The Quest for the Christ Child in the Later Middle Ages
THE MIDDLE AGES SERIES
Ruth Mazo Karras, Series Editor
Edward Peters, Founding Editor
A complete list of books in the series is available from the publisher.
THE QUEST FOR
THE CHRIST CHILD
IN THE LATER
MIDDLE AGES
Mary Dzon
UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA PRESS
PHILADELPHIA
Copyright © 2017 University of Pennsylvania Press
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations used for purposes of review or scholarly citation, none of this book may be reproduced in any form by any means without written permission from the publisher.
Published by
University of Pennsylvania Press
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-4112
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
A Cataloging-in-Publication record is available from the Library of Congress
ISBN 978-0-8122-4884-5
In loving memory of Christine T. Dzon
Coram patre Deus par patri lusit ab aevo,Coram matre nova tempore lusit homo.
—Alexander Neckam, De laudibusdivinae sapientiae
CONTENTS
Chapter 1. Introduction: Recovering Christ-Child Images
Chapter 2. The Christ Child in Two Treatises of Aelred of Rievaulx and in Early Franciscan Sources
Chapter 3. Aquinas and the Apocryphal Christ Child in the Later Middle Ages
Chapter 4. A Maternal View of Christ’s Childhood in the Writings of Birgitta of Sweden
Chapter 5. Conclusion: The Yearning of the Quest
Appendix: Summary of William Caxton’s Infantia salvatoris (c. 1477)
ABBREVIATIONS
| AASS | Acta Sanctorum, 69 vols. (Paris, 1863–1940) |
| Add | Additional |
| BL | British Library |
| BnF | Bibliothèque nationale de France |
| CCCM | Corpus Christianorum, Continuatio Mediaevalis |
| CCSA | Corpus Christianorum, Series Apocryphorum |
| CCSL | Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina |
| CF | Cistercian Fathers |
| CS | Cistercian Studies |
| CSEL | Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum |
| DS | Dictionnaire de spiritualité ascetique et mystique, doctrine et histoire, ed. Marcel Viller, 17 vols. (Paris: G. Beauchesne et ses fils, 1937–1995) |
| EETS | Early English Text Society |
| o.s. | Original Series |
| e.s. | Extra Series |
| s.s. | Supplementary Series |
| FAED | Francis of Assisi: Early Documents, edited by Regis J. Armstrong, J.A. Wayne Hellmann, and William J. Short, 4 vols. including the index (New York: New City Press, 1999–2002) |
| FC | Fathers of the Church |
| FF | Fontes Franciscani, edited by Enrico Menestò and Stefano Brufani (Assisi: Edizioni Porziuncola, 1995) |
| GL | Golden Legend |
| LA | Legenda aurea |
| MED | Middle English Dictionary, ed. Hans Kurath et al. (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1952–2001) |
| MGH | Monumenta Germaniae Historica |
| OED | Oxford English Dictionary, ed. J. A. Simpson and E. S. C. Weiner, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989) |
| PG | Patrologia Graeca, ed. J.-P. Migne, 161 vols. (Paris, 1857–66) |
| PL | Patrologia Latina, ed. J.-P. Migne, 221 vols. (Paris, 1844–64) |
| PMLA | Publications of the Modern Language Association |
| RS | Rolls Series |
| SC | Sources Chrétiennes |
| SFSS | Samlingar utgivna av Svenska Fornskrifsällskapet (Swedish Medieval Texts’ Society Series) |
| ST | Summa theologiae |
The Quest for the Christ Child in the Later Middle Ages