Images and the Power of the Spoken Word

Images and the Power of the Spoken Word
Gerhard Jaritz
In the thirties of the sixteenth century, the German reformatory author
Sebastian Franck criticized the use of images in the Catholic churches: ‚ 1
Whenever there i s an important feast-day, the church is decorated with
hangings and great garlands; the altarpieces are opened up and the saints
dusted and prinked, especially the Patron of the feast. They set him dressed
up under the church door in order to beg, and a man sits by him to say the
words for him, because the statue cannot speak. He says: ‚Give St George
( or St Leonard, or whoever it may be) something, for God ’s sake … ‚
We are rarely confronted with such a situation conceming image and orality. We
also seldom come across actually speaking visual images; they have to be looked
for in the area and competence of extraordinary miracles.2
However, the context and connection between medieval images and the
spoken word occurred regularly and played a decisive role in the mediation of
messages with the help of pictures. I would like to concentrate mainly on the late
Middle Ages and on religious space. The examples originate particularly from the
German speaking area of Europe.
The representation of oral communication was one of the main contents of
medieval images. lf depicted persans communicated, this could be made evident
through their gestures and their position toward each other.3 That way, visual
pattems of the actors‘ oral communication were created to be perceived and
understood by the beholders ofthe pictures.
This creation could be continued and intensified i f the spoken words were
actually made present, most often in scrolls or banderoles.4 Through such scrolls
1 Michael Baxandall, The Limewood Sculptors of Renaissance Germany (New Haven and
London: Yale University Press, 1980), p. 59.
2 Cf. Hans Belting, Likeness and Presence: a His101y of the Image before the Era of Art
(Chicago: University ofChicago Press, 1 994), pp. 194, 3 1 0, and 362.
3 Cf., e.g., Fran.yois Gamier, Le Iangage de l ‚image au Moyen Age. Signijication et symbolique
(Paris: Le Leopard d’Or, 1 982); idem, Le Iangage de l’image au Moyen Age, II. La grammaire
des gestes (Paris: Le Leopard d’Or, 1989); Jean-Ciaude Schmitt, La raison des gestes dans
/ ‚Occident medil!val (Paris: Gallimard 1990); Jan Bremmer and Herman Roodenburg, eds., A
Cultural History of Gesture. From Antiquity to the Present Day (lthaca: Comell University
Press,: 1 992).
4 Cf. Wilhelm Messerer, „Illustrationen zu Wemhers ‚Drei Liedern von der Magd‘,“ in Deutsche
Literatur im Millefalter – Kontakte und Perspektiven. Hugo Kuhn zum Gedenken, ed.
Christoph Cormeau (Stuttgart: Metzler, 1 979), pp. 448-45 1 .
278 ÜERHARD )ARlTZ
the visual was not only penetrated by the verbal,5 but also by the oral. This material
presence of the spoken word contributed to the explicit physical presence of
’speech acts‘ of the depicted persons, as weil as to their authenticity and
importance.6 The word was to create or to increase the life-likeness and, by that,
the efficacy and the success of the picture, its contents and its actors.7 In a given
context, the spoken text might have been explaining, contextualizing, signifying,
mediating, inviting, stimulating, or emotionalizing; and it is clear that the beholder
need not have been Iiterate to understand.
In the case of the words spoken by depicted donators, for instance, experience
told everybody that the latter asked certain mediators, mainly saints, to
pray for them: „ora pro me,“ „ora pro nobis,“ „bitt für mich,“ etc. (fig. 1).8 In such
cases and contexts, the representation of the spoken word in pictures did not mean
that the audience had to be confronted with letters or actually, written text. 1t was
enough to depict the act of speaking and its importance by using the empty bearers
of the oral statements, i.e. the text scrolls or bandemies without text, as attributes
of the actors. 9 lt would have been clear that a kneeling donator holding an empty
banderoJe was about to ask a saint to pray for him or her (fig. 2). ro Everyone would
5 See Alison R. Flett, „The Significance ofText Scrolls,“ in Medieval Texts and Images. Studies
ofManuscriptsfrom the Middle Ages, eds. Margaret M. Manion and Bernard J. Muir (Chur et
al.: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1991), p. 44. – For the different functions of inscriptions
in images see Mieczyslaw Wallis, „Jnscriptions in Paintings,“ Semiotica, 9 ( 1 973), pp. 6- 1 1 .
6 For the scrolls and inscriptions in medieval pictures as ’speech acts,‘ see Michael Camille,
“The Book of Signs: Writing and Visual Difference in Gothic Manuscript Illumination,“ Word
and Image, I ( 1 985), p. 143. Concerning the perceived importance of the written text or dialogue
in medieval paintings, see Wallis, „Inscriptions,“ p. 1 3 ; Leslie Brubacker, „When
pictures speak: Incorporation of Dialogue in the Ninth-century Miniatures of Paris gr. 5 1 0,“
Ward & Image, 1 2 ( 1 996), p. I 06. In regard to the physical presence of the words, see Roger
Tarr, „Visibile parlare: the Spaken Word in Fourteenth-century Central ltalian Painting,“
Word & Image, 1 3 ( 1 997), p. 225.
7 Cf. the story in Giorgio Vasari’s Le vite de piu eccellenti architetti, pittori, et scultori ltaliani,
da Cimbabue insino a ‚tempi nostri (Florence, 1550) about Buonamico Buffalmacco, who told
Bruno di Giovanni to paint words issuing from the mouths of the depicted figures to Iet them
appear alive (Tarr, „Visibile parlare,“ p. 232). For other possibilities of bringing to life the
depicted situations by ·using text scrolls, see Susanne Wittekind, „Vom Schriftband zum
Spruchband. Zum Funktionswandel von Spruchbändern in Illustrationen biblischer Stoffe,“
Frühmittelalterliche Studien, 30 (1 996), p. 352: „Generell bedeutet die Verwendung von
Spruchbändern eine Verlebendigung des historischen Ereignisses, da der Betrachter die ‚verschriftlichte‘
Rede ja laut mitliest.“
8 The donator Wolfgang Arndorfer praying: „0 sancte Bernhardine ora pro me“. Stained glass
window, end öfthe lS’h century, Neukirchen am Ostrang (Lower Austria), parish church. Photo:
Institut für Realienkunde des Mittelalters und der frühen Neuzeit (Krems an der Donau).
9 Cf. Wittekind, „Vom Schriftband zum Spruchband,“, p. 343: „Daher genügt oft schon die
