Royal Nunneries at the Center of Medieval Europe 9788028000233, 8028000231

Table of contents :
Front Matter
Tanja Michalsky, Daniela Rywiková & Elisabetta Scirocco. Royal Nunneries at the Center of Medieval Europe
Jakub Adamski and Piotr Pajor. The Architecture of Poor Clares’ Nunnery in Stary Sącz. Early Fourteenth-Century Artistic Relations between Lesser Poland and Upper Rhineland
Susan Marti. Networking for Eternal Salvation? Agnes of Habsburg, Queen of Hungary and Co-Founder of Königsfelden
Michaela Zöschg. Beyond Naples. Fourteenth-Century Royal Widows and their Clarissan Foundations in a Trans-Regional Perspective
Giulia Rossi Vairo. Seeing Double in Odivelas. Nuns and Monks at the Monastery of St Dinis, a Royal Pantheon in Late Medieval Portugal
Angelica Federici. Art, Architecture, and Aesthetics in the Baronial Convents of Medieval Latium
Agnieszka Patała. The Convent of Poor Clares in Breslau and its Medieval Furnishings
Eszter Konrád. Helisabet filia Stephani regis Ungarorum illustris. Image of a Saintly Nun of the Arpad Dynasty as Reflected in Hagiographic Sources
Klára Benešovská. Royal Nunneries in Czech Lands: Their Specificity and Research Perspectives
photographic credits

Citation preview

Exchanges and Interactions in the Arts of Medieval Europe, Byzantium, and the Mediterranean Seminarium Kondakovianum, Series Nova Université de Lausanne • Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic • Masaryk

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University •

CONVIVIUM SUPPLEMENTUM  2 022/1 Exchanges and Interactions in the Arts of Medieval Europe, Byzantium, and the Mediterranean Seminarium Kondakovianum, Series Nova Journal of the Department of Art History of the University of Lausanne, of the Department of Art History of the Masaryk University, and of the Institute of Art History of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic This supplementary issue was published thanks to the financial sUpport of the Czech Academy of Sciences and the Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History.

Editor-in-chief / Ivan Foletti Executive editors / Jana Černocká, Natália Gachallová, Katarína Kravčíková, Giada Lattanzio, Martin F. Lešák, Annalisa Moraschi, Sara Salvadori, Nicolas Samaretz, Johanna Zacharias Typesetting / Helena Konečná Layout design / Monika Kučerová Cover design / Petr M. Vronský, Anna Kelblová Publisher / Masarykova univerzita, Žerotínovo nám. 9, 601 77 Brno, IČO 00216224 Editorial Office / Seminář dějin umění, Filozofická fakulta Masarykovy univerzity, Arna Nováka 1, 602 00 Brno Print / Tiskárna Didot, spol s r.o., Trnkova 119, 628 00 Brno E-mail / [email protected] www.earlymedievalstudies.com/convivium.html © Ústav dějin umění AV ČR , v. v. i. 2022 © Filozofická fakulta Masarykovy univerzity 2022 © Faculté des Lettres, Université de Lausanne 2022 Published / June 2022 Reg. No. MK ČR E 21592 ISSN 2336-3452 (print) ISSN 2336-808X (online) ISBN 978-80-280-0023-3 (print) ISBN 978-80-280-0024-0 (online) Convivium is listed in the databases SCOPUS, ERIH, “Riviste   di classe A” indexed by ANVUR, and in the Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI) of the Web of Science.

committees Editors — Michele Bacci ( Université de Fribourg), Klára Benešovská (Institute of Art History, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic , Prague), Ivan Foletti (Masaryk University, Brno), Herbert L. Kessler ( Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore), Serena Romano ( Université de Lausanne), Elisabetta Scirocco (Bibliotheca Hertziana, Max-Planck-Institut für Kunstgeschichte, Rome) Emeritus — Hans Belting (Staatliche Hochschule für Gestaltung in Karlsruhe) Editor - in - chief — Ivan Foletti Associate editors — Nathan Dennis (University of San Francisco), Stefanie Lenk (Georg-August-Universität Göttingen), Adrien Palladino (Masaryk University, Brno) Executive editors —Jana Černocká, Natália Gachallová, Katarína Kravčíková, Giada Lattanzio, Martin F. Lešák, Annalisa Moraschi, Sara Salvadori, Nicolas Samaretz, Johanna Zacharias Advisory board — Xavier Barral i Altet ( Université de Rennes, Università di Venezia Ca’ Foscari), Nicolas Bock ( Université de Lausanne), Valentina Cantone ( Università di Padova), Jaś Elsner (University of Oxford), Clario Di Fabio ( Università di Genova), Finbarr Barry Flood (New York University), Ondřej Jakubec ( Masaryk University, Brno), Alexei Lidov (Moscow State University), Assaf Pinkus ( Tel Aviv University), Stefano Riccioni (Università di Venezia Ca’ Foscari), Jiří Roháček ( Institute of Art History, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic), Erik Thunø (Rutgers Unive­rsity, New Jersey), Alicia Walker ( Bryn Mawr College)

Royal Nunneries at the Center of Medieval Europe Art, Architecture, Aesthetics (13th–14th Centuries) edited by Klára Benešovská, Tanja Michalsky, Daniela Rywiková, Elisabetta Scirocco with the collaboration of Zuzana Frantová

contents

ROYAL NUNNERIES AT THE CENTER OF MEDIEVAL EUROPE. ART, ARCHITECTURE, AESTHETICS (13th–14th Centuries) introduction 10

Tanja Michalsky, Daniela Rywiková & Elisabetta Scirocco Royal Nunneries at the Center of Medieval Europe. Art, Architecture, Aesthetics (13th–14th Centuries)

articles 22

Jakub Adamski & Piotr Pajor The Architecture of Poor Clares’ Nunnery in Stary Sącz. Early Fourteenth-Century Artistic Relations between Lesser Poland and Upper Rhineland

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Susan Marti Networking for Eternal Salvation? Agnes of Habsburg, Queen of Hungary and Co-Founder of Königsfelden

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Michaela Zöschg Beyond Naples. Fourteenth-Century Royal Widows and their Clarissan Foundations in a Trans-Regional Perspective

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Giulia Rossi Vairo Seeing Double in Odivelas. Nuns and Monks at the Monastery of St Dinis, a Royal Pantheon in Late Medieval Portugal

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Angelica Federici Art, Architecture, and Aesthetics in the Baronial Convents of Medieval Latium

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Agnieszka Patała The Convent of Poor Clares in Breslau and its Medieval Furnishings

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Eszter Konrád Helisabet filia Stephani regis Ungarorum illustris. Image of a Saintly Nun of the Arpad Dynasty as Reflected in Hagiographic Sources

afterword 154

Klára Benešovská Royal Nunneries in Czech Lands: Their Specificity and Research Perspectives

164

photographic credits

Royal Nunneries at the Center of Medieval Europe Art, Architecture, Aesthetics (13th– 14th Centuries)

introduction

Tanja Michalsky, Daniela Rywiková & Elisabetta Scirocco

The art, architecture, and aesthetics of royal female foundations Let us begin with declaring what this is not: this is not yet another volume on medieval women’s monasteries in general. Under the lens here is a very specific category, in a defined chronology. This category unites some of the best known and well-investigated examples of nunneries, by virtue of their relevance, richness, state of documentation, and conservation: the female monasteries linked to the ruling houses of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Europe. Within the late-medieval monastic universe characterized by the presence and alternating fortunes of ancient and new religious orders, male and female monasteries founded by royal patrons share particular characteristics that can be identified across the specific political contexts and beyond the space-time mapping of artistic and architectural phenomena. Besides being an expression of the piety of their promoters, royal foundations often worked as instrumenta regni. Endowed with special privileges and enriched by royal

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and aristocratic donations, they were active cultural hubs, stages for royal promotion, and places of personal and dynastic self-representation. From an architectural and artistic point of view, these prerogatives were reflected in the strategic choice of the foundation site, or in the design and decoration of curated and sumptuous architectural spaces allowing the participation of the royals in the liturgy and selected moments of the monastic life. Images and objects guaranteed the praesentia of the patrons even in absentia, in both the cloistered and the public spaces of the convents. Monasteries often preserved royal treasures or archives and were elected as burial places, according to memorial strategies designed for declaring continuity or rupture with the past. In this context, female religious communities occupy a special place, and offer the possibility to investigate the agency of female elites in medieval society. Often – but not exclusively – linked to the initiative of a queen or a princess, a duchess or a countess, nunneries connected to ruling houses were mostly motivated by devotion or piety (e.g. charitable foundations for women and children), or by their own decision or desire to take the veil, but also by more evident intentions of personal and dynastic representation and memory [Figs 1–2]. The royal religious foundation, which was in itself a mirror of the feudal society identified with the crown, was often subject to special rules, differing in various ways from those established by the religious orders. For these reasons, the architecture, artistic production, and material culture of royal nunneries lend themselves to specific inquiries. To mention just a few: the political and dynastic value of the foundation of a female community, as well as patterns of women’s patronage acting within and beyond this realm; the royal supervision for the design and decoration of spaces, both inside and outside the clausura, in the tension between seclusion and exhibition; the specifics of visual and material culture in the royal nunnery; the construction of appropriate models of feminine holiness and blessedness outside and inside the community; and, specifically to the latter context, the manipulation of the memory of the royal patrons within everchanging dynastic and political frameworks. Other lines of inquiry might turn to trying to define specificities for such establishments within the more general framework of medieval female monasticism. For example, since, as has been pointed out, a great amount of artistic production (from altarpieces to panel paintings, from manuscripts to embroideries) encouraging visualization can be associated with women’s houses, what are particularities unique to royal foundations? And, taking another perspective: which of these architectural and artistic phenomena can be read on a trans-regional scale, through trajectories that follow not only dynastic and diplomatic relations between European courts, but specifically female networks based on ties of faith and blood? Some of these questions remain open; others find answers, insights and new stimuli in the papers collected in the present volume. As its title declares, this Supplementum of Convivium collects some of the papers presented at the international conference Royal Nunneries at the Center of Medieval Europe. Art, Architecture, Aesthetics (11th–14th centuries), co-­organized by the Institute of Art History of the Czech Academy of Science, the University of Ostrava, and the Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History (July 1–3, 2021)1. It is undeniable that female monasteries have been benefitting from sustained and constant attention in the past decades, within and beyond gender studies. Research endeavors devoted to the art, architecture and material culture of medieval nunneries have even fostered a reconsideration of the categories of medieval “art” and “aesthetics” in general2. The special subset of nunneries linked to royal patronage as a phenomenon to be analyzed across medieval Europe, on the other hand, has been thematized and explored primarily by historians until now, although in a productive

