A Dominican Master of Theology in Context: John of Naples and Intellectual Life Beyond Paris, ca. 1300-1350 by Kirsten Jean Schut A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Centre for Medieval Studies University of Toronto © Copyright by Kirsten Jean Schut 2019 A Dominican Master of Theology in Context: John of Naples and Intellectual Life Beyond Paris, ca. 1300-1350 Kirsten Jean Schut Doctor of Philosophy Centre for Medieval Studies University of Toronto 2019 Abstract This dissertation provides the first comprehensive biography of the Dominican scholar John of Naples (Giovanni Regina di Napoli), who flourished during the first half of the fourteenth century. John studied and taught at the Dominican schools in Naples and Bologna, and at the University of Paris, where he was made a master of theology in 1315. He spent most of the rest of his life in Naples, where he was closely associated with the Angevin court. Chapter 1 surveys John’s life and works, setting his career in its Neapolitan context. Chapters 2-4 deal with different aspects of his teaching. Chapter 2 contrasts his contributions to debates about the nature of theology at Paris with the way he introduced this subject to his Dominican students in Naples. Chapter 3 examines the role of medicine in his theological teaching, where it served as a tool for interpreting core texts as well as a source of material for preaching. Chapter 4 analyzes the symbiotic relationship between his quodlibets and the literature of pastoral care. Chapter 5 looks at John as a Dominican friar and preacher, turning to his sermon collection as a source of information about Dominican life in southern Italy, and Chapter 6 investigates his relationship with the Angevin rulers of Naples and the role of politics and political theory in his works. Appendices to chapters 2-6 provide transcriptions of unpublished quodlibetal questions, sermons, ii and other texts used as the basis for this study. Two additional appendices provide descriptions of the main manuscripts and discuss the dating and placing of John’s works. This study considers John from a variety of angles – teacher, preacher, friar, courtier, Neapolitan – and suggests that these overlapping identities cannot be productively separated from one another. It highlights the vibrancy of intellectual life in early-fourteenth-century Naples, and the strong cultural ties between Naples, Paris, and Avignon, as well as other regions such as the Kingdom of Hungary. Furthermore, it illustrates how mendicant convents could help to disseminate theological teachings from the University of Paris to the provinces, while also serving as sites of innovation in their own right. iii Acknowledgments One of the underlying assumptions of this study is that the places in which scholarly work takes place matter to that work itself, and it is a pleasure to recall the places and people that have made this dissertation what it is. The Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of Toronto has been a true community of learning in the time I have spent there, and this work bears its stamp in many ways. Above all, I am indebted to the members of my advisory committee. Martin Pickavé has been solidly supportive of my academic progress right from my earliest weeks as an MA student, working on the first shaky SSHRC proposal, and that support has continued unabated even as it became apparent that I would not be a philosopher. Lawrin Armstrong provided invaluable training in Latin and technical skills; any deficiencies in those areas reflect my own failings, not his. Joseph Goering’s curious and humane approach to his sources remains an inspiration, and I hope that his influence is detectable here. Conversations with Alexander Andrée, Mark Meyerson, Michèle Mulchahey, Bert Roest, and Giulio Silano have also influenced this project in numerous ways over the years, and Shami Ghosh provided much-needed encouragement during the later stages. Among classmates, Lochin Brouillard deserves special mention as one of the best colleagues and friends that one could ask for. Toronto is but one node in a wider intellectual network, and I must thank a number of colleagues, including Antonella Ambrosio, Joshua Benson, William Duba, Andrea Improta, Thomas Jeschke, Rosalba di Meglio, Timothy Noone, Francesco Pica, Christopher Schabel, Andreas Speer, and Florian Wöller, for their generosity in sharing research materials and advice. I am especially grateful to Ian Wei for taking time out of a busy visit to Toronto for what proved to be a valuable conversation at a critical point in the writing process, and to William Courtenay for graciously serving as my external examiner. Thanks are also due to Roy Laird and Gregory MacIsaac of Carleton University for introducing me to the joys of medieval intellectual history and for their continued mentorship. Material and institutional support is a prerequisite for any scholarly activity, and I must acknowledge the financial assistance I have received from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the School of Graduate Studies, the Centre for Medieval Studies, and the Hungarian Helicon Foundation. I would also like to acknowledge the staff of the iv Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale in Florence, the Biblioteca Nazionale in Naples (especially Luca!), and the Biblioteca della Società Napoletana di Storia Patria. Closer to home, the staff of the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies library and the interlibrary loans staff of the University of Toronto libraries have helped me to solve many problems over the years, and I will miss them terribly. Most of this dissertation was written in a room on the third floor of a house in Toronto’s Greektown, in an apartment shared most consistently with the incomparable Emma Meadley Dunphy. To her good company, good cooking, good conversations, well-timed book recommendations, and sense of humour I owe rather more of my sanity than I care to admit. Substantial amounts of research, writing, and editing also took place at the rural Ontario home of my parents, Peter Schut and Carol Mortimer. I will cherish the memories of sunny days spent working on the screened-in porch, watching the phoebe chicks learn to fly. My parents deserve special thanks for their remarkably genuine interest in whatever their children happen to be doing. When (for example) my mother offered to learn Latin with me during a sixth grade homeschooling experiment, she had no idea just how far that was going to go. Finally, I am grateful to my younger siblings, Nathan, Adrian, and Thomas, for making me laugh and reminding me of the worlds beyond the humanities, be they engineering, server systems, or the delights of heavy machinery. v Table of Contents Acknowledgments.......................................................................................................................... iv Table of Contents ........................................................................................................................... vi Abbreviations for commonly cited manuscripts and a note on transcriptions ............................... xi Introduction ......................................................................................................................................1 Chapter 1 John’s Life and Works ..................................................................................................20 1.1 Biographical study .............................................................................................................20 Early years: Naples and Bologna, ca. 1275-1309 ..............................................................20 Paris, ca. autumn 1309-autumn 1317 .................................................................................27 Naples, autumn 1317-ca. 1322...........................................................................................33 Avignon, ca. 1322-1323/1324............................................................................................35 Naples under Robert, ca. 1323/1324-1343 ........................................................................40 Last years: Naples and a brief trip to Avignon under Johanna, ca. 1343-1348 .................50 Themes ...............................................................................................................................56 1.2 John’s Naples .....................................................................................................................57 San Domenico Maggiore ...................................................................................................57 The city ..............................................................................................................................63 Castel Nuovo ......................................................................................................................66 Other ecclesiastical foundations in Naples ........................................................................71 1.3 Conclusion .........................................................................................................................80 Chapter 2 John as a Teacher of Theology ......................................................................................82 2.1 The language of theology...................................................................................................85 2.2 John on the science of theology .........................................................................................87