unbeschriebene Rolle als Hinweis, als Sinnbild des Evangeliums, des apostolischen Lehrauftrags
bzw. der Weissagung, die in Formen verschriftlichter Rede dargestellt werden.“
10 St. Florian with the donator Leonhard, provost of the Austin Canon house of Saint Florian
(Upper Austria), panel painting, 1487. St. Florian, collections ofthe monastery. Photo: Institut
für Realienkunde des Mittelalters und der frühen Neuzeit (Krems an der Donau).
IMAGES AND THE POWER OF THE SPOKEN WORD 279
have known tbe existing or necessary formula in this context. The words were
material, they were visible and spoken, without actually having been written down.
A similar situation could, for instance, occur on the occasion of the·
„Annunciaton of the Virgin.“11 In many images, one can read that the angel said
„Ave, gracia plena, dominus tecum“ when approaching the Virgin;12 the written
word becomes part of the rhetoric.13 But some examples show that this was not
indispensable, and that the banderoJe could stay empty (fig. 3)!4 or was even
missing, because everybody already knew the spoken words in the oral
communication between the Angel and the Virgin on the occasion of the
Annunciation. This would also have been true for the illiterates who were
confronted with the written words ofthe Angel. The speech act and its text were so
important that one simply had to be aware of the contents without necessarily
being able to read, or even to see the text.
In other cases, it was just oral comrnunication generally tbat was important
and had to be made visible – even if the source or explicit background of the
spoken words was missing. There, it did not matter what was actually said; the
beholder should be able to imagine or to (re)construct herself or hirnself what the
speech act was about. Let us, for example, take a well-known and typical satiric,
and in that way, also didactic, engraving by lsrahel van Meckenem (t 1 503): the
„world-upside-down“ representation of tbe „Subjugated Husband“ (fig. 4). 15 The
busband is spinning, the wife has taken power; the distaff is her sword, and she
1 1 For the role of the communicated word and its iconography in Annunciation-scenes, cf. esp.
Horst Wenzel, „Die Schrift und das Heilige,“ in Die Verschriftlichung der Welt. Bild, Text und
Zahl in der Kultur des Mille/alters und der Frühen Neuzeit, eds. Horst Wenzel, Wilfried
Seipel, and Gotthart Wunberg (Vienna: Kunsthistorisches Museum and Milan: Skira, 2000),
pp. 19-29; idem, „Die Verkündigung an Maria. Zur Visualisierung des Wortes in der Szene,
oder: Schriftgeschichte im Bild,“ in Maria in der Welt. Marienverehrung im Kontext der
Sozialgeschichte, 10.-18. Jahrhunderts, eds. Claudia Opitz et al. (Zürich: Chronos, 1993), pp.
23-52; idem, Hören und Sehen, Schrift und Bild. Kultur und Gedächtnsi im Mille/alter
(München: C.H. Beck, 1995), pp. 270-291 . See also Klaus Schreiner, „Marienverehrung,
Lesekultur, Schriftlichkeit. Bildungs- und frömmigkeitsgeschichtliche Studien zur Auslegung
und Darstellung von ‚Mariä Verkündigung‘,“ Frihmillelalter/iche Studien, 24 { 1 990), pp.
314-368.
12 For the variations ofthe Annunciation scene from the point ofview ofthe communication and
time factor, see also Lucien Rudrauf, „The Annunciation: Study of a Plastic Theme and Its
Variations in Painting and Sculpture,“ Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 7 (1948/49),
pp. 325-348.
13 See Wenzel, „Die Schrift und das Heilige,“ p. 27.
14 An{fel of an Annunciation, panel of a winged altarpiece, Nikolaus Stuerhofer, beginning of the
161 century. Innsbruck, Tiroler Landesmuseum Ferdinandeum. Photo: Institut fiir Realienkunde
de-.s Mittelalters und der frühen Neuzeit (Krems an der Donau).
15 Max Lehrs, Geschichte und kritischer Katalog des deutschen, niederländischen und französsi
clzen Kupferstichs im XV. Jahrhunderts, 9. Textband (Vienna: Gesellschaft fiir verviel faltigende
Kunst, 1934; reprint New York: Collectors Editions, n.y.), pp. 368-369. Cf. Gerhard
Jaritz, „Die Bruech,“ in Symbole des Alltags, Alltag der Symbole. Festschrift for Harry Kühne/
zum 65. Geburtstag, eds. Gertrud Blasehitz et al. (Graz: Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt,
1992), pp. 395-416.
280 GERHARD JARITZ
puts on male pants, meaning that she had occupied the rule. The action seerns to be
accompanied by an oral dispute between the two – the connotation is clear, its contents
are imaginable. We need not be able to read the conversation Ietter by Ietter.
The „Churchgoers,“ again an engraving by Israhel van Meckenem (fig. 5),16
are obviously more interested in thernselves and their own outer appearance than in
their piety – one only has to Iook at the pointed shoes of the Iady, her headgear, the
long rosary, the wealth of cloth, etc. Part of their outer appearance is certainly also
the materialized and again improper oral comrnunication, their talkativeness, represented
not only by the accornpanying dog but made clearer with the help of the
empty but long banderoles. It again does not seem irnportant what they chat about,
but that they do. lt also fits into the well-known pattem of attributes and stereotypes
that the banderote of the Iady is much Ionger than the one of her husband.
Both churchgoers are improperly talkative, but she talks more than he does: this
message may have reached the beholder of araund 1500. It was important to see
and to recognize the speech act and its negative connotations geoerally, not the
contents of the discussion or its explicit meaning. It was the act and image of the
negative conversation that counted, on which everybody – out of his or her own
experience – would have been able to imagine or to construct the fitting conteots.
In this way, the different possibilities for representing the spokeo word in
images established contexts, were parts of contexts, or of networks of the latter.
They created various types of rnessages. The depicted speech acts affered chances
for the beholder to create or add his or her own fitting texts.
The pictorial construction of conversation, i.e. the materialization of the
spoken word, was clearly dependent on its importance. It may have been the word
that becarne flesh, the „Ave, gracia plena“, or the „Vere, vere, filius Dei erat“, etc.
It may, for instance, have been the spoken words that were in other ways decisive
