Spring 2004 Graduate Courses - Medieval Institute, University of Notre Dame

715 Hesburgh Library, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556-5629, Telephone: (574) 631-6603, Facsimile: (574) 631-8644, Email: medinst@nd.edu

Spring 2004: Graduate Courses

MI 517 Paleography
M. Boulton
T 3:30-6:00

This course is an introduction to Latin paleography from the oldest surviving Latin manuscripts (c. 5th century) to about 1500 A.D. Classes will consist of lectures on the developments of handwriting over the course of this period and special emphasis will be given to practical exercises in reading various hands and to the technique of describing medieval manuscripts, and to the nature of paleographical research.

Requirements include weekly transcriptions of assigned material, two short papers, and a final examination. Students are expected to have a good working knowledge of Latin.

MI 525 Lyric and Narrative in Medieval French
M. Boulton
M 3:30-6:00

This course will examine the ideology of troubadour poetry and its influence on French literture of the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries. We will trace this influence from the narrative response to lyric poetry in the romances of Lancelot, Tristan and Iseut, and Guillaume de Dole, through the erotic pseudo-autobiographies (Roman de la Rose, Remède de Fortune), to the tendency of lyric cycles to recount stories (Christine de Pizan's Cent Ballades). In these works and others, the confrontation of lyric and narrative tendencies, the combinations of song and speech, and the intertextual implications of hybrid works will be of particular interest.

The course will be conducted in French or English, depending on the preferences of the class. Modern French will be provided for all Old French texts, but good reading knowledge of modern French is required.

Requirements: One fifteen- to twenty-page research paper; several class presentations.

MI 525A Topics in Early Christianity: The Formation of Christian Empire from Constantine to Justinian
R. Young
TH 11:00-12:15

This course will evaluate scholarly treatments of the problem of Christian Empire from the conversion of Constantine to Justinian's reconquest of the West, as well as the ancient historiography of Christian empire from Eusebius to Procopius. It will examine the way in which early Christians adapted the history of Rome in their own literary, architectural, and political attempts to construct a new society.

MI 529A St. Bonaventure: Theology & Spirituality in Thirteenth-Century Scholasticism
T. Prügl
MW 10:00-11:15

Along with Thomas Aquinas and Albertus Magnus, St. Bonaventure is considered one of the leading and most influential theologians of the high Scholastic period. Although he had to abandon his promising career as a university teacher in order to lead the fledgling Franciscan Order as its Minister General, Bonaventure continued his theological work until the end of his life. Critical of the growing influence of Aristotelian thought within theology, he deliberately chose the tradition of St. Augustine, Ps.-Denis, and Hugh of St. Victor as the basis for his theology. The recent emphasis on his spiritual writings notwithstanding, Bonaventure developed a highly speculative and consistent theology, which spans the whole horizon of Scholastic theology. Providing an introduction to Bonaventure's life and writings, the course will focus on central aspects of his theology such as the Trinity, creation, christology, anthropology and theological epistemology.

MI 531 Beowulf
K. O'Brien O'Keeffe
TH 9:30-10:45

What relationship do we expect between "heroic" texts and the society that produced and enjoyed them? What cultural investments of our own lead us to read certain Old English texts and not others? How did Beowulf receive canonical status? What strategies of reading permit the past to offer a critique of the present? Using Beowulf as both focus and foil, this course will examine a wide range of textual and material cultural issues presented by the surviving verse from Anglo-Saxon England. Prerequisite: Reading knowledge of Old English. (Undergraduates may enroll with permission of the instructor.)

Required work: Mid-term examination, oral report, a short critical paper, final examination.

MI 536A Poetry after Chaucer: English Writing in the Fifteenth Century
M. Nolan
TH 5:00-6:15

This course will focus on the poetic tradition in English as it developed both during and after Chaucer's life. We will be reading texts by Gower, Lydgate, and Hoccleve, and becoming familiar with the extensive secondary literature on these poets that has been roduced in recent years. Critics once dismissed the fifteenth century as "dull," the province of "desperate thesis hunters," but as of late scholars have begun to recognize the genuine innovativeness and heterogeneity of non-Chaucerian writing. Indeed, all three of the poets we will read in this course--Gower, Lydgate, and Hoccleve--have emerged from the shadow of Chaucer to be seen as the crucial bridge between the medieval and the early modern period. A series of questions will inform our reading: To what degree do the labels "medieval" and "Renaissance" still provide useful temporal markers? What is the relationship between politics and poetry during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries? How do these poets understand themselves and their poetic projects? What theoretical models are useful for reading these poets? Who read Gower, Lydgate, and Hoccleve? How were their texts circulated and produced? What models did Chaucer provide, and how were they reworked and rearticulated by fifteenth-century poets?