dialogue with historians of art and architecture3. A comparable art historical inquiry on a wider transregional scale, however, is still in the making. It is this endeavor which our volume seeks to further stimulate4. While recent contributions expand the geo-cultural scope beyond the geographical and historical borders of medieval Europe toward the Americas5, we must acknowledge that some types of intellectual “borders” are still very present and that most of the literature of reference remains Western-centered and oriented. One must also admit that a significant number of scientific results produced in the languages of Central and Eastern Europe 1 2

3 4

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The event also benefitted from partnership with the National Gallery in Prague and the Center for Early Medieval Studies at the Masaryk University in Brno. The final program of the conference and the booklet with full abstracts of the papers presented are available here: https://www.biblhertz.it/events/28932/2643800. It would be impossible and beyond the scope of this short introduction and this volume to draw an exhaustive picture of bibliographical references, from both a geographical and chronological point of view. For fundamental references to approach the universe of medieval nunneries, see: Caroline Walker Bynum, Jesus as Mother. Studies in the Spirituality of the High Middle Ages, Berkeley 1984; eadem, Holy Feast and Holy Fast. The Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women, Berkeley 1988; eadem, Fragmentation and redemption. Essays on gender and the human body in medieval religion, New York 1991; Monastic Architecture for Women, special issue of Gesta, xxxi/2, Caroline A. Bruzelius, Constance H. Berman eds, 1992; Les religieues dans le cloître et dans le monde des origins à nos jours, Saint-Etienne 1994; Jeffrey H. Hamburger, Nuns as artists. The Visual Culture of a Medieval Convent, Berkeley / Los Angeles / London 1997; idem, The Visual and the Visionary. Art and Female Spirituality in Late Medieval Germany, New York 1998; Architecture and the Politics of Gender in Early Modern Europe, Helen Hills ed., Aldershot 2003; Cîteaux et les femmes. Architectures et occupation de l’espace dans les monastères féminins; modalités d’intégration et de contrôle des femmes dans l’Ordre; les moniales cisterciennes aujourd’hui, Bernadette Barrière ed., Paris 2001; Femmes, art et religion au Moyen Âge, Jean-Claude Schmitt ed., Colmar 2004; Krone und Schleier. Kunst aus mittelalterlichen Frauenklöstern (Die frühen Klöster und Stifte, 500–1200; Die Zeit der Orden, 1200–1500), catalogue of the exhibition (Essen – Bonn, 19.03.–7.07. 2005), Jutta Frings, Jan Gerchow eds, München 2005; Carola Jäggi, Frauenklöster im Spätmittelalter: die Kirchen der Klarissen und Dominikanerinnen im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert, Petersberg 2006; Frauen – Kloster – Kunst. Neue Forschungen zur Kulturgeschichte des Mittelalters, Jeffrey F. Hamburger, Carola Jäggi, Susan Marti, Hedwig Röckelein eds, Turnhout 2007; Crown and Veil. Female monasticism from the fifth to the fifteenth century, Jeffrey F. Hamburger, Susan Marti eds, New York 2008; Reassessing the Roles of Women as ‘Makers’ of Medieval Art and Architecture, Therese Martin ed., 2 vols., Leiden/Boston 2012. For more extensive literature, see also the articles in this volume. See for example Queens and Queenship in Medieval Europe, Anne J. Duggan ed., Woodbridge 1997; Gábor Klaniczay, Holy Rulers and Blessed Princesses: Dynastic Cults in Medieval Central Europe, Cambridge 2002; Queens, Princesses and Mendicants. Close relations in a European perspective, Nikolas Jaspert, Imke Just eds, Wien 2019. A recent research desideratum was expressed in these terms: “There is a history of royal support for the Mendicant orders and individual houses that still needs to be written – monographic and comparative studies are even now very much required”; see Nikolas Jaspert, Imke Just, “Queens, Princesses and Mendicants: Systematic Thoughts on Female Aristocratic Agency and Piety”, in Queens, Princesses and Mendicants (n. 3), pp. 3–12, esp. p. 4. This need is even stronger, if one looks at other religious orders. Studies of broader and more comparative nature have developed, starting from the examples in German-speaking countries (see n. 2), while recent years show a new focus on the Mediterranean kingdoms and their interconnections: Redes femeninas de promoción espiritual en los reinos peninsulares (s. xiii–xvi), Blanca Garí ed., Rome 2013; Les princesses angevines. Femmes, identité et patrimoine dynastiques (Anjou, Hongrie, Italie méridionale, Provence, xiiie–xve siècle), Marie-Madeleine de Cevins ed., with the collaboration of Gergely Kiss, Jean-Michel Matz, Mélanges de l’École française de Rome, cxxix/2, (2017); Clarisas y Dominicas. Modelos de implementaciòn, filiaciòn, y devociòn en la Península Ibérica, Cerdeña, Nápoles y Sicilia, Gemma Teresa Colesanti, Blanca Garí, Núria Jornet-Benito eds, Firenze University Press 2017. From the perspective of the Angevin Kingdom of Naples, see also: Tanja Michalsky, Memoria und Repräsentation. Die Grabmäler des Königshauses Anjou in Italien, Göttingen 2000; Caroline A. Bruzelius The Stones of Naples. Church Building in Angevin Italy, 1266–1343, New Haven 2004; The Church of Santa Maria Donnaregina: Art, Iconography and Patronage in Fourteenth-Century Naples, Janis Elliott, Cordelia Warr eds, Aldershot/Burlington 2004; La chiesa e il convento di Santa Chiara. Committenza artistica, vita religiosa e progettualità politica nella Napoli di Roberto d’Angiò e Sancia di Maiorca, Francesco Aceto, Stefano D’Ovidio, Elisabetta Scirocco eds, Battipaglia 2014. About the Czech Lands, most recently see: Daniela Rywiková, Medieval Art in the Czech Lands through the Prism of Gender: The Visual Culture of Female Monasteries in Medieval Bohemia and Moravia, in Premodern History and Art through the Prism of Gender in East-Central Europe, eadem, Michaela A. Malaníková eds, Lanham / New York / London 2021, pp. 35–58; Daniela Rywiková, “Art and Devotion in the Female Religious Communities of Late Medieval Český Krumlov”, in Medieval and Early Modern Art in Central Europe, Waldemar J. Deluga, Daniela Rywiková eds, Ostrava 2019, pp. 61–85. Further literature about Central Europe can be found in the essays of this volume. Franciscan Women: Female Identities and Religious Culture, Medieval and Beyond, Lezlie Knox, David B. Couturier eds, St Bonaventure 2020; Women Religious Crossing between Cloister and the World. Nunneries in Europe and the Americas, ca. 1200–1700, Mercedes Pérez Vidal ed., Amsterdam 2022.

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1 –2/ Tino di Camaino, Funerary Monument for Queen Mary of Hungary, details, Santa Maria Donnaregina, Naples, 1325–1326

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have been (and remain) hardly accessible outside the region, and the same can also be said for most of the languages of Western Europe6. This issue is neither unknown nor new, but it is not trivial, especially if one tries to think in terms of “transregional networks” and is prevented from accessing the most recent literature on comparable case studies, or even the sources for new research. This linguistic issue is strictly intertwined, moreover, with an historiographic one. As in many other fields of study – but perhaps even more so because of the inevitable political connotations of the topic – European regions (from West to East, from North to South) have developed parallel historiographic traditions in art history, often on a national basis, resulting in separate narratives of phenomena which in fact were often strictly interconnected, if considering the networks and actors involved (religious orders, royal and aristocratic connections, concepteurs, craftsmen, artists, and architects). One of the main objectives of the conference Royal Nunneries at the Center of Medieval Europe and this resulting publication was precisely to bring back to the center, on the same stage, cases that are well known and explored together with others that have remained unjustly “peripheral” and less known, so as to solicit a dialogue among scholars with different backgrounds around monuments, objects and images, looking for common questions – old and new ones –, for some answers, and for novel research perspectives. Royal nunneries in the Czech lands: old and new questions and approaches