for the narration on which the contents and the meanings of the image were based.
One may think of the attempt of Potiphar’s wife to seduce Joseph (Genesis 39: 7).
Based on the biblical reference, it became the „Dormi mecurn“ in an illustration of
a rnid-fourteenth-century „Concordantiae caritatis“ from the Lower Austrian Cistercian
hause of Lilienfeld, emotionalizing and clarifying the Bible story; 17 as weil
as Joseph’s strict answer „Non faciam haue rern quam nefas.“ Again, explanation
and emotion, presence and authenticity are explicitly provided. This is the power
of the spoken word.
The recipients of text and images in the „Concordantiae Caritatis,“ the Cistercian
rnonks of Lilienfeld, were certainly able to read the text of the manuscript
as weil as the spoken words in the images. This must have been different in a small
16 Lehrs, Geschichte und la·itischer Katalog, 9. Tcxtband, pp. 389-390; The lllustrated Barisch,
vol. 9 (fonnerly vol. 6, part 2): Early German Artists, lsrahel van Meckenem, ed. Fritz Koreny
(New York: Abaris Books, 1981), p. 1 67, n. 176 (269).
17 See the cover illustration of this volume. Conceming the „Concordantiae Caritatis“ generally,
see Hedwig Munschek, Die Concordamiae caritatis des Ulrich von Lilienfeld. Untersuchungen
zu Inhalt, Quellen und Verbreitung mit einer Paraphrasierung von Temporale, Sanktorale
und Commune (Frankfurt am Main et al.: Peter Lang, 2000).
IMAGES AND THE POWER OF THE SPOKEN WORD 28 1
rural community like, for instance, the east Tyrolean village of St. Justina, where
another depicted seducer tried to be successful. The devil, masked as a woman,
approaches Saint Justina and says to her „Hodie missa sum ad te a Christo vivere
tecum in castitate“ (fig. 6).18 Here, we are confronted with another Situation: most
of the beholders will not have been able to read the text that is so important for
comprehending the story. They also would not have understood Latin. A mediater,
the priest, must have been available to provide the audience with more information
than the clear general fact to be understood by everybody that the spoken word
played an important role in the legend of the church’s patron saint and this
confrontation between good and bad.
Mainly in the fifteenth century, we find a modification of the message,
wbich also occurs in religious images. The role of the vemacular increased and
took over. „Ora pro nobis“ became „bitt für uns;“ and Saint Niebolas (fig. 7)
successfully trying to save the ship in the storm could now express his command to
tbe sea in Gerrnan: „mer, ich gebiet dir dass du still stest.“’19 A mediater, a reader
might still have been necessary, but not a translator any more. An increased
closeness20 ofthe depicted spoken word was provided to its beholders.
Such aspects of transmitting a written oral message in images or in context
with images also Ieads us to further variants conceming oral communication and
its visual presentation. If we, for instance, think of votive images from pilgrimage
sites, we see that they regularly contain written texts that describe tbe miracles,
often in a kind of summary out of Ionger miracle reports – as in the example (fig.
8) from the so-called Large Mirade altarpiece from the Styrian pilgrimage site of
Mariazell („Großer Mariazeller Wunderaltar“) that explains in the vemacular the
representation of a carpenter and his cross-bow fight with another man, miraculously
reaching a good and peaceful end through the intervention of the Virgin
of Mariazell?1 The text, i.e. caption of the image, would have been made public in
1 8 Temptation of St. Justina by the Devil Clad as a \Vornan, panel of a winged altarpiece, Pacher
workshop, c. 1490. St. Justima (East Tyrol), parish church. Photo: Institut fiir Realienkunde
des Mittelalters und der frühen Neuzeit (Krems an der Donau).
19 Choir fresco, workshop of Leonhard von Brixen, c. 1480. Klerant (South Tyrol), filial church
St. Nicholas. Photo: Institut fiir Realienkunde des Mittelalters und der frühen Neuzeit (Krems
an der Donau).
2° For the closeness of late medieval images to their beholders and the methods to increase it, see
Gerhard Jaritz, „Nähe und Distanz als Gebrauchsfunktion spätmittelalterlicher religiöser Bilder,“
in Frömmigkeit im Mittelalter. Politisch-soziale Kontexte, visuelle Praxis. kö1perliche
Ausdrucksformen, ed. Klaus Schreiner (in the press), pp. 265-280.
21 Großer Mariazeller Wunderaltar, 1 5 1 8/22. Graz (Styria), Landesmuseum Joanneum. Photo:
Institut fiir Realienkunde des Mittelalters und dei frühen Neuzeit (Krems an der Donau). Cf.
Gottfried Biedennann, Katalog Alte Galerie am Landesmuseum Joanneum (Graz: Alte Galerie
am Landesmuseum Joanneum, 1982), pp. i 62-166 (lit.); Peter Krenn, „Die Wunder von Mariazell
und Steiennark,“ in Die Kunst der Donauschule 1490-1540, ed, Otto Wutze! (Linz: Oberösterreichischer
Landesverlag, 1965), pp. 164-168; idem, „Der große Mariazeller Wunderaltar
von 1519 und sein Meister,“ Jahrbuch des Kunsthsi torischen Institutes der Universität Graz, 2
(1 966/67), pp. 3 1 – 5 1 .
282 ÜERHARD ]ARITZ
a similar way to the written, Ionger miracle reports themselves: they will have been
read and explained to the audience.
An oral transmission of such „image descriptions“ or captions particularly is
to be taken for granted in all the cases where these texts are rhymed. A significant
example is the South German, so-called Söflingen altarpiece from the beginning of
the sixtenth century.22 It was produced for the convent of Poor Clares at Söflmgen
near Ulm and shows 126 scenes out of the life of Saint Francis. Each of the scenes
has a rhymed description in the vernacular, which may be seen as corresponding to
and typical for the needs of a female religious community of this period.
There, we also see a phenomenon that became significant for secular woodcuts
at araund 1 500, and also later: the roJe of the narrator or moderator who was
integrated into picture and/or text. This could happen with the help of two-part
images like, for instance, in the woodcut illustrations of the first print (Barnberg,
146 1 ) of Ulrich Boner’s fables „Edelstein“ (c. 1345) (fig. 9).23 The !arger part in
the right half of the pictures contains the illustrations of the written text of the
fables, the smaller to the left the figure of the narrator.
One finds the narrator in the text or as part of the text in a !arge number of