Students will write a short, conference-length paper, and a longer seminar paper.

MI 548 Dante II
C. Moevs
TH 11:00-12:15

Dante's Comedy is one of the supreme poetic achievements in western literature. It is a probing synthesis of the entire Western cultural and philosophical tradition that produced it, a radical experiment in poetics and poetic technique, and a profound exploration of Christian spirituality. Dante I and II are a close study, over two semesters, of the entire Comedy, in its cultural (historical, literary, artistic, philosophical) context. Dante I covers the works that precede the Comedy (Vita Nuova, Convivio, De vulgari eloquentia) and the Inferno, Dante II covers the Purgatorio and Paradiso, along with the Monarchia. These are separate courses, and can be taken independently, though they do form an integrated sequence. The course and all discussion will be conducted in English. Dante's minor works will be read in English translation; all critical articles will be in English. The Comedy will be read in facing-page translation, and we will refer to it in Italian. Acquaintance with Latin or a Romance language is therefore helpful, though not strictly necessary.

MI 550B Ancient Philosophy for Medievalists
S. Gersh
TH 12:30-1:45

One of the main difficulties posed by medieval philosophers to their modern readers results from their dependence upon a variety of traditional assumptions and their use of a range of traditional terminology. In the face of so much that is unexplained, a beginning student runs the risk of becoming confused and disheartened. This course is an attempt to remedy the situation by looking at the relevant ancient background to the main medieval developments. We shall study texts which can be roughly arranged under five headings: 1) Plato: "Timaeus," 2) Fragments of Plato in ancient and patristic writers, 3) Aristotle: "Physics," "Metaphysics," "De Anima" (extracts), 4) Cicero's doxographies, and 5) the Latin Plotinus. Most of the material will be studied in English, although it will obviously be necessary to introduce a certain amount of Graeco-Latin terminology.

MI 552 Fifteenth-Century Italian Renaissance Art
C. Rosenberg
MWF 10:40-11:30

This course investigates the century most fully identified with the early Renaissance in Italy. Individual works by artists such as Brunelleschi, Donatello, Ghiberti, Botticelli, and Alberti are set into their social, political, and religious context. Special attention is paid to topics such as the origins of art theory, art and audience, Medician patronage, and art for the Renaissance courts of northern Italy and Naples.

MI 561B Boccaccio
C. Moevs
T 2:00-4:30

Though one of the most entertaining texts in literature, Boccaccio's Decameron has been called "the most enigmatic of medieval texts, richly difficult to fathom." The text that lies behind Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, and that created the modern short story, the Decameron is one of the most important and influential works in literature. It is a profound meditation on the grounds of faith and the meaning of death, on the relation between language and reality, on literature as a response to human suffering and mortality, and on the nature of crisis and historical change. It is a subtle exploration of the concepts of fortune, human intelligence and creativity, love, social hierarchy and social order, and religious language and practice. We shall also pay special attention to the representation of women in the Decameron, and to the book's apparent "feminism." Students will be free to explore other topics as well, such as magic, the visual arts, mercantile culture, travel and discovery, and new religious practices. We will read the text in its entirety in Italian; a reading knowledge of Italian is thus required, but the enrollment will determine the language of discussion. Open to advanced and qualified undergraduates by permission.

MI 563 Latin Literature and Stylistics
B. Krostenko
TH 2:00-3:15

The aim of this class is an appreciation of the history of Latin prose. The aim will be achieved in three ways. First, we will examine samples of authors from Cato the Elder to Apuleius to isolate their stylistic peculiarities and attempt to see shifts in style as responses to varying social pressures in the Roman world. Second, we will practice composing short pieces of Latin prose in imitation of some of the peculiarities observed. Third, we will consider some general problems in the history of Latin semantics, syntax, and style.

Prerequisite: CLLA 103 or equivalent.

MI 565 St. Augustine's Confessions
B. Krostenko
MW 11:45-1:00

This course provides an introduction to St. Augustine's Confessions, through reading of extensive selections from the Latin text, a careful reading of the entire work in English translation, and the application of a variety of critical approaches, old and new.

