The new thirteenth century hagiography: Royalty, sainthood, and writing

This dissertation examines the cultural and literary forces at work in the generic developments of royal saints\u27 lives during the thirteenth century. I trace these developments and their implications by analyzing Old French texts, in particular La Estoire de Seint Aedward le Rei (Matthew of Paris, c. 1236), La Vie de Sainte Elysabel (Rutebeuf, c. 1264), and La Vie de Saint Louis (Joinville, presented 1309). One crucial feature shared by these texts is their attention to authorial self-representation. In my analysis, I consider the influence of social changes such as urbanization and the transformation of official sanctity prompted by Saint Francis. The mendicants are not only ascetics but also teachers and preachers concerned with conversion. They therefore produce saints\u27 lives to commemorate their brothers and to edify the faithful. This production places a new emphasis on eye-witnessing, as does the parallel trend of swifter canonization. The figure of the witness is fundamental to the generic developments at issue. This notion allows the hagiographer to emphasize his own creative role by comparing it to that of more direct witnesses to the saint\u27s life. The depiction of royal sanctity as essentially social, stimulated by urbanization and the mendicant conception of religious practice, further facilitates the authors\u27 portrayal of their own role in the world, especially as writer, as similarly contributing to the salvation of souls. The process of hagiographic production, transmission, and reception becomes part of the narrative and plays an essential role in the construction of authority. Each text describes its own evolution through life, telling, and writing. Moreover, by exploring the function of saint, witness, and audience, each work ultimately claims responsibility for the process of sanctification. This project seeks to integrate texts and approaches typically separated by national and disciplinary boundaries in order to arrive at a better understanding of the dynamics of creation and reception of medieval texts, particularly the role played by religious belief and practice