Medieval narratives

Boccaccio inizia il Proemio del Decameron con le parole « Umana cosa è aver compassione degli afflitti », e spiega che essendo stato egli stesso nel passato distolto dai dolori dell'amore dai « piacevoli ragionamenti d'alcuno amico », senza i quali sarebbe morto, scrive ora in consolazione di quelli similmente afflitti. L'autore dichiara di voler portare sollievo, in particolare, alle giovani donne che soffrono il mal d'amore, alle quali non sono concessi gli stessi diversivi per superarlo che gli uomini hanno a loro disposizione. Lo scopo del Decameron è perciò di offrire loro una distrazione o un divertimento, un'occupazione temporanea in modo che non pensino ai loro problemi, i quali poi, nel tempo, si risolveranno. Tuttavia, la frase iniziale del libro solleva anche un'altra questione molto dibattuta dalla critica : leggere la narrativa, le novelle, i romanzi, può davvero insegnare la compassione ? È questo ciò che Boccaccio intende ? Alcuni stu-diosi contemporanei, come la filosofa americana Martha Nussbaum e il critico letterario Wayne Booth, giustificano l'insegnamento della letteratura, soprattutto del romanzo borghese, coll'argomento che esso migliora il lettore, sviluppando le sue capacità di capire norme morali astratte in modo più concreto o reale e di fare scelte etiche, facendolo agire alla fine in maniera più generosa e compassionevole.

The author of this study tries to determine the years, when Bolesław I the Brave occupied a part of the northwestern Kingdom of Hungary and when Stephen I of Hungary regained this part. He rejects the previous opinions of historians, who dated this event from the year 1000 / 1003 to the year 1025 / 1029 / 1030 / 1031. According to the author the military campaign of the Polish prince to the Kingdom of Hungary took place in the first third of the 11th century during Polish-German wars. Bolesław I the Brave lost a part of the northwestern Kingdom of Hungary in the final phase of Polish-German wars. Historical sources do not mention the time when Bolesław I the Brave started occupation of the northern part of the Nitra Principality in the Kingdom of Hungary. Based on the data preserved, the author tried to determine the years when the occupation might have started. He assumes that the Polish ruler’s invasion of the Kingdom of Hungary could have taken place in the second phase of the German-Polish war around 1007–1013. After a truce con¬cluded in Poznan in 1005, Bolesław I the Brave started new military activities not later than in the spring of 1007. The subsequent attacks commenced in the spring of 1009. Soon, in 1010, Henry II, Holy Roman Emperor, declared war against Bolesław I. As a result, Bolesław I could control the northern part of the Kingdom of Hungary – the Principality of Nitra between the spring of 1007 and the spring of 1009 (or, between the spring of 1009 and the spring of 1010). Rocznik świętokrzyski, nowy-R. św.n says that after Emeric’s birth, Stephen I concluded truce with Bolesław (in the source related to as Mieszko). The peace lasted 10 years. As Emeric was born in 1007, the occupation of the Nitra Principality and the peace agreement from Esztergom mentioned in the Hungarian-Polish Chronicle could have hap¬pened in 1007. One of the manuscripts of R. św.n from the 16th century mentions that truce was concluded in 1006. If the information from R. św.n about the peace between the Hun¬garian and Polish ruler is reliable, occupation of the Nitra Principality and the subsequent Esztergom meeting could have taken place in 1006–1007. Thietmar of Merseburg wrote that Bolesław I the Brave gave one castle at the Hungarian-Polish border to Prokui-Gyula II. Gyula II, the former Prince of Transylvania, had lived at Stephen I’s court since 1003. According to the Long Life of Saint Gerard, Gyula II and Csanád participated in a military campaign against Ajtony (?) or against Black Hungarians in 1008. Gyula II claimed that the Csanád success should have been attributed to him and for this reason he was sent away from the royal court. If Gyula II left the Kingdom of Hungary in 1008 and took cover at the court of Bolesław I the Brave, it means that the Polish ruler could have controlled the northern part of the Kingdom of Hungary back in 1008. A legend of Saint Romuald contains information about a message sent by the Polish ruler to Rome (probably in 1008) and which pertained to the coronation by the pope. Bolesław I’s plans were cancelled by Henry II. During a period of hostility between Germans and Poles in 1003–1007, the German king did not have very good relations with the Polish ruler. The story of a failed coronation of Bolesław I is described also by bishop Hartvik (in Life of St. Stephen I); it is also mentioned in the Hungarian-Polish Chronicle. The campaign of Henry II against the Polish ruler was probably rooted in the military success of Bolesław I in 1007. Henry II tried to win sup¬port of his brother-in-law, Stephen I. In a letter to Henry II from 1008 / 1009, Bruno of Querfurt wrote that bishop Bruno of Augsburg had come to the Kingdom of Hungary in 1007. Historians assume that the reason of his arrival was Henry II’s efforts to gain military support from Stephen I against Bolesław. In this way, Bolesław I might have had a reason to attack the Hungarian king around 1007. If Stephen I had made an alliance with Henry II, there would have been a danger of Poland being attacked from the south by Stephen I or the Hungarian king could have tried to endanger Bolesław’s position in Moravia. To strengthen the southern border of Poland, Bolesław I started to occupy the northern part of Hungary – the Nitra Principality – in 1007/1008. The Hungarian-Polish Chronicle writes that when the peace treaty between Stephen and Bolesław was signed in 1001, a mass was celebrated in St. Adalbert’s Basilica in Esztergom. Construction of the Basilica was not finished yet. However, the Basilica’s state must have allowed mass celebration. D. Dercsényi says that construction of St. Adalbert’s Basilica in Esztergom could have been completed around 1010. Thus, occupation of northern Hungary – the Nitra Principality and the subsequent Esztergom treaty should have happened around 1007–1009. Information in the Hungarian- Polish Chronicle about a meeting of the Polish and Hungarian rulers and the mass in St. Adalbert’s Basilica in Esztergom provides also data about Esztergom archbishop Astrik. Astrik was appointed bishop of Esztergom in 1007; therefore the attack against Stephen I, the meeting and the mass could have happened in 1007 or in the following years (1008–1009). To sum up, bearing in mind all the above mentioned years when Bolesław might have oc¬cupied the Nitra Principality, it is most likely to have happened sometime in 1007 or 1008. After all, based on dendrochronology data, a part of the Bratislava Castle fortification was built in 992–1012; this was probably related to the presence of the Polish army headed by Bolesław. If the Polish ruler occupied the Nitra Principality in 1007 – 1008, he would have had enough time to construct new fortifications in the Bratislava Castle. Stephen I regained the Nitra Principality in 1017 when he chased away Prokui-Gyula II from the Bratislava (Preslava) Castle and took over also other Nitra Principality castles. The Polish-German war was officially ended in early 1018 by the Bautzen Peace. It might have also included an agreement between Stephan I and Bolesław I about a new borderline. That might be the reason why Bolesław accepted the loss of the Nitra Principality in 1017 in favour of Stephen I who, in return, offered Bolesław I assistance in his military campaign to Kiev Rus’ in the summer of 1018. With all the above-mentioned facts in mind, Bolesław I the Brave could have controlled the Nitra Principality from 1007/1008 to 1017/1018 when Stephen I an¬nexed it to the Kingdom of Hungary.