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The medieval world did not know borders in the way we understand them today; the intellectual and imagined borders of the period did not necessarily reflect the physical and political borders and limitations of medieval Europe and beyond. One of the reasons for organizing this conference was to demonstrate that for the monastic culture as well, borders were fluid, and individual nunneries – in our case the exclusive “cast” of the royal nunneries – maintained rich contacts across Europe shaped by blood (political contacts and family relationships), and also, by region and hierarchy (from South to North and West to East). This fact has, however, been somehow overlooked in the relatively recent large international research projects dealing with the medieval European nunneries such as, for example, Krone und Schleier7 or the Repertorium of Manuscripts Illuminated by Women in Religious Communities of the Middle Ages8. Therefore, one of the tasks of the conference was to introduce the Bohemian and Moravian royal nunneries to wider academia, as well as to explore recent Czech art historical findings and frame these works and this scholarship within the international research on medieval nunneries9. The research on the nunneries of Bohemia and Moravia has a long tradition within Czech art history. We know today a great deal on the architecture of the nunneries and its function in the context of clausura, communication, corporality, liturgy, paraliturgy, and religious practice in general10. Czech medieval research often stresses the lack of a great number of visual and literary sources caused by the dramatic religious situation in the Czech lands in the fifteenth century. This handicap, however, should not prevent Czech art historians from acknowledging the agency of medieval nuns and problematizing their representation, as well as recognizing them as active and self-confident users, donors, and commissioners of medieval art, who looked at, responded to, appreciated, and even produced high-quality artwork [Fig. 3]. However, the study of international networks and relationships maintained by the nunneries represents a great desideratum in Czech research. There were numerous examples of direct mutual inspirations, exchanges of ideas, circulation of art objects, and a variety of personal contacts and interconnections amongst these establishments. Although there

introduction

3 / Christ carrying the Cross, Abbess Kunigunde gazing into Christ’s wound, Passional of Abbess Kunigunde, 1314–1321, Národní knihovna České republiky, Prague, xiv A 17, fol. 7r. 6

The bibliographical selection proposed in the notes to this introduction is of course no exception to this rule, as well as the choice of using English as the lingua franca for the conference and the following publication. 7 Krone und Schleier (n. 2). 8 See here about the project: http://www.agfem-art.com. 9 For reasons related to the Covid-19 pandemic crisis, the conference was held online, but it was originally planned to take place in Prague’s Na Františku double convent, founded by the Přemyslid princess St Agnes and her brother King Wenceslas i. The original program included a series of on-site visits and discussion at the medieval nunneries in Prague. To compensate for this lacuna, the Institute of Art History of the Czech Academy of Sciences made a series of videos under the guidance of Klára Benešovská, now available online: https://youtu. be/kwAV8dpBxac (St George’s Basilica in Prague Castle); https://youtu.be/zwDoBvjEcxY (Convent of St Agnes of Bohemia); https://youtu.be/9xlrEHdRObk (Dominican Church of St Anne). 10 Thanks to the research of Klára Mezihoráková, Helena Soukupová, Klára Benešovská and others. See, for example, Klára Mezihoráková, Architektura středověkých klášterů dominikánek v Čechách a na Moravě, Prague 2016; Helena Soukupová, Anežský klášter v Praze, Prague 2011; Helena Soukupová, Svatá Anežka Česká – život a legenda, Prague 2015; Jan Dienstbier, Klára Mezihoráková, Lenka Panušková, “Ženské kláštery a jejich obrazy”, in Imago, Imagines. Výtvarné dílo a proměny jeho funkcí v českých zemích od 10. do první třetiny 16. století, i, Kateřina Kubínová, Klára Benešovská eds, Prague 2019, pp. 104–141; Helena Soukupová, “Program Anežčina kláštera a jeho vliv na architekturu mendikantů”, in Sztuka w kręgu krakowskich franciszkanów i klarysek, Marcin Szyma, Marek Walczak eds, Cracow 2020, pp. 45–  66; see also the Afterword by Klára Benešovská in this volume, with her further bibliography.

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is a plethora of remarkable art objects in the Czech lands that were demonstrably connected with female commissioners or made for/by female religious communities or individuals, this fact has generally been either ignored or marginalized in the “mainstream” Czech medieval art historical research. Consequently, there is a lack of more ambitious interpretation of medieval visual culture, particularly concerning the function fulfilled by such objects in the context of women’s personal and collective devotion and religious practice, their regime of discipline (especially in nunneries), social activities and contacts. Royal nunneries across medieval Europe Apart from the geographical expansion of case studies, a specific approach was chosen, and the individual topics investigated show that in the view of changed methods of art history, a new look at the broad material is worthwhile. In this volume, women are not primarily understood as isolated actors or even objects of history. Rather, the authors discuss the networks they formed, how far their self-determination went, and what radius of action they were able to achieve. Of course, the aristocratic networks (especially the royal houses) played a major role in this, but members of the “lower” nobility also had a substantial share in preserving the networks. Female agency was to a large extent tied to patronage, but the nunneries also served as recruitment centers for the international aristocracy. The image of the chaste, charitable woman was echoed in the creation and veneration of saints. In these processes, the power of tombs, relics, and liturgical objects can hardly be underestimated. While this applies to the cults of saints in general, the particularities of the cult of female saints still need to be further worked out and (once again) compared within the broader European context. The lines of comparison and areas of comparison have changed: Byzantium and the West remain an important pair, but in addition to East-West, the connection of North and South also occurs and is explored. A wider geographical area is therefore examined. In addition to the internationally better known and studied nunneries in Italy, Hungary, France, and Germany, those of Poland, Spain, Portugal, and Bohemia now come into focus. This list alone reveals how far away national art historiography is from historical-­ political conditions. This expansion of the area studied not only offers new case studies but also, above all, enables comparisons on a different scale. A great advantage of recent art history is that we can always readjust the scale of our comparisons due to better and greater knowledge of individual actors, monuments, or objects and European relations. The narratives of the well-known centers and their peripheries, which characterized the older history of art, can thus be changed. With respect to the broader chronological spectrum of the conference, the papers published here are primarily concerned with royal patronage of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, but also include processes of broader duration11 and cases for contrast12. As one might expect, the Franciscan order plays a major role but, in addition to the Poor Clares, there are also convents inhabited by nuns of the Cistercian and Dominican orders. Another aspect that emerges prominently is the coexistence of male and female communities, which both deepens and questions the category of “double convents”, when looking simultaneously at cases that differ in terms of time of foundation, spatial arrangements, and the mode of interaction between the two communities13. Architectural analysis appears preeminently and presents a tangible trace of the circulation of models and shared patterns of patronage14, but the broader material culture — the artworks

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and the treasures of nunneries — are also the object of careful examination in terms of contemplative and performative aesthetic values15. Sepulchral choices, strategies of self-­ representation, memorial care for the afterlife, ways of constructing kingship/­queenship based on the nunnery’s patronage and care emerge as a characterizing plot in many of the case studies examined here16. The persistence of liturgical and memorial practices for the royal founders and their relatives over the centuries finds its counterpart in the re-writing of their biographies in early modern times17. Another important aspect of this volume is that a stronger emphasis is placed on the history of (even small) objects, and the different agencies associated with immobile and mobile decorative elements. This relatively new branch of art history gives more weight to the intrinsic power of objects, their ability to create meaning and communicate through their form, materiality, and specific use. When we speak of networks in this volume, we mean not only the relationships between people, but also between buildings, images, and liturgical furnishings that keep memories alive in the space. And “space” itself has taken on a much broader meaning than in the earlier studies on women’s monasteries. After the “spatial turn”, it is self-evident that alongside the concrete architectural spaces, one must also consider those of the networks, as well as the ephemeral spaces of the liturgy, in which both the enclosure of the nuns and an occasional public sphere were created18. The proceedings of this truly transdisciplinary conference at which royal nunneries, especially those from lesser-known areas, are assigned their appropriate place in a European context, address new methodological territory, insofar as the scales and parameters of the comparisons are always called into question, as we have learned from the histoire croisée19. We would like to express our gratitude to the speakers at the conference and to the contributors to this issue, as well as the many colleagues and specialists in history, art history, architectural history, history of music, and medieval liturgy who participated in the conference as chairs or discussants or who provided their expertise and bibliographical aids in the publication process20. The names of many of them surface in the bibliography on these pages, or at various points in the articles in this volume. The vitality of the conference debate brought to the center questions that demand further study, demonstrating the great potential of this topic for art history in a transdisciplinary dialogue. The essays collected here aim to contribute to this broader and more complex frame with fresh ongoing research, through selected case studies that locate female royal foundations and their networks at the center of a significant part of European history.

introduction

11 In more than one case, analysis includes the post-medieval life of nunneries and the related production of arts and documents up to the nineteenth century. 12 The baronial convents of Latium offer an eccentric point of view, more focused on bottom-up networks, useful to compare and contrast with the specificities of royal patronage. 13 On this topic: Doppelköster und andere Formen der Symbiose männlicher und weiblicher Religiosen im Mittelalter, Kaspar Elm, Michel Parisse eds, Berlin 1992; Alison I. Beach, Andra Juganaru, “The Double Monastery as a Historiographical Problem (Fourth to Twelfth Century)”, in The Cambridge History of Medieval Monasticism in the Latin West, Alison I. Beach, Isabelle Cochelin eds, Cambridge 2020, pp. 561–578. 14 See the articles by Jakub Adamski and Piotr Pajor (pp. 22–37); Michaela Zöschg (pp. 56–75); Giulia Rossi Vairo (pp. 76–91); and Angelica Federici (pp. 92–111). 15 See the articles by Agnieszka Patała (pp. 112–135); and Susan Marti (pp. 38–55). 16 See the articles by Susan Marti (pp. 38–55); Giulia Rossi Vairo (pp. 76–91); and Michaela Zöschg (pp. 56–75). 17 See the article by Eszter Konrád (pp. 136–153). 18 Stephan Günzel, Raum. Eine kulturwissenschaftliche Einführung, Bielefeld 2017; Jörg Dünne, Raumtheorie. Grundlagentexte aus Philosophie und Kulturwissenschaften, Frankfurt am Main 2006. 19 Michael Werner, Bénédicte Zimmermann, “Beyond Comparison. Histoire Croisée and the Challenge of Reflexivity”, History and Theory, xlv (2006), pp. 30–50. 20 The authors would like to thank Sarah S. Wilkins for proofreading the English text of this Introduction.