broadsheets from the first half of the sixteenth century: for instance, in Barthel or
Sebald Beham’s „Kirchweih zu Mögelsdorf‘ (Church Anniversary Holiday at
Mögelsdorf) (fig. I 0).24 The story starts with:
Eins tags ich auff ein kirchwey kam
gen Megeldorff, da ich vernam
in einem grossen wirteshaus
die pauren leben in dem sauß …
(One day I went to a church anniversary
at Mögelsdorf, where I saw
the peasants carousing
at a !arge inn … ).
Then the narrator teils stories about the chaotic festival and about each dancing
couple, to conclude at the end:
22 SöfÜnger Altar, c. 1 5 10, Ulm, fTOm the convent of Poor Clares, Söflingen. Füssen, St:jatsgalerie.
Cf. Elisabeth Vavra; „Söflinger Altar,“ in Niederösterreichische Landesausstellung 800
Jahre Franz von Assisi: franziskanische Kunst und Kultur des Mittelalters (Vienna: Amt der
Niederösterreichischen Landesregierung, 1982), p. 772-775 (lit.).
23 This image is the last woodcut in the volume and shows the author with book and banderote to
the right and the narrator to the left: Wenzel, Hören und Sehen, p. 386 f.; Ulrich Boner, Der
Edelstein, with an introduction by Doris Fouquet-Plümacher, facs. of the first printed edition,
Bamberg, 1461. 16. I Eth. 2 of the Herzog August Library, Wolfenbüttel (Stuttgart: Müller &
Schindler, 1972).
24 Barthel Beharn and Erhard Schön, Die Kirchweih zu Mögelsdorf, with verses by Hans Sachs,
woodcut, 1 527/28 (detail). See Keith Moxey, Peasams, Warriors. and Wives. Popular
Jmagery in the Reformation (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1 989), pp. 42-
45; Hans Joachim Raupp, Bauernsatiren. Entstehung und Entwicklung des bäuerlichen Genres
in der dewschen und niederländischen Kunst, ca. 1470-1570 (Niederzier: Lukassen Verlag,
‚ J 986), pp. l39-145).
IMAGES AND THE POWER OF THE SPOK.EN WORD
Ich dacht es wirt ind Ieng nicht feien,
sie werden aneinander strelen,
und wirt ein grosses schlahen draus,
ich macht mich auff und geng zü haus.
(At the end, I thought
that they will beat each other,
and that there will be a great fight,
I set out and went home).
283
The rhymed written words of the narrator were certainly meant for an oral presentation
in context with the presentation ofthe image. This creates an audiovisual
performance to entertain and play on the emotions of the audience. The read text
must have had decisive influence on the efficacy and success ofthis performance.
To summarize: the medieval connection of image and the depicted spoken
word was an important one. From the banderotes of speech acts that neither contain
any letters nor words to the various representations of narrators and their presented
‚image-texts‘ or ‚text-images;‘ depicted orality represented presence,
authenticity, power/5 and possibilities to understand – to influence, to perform, to
explain, to educate, to emotionalize, etc. For the late medieval perception of
images, the spoken word often had a variety of determining and dominating
functions. This, at last, could Iead to the images of spoken text ( fig. 1 1 ), to be read,
prayed, and orally communicated, like the mid-fifteenth century example from
Hitdesheim set up on the occasion of the visit of Cardinal Nicolaus Cusanus?6 It
says in the vemacular that the common people did not know the most important
prayers. Therefore, the Lord’s Prayer, the ‚Ave Maria,‘ the Creed, and the Ten
Commandments were written down in this image of text, which was placed in St.
Lambert’s Church of Hildesheim. 1t is text, but also image: the image of written
prayers representing their oral offering.
Some years ago, Norbert Ott postulated that medieval manuscript illustrations
may not only be seen as a means of decoration and accompaniment of the
text, but mainly as an instance of information and an elevation of the claim to truth
and identification of the illustrated text.27 Similarly, the latter may also be assumed
25 For other Ievels of the ‚power of the word,‘ see Werner Röcke, „Die Macht des Wortes. Feudale
Repräsentation und christliche Verkündigung im mittelalterlichen Legendenroman,“ in
Höfische Repräsentation. Das Zeremoniell und die Zeichen, eds. Hedda Ragotzky and Horst
Wenzel (Tübingen: Niemeyer 1 990), pp. 209-226.
26 Catechism panel in St. Lambert’s church, Hildesheim, 1 45 1 . H.-J. Rieckenberg, „Die Katechismus-
Tafel des Nikolaus von Kues in der Lamberti-Kirche zu Hildesheim;“ Deutsches
Archiv fiir Erforschung des Mittelalters; 39 { 1983); pp. 555-5 8 1 ; Hartmut Boockmann, „Über
Schrifttafeln in spätmittelalterlichen deutschen Kirchen,“ ibidem, 40 ( 1 984), pp. 2 1 0-221 ;
idern, Die Stadt im späten Mittelalter (Munich: Verlag C.H. Beck, 1986).
27 Cf. Norbert H. Ott, „Mündlichkeit, Schriftlichkeit, lllustration. Einiges Grundsätzliche zur
Handschriftenillustration, insbesondere in der Volkssprache,“ in Buchmalerei im Bodenseeraum
13. bis 16. Jahrhundert, ed. Eva Moser (Friedrichshafen: Verlag Robert Gessler, 1 997),
p. 48: „Auch in der Spätzeit der Handschriftenillustration leistet das Bildmedium mehr als die
bloße Verschönerung und visuelle Begleitung des Texts. Sie ist Informationsinstanz ebenso
284 GERHARD JARITZ
for the materialized speech acts in medieval images, their fimction and power.
Pictures did not work weil without the spoken word.
Fig. I : The spoken words ofthe donator: „0 sancte Bemhardine, ora pro me.“
wie auratische Überhöhung des Wahrheits- und Identifikationsanspruchs der illustrierten
Literatur.“
IMAGES AND THE POWER OF THE SPOKEN WORD 285
Fig. 2: The spoken words ofthe donator: to be known without having been written.
286 GERHARD JARITZ
Fig. 3: The Angel ofthe Annunciation with the empty banderote as his attribute: saying what
everybody knows.
IMAGES AND THE POWER OF THE SPOKEN WORD
Fig. 4: The „Subjugatcd Husband“ quarrels with his wife
(lsrahel van Meckenem).
287
288 GERHARD 1ARITZ
Fig. 5: Israhel van Meckenem: the talkative „Churchgoers.“
IMAGES AND THE POWER OF THE SPOKEN WORO
Fig. 6: The Latin speaking devil clad as a virgin tries to seduce St. Justina
in an East Tyrolian viiJage church.
289
290 GERHARD JARJTZ
Fig. 7: St. Nicholas commands the sea in Gennan to become calm.
IMAGES AND THE POWER OF THE SPOKEN WORD 291
Fig. 8: The summary of a miracle-report as caption ofthe image.
292 GERHARD JARJTZ
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• 0

