Herbert persists in his works. Finally, riding at night, he is violently struck by the one he believes to recognize as Saint Benoît, coming to avenge the monks. No sooner has time to repent of his wrongs that he trepped (p. 52). However, these circumstances should not suggest an erasure of the public authorities. On the contrary, the forms of negotiation are everywhere in miracle stories. Their objective would not be to dissuade the spoils and encourage knights to favor negotiations ?
Just as common are the revenge of saints vis-à-vis the knights attacking serfs. Indeed, the author does not fail to recall the harmful effect of feudal wars towards the latter. We can mention, on this occasion, recurrence in the stories of miracles of “ rustic threats », That is to say prayers a little too harshly addressed by peasants or knights with saints. Thus the author of Miracles of Saint Benoît narrates scenes where the saint is taken to task, often in very uncommon or even threatening terms. A woman, seeing herself removed by the Lord of Château-Porcien the apostrophe in these terms: “ Eh Benoît, lazy old man, eh sown ! What are you doing ? You sleep ? And during this time you abandon your serfs to the outrages ? (P. 105).
Relics and peacekeepers
Finally, a place is made in the work to the role of the relics during the peacekeepers of the year Mil, assembled assembled under the authority of some bishops, in particular in Aquitaine, to punish the profanations of sacred places. In a context of feudal wars, the lords and knights had to take an oath, in the presence of relics, not to tackle ecclesial space, church people and peasants. Refractories are threatened with spiritual sanctions and incur anathema excluding the faithful of the Christian community. It is then a question of exercising real pressure on the knights to force them to respect the terms of the pact.
It is in these circumstances that the relics are mobilized, like the anthropomorphic statue-reliquary of Saint Foy, also called “ majesty ” – which appears on the cover of the work. If the “ majesty From Sainte Foy was able, for a time, to be taken for a testimony to the survival of a form of paganism, for Dominique Barthélemy these statues-reliquaries, pure product of Carolingian society, intended to inspire fear and respect, are quick to arouse in the faithful the regret of their sins. The statue-reliquary, a true spiritual weapon, is then transported by the monks to the disputed lands, but also during these peacekeepers. Again, this use of relics shows that the year Mil has well possessed its own culture of peace and was therefore not only torn by incessant conflicts.
The new features of the year 1100
Dominique Barthélemy finally notes many inflections in practices around the year 1100. The last chapter entitled “ New times miracles Is an opportunity to take stock of miraculous dynamics at the edge of the XIIe century. The culture of peace evolves, as is the vision of peace councils: they fall into disuse and the transport of relics to force adhesion to a code of good conduct no longer seems necessary, because the progress of royal and princely governments then make this mode of functioning obsolete.
More broadly, social regulation miracles seem to have started their decline. They do not completely disappear and we still find in the Miracles of Saint Benoît Some miraculous revenge, but their function evolves. THE “ rustic threats Decrease while moral concerns in particular linked to the beyond seem to be more significant. The relics keep their importance, but without being moved to public space: we now worship them in dedicated sanctuaries. These developments in Christianity lead to what André Vauchez had described as “ Religion of new times “, More spiritual, more marked by a pastoral turning point characteristic of the Gregorian reform.
The abundance of examples mobilized by Dominique Barthélemy undoubtedly constitutes the strength of the work. However, due to this accumulation, the reader is warned from the start that this book lends itself “ more to navigation than to linear reading (P. 9). Like the previous publications of the author on the subject, this work has the merit of giving body to the Société de l’E Mil and to honor the actors of feudal society that we see interacting according to the systems of alliance and rivalry.