Prerequisite: CLLA 103 or equivalent.

MI 572A Seminar: Topics in Medieval Art (Sculpture and Architectural Sculpture in Trecento Italy and Its Meaning
P. Sanvito
MW 1:30-2:45

This seminar will address the complex problem of the dialogue between monumental sculpture in the last phases of the Italian Middle Ages and its architectural support. The fourteenth century was among the most productive in Italian art, not least because the country experienced its highest accumulation of capital. Merchant cities, oligarchic states, and dynastic courts engaged many of their strongest resources to realize some of the most impressive artistic commissions of Italian art (e.g., in Florence, Siena, Naples, Milan, and Venice). Interaction of the local schools of sculpture with numerous Swabian and French masters, frequently appointed to the aforementioned centers, enriched the variety of tendencies which late Gothic art shows right up to the end of its development.

MI 572B Ovid's Metamorphoses
A. Wouters
TH 3:30-4:45

In this course, we translate and discuss selected passages from the Metamorphoses, Ovid's idiosyncratic poetic history of the world. Topics for our discussions include the spiritual, moral, religious, political, and physical transformations portrayed between the creation story at the beginning and the deification of Caesar at the end of the text; the tension between Ovid's adherence to Roman traditions and his irreverent, sometimes subversive, artistic originality; the poem's narrative techniques, poetic style, and structure; the significance of intertextual allusions to Greek drama, Virgilian epic, and Ovid's own love poetry; the instability of gender; portraits of the poet within the work; and the innumerable faces of love, as presented through characters who are pious, raging with passion, inseparable, violent, infatuated, lovesick, devoted, and much more. Above all, this course aims at clarifying how Ovid's inexhaustible playfulness and delightful wit contributed to shaping a work of both epic grandeur and lyric intimacy that continues to inspire poets, composers, novelists, painters, and at least one playwright whose version recently made it all the way to Broadway. Daily preparation and active participation in class are essential components of this course; brief written assignments, one mid-term exam, one brief project, and a final exam also count toward the final grade.

MI 572C Readings in Medieval Latin
A. Wouters
TH 11:00-12:15

This course aims at making its students better translators of medieval Latin texts. To that end, we will focus on the translation and morphological and syntactical analysis of a variety of excerpts. In order to ensure the relevance of our brief selections for the broader research interests of the students, our readings will be taken whenever feasible from the reading lists of other courses offered during the Spring 2004 term. Enrollment in any of these other courses is not a prerequisite for our course. Daily preparation and active participation in class are essential components of this course; two written assignments, brief quizzes, one mid-term exam, and a final exam also count toward the final grade.

Prerequisite: (the equivalent of) one year of Latin at the college level or permission of the instructor.

MI 574 Introduction to Plotinus
S. Gersh
TH 2:00-3:15

The course will be divided into three parts: 1) A general survey of Plotinus' philosophy based on writings of his early and middle periods; 2) A close study of Plotinus' longest treatise (divided into four parts by Porphyry): Enneads III.8, V.8, V.5, II.9; and 3) Discussion of certain apparent innovations in Plotinus' last works. Our aim will be not only to understand Plotinian thought as a system of emanative monism but also to evaluate the expository and argumentative techniques by which this thought is organized into verbal discourse.

MI Medieval Latin Survey
A. Wouters
W 9:30-12:00

This course offers its students training in translation and grammatical analysis of a broad spectrum of medieval Latin texts. Our readings will be representative of a variety of genres, eras, and regions. Daily preparation and active participation in class are essential components of this course; two written assignments, brief quizzes, one mid-term exam, and a final exam also count toward the final grade.

Prerequisite: CLLA 475/MI 475 (Introduction to Christian Latin) or permission of the instructor.