 

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• 294 GERHARD JARITZ

 

• Fig. l l : The catechism panel as a picture of prayers ( detail).

 

• List of Contributors

 

• Anna ADAMSKA, University of Utrecht, Fakulteit der Letteren, Kronune Nieuwegracht

 

• 66, NL-Utrecht 3 5 1 2 HJ, Netherlands

 

• Tracey Lynn BILLADO, Emory University, Department of History, Bowden Hall,

 

• Atlanta, GA 30322, USA

 

• Michael BRAUER, Goerschstraße 14a, D-13 187 Berlin, Gerrnany

 

• Albrecht CLASSEN, University of Arizona, College of Humanities, Department of

 

• German Studies, Modern Languages, Building 571, Tucson AZ 85721, USA

 

• Maria DOBOZY, University of Utah, Department of Language & Literature, Salt Lake

 

• City, UT 841 12, USA

 

• Michael GOODICH, University of Haifa, Faculty of Humanities, General History,

 

• Mount Carrnel, IL-31 905 Haifa, Israel

 

• Gerhard JARITZ, Institut fiir Realienkunde des Mittelalters und der frühen Neuzeit,

 

• Körnermarkt 13, A-3500 Krems, Austria, and Central European University, Department

 

• ofMedieval Studies, Nador utca 9, H-1051 Budapest, Hungary

 

• Martha KEIL, Institut fiir Geschichte der Juden in Österreich, Dr. Kar! Renner-Promenade

 

• 22, A-3 100 St. Pölten, Austria

 

• Detlev l<RAACK, Technische Universitat Berlin, Institut fiir Geschichte und Kunstgeschichte,

 

• Ernst-Reuter-Platz 7, D-10587 Berlin, Gerrnany

 

• Elena LEMENEVA, Central European University, Department of Medieval Studies,

 

• Nador utca 9, H-1 05 1 Budapest, Hungary

 

• Giedre MICKÜNAITE, Central European University, Department of Medieval Studies,

 

• Nador utca 9, H-1 051 Budapest, Hungary

 

• 296

 

• Ulrich MüLLER, Universität Salzburg, Institut für Germanistik, Akaderniestr. 20, A-

 

• 5020 Salzburg, Austria

 

• Elöd NEMERKENYI, Central European University, Department of Medieval Studies,

 

• Nädor utca 9, H-1 0 5 1 Budapest, Hungary

 

• John NICHOLS, Slippery Rock University, Department of History, Slippery Rock, PA

 

• 16057, USA

 

• Tom PEITIIT, University of Southem Denmark, Institute for Literature, Culture and

 

• Media Studies, Odense Campus, Campusvej 55, DK-Odense M 5230, Denmark

 

• Michael RICHTER, Universität Konstanz, Fachgruppe Geschichte, D-78457 Konstanz,

 

• Germany

 

• Sylvia SCHEIN, University of Haifa, Faculty of Humanities, General History, Mount

 

• Carmel, IL-3 1905 Haifa, Israel

 

• Margarete SPRINGETH, Universität Salzburg, Institut fiir Germanistik, Akademiestr.

