Medieval Childhood Work Done in Other Disciplines--Much of Which Is Took Shape
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Albrecht Classen, ed. Childhood in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance: The Results of a Paradigm Shift in the History of Mentality. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2005. vii + 445 pp. Illustrations $157.00, cloth, ISBN 978-3-11-018421-1. Reviewed by Daniel T. Kline Published on H-Childhood (October, 2008) Commissioned by Patrick J. Ryan (University of Western Ontario) If the broader culture "knows" anything understanding of childhood as a distinct phase of about children and childhood in the Middle Ages, life. Yet the research of Barbara Hanawalt, Ronald it is that medieval culture didn't know anything Finucane, Sally Crawford, Michael Sheehan, about children. They were considered "little Nicholas Orme, Shulamith Shahar, and others has adults" with whom medieval parents had little if emphasized the existence of parental care, com‐ any emotional connection, and children (especial‐ munity investment, legal consideration, theologi‐ ly girls) were driven as quickly as possible out of cal reflection, and literary investigation of me‐ the home and into adult roles. A close corollary of dieval children and childhood from a wide range this view is that the march of Western culture of source material and in a number of European since the "Dark Ages" has progressed away from regions. This investigation into the children, fami‐ the casual barbarity of the past and into our more lies, and households of the predominantly Chris‐ developed understanding and enlightened treat‐ tian West are being matched by exciting new ment of children. However, over the thirty years, work in Judaic (Ivan Marcus, Elisheva Baum‐ medieval historians have frmly put to rest garten) and Islamic (Avner Gilead) culture as well. Philippe Ariès' fundamental though fawed analy‐ However, literary scholars generally have sis that is the source of these misconceptions. Ac‐ been rather slow to integrate these historical fnd‐ cording to Classen, in Centuries of Childhood ings into their academic studies, that is, until (1960; English trans. 1962), Ariès argued that high quite recently. Albrecht Classen's anthology, Child‐ infant mortality essentially prevented medieval hood in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance: The parents from investing emotionally in their chil‐ Results of a Paradigm Shift in the History of Men‐ dren and Ariès examination of iconography and tality is one several recent volumes devoted to portraiture in particular convinced him that me‐ medieval and early modern children. Comprised dieval culture did not have a clear, differentiated of nineteen chapters, including Classen's introduc‐ H-Net Reviews tion and Christopher Carlsmith's closing pedagogi‐ to the Annales school and its concern for the cal essay, Childhood in the Middle Ages and the longue duree), is as puzzling as it is limiting. Renaissance treats literature featuring children in While I too strongly question the idea of any sin‐ Latin, English, Italian, French, and German, rang‐ gular medieval "mentalité," the idea of emotional ing from the Carolingian period to seventeenth- attachment is still very much indebted to Ariès, century England and America. Classen's introduc‐ and by keeping his analysis wed to a putative tory essay, "Philippe Ariès and the Consequences: refutation of Ariès, Classen nonetheless remains History of Childhood, Family Relations, and Per‐ firmly within Ariès' orbit. With this critique in sonal Emotions: Where Do We Stand Today?" pro‐ mind, it is important to be clear about what Ariès vides an overview of the development of some actually argued and what has been widely mis‐ important research, offers a series of "case stud‐ construed. Ariès neither claimed that medieval ies" on Middle High German texts, and examines parents were indifferent to their children nor did a variety of disciplinary perspectives into me‐ he write that pre-modern parents were abusive dieval childhood since Ariès, including such nota‐ toward their kids. Such a claim is the hallmark of bles as Johann Huizinga (The Waning of the Mid‐ Lloyd DeMause's work (see especially "The Evolu‐ dle Ages, 1924), Shulamith Shahar (Childhood in tion of Childhood" in his History of Childhood, the Middle Ages, 1990), James A. Schultz (Knowl‐ 1974). In perhaps the most (in)famous passage in edge of Childhood in the German Middle Ages, Centuries of Childhood Ariès wrote: "In medieval 1995), and Elisheva Baumgarten (Mothers and society the idea of childhood did not exist; this is Children: Medieval Jewish Family Life, 2007). not to suggest that children were neglected, for‐ Classen's Introduction ends with a call for inter‐ saken, or despised. The idea of childhood is not to disciplinary research into pre-modern childhood be confused with affection for children; it corre‐ and brief summaries of the essays to follow, sponds to an awareness of the particular nature which will "illuminate the complex of mental-his‐ of childhood, that particular nature which distin‐ torical perspectives on emotions, affections, feel‐ guishes the child from adult, even the young ings, and social structures within the medieval adult."