The assignment for Wednesday, given in advance in case you want to get started now, is a little thick in terms of page count; don't miss the reading strategies at the end of this post to help you manage.
On March 25, we'll be exploring the topic of pilgrimage to Rome: the journeys undertaken by Christian travelers (pilgrims) to the Eternal City.
Please do the following:
(1) Download, print, and read Charles L. Stinger's short discussion of Roman pilgrimage from his book The Renaissance in Rome (Yale, 1985).
(2) Download, print, and read the selections from the Mirabilia Urbis Romae (Marvels of the City of Rome), a kind of Blue Guide for medieval pilgrims, originally written by a priest of St. Peter's basilica in the 1140s and copied and expanded for centuries thereafter.
(3) Download, print, and read the excerpt from chapter 4 of Herbert Kessler and Johanna Zacharias' book, Rome 1300: On the Path of the Pilgrim. Kessler and Zacharias recreate the experience of a Roman pilgrim in a medieval jubilee year. This fourth chapter, like much of the book, is concerned with the procession of the Acheropita through the city, in this case the Forum Romanum. (Recall that the Acheropita is the relic-painting of Christ begun by St. Luke and finished by an angel, previously noted in the Relics factsheet.)
(4) Read the following sections in the Blue Guide to supplement the above:
- "Holy Years & the Pilgrimage Churches," p. 276; and
- "Rome as a Centre of Pilgrimage," p. 432.
* * * * *
Strategies for reading the Mirabilia and Kessler-Zacharias:
- Do use your foundational knowledge of the physical city to make sense of these texts. That's one of the reasons we're reading them, to help you appreciate the layering of the centuries.
- Do focus on the ideologies at work and how they illuminate the Christian mindset. A faithful pilgrim must approach an old pagan city with a certain value system. What are the tenets of that value system?
- With regard to the jubilee procession, think again about other processional routes we have studied. The best parade routes are often practical (which locations maximize the spectacle?) and are always meaningful (which locations offer the most resonance and wonder?).
- Don't skim the texts; read them carefully, but don't worry so much about every last detail.