 

• 20, A-5020 Sa1zburg, Austria

 

• Katalin SZENDE, Central European University, Department of Medieval Studies,

 

• Nädor utca 9, H-1 0 5 1 Budapest, Hungary

 

• Jolanta SZP!LEWSKA, Central European University, Department of Medieval Studies,

 

• Nädor utca 9, H-1 0 5 1 Budapest, Hungary

 

• Jens WOLLESEN , University of Toronto, Department of Fine Art, 1 00 St. George

 

• Street, Toronto, Ontario M S S 2X3, Canada

 

• Yurij ZAZULIAK. Central European University, Department of Medieva1 Studies,

 

• Nädor utca 9, H-1 0 5 1 Budapest, Hungary

 

• Nada ZECEVIC, Central European University, Department of Medieval Studies, Nädor

 

• utca 9, H- 1 05 1 Budapest, Hungary

 

• ORAL HISTORY OF THE MIDDLE AGES

 

• THE SPOKEN WORD IN CONTEXT

 

• Edited by Gerhard Jaritz and Michael Richter

 

• MEDIUM AEVUM QUOTIDIANUM

 

• SONDERBAND XII

 

• =

 

• CEU MEDIEV ALIA

 

• VOLU1vfE 3

 

• Oral History of the Middle Ages

 

• The Spoken W ord in Context

 

• Edited by Gerhard Jaritz and Michael Richter

 

• Krems and Budapest 200 1

 

• GEDRUCKT MIT UNTERSTÜTZUNG DER ABTEILUNG

 

• KULTUR UND WISSENSCHAFT DES AMTES

 

• DER NIEDERÖSTERREICIDSCHEN LANDESREGIERUNG

 

• niederästerreich kultur

 

• copy editor: Judith Rasson

 

• Cover illustration: The wife of Potiphar covets Joseph: “ … erat autem Joseph pulchra facie et

 

• decorus apectu: post multos itaque dies iecit domina oculos suis in Ioseph et ait donni mecum.“

 

• (“ … And Joseph was (a] goodly fperson], and weil favoured. And it came to pass after these

 

• things, that his master’s wife cast her eyes upon Joseph; and she said, Lie with me. „), Gen. 39:

 

• 6-7 (KJV). Concordantiae Caritatis, c. 1350. Cistercian abbey of Lilienfeld (Lower Austria), ms

 

• 151, fol. 244v (detail). Photo: Institut fiir Realienkunde des Mittelalters und der frühen Neuzeit

 

• (Krems an der Donau).

 

• Alle Rechte vorbehalten

 

• – ISBN 3-90 Hl94 15 6 (Krems)

 

• All rights reserved.

 

• No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any

 

• form or by any means, without the permission of the Publishers.

 

• Published by:

 

• and

 

• – ISBN 963 9241 64 4 (Budapest)

 

• -ISSN 1587-6470 CEU MEDIEVALIA

 

• Medium Aevum Quotidianum. Gesellschaft zur Erforschung

 

• der materiellen Kultur des Mittelalters, Körnermarkt 13, A-

 

• 3500 Krems. Austria,

 

• Department ofMedieval Studies, Centrat European University,

 

• Nador utca 9, H-1051 Budapest, Hungary.

 

• Printed by Printself, Budapest.

 

• Table of Contents

 

• Preface . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ……………………….. 7

 

• Michael RICHTER, Beyond Goody and Grundmann ………. . . . . . . ………. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I I

 

• Tom PETTIIT, Textual to Oral: the Impact ofTransmission

 

• on Narrative Word-Art …………………………………………………………………….. 1 9

 