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Abstract – The Architecture of Poor Clares’ Nunnery in Stary Sącz. Early Fourteenth-Century Artistic Relations between Lesser Poland and Upper Rhineland – The nunnery of Poor Clares in Stary Sącz, founded in 1280 by the Duchess of Cracow and Sandomierz (recently canonized as Saint Kinga), is regarded as one of the most notable religious institutions of its kind in medieval Poland. This article focuses on the first tierce of the fourteenth century, when the present church – consecrated in 1332 – was constructed. The paper presents detailed analysis of the Stary Sącz nunnery’s architecture, which was developed in the context of a dense network of artistic relations between the southeast regions of the Polish Empire and Central Europe. The church emerges not only as an exemplary case of a dynastic foundation for a female order, but also as a prime example of the artistic phenomenon that today’s historiographers cite as “architectural avantgarde around the year 1300”. Keywords – church architecture, dynastic foundation, fourteenth century, gothic architecture, Lesser Poland, mendicant architecture, mendicant orders, Poor Clares, Stary Sącz, Upper Rhineland Jakub Adamski University of Warsaw [email protected] Piotr Pajor Pontifical University of John Paul ii in Kraków [email protected]

The Architecture of Poor Clares’ Nunnery in Stary Sącz Early Fourteenth-Century Artistic Relations between Lesser Poland and Upper Rhineland Jakub Adamski & Piotr Pajor

The Nunnery of Poor Clares in Stary Sącz, located at the southernmost point of Lesser Poland (the Małopolska region in Polish), was among the most notable religious institutions of its kind in the medieval Kingdom of Poland. A large monastic complex encircled with defensive walls and towers, the convent once served as a spiritual and political center of a mighty dominion, the Castellany of Sącz, made powerful by its strategic location bordering the Kingdom of Hungary along the important trade route that branched from Cracow (Polish Kraków) to Košice (Hungarian Kassa) and further south. Inhabited without interruption

by the community of Poor Clares since  1280, the convent is now best known as the sanctuary of the monastery’s founder, the Holy Duchess Kinga (or Cunegunda), who was beatified in 1690 and canonized in 1999. The complex’s architectural and liturgical center – a conventual church originally dedicated to St Clare and later to the Holy Trinity, consecrated in 1332 – can be considered the most important early fourteenth-century building of its kind in the entire Kingdom of Poland. Despite its recognized significance, the convent’s exquisite, “avant-garde” architecture of Upper Rhenish origin has attracted limited art historical

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interest; it is most frequently studied in the context of mendicant architecture in Lesser Poland1. Until recently2, Paul Crossley was the only scholar to emphasize the fine qualities of the church’s design and masonry, as well as to suggest its close relationship to the workshop behind the Cracow Cathedral choir that began in 13203. The main objective of this paper is to demonstrate that the church of the Nunnery of Poor Clares is an exemplary case of a dynastic foundation for a female order4, as its present design was likely erected with the financial support of the King of Poland Władysław the Short (Polish Łokietek) of the Piast dynasty and his wife Queen Jadwiga (Hedwig) of the same dynasty. This assumption, although not confirmed by contemporary sources, finds corroboration both in the nunnery’s well-known history and its materiality, particularly in the shrine’s sandstone detailing. This is discussed in the final section of this paper, after analy­sis proving that the stonemasons employed in Stary  Sącz, who worked closely with those concurrently building the choir of the Cracow cathedral, possessed first-hand knowledge of the leading architectural workshops in the Upper Rhineland, and likely had been recruited directly from this area. A nuanced analysis of the convent thus depends on the study of the dense network of artistic relations linking Central Europe and the southwest regions of the Empire. As we will see, the church of Poor Clares in Stary Sącz presents the most interesting example of an artistic phenomenon that has been designated as “architecturally avant-garde around the year 1300”5, surprisingly emerging at the very outskirts of Latin Europe. The “prehistory” of the female Franciscan convent in Stary Sącz starts on March 2, 1257, when Bolesław v the Chaste (Polish Wstydliwy) of the Piast dynasty, duke of Cracow and Sandomierz, donated the castellany of Sącz (terra Sandecensis) as a bridewealth to his wife Kinga, who was a Hungarian princess of the Árpád dynasty by birth6. According to the tradition recorded in her Vita (ca 1320), the pious duchess and her sister Jolenta decided to join the Order of Saint Clare immediately after Bolesław the Chaste died in 1279, announcing their intention at the duke’s funeral7.

A new convent in the main political center of the Sącz district was officially established on July 6, 1280. The foundation charter issued by Kinga guaranteed a rich endowment for the monastery, which included twenty-eight vil­lages and the town of Sącz itself8. Due to the widowed duchess’ immense generosity, the convent strengthened its political and economic position in the following centuries to such an extent that the terra Sandecensis developed into a monastic dominion ruled by the Sącz abbesses9. It is probable, that works on the church started within the decade following the foundation of the convent. In 1285, the Archbishop of Gniezno Jakub Świnka granted indulgences to visitors who supported the shrine’s prospective construction (qui ad opus ecclesie de novo ibidem construende, manum porrexerint adiutricem)10. Jan Grotowic, the Bishop of Cracow, granted additional indulgences to the faithful on July 31, 1332, for the church’s consecration, which he likely performed the same day (ecclesiam in Antiqua civitate Sandecz in honorem sancte Clare fundatam ac demum per nos […] dedicatam)11. Many past scholars believed that the surviving church remained essentially identical to the one built after 128512. Is it, however, possible that the construction of this moderately-sized building lasted up to half a century? Unfortunately, no comprehensive archaeological investigations of the existing architectural structure, whose interior and exterior are almost fully covered with plaster, have been undertaken. Yet we do know that the church was uniformly constructed with sandstone rubble13, while its structural and decorative elements, such as buttresses, portals, window tracery, and detailing of the vaults are composed of sandstone ashlar. The design of the shrine and its walls shows no anomalies or junctures, and the ground plan is fully coherent and regular. Finally, the stylistically advanced masonry forms, sharp and linear in character, rule out a dating prior to the first decades of the fourteenth century. This last observation was already clear to Władysław Łuszczkiewicz in 189114, and thus we can easily follow Crossley’s assertion that “from its comparatively small size, and the obvious wealth and status of the convent, we can infer that the building was completed quickly and was therefore begun

about ten years earlier”, around 132015. It should also be stressed that it is not entirely clear, whether any stone church was really built during Kinga’s lifetime, as the aformentioned document mentions some preparations rather than outgoing works. The present-day church of Poor Clares in Stary Sącz consists of a short double-bay choir enclosed by five sides of an octagon, and a nave, slightly wider than the chancel, following an elongated rectangular ground plan with an aspect ratio of ca 1:2:5 [Figs 1–3]. The former part of the church is vaulted, featuring ribs with pear-shaped profiles  [Fig. 4]. Polygonal brackets ornamented by small, hollowed arches with cusps, support the vaults [Fig. 5]. It is worth noting that the polygonal termination of the sanctuary in Stary Sącz presents the first example of this architectural solution among medieval churches for Franciscan and Dominican nuns in the historic lands of Poland16. See Władysław Łuszczkiewicz, “Architektura najdawniejszych kościołów franciszkańskich w Polsce”,  Sprawozdania Komisyi do Badania Historii Sztuki w Polsce, iv (1891), p. 175; Stefan Świszczowski, “Materiały do dziejów kościoła klasztornego S.S. Klarysek w Starym Sączu”,  Rocznik Sądecki, xvii (1982), pp. 291–296; Zbigniew Beiersdorf, Bogusław Krasnowoski, Stary Sącz. Zarys historii rozwoju przestrzennego, Cracow 1985, pp. 27–31; Paweł Pencakowski, “Gotyckie kościoły zakonu św. Franciszka w Starym i Nowym Sączu”,  Kwartalnik Architektury i Urbanistyki, xxxvi/2 (1991), pp. 83–102; idem, “Mediaeval Minorite Architecture in Lesser Poland – Selected Problems”,  in Nidzica Seminars, vol. vii: Gothic Architectures in Poland, Bohemia, Slovakia, and Hungary, Lech Kalinowski et al. eds, Cracow 1992, p. 40; Paweł Pencakowski, Andrzej Włodarek, “Stary Sącz. Diec. krakowska, ob. tarnowska; woj. nowosądeckie. Kościół p.w. św. Klary, klarysek”,  in Architektura gotycka w Polsce, Teresa Mroczko, Marian Arszyński eds, vol. 2: Katalog zabytków, Andrzej Włodarek ed., Warsaw 1995, pp. 214–215; Olga Miriam Przybyłowicz, “The Architecture of the Church and Cloister of Nuns of the Order of St. Clare in Stary Sącz in the Light of Written Sources and Literature of the Subject”,  Architectus. Pismo Wydziału Architektury Politechniki Wrocławskiej, xxiv/2 (2008), pp. 19 –37. 2 See Piotr Pajor, “Several Remarks on the Circumstances of the Construction and Architectural Form of the Order of St. Clare Church in Stary Sącz”,  Modus. Prace z Historii Sztuki. Art History Journal, xviii (2018), pp. 21–33; Jakub Adamski, “Über den Anteil Schlesiens und Kleinpolens an der Entwicklung und Verbreitung der architektonischen ‘Moderne’ um 1300. Wege und Akteure des Kunsttransfers in der mitteleuropäischen Gotik”,  Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, lxxxiii/2 (2020), pp. 139 –172. 3 Paul Crossley, Gothic Architecture in the Reign of Kasimir the Great. Church Architecture in Lesser Poland 1320 –1380, Cracow 1985, p. 88. 4 The term “dynastic foundation” is understood here as a broad notion denoting religious monastic institutions found­ ed by members of ruling dynasties, supported and promoted by them. A special kind of such support was the financing of the construction of the church and other conventual buil-