MI 604 World of Charlemagne
T. Noble
MWF 1:55-2:45

The Carolingian (from Carolus, Latin for Charles: Charles the Great--Charlemagne--was the most famous Carolingian) period, roughly the eighth and ninth centuries, was foundational for western Europe. But this was also the time when the mid-Byzantine Empire consolidated its position and when the Abbasid family of caliphs introduced important and durable changes in the Islamic world. This course will focus on the West in the age of Charlemagne, but will draw frequent comparisons with and make continuous reference to Europe's Byzantine and Islamic neighbors. The course will explore such themes as: Europe's Roman and Christian inheritances from antiquity; the peoples of the Carolingian world; kingship and empire; political and social institutions and ideologies; religious and secular law; war and diplomacy; agriculture and trade; the church--popes, bishops, monks, and nuns; theology; art and architecture; Latin and vernacular literature. Reading assignments will combine modern scholarship and primary sources (in translation). Students will write mid-term and final examinations and will choose between several short papers or one long paper. Graduate students will meet weekly with the professor, carry out reading assignments different from those of the undergraduates, and submit a series of short papers.

MI 615 Literacy, Piety, and Power in the High Middle Ages
J. Van Engen
W 3:00-6:00

This course explores the impact of literacy on two aspects of high medieval history, on political administration and religious piety. It will examine the degree to which writing transformed the ways in which political power was conceived and implemented, and also the ways internal piety was understood and cultivated. While these two spheres of life may appear quite different at first glance, they also intersected in important ways, not only at royal or princely courts, but also, for instance, at the council of Constance in 1414-18. The course will consist in a combination of secondary readings (at least one language beyond English required) and primary readings in Latin and Middle English. It will require weekly readings and discussion in class, and a major seminar paper as the final achievement.

MI 634 Historical Theology Seminar: Christology of Thomas Aquinas
J. Wawrykow
H 9:30-12:00

Thomas Aquinas offered sustained reflections on Jesus Christ in a wide variety of his works, and throughout his career. Thomas's christology played a central role in his entire theology, providing a distinctive cast to his understanding of God and the human person. This course examines the Thomistic accomplishment in christology, paying particularly close attention to the different ways in which Thomas organized his various discussions of Christ, and, to the principal developments in his depiction of Christ.

MI 664 The Study of the Bible in Church and Synagogue: From Antiquity to the Middle Ages
M. Signer
T 1:15-3:45

The Bible formed the core revelatory text of both the synagogue and the early church. Although both communities developed differing collections of books considered to be sacred writings, there was a large body of works shared by the two communities. Students in this course will explore three dimensions of how Scripture was studied in Judaism and Christianity: The first consideration will be the material nature of the Bible. What were the physical characteristics of the book or books that Christians and Jews studied? A consideration of scroll and codex will form the basis for an investigation of how manuscripts transmitted the biblical text from antiquity to the Middle Ages. A second dimension will be the development of lectionary and liturgical approaches to Scripture. Students will explore how the Bible was read in the public worship of the church and synagogue. The genres of homily, Midrash, and liturgical poems or hymnody as liturgical contexts for Scripture will constitute the primary texts for this section of the course. The third part of the course will trace the hermeneutics of both Jews and Christians. What could one know of God and the divine will from the Scriptures?

Works such as Origen's Peri Archon, Augustine's De Doctrina Christiana, St. Benedict's Rule, Hugh of St. Victor's Didascalicon, and Thomas Aquinas's Summa will provide evidence for the Christian community. From the Jewish perspective, students will read portions of the Babylonian Talmud, Saadia Gaon's Book of Beliefs and Opinions, Maimonides's Guide of the Perplexed, and Nachmanides's Introduction to the Commentary on the Pentateuch.

Prerequisites: None.

Course Requirements: 1) Preparation of the readings and participation in the seminar, 2) An oral presentation on a topic decided with the instructor, and 3) A seminar paper due at the end of the course.

MI 673 Medieval Liturgies
M. Driscoll
W 9:30-12:00

The purpose of this seminar is to examine the various sacramental rites in the Middle Ages, especially the Eucharistic liturgy, and to attempt to reconstruct them within the context of liturgical enactment, architectural space, artistic and musical decoration, etc. The seminar must necessarily deal with liturgical texts, but this is only a first step for understanding the broader dimensions of the liturgy. Architectural, artistic, and musical components will be taken into consideration. Numerous commentaries on the liturgy are also an important source for garnering the medieval understanding of the liturgy, especially in its allegorical interpretation. A tangential but key element for the understanding is the devotional and spiritual practices that grew up alongside the official liturgy. Therefore, some attention will be given to these dimensions, including liturgical drama.

MI 688 Medieval Legal History
R. Rodes
W 8:00-10:00 p.m.

This course studies the formative period of the Anglo-American legal system using fourteenth-century yearbooks and other materials from the same period.