• Elöd NEMER!<.ENYI, Fictive Audience. The Second Person Singular in the Deliberatio ofBishop Gerard of Csanäd …………………………………………….. 3 9 Katalin SZENDE, Testaments and Testimonies. Orality and Literacy in Composing Last Wills in Late Medieval Hungary ……………………………. 49 Anna ADAMSKA, The Kingdom of Po land versus the Teutonic Knights: Oral Traditions and Literale Behaviour in the Later Middle Ages …………… 67 Giedre MICKÜNAITE, Ruler, Protector, and a Fairy Prince: the Everlasting Deeds of Grand Duke Vytautas as Related by the Lithuanian Tatars and Karaites ………………………………… 79 Yurij Zazuliak, Oral Tradition, Land Disputes, and the Noble Community in Galician Rus‘ from the 1440s to the 1 460s ……………………………………… 88 Nada ZECEVIC, Ai􀃭tc; yA.uKeia. The Importance ofthe Spoken Word in the Public Affairs ofCarlo Tocco (from the Anonymous Chronaca dei Tocco di Cefalonia) . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . 108 lohn A. NICHOLS, A Heated Conversation: Who was Isabel de Aubigny, Countess of Arundel? …………………………… 1 1 7 Tracey L. BILADO, Rhetorical Strategies and Legal Arguments: ‚Evil Customs‘ and Saint-Florent de Saumur, 979- 1 0 1 1 …………………….. 1 28 Detlev KRAACK, Traces of Orality in Written Contexts. Legal Proceedings and Consultations at the Royal Court as Reflected in Documentary Sources from l21h-century Germany ……… 1 42 6 Maria DOBOZY, From Oral Custom to Written Law: The German Sachsenspiegel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 Martha KEIL, Rituals of Repentance and Testimonies at Rabbinical Courts in the 151h Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 64 Michael GOODICH, The Use of Direct Quotation from Canonization Hearing to Hagiographical Vita et Miracula . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 77 Sylvia ScHEIN, Bemard of Clairvaux ’s Preaching of the Third Crusade and Orality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ….. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188 Michael BRAUER, Obstades to Oral Communication in tbe Mission offriar William ofRubruck among the Mongois . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196 Elena LEMENEVA, From Oral to Written and Back: A Sermon Case Study . . . . . . . . 203 Albrecht CLASSEN, Travel, Orality, and the Literary Discourse: Travels in the Past and Literary Travels at the Crossroad of the Oral and the Literary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . 217 Ulrich MÜLLER and Margarete SPRJNGETH, “Do not Shut Your Eyes ifYou Will See Musical Notes:“ German Heroie Poetry („Nibelungenlied“), Music, and Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236 Jolanta SZPILEWSKA, Evoking Auditory Imagination: On the Poetics of Voice Production in The Story ofThe Glorious Resurrection ofOur Lord (c. 1580) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248 Jens T. WOLLESEN, SpokenWords and Images in Late Medieval Italian Painting . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . 257 Gerhard JARTTZ, Images and the Power of the Spoken Word . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277 List of Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295 Preface Oral culture played an instrumental role in medieval society.1 Due to the Iack of any direct source evidence, however, research into the functions and importance of oral communication in the Middle Ages must confront a number of significant problems. Only indrect traces offer the opportunity to analyze phenomena that were based on or connected with the spoken word. The ‚oral history‘ of the Middle Ages requires the application of different approaches than dealing with the 201h or 2 151 century. For some decades Medieval Studies have been interested in questions of orality and literacy, their relationship and the substitution of the spoken by the written word2 Oral and literate culture were not exclusive and certainly not opposed to each other.3 The ‚art of writing‘ was part of the ‚ars rhetorica‘ and writing makes no sense without speech.4 Any existing written Statement should also be seen as a spoken one, although, clearly, not every oral Statement as a written one. Authors regularly wrote with oral delivery in mind. ‚Speaking‘ and ‚writing‘ are not antonyms. It is also obvious that „the use of oral conununication in medieval society should not be evaluated … as a function of culture populaire vis-a-vis culture savante but, rather, of thc communication habits and the tendency of medieval man 1 For the late Middle Ages and the early modern period, cf. Willern Frijhoff, „Communication et vie quotidienne i1 Ia fin du moyen äge et a l’epoque moderne: reflexions de theorie et de methode,“ in Kommunialion und Alltag in Spätmillefalter und fniher Neuzeit, ed. Helmut Hundsbichler (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1992), p. 24: „La plupart de gens vivait encore pour l’essentiel dans une culture orale et !es procedes d’appropriation des idCes passaient de prefcrence par Ia parolc dite et ecoutee, quand bien memc on ctait capable d’une Ieelure visuelle plus ou moins rudimentaire.“ 2 See Marco Mostert, „New Approaches to Medieval Communication?“ in New Approaches to Medieval Communication. ed. Marco Mostert (Tumhout: Brepols, 1999), pp. 15-37; Michael Richter, “Die Entdeckung der ‚Oralität‘ der mittelalterlichen Gesellschaft durch die neuere Mediävistik,“ in Die Aktualität des Miue/alters, ed. Hans-Werner Goetz (Bochum: D. Winkler, 2000), pp. 273-287. 3 Peter Burke calls the constrnct of „oral versus literate“ useful but at the same time dangerous: idem, „Mündliche Kultur und >Druckkultur< im spätmittelalterlichen Italien,“ in Volkskultur des europäischen Spätmittelalters, eds. Peter Dinzelbacher and Hans-Dieter Mück (Stuttgart: Alfred Kröner Verlag, 1987), p. 60. 4 Michael Clanchy, „lntroduction,“ in New Approaches to Medieval Communication. ed. Marco Mostert (Tumhout: Brepols, 1999), p. 6. 8 to share his intellectual experiences in the corporate framework.“5 Oral delivery was not „the sole prerogative of any socioeconomic class. „6 For all these reasons, it is important to analyze the extent of and context, in which ’speech acts,‘ auditive effects, and oral tradition occur in medieval sources .7 Research into the use of the spoken word or references to it in texts and images provides new insight into various, mainly social, rules and pattems of the communication system. 1t opens up additional approaches to the organization and complexity of different, but indispensably related, media in medieval society, and their comparative analysis.8 The spoken word is connected with the physical presence of its ’sender.‘ Speech may represent the authenticity of the given message in a more obvious way than written texts or images. Therefore, the use of ’speech acts‘ in written or visual evidence also has to be seen in context with the attempt to create, construct, or prove authenticity. Moreover, spoken messages contribute to and increase the lifelikeness of their contents, which may influence their perception by the receiver, their efficacy and success. Being aware of such a situation will have led to the explicit and intended use and application of the spoken word in written texts and images- to increase their authenticity and importance, too. lf one operates with a model of ‚closeness‘ and ‚distance‘ of communication with regard to the Ievel of relation of ’senders‘ and ‚receivers,‘ then the ’speech acts‘ or their representation have to be seen as contributors to a ‚closer‘ connection among the participants of the communication process.9 At the same time, however, Speech might be evaluated as less official. One regularly comes across ‚oral space‘ 5 Sophia Menache, The Vox Dei. Commwzication in the Middle Ages (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), p. 19. 6 Ibidem, p. 21. Cf. also Jan-Dirk Müller, „Zwischen mündlicher Anweisung und schrifilicher Sicherung von Tradition. Zur Kommunikationsstruktur spätmittelalterlicher Fechtbücher,“ in Kommunikation und Alltag in Spätmittelalter und früher Neuzeit, ed. Helmut Hundsbichler (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1992), p. 400: „Offensichtlich sind schriftliche und nichtschriftliche Tradierung von Wissen weiterhin relativ unabhängig voneinander, nachdem die Schrift längst dazu angesetzt hat, lnseln der Mündlichkeil oder praktisch-enaktiver Wissensvermittlung zu erobem. Die Gedächtnisstütze kann die Erfahrung nicht ersetzen, sendem allenfalls reaktivieren. Sie ist sogar nur verständlich, wo sie auf anderweitig vermittelte Vorkenntnisse stößt.“ 7 􀆿f. W.F.H. Nicolaisen, ed., Oral Tradition in the Middle Ages (Binghamton: Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 1995). 8 See, esp., Horst Wenzel, Hören und Sehen, Schrift und Bild. K ultur und Gedächtnis im Mittelalter (Munich: C.H. Beck, 1995), passim. 9 See also Siefan Sonderegger, „>Gesprochen oder nur geschrieben?< Mündlichkeil in mittelalterlichen

