At 02:46 PM 1/29/2004 -0800, Vance Wood wrote: An overly condensed, black-and-white summary of 1000+ years of the history of a complex institution with many different attributes and entities extending over many nations, including some downright errors.
> It took the invention of the printing press to change all of this >and start both the Protestant reformation and a couple of generations of war >over issues spiritual. Umm, where do you fit in the medieval sects and their clashes with the established Church? Cathars, Waldensians, Albigensians, Jan Hus . . . >It was not until Henry VIII decided to challenge the authority of the Church >by declaring himself the supreme head of the Church in England did the >mortar that held Medieval Christianity under the thumb of Rome start to >crumble, and the corruption of that institution begin to be known by an >increasingly educated population. Vance, have you never heard of Martin Luther? Not to mention the many earlier reformers, many of whom wrought significant changes in the institutional Church. Of course, any institution is corruptible. To mention that the medieval Church was corruptible and corrupted is to state no more than a truism. This short essay, which I found in about 5 minutes of Googling, will get you started. Then you can follow the footnotes and suggestions for further reading. http://www.the-orb.net/non_spec/missteps/ch11.html To the original questioner: There are many books that will help you get an impression of what people believed and how they lived, not only relating to religion. Not to blow the family horn, but I can't help mentioning a book written by MY COUSIN, tantara tantara, Miriam Usher Chrisman, called "Lay Culture, Learned Culture: Books and Social Change in Strasbourg, 1480-1590." She examined all the books printed in Strassbourg during this crucial period, and gets a lot out of them about people's lives. Yes, books were rare. But books were not printed only for the learned and wealthy classes, there were items to appeal to other classes. Calendars, medico-astrological texts, etc. In fact the publishers divide neatly into high-falutin & scholarly vs. popular & practical. Interestingly, both types published music. Another great read is a two-volume work of German broadsides from the sixteenth-century, which I have mentioned before on this list. Can't find the title and author at the moment. These are the newspapers of the day and they range from the New York Times ("Description and Map of the Siege of Vienna by Count so-and-so, who was in the entourage of Prince such-and-such") to the Daily Enquirer ("Strange Growth of Hairy Grapes in Augsburg," "Notorious Murderer Caught Tried and Executed in Frankfurt," etc.) Read the lay literature of the period. Renard the Fox, Patient Griselda. El Cid. Roland. Puppet shows were very popular and were based on these familiar fables, as well as ancient stories about the Crusades, possibly taken from the Italian 16th-century epics by Tasso and Ariosto. Read Boccacio's Decameron. Machiavelli's play Mandragora. There are even joke books. Of course there are thousands of English broadsides and pamphlets, not to mention all the playwrights besides Shakespeare. (I've always loved the name "Ralph Royster-Doyster.") And it's fun! Caroline ********************************* Caroline Usher DCMB Administrative Coordinator 613-8155 Box 91000
