DIPLOMARBEIT Titel der Diplomarbeit „A woman's life in Gregory of Tours' Histories“ Verfasser Richard Hemmer angestrebter akademischer Grad Magister der Philosophie (Mag.phil) Wien, 2013 Studienkennzahl lt. A 312 Studienblatt: Studienrichtung lt. Geschichte Studienblatt: Betreuer: Univ.-Prof. Dr. Walter Pohl 1 2 I'd like to thank: My parents, for their unwavering support. Lene, for putting up with long hours. And me. Everyone who so tirelessly kept encouraging me through the years. 3 4 Table of Contents 1 Introduction.......................................................................................7 2 Theory.............................................................................................11 2.1 Current State of Research............................................................11 2.1.1 Gregory of Tours..................................................................11 2.1.2 Gender in the early Middle Ages.............................................12 2.2 Gender and History.....................................................................13 2.2.1 Gender and the Middle Ages...................................................14 2.2.2 Gender in the Middle Ages.....................................................15 2.3 Gregory of Tours............................................................................18 2.3.1 Life.....................................................................................18 2.3.2 Gregory's Family..........................................................................20 2.3.3 Gregory, Bishop of Tours........................................................22 2.3.4 Works.................................................................................27 2.3.4.1 The Histories.................................................................27 2.3.4.2 Other writings................................................................28 2.3.5 Historiographic Significance...................................................30 3 A Woman's Life in Gregory of Tours' Histories........................................33 3.1 Good vs. Evil..............................................................................33 3.1.1 Fredegund as seen by Gregory...............................................34 3.1.1.1 The rise of Fredegund.....................................................35 3.1.1.1.1 Getting rid of competition..........................................35 3.1.1.1.2 Getting rid of opposition............................................37 3.1.2 Brunhild or Beauty lies in the Eyes of the Beholder....................45 3.1.3 The Beauty versus the Beast..................................................49 3.1.4 Contrast: Fredegar...............................................................50 3.1.5 Chilperic and Guntram as seen by Gregory...............................53 3.1.6 Chilperic..............................................................................55 3.1.7 Guntram.............................................................................65 3.1.8 Conclusion...........................................................................73 3.2 Rights.......................................................................................74 3.2.1 Division between legal positions.............................................74 3.2.2 Royalty and Aristocracy.........................................................75 3.2.2.1 Marriage.......................................................................75 3.2.2.2 Unmarried.....................................................................83 3.2.2.2.1 Divorced.................................................................84 3.2.2.2.2 Widowed.................................................................87 3.2.3 The People...........................................................................88 3.2.3.1 Free.............................................................................88 3.2.3.2 Unfree..........................................................................91 3.3 Relationships within families.........................................................95 3.3.1 Mother and Child..................................................................96 3.3.2 Women and relatives...........................................................106 4 Conclusion......................................................................................109 Bibliography.......................................................................................113 Sources..........................................................................................113 Literature.......................................................................................113 Images used...................................................................................117 Abbreviations.....................................................................................117 5 6 1 Introduction The early Middle Ages, generally categorized as that time between the Fall of Rome and the coronation of Charlemagne, are a period often overlooked not only by students but also teachers. While we are all well versed in the philosophers of antiquity, the knights who went to fight the crusades and the history of World War II, the early Middle Ages are often curiously absent from our collective minds. The earliest events after the fall of Rome we learn about in school are generally about the time of Charlemagne, sometimes maybe that of his father and grandfather. This is already a few hundred years past what is classified by many scholars as the early Middle Ages.1 When it comes to gender studies or dealing with women in whatever period in history, it is not a rare occasion that people, among them even trained historians, put on a vague look and decide to change the subject. Fortunately, gender studies have become more and more part of the everyday curriculum of almost any liberal arts university, while the early Middle Ages studies are still somewhat behind in that regard. The core piece of my research will be the Histories by Gregory of Tours, the bishop, saint and historiographer of the Merovingian Franks during the 6th century. This for the time very rare narrative source has been under the scrutiny of many scholars since it was written in the 6th century, and many have found flaws as well as merit in the writings of Gregory of Tours. He has been used as a face-value account of the royal Merovingians, studied for his historiographical significance, and dissected by scholars for the numerous elements of his writings. There have been various studies dealing with the role of women during the early Middle Ages, most prominent that by Suzanne F. Wemple.2 She attempted to connect various sources of the early Middle 1 For a discussion on the dates which try to put the early Middle Ages into a temporal framework see Chris Wickham. Framing the Early Middle Ages: Europe and the Mediterranean 400-800. Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2005, pp.1-6. 2 Suzanne Fonay Wemple, Women in Frankish Society: Marriage and the Cloister, 500 to 900. 7 Ages and create a picture of women's situation, their status and the most important discrepancies between legal documents and the actual perceived reality as depicted in narrative sources like the Histories of Gregory of Tours. For this thesis, the circumstances of a woman's life in these times, that is the day-to-day struggle or hardships, are of interest as well. As with all accounts, evaluating these demands from the reader a certain distance, which of course cannot guarantee total objectivity, but help clear one's vision regarding positions taken rather obviously through one or another sort of bias. In the case of Gregory, these issues of how to process and dissect an historical text are even more complex considering the differing perceptions of Gregory's writings ranging from ridicule as a pious annalist of the Franks to the conduct of serious scholarly research into his merits as a historiographer. Even though today Gregory is mostly regarded as an actual historiographer of his time, reading his work has not become easier. I would rather argue that a reading of the Histories demands a kind of discipline of keeping in mind this anecdotal character of his writings not necessary when it comes to historiographers who at their time of writing had already been regarded as such. This is owed to Gregory's anecdotal writing most obvious in his Histories which needs to be seen as a pars pro toto at times, but then sometimes simply left as what it is, namely anecdotes which might or might not have been of core significance in the greater scheme of things. While in scientific writing anecdotal evidence is frowned upon, in certain chapters it won't be possible to avoid using it, especially in the ones dealing with the language of Gregory's depictions of certain people and events. These chapters will be focusing on how Gregory portrays certain people he obviously held in great esteem and the ones he also quite obviously held to be responsible for treacherous and murderous events in the Merovingian period. The single episodes of either their benevolence or malevolence are examined, more or less free of other University of Pennsylvania Press: Philadelphia, 1981. 8 context, in order to distill how the language Gregory uses is already giving away his misgivings about or his admiration for either of the persons described. The following chapters will give an overview of gender and the early Middle Ages and a concise description of Gregory's life and impact. 9 10 2 Theory