 

• Texten als direkter Zugang zum Menschen,“ in Homo Medietas. Aufsätze zu Religiosität,

 

• Literatur und Denkformen des Menschen vom Mittelalter bis in die Neuzeit. Festschrift

 

• for Alois Maria Haas zum 65. Geburtstag, eds. Claudia Brinker-von der Heyde and

 

• Niklaus Largier (Bem e\ al.: Peter Lang, 1999), p. 665: „Jedenfalls darf man sich bewußt bleiben,

 

• daß auch in den Texten des deutschen Mittelalters die Reflexe gesprochener Sprache eine

 

• bedeutende Schicht ausmachen, die besonders dann immer wieder hervortritt, wenn es um

 

• einen direkten Zugang zum Menschen geht, um einVerstehen aus unmittelbarer Partnerschaft

 

• heraus … „

 

• 9

 

• that has become institutionalized or more official by the application of ‚written

 

• space.‘ 10 Simultanous employment of such different Ievels and qualities of

 

• messages must often have had considerable influence on their efficacy.11

 

• The papers in this volume are the outcome of an international workshop that

 

• was held in February, 2001, at the Department ofMedieval Studies, Central European

 

• University, Budapest. Participants concentrated on problems of the occurrence,

 

• usage, and pattems of the spoken word in written and visual sources of the

 

• Middle Ages. They dealt with the roJe and contents of direct and indirect speech in

 

• textual evidence or in relation to it, such as chronicles, travel descriptions, court

 

• and canonization protocols, sermons, testaments, law-books, literary sources,

 

• drama, etc. They also tried to analyze the function of oral expression in connection

 

• with late medieval images.

 

• The audiovisuality of medieval communication processes12 has proved to be

 

• evident and, thus, important for any kind of further comparative analysis of the

 

• various Ievels of the ‚oral-visual-literate,‘ i.e. multimedia culture of the Middle

 

• Ages. Particular emphasis has to be put on methodological problems, such as the

 

• necessity of interdisciplinary approaches,13 or the question of the extent to which

 

• we are, generally, able to comprehend and to decode the communication systems

 

• of the past.14 Moreover, the medievalist does not come across any types of sources

 

• in which oral communication represents the main concem.15 lnstead, she or he is

 

• confronted, at first glance, with a great variety of ‚casual‘ and ‚marginal‘ evidence.

 

• We would like to thank all the contributors to the workshop and to this

 

• volume. Their cooperation made it possible to publish the results of the meeting in

 

• the same year in which it took place. This can be seen as a rare exception, at least

 

• in the world of the historical disciplines. The head, faculty, staff, and students of

 

• the Department of Medieval Studies of CentTal European University offered

 

• various help and support. Special thanks go to Judith Rasson, the copy editor of

 

• 10 This, e.g., could be weil shown in a case study on thc pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela:

 

• Friederike Hassauer, „Schriftlichkeit und Mündlichkeil im Alltag des Pilgers am Beispiel der

 

• Wallfahrt nach Santiago de Compostela,“ in Wallfahrt und Alltag in Mittelalter und früher

 

• Neuzeit, eds. Gerhard Jaritz and Barbara Schuh (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie

 

• der Wissenschaften, 1992), pp. 277-316.

 

• 11 Cf. Bob Scribner, „Mündliche Kommunikation und Strategien der Macht in Deutschland im

 

• 16. Jahrhundert,“ in Kommunikation und Alltag in Spätmittelalter und früher Neuzeit, ed.

 

• Helmut Hundsbichler (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften,

 

• 1992), pp. 183-197.

 

• 12 Wenzel, Hören rmd Sehen, p. 292.

 

• 13 Cf. Ursula Schaefer, „Zum Problem der Mündlichkeit,“ in Modernes Miuelalter. Neue Bilder

 

• einer populären Epoche, ed. Joachim Heinzle (Frankfurt am Main and Leipzig: Insel Verlag,

 

• 1994), pp. 374 f.

 

• 14 Frijhoff, „Communication et vie quotidienne,“ p. 25: „Sommes-nous encore en mesure de

 

• communiquer avec Ja communication de jadis?“

 

• 1􀅄 Michael Richter, Sprache und Gesellschaft im Mittelalter. Untersuchungen zur mündlichen

 

• Kommunikation in England von der Mit te des elften bis zu Beginn des vierzehnten Jahrhunderts

 

• (Stuttgart: Anton Hiersemann, 1979), p. 22.

 

• 10

 

• this volume, who took particluar care with the texts of the many non-native

 

• speakers fighting with the pitfalls of the English language.

 

• Budapest, Krems, and Constance

 

• December 200 I

 

Gerhard Jaritz and Michael Richter