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6

7 8 9 10 11 12

13 14 15 16

dings, often carried out by builders employed by the founder, as was most probably the case at Stary Sącz. On dynastic foundations of female mendicant orders, see especially Franz Machilek, “Die Přemysliden, Piasten und Arpaden und der Klarissenorder im 13. und im frühen 14. Jahrhundert”,  in Westmitteleuropa, Ostmitteleuropa. Vergleiche und Beziehungen. Festschrift für Ferdinand Seibt zum 65. Geburtstag, Winfried Eberhard et al. eds, Munich 1992, pp. 293–306; Monarchische und adlige Sakralstiftungen im mittelalterlichen Polen, Eduard Mühle ed., Berlin 2012; Bert Roest, Order and Disorder. The Poor Clares between Foundation and Reform, Leiden 2013; Princesses and Mendicants. Close Relations in a European Perspective, Nikolas Jasperts, Imke Just eds, Zürich 2019; Franciscan Women: Female Identities and Religious Culture, Medieval and Beyond, Lezlie Knox, David B. Courtier eds, Saint Bonaventure, ny 2020. See Werner Gross, Die abendländische Architektur um 1300, Stuttgart 1948; Peter Kurmann, “Spätgotische Tendenzen in der europäischen Architektur um 1300”,  in Europäische Kunst um 1300. Akten des xxv. Internationalen Kongresses für Kunstgeschichte, Wien, 4.–10. September 1983, vol.  vi, Hermann Fillitz, Martina Pippal eds, Vienna/Cologne/Graz 1986, pp. 11–18; Dobroslav Líbal, “Die schöpferischen Initiativen der mitteleuropäischen gotischen Architektur um 1300”,  in ibidem, pp. 19 –24; The Year 1300 and the Creation of a New European Architecture, Alexandra Gajewski, Zoë Opačić eds, Turnhout 2007; Marc C. Schurr, “Die Zisterzienserbauten im mittleren Europa und ihr Beitrag zur Ausprägung des spätgotischen Maßwerkrepertoires”,  in Regnum Bohemiae et Sacrum Romanum Imperium. Sborník k poctě Jiřího Kuthana, Jan Royt, Michaela Ottová, Aleš Mudra eds, Prague 2005, pp. 233–246; idem, “Die Klosterkirche von Sedletz und die ‘Avantgarde’ der Architektur um 1300”,  in Sedlec. Historie, architektura a umělecká tvorba sedleckého kláštera ve středoevropském kontextu kolem roku 1300 a 1700. Sedletz. Geschichte, Architektur und Kunstschaffen im Sedletzter Kloster im mitteleuropäischen Kontext um die Jahre 1300 und 1700, Radka Lomičková ed., Prague 2009, pp. 297–313; Christoph Brachmann, Um 1300. Vorparlerische Architektur im Elsaß, in Lothringen und Südwestdeutschland, Korb 2008. Kodeks dyplomatyczny Małopolski, vol. ii: 1153–1333, Franciszek Piekosiński ed., Cracow 1886, document no. 452, pp. 106 –108. See also Dariusz Karczewski, Franciszkanie w monarchii Piastów i Jagiellonów w średniowieczu. Powstanie – rozwój – organizacja wewnętrzna, Cracow 2012, p. 138. Żywot świętej Kingi księżnej krakowskiej. Vita sanctae Kyngae ducissae cracoviensis, Bolesław Przybyszewski transl. and ed., Tarnów 1997, p. 58. Kodeks dyplomatyczny (n. 6), document 487, pp. 145–147. See Anna Rutkowska-Płachcińska, Sądeczyzna w xiii i xiv wieku. Przemiany gospodarcze i społeczne, Wrocław/Warsaw/ Cracow1961. Kodeks dyplomatyczny (n. 6), document 502, p. 163. Ibidem, document 606, p. 279. See Świszczowski, “Materiały” (n. 1), pp. 291–296; Beiersdorf/ Krasnowolski, Stary Sącz (n. 1), pp. 28 –31; Pencakowski/ Włodarek, Stary Sącz (n. 1), pp. 214–215; Bogusław Krasnowolski, “Kraków, Zawichost, Nowe Miasto Korczyn, Skała, Sącz: plany urbanistyczne jako źródło do badań nad epoką Bolesława Wstydliwego, błog. Salomei i św. Kingi”,  Nasza Przeszłość: studia z dziejów Kościoła i kultury katolickiej w Polsce, ci (2004), pp. 185–186; Przybyłowicz, “The architecture” (n. 1), pp. 22–23. Świszczowski, “Materiały” (n. 1), pp. 296. Łuszczkiewicz, “Architektura” (n. 1), pp. 174–175. Crossley, Gothic Architecture (n. 3), p. 88. Cf. Łuszczkiewicz, “Architektura” (n. 1); Crossley, Gothic Architecture (n. 3), p. 86; Pencakowski, “Mediaeval Minorite Architecture” (n. 1).

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The composition of the shrine’s ground plan, most common for the architecture of female mendicant orders17, recalls the design of two nunneries in Lower Austria: the Dominican nunnery in Imbach near Krems (after 1269) and the Poor Clares nunnery in Dürnstein on the Danube (after 1289)18. Equally similar is the spatial arrangement of the famous Clarissan Church of Santa Maria Donnaregina in Naples, founded by Queen Mary of Hungary and consecrated in 132019. All include short chancels (consisting of a rectangular bay and a polygonal apse) and elongated naves, as well as conventual choirs on galleries located in their western bays. The analysis of the internal organization of the building’s main body is more complicated. The Poor Clares Church in Stary Sącz shares a general spatial layout with the aforementioned buildings, but the internal divisions of its western half are far more complicated and specific spaces have different functions. The proper nave, originally unvaulted, is short and occupies the eastern part of the building. It is accessible from the north by a fine portal with continuous moldings along the jambs [Fig. 10], while two narrow windows, puncturing the north wall, light the interior. The nave’s quadripartite rib vaults were constructed at a later date in the early sixteenth century20; unfortunately, no medieval furnishings or decorations from the interior have survived. A lower, rib-vaulted chapel, equal in length to the nave, adjoins it from the south [Fig. 6]; this chapel will be discussed in the final section of this paper. The remaining part of the church’s main body, separated from the nave by a transversal wall,

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17 See especially Carola Jäggi, Frauenklöster im Spätmittelalter. Die Kirchen der Klarissen und Dominikanerinnen im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert, Petersberg 2006. 18 Beiersdorf/Krasnowoski, Stary Sącz (n.1), p.31–32; Pencakowski, “Gotyckie kościoły” (n. 1), p. 88; idem, “Mediaeval Minorite Architecture”(n. 1), p. 40. On the Lower Austrian churches in question, see Richard Kurt Donin, Die Bettelordenskirchen in Österreich. Zur Entwicklungsgeschichte der österreichischen Gotik, Baden bei Vienna 1935, pp. 155–185; Mario Schwarz, Die Baukunst des 13. Jahrhunderts in Österreich, Vienna/Cologne/ Weimar 2013, p. 380. 19 See Caroline A. Bruzelius, The Stones of Naples. Church building in Angevin Italy, 1266 –1343, New Haven / London 2004, pp. 99 –103; Jäggi, Frauenklöster (n. 17), pp. 154–157 [with further literature]. 20 Beiersdorf/Krasnowoski, Stary Sącz (n. 1), p. 31.

1 / Ground plan, drawing by Jakub Adamski, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz 2 a–b/ Longitudinal and transversal section according to Władysław Łuszczkiewicz, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz

3/ View from the north, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz

4/ Interior of the chancel, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz

5/ Vaulting bracket in the chancel, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz

6/ Interior of the nave with the entrance to St Kinga’s Chapel, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz

