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Gratia Undecima Mille the Cult of the Eleven Thousand Virgins in Cologne

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Gratia Undecima Mille the Cult of the Eleven Thousand Virgins in Cologne Gratia Undecima Mille The Cult of the Eleven Thousand Virgins in Cologne By Eleanor Deumens Undergraduate Thesis Department of History 2011 Deumens 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements . 2 Introduction . 3 Chapter One: Writing the Legend . 10 Cologne and Cult: growing up together . 10 An army of virgins . 14 Chapter Two: The King, the City and the Cult . 21 Finding the Bones . 21 An Incomparable Treasure . 22 Levata sunt corpora sanctorum martirum . .26 Chapter Three: The Bones Speak . 29 Female Visionaries . 29 The Book of Revelations . 32 Conclusions . 38 Appendix: Images . 41 Bibliography . 45 Deumens 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This project would not have been possible without the continuous support and encouragement from these people: my wonderful advisor, Andrea Sterk, whose faith in me kept me going whenever I felt inadequate to the task; Howard Louthan, who helped me find a topic that continues to excite me; all the other professors who gave me new ideas and new ways to look at my research, especially Elisabeth Ross and Florin Curta; Stephanie Wessling, who never complained about my horrible German translations; the welcoming and helpful staff at the Ruusbruck library in Antwerp, the Köln Stadmuseum and the Sankt Ursula Kirche in Cologne; and especially my friends and family, who were always willing to read drafts of this thesis. I also extend my sincere thanks to the University Scholars Program and the Bridget Phillips Scholarship for the financial support that made my research in Germany possible. Thank you all. Deumens 3 INTRODUCTION Frequently admonished by divine visions of flame and by virtue of the most majestic heavenly martyred virgins coming from the east, in fulfillment of a vow, the virtuous Clematius restored this basilica on their land from the foundation up. It should be known that if the body of anyone other than the holy virgins is deposited in this majestic basilica, built on the site where the holy virgins spilled their blood in the name of Christ, he will be punished by eternal hellfire.1 So reads the Latin inscription on the south wall of the choir bay in the Saint Ursula church in Cologne. Dated as roughly fourth century, this inscription is the earliest surviving evidence of the cult of the Eleven Thousand Virgins.2 According to the legend which developed over the centuries after Clematius’s inscription, this large group of young women accompanied a British princess named Ursula on a pilgrimage to Rome.3 On their return journey down the Rhine River, the virgins encountered an army of Huns menacing Cologne. When Ursula refused to renounce Christ and marry the Huns’ leader, all eleven thousand virgins were slaughtered by the barbarians. In recognition of their sacrifice, God sent a fearful vision of an avenging army to the Huns, who fled, thereby saving Cologne. The 1 Clematius Inscription, circa 400. Translation from Scott Montgomery, St. Ursula and the Eleven Thousand Virgins of Cologne : relics, reliquaries and the visual culture of group sanctity in late medieval Europe (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2009), 10. 2 There is some debate about the dating of the Inscription, some scholars arguing that the stone was carved as late as the ninth or tenth century. For this paper, I have adopted the earlier date, which most of my sources agree on. Also, the Inscription does not number the virgins. It was only in the eleventh and twelfth centuries that they became the Eleven Thousand. See chapter one, below; and Joseph P. Huffman, Family, Commerce, and Religion in London and Cologne: Anglo-German emigrants, c. 1000-c.1300 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 208. 3 It is assumed that this occurred in the third or fourth century, though most scholars agree that the story is fictional. Thankfully, it is beyond the scope of this paper to prove or disprove the reality of eleven thousand virgin martyrs. Deumens 4 citizens gratefully venerated the virgin martyrs for their role in this miraculous salvation, building the church which Clematius, allegedly a man of senatorial rank, restored in the fourth century. The Eleven Thousand Virgins became very important saints for the people of Cologne, acting as spiritual patrons and protectors for the city. In medieval Christian society, veneration of a particular saint by a community, family or individual was common. Saints’ cults were based on the belief in a reciprocal relationship between the person on earth and the saint in heaven. In exchange for devotion and prayer, often accompanied by substantial donations to churches or monasteries, the saint granted miracles such as extraordinary healing, exorcism of demons, good fortune, or fertility. The saint also acted as an advocate before God, lending his or her holy voice toward the