[1] So, when Classen correctly states (in a and early-modern family, with particular empha‐ number of places), "We may confidently conclude sis on the child" (p. 51). that the paradigm established and popularized by I found the volume thought-provoking but Philippe Ariès through his famous study ... now equally frustrating. The greatest virtue of can be discarded" (p. 46), he redresses Ariès' sup‐ Classen’s introduction is the breadth of his exam‐ posed devaluation of pre-modern parent's affec‐ ples, the extent of his research into pre-modern tion, as do most of the essays, rather than the childhood, and his valuable incorporation of im‐ "particular nature" of premodern children. As portant work by German scholars. His interesting, such, Classen's pronouncements of an already short "case studies" on Middle High German liter‐ overturned paradigm seem rather, well, dated-- ary texts also directly address Schultz's devalua‐ despite the introduction's tone of innovation and tion of literary sources for insight into medieval discovery. To take one example dealing specifical‐ childhood. However, the two schools of thought ly with England, Barbara Hanawalt demonstrated around which Classen orients his introductory as much in a series of articles dating back nearly chapter pose conceptual limitations on the analy‐ three decades, as have other scholars for different sis. First, Classen's programmatic approach to pre- eras and regions, many of whom seem not to have modern childhood, focusing primarily upon emo‐ been investigated in the collection. tional relationships between parents and children To give Ariès credit, he did establish what and upon medieval "mentalité" (indebted as it is might now be termed the "social construction" of 2 H-Net Reviews childhood. The challenge Ariès presented was not thinkingly and uncritically, and (2) that the lack of so much whether medievals had affection for interdisciplinary effort has hampered the study of their children but in what did the medieval idea pre-modern childhood. However, it must be fatly of childhood consist? What "particular nature"--if stated that too many of the essays in Childhood in any--distinguished children from adults in the me‐ the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, to judge dieval period? Thus, the question concerns not from the relative paucity of references to any‐ only familial affection but social dynamics, not thing other than the immediate topic at hand, simply personal love but the entire complex of simply have not explored the wide variety of cultural discourses in which medieval childhood work done in other disciplines--much of which is took shape. To be sure, Ariès did see in his limited scattered throughout studies devoted to broader range of materials a qualitative and quantitative subjects like women, family, household, genealo‐ difference in the kind of attachment medieval gy, inheritance, virginity, violence, and related persons had with children, but that is not at all topics. Though Classen’s introductory essay is am‐ the same thing as saying that pre-modern persons bitious enough to draw the above criticism, this did not hold their children dear. I would argue robust collection also includes eighteen chapters that historical inquiry into pre-modern children which are each worthy of individual summary and childhood has already moved well past Ariès, treatment. though he remains the putative "father" that In chapter 2, Valerie L. Garver's "The Influ‐ many childhood historians must continually res‐ ence of Monastic Ideals upon Carolingian Concep‐ urrect in order to put him again to death. Similar‐ tions of Childhood" addresses the problem that ly, the concept of a "paradigm shift," indebted as it much of the remaining evidence for Carolingian is to Thomas Kuhn's pioneering work, (The Struc‐ childhood comes from monastic sources (Odo of ture of Scientific Revolutions, 1962), here is ap‐ Cluny, Alcuin of York, Paulinus of Aquileia, Jonas plied rather structurally, without any historio‐ of Orléans, but not Dhuoda's Handbook), which graphical critique and little analysis of what the tend to idealize the subjects of their hagiographi‐ new paradigm, if any, the discipline is moving to‐ cal vitae and make it difficult to derive data con‐ ward, other than descriptions (as opposed to an cerning the lived conditions of real, historical chil‐ argument) concerning interdisciplinarity. As a re‐ dren. However, as appears to be consistent in sult, Classen lumps together as "followers"