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is divided into two floors; the upper floor makes up two thirds of the building’s height. The easternmost section of the ground level forms a low, rib-vaulted bay; it features two wide, pointed arcades that connect it to the nave. Further to the west, a rectangular, vaulted interior marked by a central pier now serves as a chapel [Fig. 7]. Originally, a solid wall divided the space from the rest of the church, making it accessible only from the convent21. It is probable that the Poor Clares originally used this interior as their chapter house. Its architectural detailing is sober and restrained: the central pier, rising from a square base to an octagonal shaft via triangular slopes, is devoid of any kind of horizontal termination. The vault’s thick ribs, chamfered on their edges, spring directly from the plain sides of the pier and from the perimeter walls, with their lowest elements shaped like tiny polygonal corbels with concave sides. The upper floor of the western section of the church forms a unified space, serving from the outset as the nuns’ oratory, inaccessible from the nave and communicating with the convent’s first floor only [Fig. 8]. Originally, the interior had a flat ceiling; the present-day barrel vault dates to the seventeenth century22. Four openings pierce the oratory’s eastern wall, which allow the sisters to hear (rather than see) the holy mass celebrations in the chancel23. The three lower apertures are simple in shape and set in an iron grid, although the lateral windows, much smaller than the central one, may date to a post-medieval intervention. The upper opening consists of a large, pointed window with opulent four-light tracery, crowned by three oculi featuring polylobes and devoid of mullion capitals. On both sides, the window’s compositional structure includes three layers of masonry, forming a stratified sequence of rounded, concave, and chamfered bars of the tracery. In contrast, the external windows in the church’s perimeter walls are very narrow and filled with two-light traceries of various designs, mostly a combination of rounded and pointed trefoils and cinquefoils. The aforementioned functional design of the main body of the church finds no direct precedents in Western mendicant architecture. The almost total visual separation of the nuns’ choir from

the nave, by means of a solid wall punctuated by a few openings, clearly differentiates the church in Stary Sącz from the architectural solutions common in religious buildings for the female orders in Central Europe during the medieval period. These solutions placed the conventual oratory in an open gallery, usually inserted in the western part of the nave24. However, full separation of nuns’ oratories from the chancels, the former often located in separated annexes of the church, was quite common in Italian monasteries starting in the early thirteenth century. Such an arrangement was, among others, envisaged for the Clarissan convents of San Damiano at Assisi, San Sebastiano at Alatri, and San Pietro in Vineis in Anagni25. In Central Europe, solutions like this could be found only occasionally. In the Poor Clares Church at Zawichost near Sandomierz, the very first convent of this order in Poland (founded around 1245), the nuns’ oratory was probably housed in a room adjacent to the lateral wall of the choir, which opened towards the altar with a grilled window. A similarly located space, the Lady Chapel, existed also in the Clarissan convent in Prague, however, its exact function remains unclear26. On the other hand, in all the known churches with nuns’ choirs situated on the western tribunes, like Santa Maria Donnaregina, there are no solid walls separating them from the naves. Thus, despite obvious differences, the design chosen for the Lesser Polish Nunnery is perhaps most comparable to the contemporary church of Santa Chiara in Naples (1310–1340), which was founded by the Neapolitan Angevins, Sancia of Mallorca and Robert the Wise, to serve both Poor Clares and Franciscans27. In this church, the nuns’ spacious oratory is located directly behind the east wall of the friars’ choir and communicates with it only via three ironbarred openings (comunichini) in the lower register and a big window with opulent four-light tracery above [Fig. 9]. The similarity to the Stary Sącz design is therefore quite striking, even though the nuns’ oratory in the Polish church is located far above the nave’s pavement. Of course, any direct relationship of the two nunneries cannot be suggested, although they were both under construction during the first third of the fourteenth century. However, it is worth

noting that a dynastic link connects the two projects: the supposed founders of the church in Stary Sącz, King Władysław the Short and Queen Jadwiga, were parents-in-law of the Angevin King of Hungary Charles Robert, who was the nephew of Robert the Wise, the co-founder of Santa Chiara in Naples. Moreover, Kinga, Jadwiga, Robert the Wise, and Charles Robert were all descendants of the King of Hungary Bela iv – his daughter, granddaughter, great-grandson, and great-greatgrandson, respectively. However, despite these dynastic ties, what is more important from an art historical perspective is that the way the nuns are separated from the rest of the congregation in both churches proves how vivid, and to some extent unpredictable, the paths of architectural development were among female orders, especially if a convent received support from a royal benefactor. This is especially true for the first two centuries of the mendicant movement in Europe. We can  only conclude that the highly secluded conventual oratories in Stary Sącz and Santa Chiara represent the ultimate architectural fulfilment of the obligations imposed on the nuns by Pope Boniface viii in his famous 1298 decretal; known for its incipit as Periculoso, it demanded the full claustration of female religious communities28. Refined architecture is often featured in mendicant churches founded or financially supported by members of the ruling dynasties, a well-known assessment, but one nevertheless worth revisiting29. In the case of the Nunnery in Stary Sącz, the strict regularity of the ground plan, the precise execution of the walls made of rubble, and, above all, the advanced forms of the window and vault masonry evoke this refined style. As noted in the beginning of this paper, Crossley convincingly proposed that the church’s construction was executed by some of the same masons who worked on the new choir of the Cracow cathedral, begun in 1320, only a few months after Władysław the Short’s coronation in the Romanesque antecedent to the present-day church30. 21 Cf. Świszczowski, “Materiały” (n. 1), p. 294. 22 Beiersdorf/Krasnowoski, Stary Sącz (n. 1), p. 31. 23 On the problem of seeing and hearing mass celebrations in the chancel by nuns gathered in their choirs, see Caroline A. Bruzelius, “Hearing is Believing: Clarissan Architecture, ca. 1213–1340”,  Gesta, xxxi/2 (1992), pp. 83– 91.

24 Cf. Jäggi, Frauenklöster (n. 17). pp. 185–246. 25 See Caroline A. Bruzelius, Caroline J. Goodson, “The Buildings”,  in Walls and Memory. The Abbey of San Sebastiano at Alatri (Lazio) from Late Roman Monastery to Renaissance Villa and Beyond, Elizabeth Fentress et al. eds, Turnhout 2005, pp. 110 –111. 26 Piotr Pajor,“The Poverty and the Power. Duke Boleslaus the Chaste’s Patronage of the Franciscans in 13th-Century Lesser Poland”,  Umění/Art, lxv/2 (2017), pp. 106 –110. 27 See Jäggi, Frauenklöster (n. 17), pp. 154–160; Wolfgang Schenkluhn, Architektur der Bettelorden. Die Baukunst der Dominikaner und Franziskaner in Europa, Darmstadt 2000, pp. 100 –102; Bruzelius, The Stones (n. 19), pp. 133–153 [with further literature]; Cristina Andenna, “Women at the Angevin Court between Naples and the County of Provence. Sancia of Majorca, Delphine of Puimichel, and the ‘Struggle’ for a Female Franciscan Life”,  in Princesses and Mendicants (n. 4), pp. 29 –51. 28 See Bruzelius, “Hearing” (n. 23); Elisabeth M. Makowski, Canon Law and Cloistered Women: Periculoso and its Commentators, 1298 –1545, Washington d.c. 1997. 29 See Schenkluhn, Architektur der Bettelorden (n. 27), pp. 95–102. 30 For comprehensive literature on the gothic cathedral in Cracow up to the early 1990s, see Tomasz Węcławowicz, “Kraków. Kościół katedralny pw. śś. Wacława i Stanisława”,   in Architektura gotycka (n. 1), pp. 122–124. See also a recent collection of essays Klejnot w koronie. 650-lecie konsekracji katedry krakowskiej, Jacek Urban, Ewelina Zych eds, Cracow 2017.

7/ Interior of the former chapter house, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz 8 / Interior of the nuns’ oratory, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz

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According to the British scholar, “especially the pear-shaped profiles [of the ribs], the fine handling of stone, and the same vaulting shaft brackets decorated with small arches” in Cracow and Stary Sącz testify to a shared link between the buildings31. Even a brief comparison of the masonry of both buildings reveals a similar brittle, linear style. It must be emphasized that, in Lesser Poland in ca 1320–1330, no architectural undertakings compared to or matched the prestige of the Cracow and Stary Sącz projects. Crossley’s hypothesis may be corroborated by further observations. The north portal of the nave in Stary Sącz, whose rich and uninterrupted moldings stem directly from the sloping surfaces on the lowest section of the jambs [Fig. 10], finds  an exact, albeit smaller, counterpart in Cracow, on a doorway leading from the northern arm of the choir ambulatory to a stair turret at the corner of the northern transept. The sandstone traceries in both buildings have a striking similarity, notable for their sharp, concave, or chamfered mullions without capitals. In Cracow, only the decoration of the blind bipartite panels that frame the clerestory windows provide information about the original tracery designs of the cathedral, which unfortunately suffered a complete loss of its medieval window masonry in the seventeenth

and eighteenth centuries32. It is, however, telling that these panels appear almost as blind versions of the two-light traceries in Stary Sącz  Figs 11, 12]. The designer of the latter was particularly fond of the motif, which enjoyed considerable popularity in the leading architectural centers of the western parts of the Empire: Upper and Middle Rhineland, Alsatia, and Swabia33. One such pattern consists of a trefoil with sharpened petals often inscribed in a spherical triangle, a motif used in many windows in Stary Sącz: the ones in the chancel (2), nave (2), and the nuns’ oratory (2). In Cracow, the same motif was used on the eastern wall of the northern arm of the transept and on the two easternmost bays of the north wall of the choir. Furthermore, an oculus inscribed with horizontal quatrefoil, used in the two windows of the chancel and in the great four-light tracery of the nuns’ oratory as the crowning of the lancets at Stary Sącz, appears on the north wall of the cathedral’s choir, on both panels of the second bay, counting from the west. Bearing in mind the destruction of the Cracow cathedral’s window masonry, the aforementioned tracery of the conventual choir in Stary Sącz may be justifiably recognized as the most important surviving work of its kind from the first third of the fourteenth century in Lesser Poland  [Fig. 13].