The autor of this study is concerned with the occupation of a part of the northwestern Kingdom of Hungary by Bolesław I the Brave at the beginning of the 11th century. He analyses the military campaigns of the Polish prince in medieval narrative sources and annals. The author tries to find out why Bolesław I the Brave occupied part of the Kingdom of Hungary, what was the territory and who ruled there in the early third of the 11th century. Gallus Anonymus, The Hungarian-Polish Chronicle and some Poles’ annals mention that Bolesław I the Brave defeated Hungarians and occupied their land down to the Danube. The Hungarian-Polish Chronicle is the only medieval source that mentions the meeting of Hungarian king Stephan I and Polish prince Bolesław near Esztergom. The meeting was preceded by the war in which Stephan lost and Bolesław won and so Bolesław was sup¬posed to take over the area around Nitra. The war between Stephan and Bolesław was not a mere coincidence. Bolesław must have had a reason to invade the northwestern part of the Kingdom of Hungary. Bolesław could not occupy the that part of Hungarian Kingdom before the year 1000 as he was not interested in the area in the south from his land at that time. He could not overtake that part neither in the year 1000 or 1001. Boleslaw was able to expand his realm only after a political change after the death of Otto III in 1002. In the year 1003, after internal dynastic disagreements of the Przemyslids, Bolesław took over Czech and Moravian area. As he did in Czech area (Vladivoj, Soběslav), Bolesław engaged a man accepted by local nobility in the northwestern part of the Kingdom of Hungary to be able to control it better. The chosen person was called Ladislav the Bald and belonged to the Árpáds. He might resided at Piast court and was prince Michal’s older son. The only information about Ladislav’s rule in northwestern Hungarian Kingdom, overtaken by Bolesław at the beginning of the 11th century, may be found in Wielkopolska Chronicle.

This paper presents a comparative analysis of six dicta testium from the Tuscia from 1177 to 1237, highlighting fascinating elements of political language and discourse. For instance, the study of a particular theme (violent conflict) and several particularly gravid words (guerra, exercitus, cavalcata, oste) indicate the existence of several groups or communities of memoria in the territories documented in the inquisitiones. The contraposition of these groups within the judicial vertices prompted them to manipulate the record through the use of particularly sophisticated and well-chosen language. Indeed, among the principal characteristics of the dicta is the fact that their memoria cannot be reduced to the linear, pacified, coherent thread that emerges from other types of source, for example libri iurium and statutory codes, making them an ideal record for the purposes of counterfactual historical research.

The discussion of Bjarnar saga Hítdælakappa structure has resulted in Bjarnar saga being described either as a clumsily made saga (Sigurður Nordal 1938, lxxix, Bjarni Guðnason 1994, 71) or as an odd, non-mainstream saga (Finlay 2003, 87). It has been called loose, especially in the part of the exchange of insults and violence between the
poets. However, a scholastic attempt to find the narrative strategy behind the veil of clumsiness has shown that the seemingly loosely constructed narrative of the “Icelandic” part appears to be planned in a rather sophisticated and artistic way (Finlay 1990-1993).