salvation of the supplicant. There was often a physical link to the saint in the form of a bone, a bit of hair, or a garment. This relic channeled the saint’s power, and it was thought that the saint actually resided inside the object. Another important aspect of the cult was the saint’s vita or passio, an account of the life and death of the saint. This legendary history was the voice of the cult, telling the world of the saint’s great holiness and conferring honor on the people and places associated with the saint.4 4 On saints’ cults and medieval Christianity, see: Adriaan H. Bredero, Christendom and Christianity in the Middle Ages: the Relations between Religion, Church and Society, trans. Reinder Bruinsma (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1994); Peter Brown, The Cult of the Saints: its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981); Patrick J. Geary, Furta Sacra: Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978); Herbert Grundmann, Religious Movements in the Middle Ages, trans. Steven Rowan (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1995); Gerhart B. Ladner, God, cosmos, and humankind: the world of early Christian symbolism, trans. Thomas Dunlap (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995); Anneke B. Mulder-Bakker, ed., The Invention of Saintliness, Routledge studies in medieval religion and culture (London: Routledge, 2002); Kenneth L. Woodward, Making Saints: How the Catholic Church Determines who becomes a saint, who doesn’t and why (New York: Simon & Schuster Inc., 1996); Miri Rubin, ed., Medieval Christianity in practice (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009) Deumens 5 An individual or community often tied their identity to their patron saint.5 The association of the papacy with Saint Peter is a prominent example of this, as are the connections between the various monastic orders and their sainted founders. In the case of the Eleven Thousand Virgins and Cologne, the city created and expressed a unique identity through its association with this specific saints’ cult. As the city developed from a Roman capital to the seat of an archbishop and electoral prince, the cult grew along with it, adapting the legend of the Eleven Thousand Virgins to the changing social and religious needs of the Christian community. At the same time, Cologne gained an identity as an important Catholic religious center because of its relationship with the virgin martyrs. This process is especially marked in the twelfth century, when Cologne reached its peak of power and influence, and simultaneously the cult of the Eleven Thousand Virgins gained unprecedented popularity across Europe. This thesis will explore the mutual influence between city and saint’s cult by analyzing three transformative events in the cult of the Eleven Thousand Virgins during the twelfth century. The first event was the publication of the Regnante domino, an account of the legend of Ursula infused with a sense of adventure and grandeur to match the growing power and prestige of Cologne. Secondly, a graveyard was discovered just outside the city which was identified as the burial of the Eleven Thousand Virgins, providing Cologne with a treasure trove of religious relics. Thirdly and finally, the legend was emended by a female visionary monastic named Elisabeth von Schönau, who presented the Eleven Thousand Virgins as a model of the ideal Christian society. Each of these events responded in some way to social, cultural, religious, economic or political developments, and each had an 5 See Peter Brown, The Cult of the Saints, 50-68. Deumens 6 impact on Cologne’s identity as a wealthy urban community and a Christian center rivaling Rome or Jerusalem. Most studies of the Eleven Thousand Virgins focus on the abundant and inspiring artwork generated by this widely popular saints’ cult, though some also explore the literary merits of the legend. Guy de Terverant, an early Ursula scholar, published a comprehensive two volume study of the art of the cult in 1931. He begins with a brief examination of the legend and the history of the cult, focusing as I do on the developments of the twelfth century. He then explores the spread and impact of the cult in the art of the middle ages. His work is foundational, containing a comprehensive list of major works of art as well as a catalogue of extant manuscripts of the legend.6 In his 1985 book Sankt Ursula: Legende-Verehrung-Bilderwelt, Frank Gunther Zehnder explores the “reachable, vivid personality” of St. Ursula herself. 7 He traces the cult’s story from the Clematius inscription to the Golden Legend of Jacobus Voragine, carefully comparing the different versions of Ursula’s legend. He also describes the various religious orders founded in Ursula’s name, giving special attention to the Saint Ursula church in Cologne. Zehnder spends a great deal of his analysis on the visual depictions of the legend and the iconography of Ursula. Most recently, Scott Montgomery approached the visual culture of the St.
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