The intricate design of its upper oculus, filled with triple interconnected spherical triangles featuring inscribed and interconnected trilobes, shows the hand of “a sophisticated geometrician”, as described by Crossley34. We do not know, if the lost window decorations of the Cracow cathedral displayed counterparts to this composition, but we can be certain that these kinds of hybrid35 intersecting forms of tracery are inventions perpetuated by the “avant-garde” or “proto-late-gothic” architecture of the Upper Rhineland at the turn of the fourteenth century. We find them on almost all of the most important and stylistically influential buildings of this artistic macro-region: on the west façade of the Strasbourg cathedral (after 1277), in the Dominican Nuns’ Church of Klingental in Basel (1278–1293), on the Cistercian churches in Salem on Lake Constance (begun ca 1280/1285, choir roof trusses cut down in 1301/1302) and Kappel am Albis near Zurich (ca 1285/1290–1305), on the Cistercian cloister in Hauterive near Fribourg (ca 1320–1328), on the church of Minorites and Poor Clares in Königsfelden (1310–1330), and on the east wing of the Constance cathedral’s cloister (ca  1300–1317; [Fig. 14])36. Scholars often regard the magnificent window traceries of Constance as an inexhaustible source of

inspiration for a host of Western and Central European architects in the fourteenth century37. In their designs, the tri- and quadripartite figures with inscribed, interconnected polylobes appear in such diverse and geometrically advanced 31 Crossley, Gothic Architecture (n. 3), p. 88. 32 The blind traceries on the eastern walls of the cathedral transept are original. Sławomir Odrzywolski reconstructed the decoration of the remaining panels in the choir clerestory around 1900 in frames of the great restoration of the Cracow cathedral, in most cases based on traces he found during his work; see Krzysztof J. Czyżewski, Marek Walczak, “Ślepe maswerki w katedrze krakowskiej”,  Studia Waweliana, iv (1995), pp. 13–36; iidem, “Raz jeszcze o ślepych maswerkach gotyckich w katedrze krakowskiej”,  Studia Waweliana, v (1996), pp. 195–197; Tomasz Węcławowicz, “Ostrołukowe płyciny maswerkowe przy oknach katedry wawelskiej”,  ibidem, pp. 193–195. 33 See Walter Gfeller, Geschichte des Masswerks am Oberrhein. Die Eingebung des entwerfenden Baumeisters und ihre geometrische Konstruktion, Petersberg 2016; Pajor, “Several Remarks” (n. 2), pp. 28 –29. 34 Crossley, Gothic Architecture (n. 3), p. 88. 35 Cf. Norbert Nußbaum, “Hybrid Design Strategies around 1300. Indications of a ‘Post-classical’ Gothic Architecture?”,  in The year 1300 (n. 5), pp. 143–150. 36 See Gfeller, Geschichte des Masswerks (n. 33), with further literature. 37 See Kurmann, “Spätgotische Tendenzen” (n. 5), pp. 12–14; Ulrich Knapp, “Die Bauten des Konstanzer Münsterbezirkes um 1300”,  in Glanz der Kathedrale. 900 Jahre Konstanzer Münster, exhibition catalogue (Constance, Rosengartenmuseum 1989), Björn R. Kommer ed., Constance 1989, pp. 75– 83; Schurr, “Die Zisterzienserbauten” (n. 5), pp. 239 –240; idem, Gotische Architektur im mittleren Europa 1220 –1340. Von Metz bis Wien, Munich/Berlin 2007, pp. 238 –239; Gfeller, Geschichte des Masswerks (n. 33), pp. 67– 76.

9 / Transversal section, Church of Santa Chiara (Corpus Christi), Naples 10 / North portal of the nave, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz 11 / Window traceries of the nave, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz 12/ East wall of the north transept with original blind traceries, Cathedral, Cracow

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combinations that the Constance traceries may be upheld as a kind of “manual” or “pattern book” for the most innovative window masonry of the period throughout the Empire. It seems likely that the master mason from Stary Sącz possessed firsthand knowledge of the Constance windows. The design of the former chapter house in the westernmost section of the building, astonishingly modern in its elegant but restrained style, seems to corroborate the possible Upper Rhenish origin of the builders employed in the Lesser Polish Nunnery. The stunning precision of the stonework treatment matches the abstract simplicity of the chapter house’s meticulously executed proto-late-Gothic forms, which depart from the compositional rules of the Rayonnant style in an unorthodox manner. Even if we use the traditional term of Reduktionsgotik to identify the style of this interior, the designer’s creativity and competence remain apparent. On the one hand, the aesthetic restraint and purity visible in the choice of simple profiles and massive forms, as well as in the total rejection of decorative elements, suited the design of a cloistered space in the convent. On the other hand, the master mason did not completely adopt the austerity common to the utilitarian, “style-less” architecture commonly associated with

the mendicant orders. Rather, the style of the chapter house in Stary Sącz is clearly Upper Rhenish, and thus testifies to its designer’s professional background. This interior finds exact stylistic counterparts in the works closely related to the workshop of the abbey church in Salem on Lake Constance: the choir crypt of the pilgrimage church of St Verena in Zurzach on the Rhine (1294 – before 1302 [Fig. 15]) and in the vestibule to St Conrad’s Chapel in the cathedral of Constance (ca 1290–1300)38. A singular combination of precision and refinement in style, discernible in the stereometric treatment of architectural elements, especially piers, socles, and the sharp springers of trapezoidal ribs, demonstrates the artistic kinship shared by these buildings. Even the smallest details of the Polish chapter house refer to the contemporary Upper Rhenish constructions of ca 1300. Tiny rib consoles in Stary Sącz resemble the bases of vaulting shafts in the choir ambulatory in Salem (1280s) and the aisles of the Constance cathedral (ca 1300), while the triangular slopes on the lower part of this pier, can similarly be found in the arcades and vault responds of the Cistercian church in Kappel am Albis (roof trusses of the nave cut down in 1303/1304), a building regarded as a sister work to the abbey church in Salem39.

Crucially for this analysis, an Upper Rhenish provenance may be attributed to the first workshop of the Cracow cathedral40. Begun in 1320 by Bishop Nanker and his chapter and completed a few years before the dedication of the main altar in 134641, the church’s new choir was by far the most prestigious architectural undertaking of the time in the Kingdom of Poland. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that the ecclesiastical investors, likely supported by the newly crowned Władysław the Short, aspired to hire a workshop that would guarantee the highest level of architectural craftsmanship, both in terms of formal sophistication and technological execution. Where could such a team of masons be found? Recent scholarship on southern Polish church architecture at the turn of the fourteenth century proves that the first direct architectural exchange with the Upper Rhenish milieu may be traced to Silesia as early as in ca 1280, in the new choirs of the Cistercian churches in Lubiąż (German Leubus; consecrated in 1298) and Kamieniec Ząbkowicki (German Kamenz; probably dedicated in 1305). Innovative church architecture in Alsatia and Swabia remained the principal source of inspiration for the workshops active in Silesia until at least the 1360s42. The same observation applies

to Lesser Poland, where the first known team of Upper Rhenish masons was hired around 1290 38 See Knapp, “Die Bauten” (n. 37), pp. 78 – 79; idem, Salem. Die Gebäude der ehemaligen Zisterzienserabtei und ihre Ausstattung, Stuttgart 2004, 235–241; idem, “Das Salemer Münster und die Architektur der Zisterzienser um 1300”,  in Das Zisterzienserkloster Salem im Mittelalter und seine Blüte unter Abt Ulrich ii. von Seelfingen (1282–1311), Werner Rösener, Peter Rückert eds, Ostfildern 2014, pp. 134–136. 39 Hans Rudolf Sennhauser, “Das Zisterzienserkloster Kappel im Mittelalter”,  in Zisterzienserbauten in der Schweiz, idem ed., vol. i, Zürich 1990, pp. 85–126; Peter Kurmann, Brigitte Kurmann-Schwarz, “Architektur und Glasmalerei um 1300. Die Wende zur Moderne im Langhaus der Zisterzienserkirche von Kappel bei Zürich”,  in “Luft unter die Flügel...”. Beiträge zur mittelalterlichen Kunst. Festschrift für Hiltrud Westermann-Angerhausen, Andrea von Hülsen-Esch, Dagmar Täube eds, Hildesheim / Zürich / New York 2010, pp. 136 –152; Gfeller, Geschichte des Masswerks (n. 33), pp. 45– 66. 40 Tomasz Węcławowicz, Gotyckie bazyliki Krakowa. „Czyli można konstrukcję kościołów krakowskich xiv wieku uważać za cechę specjalną ostrołuku w Polsce?”,  Kraków 1993; Szczęsny Skibiński, Polskie katedry gotyckie, Poznań 1996, pp. 53– 74; Jakub Adamski, “Biskupi Nanker i Jan Grot a architektoniczna awangarda około roku 1300. Uwagi o chronologii i stylu gotyckiego chóru katedry krakowskiej”,  in Działalność fundacyjna biskupów krakowskich, Marek Walczak ed., Kraków 2016, pp. 69 – 83. 41 See Jerzy Pietrusiński, “Katedra krakowska – biskupia czy królewska? Dzieje fundacji, in Sztuka i ideologia xiv wieku. Materiały Sympozjum Komitetu Nauk o Sztuce pan”,  Piotr Skubiszewski ed., Warszawa 1975, pp. 249 –273; Crossley, Gothic Architecture (n. 3), pp. 18 – 84. 42 See Jakub Adamski, Gotycka architektura sakralna na Śląsku w latach 1200 –1420. Główne kierunki rozwoju, Kraków 2017, pp. 237–486; idem, “Über den Anteil” (n. 2), pp. 139 –172.