However, it did not solve all of the Bjarnar saga’s structural puzzles. It was also argued that the looseness of the ‘Icelandic’ part contrasts with the tightness of the ‘Norwegian’ beginning (Finlay 2000, xxxiv). The contrast between the parts can be supported by further research on the narrator’s guidance in the saga. In this work the contrasts, and also repetitions, in the ‘Norwegian’ beginning and the ‘Icelandic’ part of Bjarnar saga are considered as the indications of the bipartite structure, which often can be found in medieval European and Scandinavian literature (Clover 1982). The analysis builds upon research on structure and narrative strategy in Bjarnar saga, as well as previous structural and narratological research in the field of saga studies. Special attention is paid to the so far overlooked architecture of the “Norwegian” part and its connection to the ‘Icelandic narrative’ in order to determine its place in the overall structure of Bjarnar saga.

The BSP survives as an eleventh-century translation from Syriac into Greek, whose plot revolves around the theme of the role of philosophers in princely education, and as advisors to rulers. The text features an array of colourful characters – a great king, a young prince, a wily wife, an erudite teacher, and seven wise men – and a series of twenty-four tales told by the protagonists in the main story. An epigram and a prologue disclose the identities of the author, and of the translator of the book into Greek, as well as of his patron, and help contextualize the early transmission of the BSP. Later Greek versions show some morphological, syntactical, lexical and stylistic modifications. Their linguistic range spans from the middle-register Byzantine koinē to several more liberal renditions into modern Greek. The printed editions of the BSP had a long run and wide circulation in Greek, as did their eighteenth- and nineteenth-century translations into Romanian, Bulgarian and Serbian.

As narrativas islandesas produzidas no século XIII são ricas fontes para se entender a cultura nórdica, abrangendo inúmeros conteúdos relevantes para o aprofundamento sobre a Escandinávia, seus povos, culturas e tradições. A Islândia, com sua cristianização, se tornou um grande polo literário na Escandinávia medieval, incorporando tradições orais de mais de nove séculos, sendo seus principais expoentes literários, as sagas e os poemas éddicos. Assim, os substratos históricos e lendários presentes nessas narrativas, são frutos dessa tradição oral, e devido a esse fator, diversas narrativas possuem os mesmos substratos, como o caso das sagas islandesas e da Edda poética. Portanto, essa apresentação objetivará, mostrar as semelhanças de substratos históricos e lendários entre Edda poética e a Saga dos Volsungos, a partir do ciclo de Sigurd, pois, observando essas similaridades se tem conhecimento sobre essas narrativas produzidas na Islândia e suas diferenças, sobre o processo de cristianização da mesma, e sobre as tradições orais nórdicas, que remontam desde as migrações germânicas, sendo um conteúdo que pode ser amplamente estudado e discutido. Palavras-chave: Estudos Nórdicos; Literatura Islandesa; Islândia Medieval; Sagas Islandesas; Edda em verso. Abstract: The icelandic narratives, written in the XIII century, are rich sources to understand the nordic culture, reaching out to several contents for the study of Scandinavia, their peoples, cultures and traditions. With the cristianization of Iceland, this small country became one of the greatests literary centers of medieval Scandinavia, bringing to their litarature nordic oral traditions. So this presentation will show the similarities of the historicals and legendarys substrates between the The Saga of the Volsungs and the poetic Edda, focusing on the cicle of the hero Sigurd, because by studying these similarities it is possible to expand knowledge about the nordic narratives produced in Iceland and their diferences, about the production process of these narratives, and about the oral traditions that go back to the germanic migrations. With that being said, this theme can be well studied and explored. Introdução O presente texto irá abordar a temática da literatura escandinava, mais precisamente os substratos históricos e lendários semelhantes entre as narrativas do tipo Edda e do tipo Saga a partir do ciclo do herói Sigurd, ambas localizadas na Islândia, produzidas como resultado da cristianização dos povos ditos como nórdicos e da influência literária europeia a partir do século XII e XIII. Comparando as duas literaturas

Średniowieczne sporty w obliczu krytyki na podstawie wybranych źródeł Medieval Sports in the Face of Criticism Based on Selected Sources ABSTRAKT Przedmiotem artykułu jest próba odpowiedzi na pytanie o przyczyny, charakter i skutki krytyki podejmowanej pod adresem niektórych sportów popularnych w średniowiecznej Europie łacińskiej. Badając to zagadnienie, autor dokonuje analizy wybranych wątków poświęconych krytyce sportów, które znajdują się w źródłach pisanych, takich jak utwory narracyjne (kroniki, traktaty dydaktyczne, literatura wizyjna, exempla i pisma homiletyczne), a także źródła dokumentowe (postanowienia soborów i synodów, edykty królewskie itd.). Artykuł wzbogacono dotychczasową wiedzą o średniowiecznych sportach, ukazując rozmaite uwarunkowania natury społecznej i kulturowej, w których przyjmowano wobec nich postawy krytyczne.