13/ Tracery of the great window in the nuns’ oratory, Poor Clares Church, Stary Sącz 14 / East wing of the cloister, Cathedral, Constance 15/ Interior of the choir crypt, Church of St Verena, Zurzach

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16 / Cathedral, north wall of the choir, Cracow 17 / Poor Clares Church, Interior of St Kinga’s Chapel, Stary Sącz

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in Cracow to conduct works on the town’s main parish church of St Mary. It is telling that the pear-shaped vault responds in the tower chapels from this building phase display the same plain, funnel-shaped capitals with a protruding impost used in the Cistercian choir in Salem and the Salem-inspired church in Zurzach43. Taking into consideration the lasting exchange of architectural contacts between leading workshops in southern Poland and the Upper Rhineland, we may confidently infer that the construction of the new cathedral choir in Cracow was entrusted to a master mason from the southwest of the Empire. Suffice to say, the two-floor composition of the chancel’s internal elevations [Fig. 16] appears to combine designs used in the choir of Salem and in the nave of the collegiate church in Niederhaslach near Strasbourg (begun before 1316)44. In turn, the unique approach to framing the clerestory windows of the Cracow choir with shorter tracery panels may have been inspired by a similar arrangement of bipartite niches in the tower narthexes of the Strasbourg cathedral, executed under the master Erwin von Steinbach, according to a design today known as “D”(now in the Musée de l’Œuvre Notre-Dame), likely traced after the church fire of 129845. It now becomes apparent that the fourteenth-­ century architecture of the conventual church in Stary Sącz, while adhering to the mendicant rules of restraint, epitomizes the highest level of stylistic and technological advancement possible at that time in the Kingdom of Poland, which was enabled by enduring cultural interchange with the south regions of the Empire. Construction of both the cathedral choir and the new church of Poor Clares began around the same time, perhaps a few years after 1320, in case of the latter. Therefore, two separate, but closely related, workshops simultaneously executed the works in Cracow and Stary Sącz. Some of the highly specialized stonemasons employed at the construction site of the cathedral likely travelled to Stary Sącz, only some 90 kilometers southeast of Cracow, where the number of structural and decorative elements executed in sandstone ashlar had been relatively limited. For example, it is possible that the church in Stary Sącz was designed by one of the leading foremen

in the Cracow workshop, who came to the Polish capital from the Upper Rhineland specifically to conduct works on the cathedral but found additional employment at the convent’s construction site. However, we cannot confirm, whether the master mason overseeing the building of the Nunnery participated in or played a significant role in designing the cathedral choir46. The deployment of some of the stonemasons from the Cracow cathedral to Stary Sącz ad­vances the argument for the royal foundation of the present-day church of Poor Clares, as Crossley suggested. Without the patronage and intermediation of King Władysław and Queen Jadwiga, the nuns would have encountered difficulty in gaining access to the builders who had worked at the Wawel Hill in Cracow, where the cathedral and royal castle are located. It should be stressed that deep blood ties linked Władysław the Short and Jadwiga to the convent in Stary Sącz; Jadwiga, the daughter of the duke of Greater Poland Bolesław the Pious and Jolenta, was the niece of Kinga, the saintly founder of the convent. After the death of Władysław, the queen herself followed in the footsteps of the duchesses Kinga and Gryfina, the latter being the widow of Leszek the Black, duke of Cracow and Sandomierz, who succeeded Bolesław the Chaste, by settling as a widow in the Stary Sącz Nunnery, whose dynastic reputation had already been affirmed. Perhaps it was possible to consider this option before the king’s death, with respect to maintaining the traditional role of the castellany of Sącz as a dowry. What is more, Jadwiga held an active economic role in the monastery, including intensive colonization47, and she was buried in the conventual church after her death48. In addition to retaining their predecessors’ patrimony, Władysław the Short and Jadwiga’s patronage of the church for the Poor Clares could have been motivated by something else, as a conciliation to the convent for the conduct of Władysław’s half-brother, Leszek the Black. Ill-disposed towards the monastery founded out of his control by the dowager duchess Kinga, he tried by all means if not to liquidate, then at least to weaken, the monastic dominion49. It seems that the construction of the new church in Stary Sącz involved, alongside the intention to

formalize Kinga’s cult, which was almost certainly supported by Władysław the Short and Jadwiga50. Miracula of the saintly duchess were  possibly written down as early as 1307; if this was the case, a striking temporal coincidence emerges with respect to Władysław’s 1306 takeover of the duchy of Cracow and the complete change of the political climate after the death of Wenceslas ii, who was inimical to Kinga. The Vita sanctae Kyngae ducissae cracoviensis was most likely written in the 1320s, possibly in the Franciscan milieu and likely in Cracow, where a historiographical literary tradition flourished, cultivated to serve the needs of the court51. The royal couple was personally involved in formalizing Kinga’s cult; according to the oldest version of the Vita, Władysław and Jadwiga themselves testified that the virginity of the saintly duchess was preserved, a claim supported by the king’s memories from childhood52. Considering this context, it is significant that the south chapel of the church in Stary Sącz, now part of the cloistered area of the convent, forms an integral part of its architectural structure, 43 Adamski, “Über den Anteil” (n. 2), p. 158; Piotr Pajor, “Co wiemy o pierwszym gotyckim kościele Mariackim? Rekonstrukcja, styl, kontekst urbanistyczny”,  in “Jako serce pośrodku ciała…”. Dzieje artystyczne kościoła Mariackiego w Krakowie, Marek Walczak ed., Cracow 2021, pp. 115–125. 44 See Peter Kurmann, “Niederhaslach, la nef de l’église Saint-Florent, ‘nec plus ultra’ du modernisme autour de 1300”,  Congrès Archéologique de France, clxii (2006), pp. 79 – 89; Schurr, Gotische Architektur (n. 37), pp. 233–235, 346 –347. 45 See Jean-Sébastien Sauvé, Notre-Dame de Strasbourg. Les façades gothiques, Korb 2012, pp. 146 –147, 156 –158, 162; Johann Josef Böker, Anne Christine Brehm, Julian Hanschke, Jean-Sebastien Sauvé, Architektur der Gotik. Rheinlande. Ein Bestandkatalog der mittelalterlichen Architekturzeichnungen mit einem Beitrag von Peter Völkle über die Zeichentechnik der Gotik, Salzburg/Vienna 2013, pp. 178 –180. 46 Cf. Crossley, Gothic Architecture (n. 3), p. 88. 47 Andrzej Marzec, “Domina terrae sandecensis. Rola polityczna królowej Jadwigi Łokietkowej w kontekście jej związków z dostojnikami małopolskimi”,  Kwartalnik Historyczny, cvii (2000), pp. 9 –13. 48 Kazimierz Jasiński, “Franciszkańskie pochówki Piastów”,  in Franciszkanie w Polsce średniowiecznej, vol. ii/iii, Urszula Borkowska et al. eds, Cracow 1989, p. 187. 49 See Paweł Żmudzki, Studium podzielonego królestwa. Książę Leszek Czarny, Warsaw 2000, pp. 310 –331. 50 On Saint Kinga and other dynastic female saints in Central Europe, see Gabor Klaniczay, Holy Rulers and Blessed Princesses. Dynastic Cults in Medieval Central Europe, Cambridge 2002, pp. 195–294; Hanna Krzyżostaniak, Trzynastowieczne święte kobiety kręgu franciszkańskiego Polski i Czech, Poznań 2014. 51 Ibidem, pp. 138 –139. See also Żywot świętej Kingi (n. 7). 52 Krzyżostaniak, Trzynastowieczne (n. 50), pp. 100 –101.

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as evidenced by the pear-shaped profiles of the ribs and polygonal vaulting brackets decorated with cusped arches, identical to those in the chancel  [Fig. 17]. According to conventual tradition, this oratory, formerly dedicated to the Virgin Mary and later to St Kinga, served as the original burial place of the saintly duchess-nun. Although the present architectural structure dates back to the 1320s, it seems probable that it was installed over Kinga’s original grave, perhaps in place of an earlier thirteenth-century mausoleum53. The chapel’s placement to the side of the nave supports the conjecture that it was erected with the cult of the venerable foundress in mind, further ensuring communication with the nave so that its interior remained accessible to both nuns and lay people. The issue of Kinga’s cult becomes more important when considering another small room adjoining the chapel from the west, the so-called “Confessional”, which, according to the convent’s tradition, was erected in the former location of Kinga’s cell. This chamber enabled the nuns to adore the tomb of the saintly foundress in the neighboring oratory, probably accessible to pilgrims on special occasions. Some scholars have suggested that double convent Na Františku in Prague establishes a precedent for the distribution of interconnected spaces devoted to a dynastic cult of a holy foundress, where St Mary’s chapel of Poor Clares, adjacent to the choir of the church of St Francis, connects to the private oratory of Agnes of Bohemia, the monastery’s foundress54. This correspondence, however, is not completely accurate, as the aforementioned spaces in the Prague complex were constructed during the life of the saintly duchess and actively used by her; additionally, they were fully cloistered, and thus inaccessible to the laity55. Rather, it should be noted, on a more general level, that the female mendicant convents fortunate enough to house a royal foundress’ grave within their walls (who had often died in odore sanctitatis) used

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the architecture to consciously “stage” the cult they wished to formalize and promote, often by establishing spatial boundaries for the veneration of a dynastic fundatrix in the form of separate chapels adjacent to the nave of the church; a research question that is beyond the scope of this paper but which merits further investigation. This analysis of the church of Poor Clares in Stary Sącz has demonstrated that its artistic significance had been drastically underrated. Although it is a relatively inconspicuous structure, not equivalent to the Cracow cathedral in scale, elaboration, or ecclesiastical importance, the noticeable high quality of its architecture, apparent above all in the sandstone detailing of its vaults and window masonry, firmly manifested the prominent Upper Rhenish style in Lesser Polish architecture in the first half of the fourteenth century. Historical records indicate that the present-day church in Stary Sącz, consecrated in 1332, was erected with the crucial support of King Władysław the Short and Queen Jadwiga. The church presents a representative example of a dynastic foundation for mendicant nuns. If this conclusion is correct, then it sheds new light on the patronage activities of this ruler, whom scholars have recognized for his meritorious contribution in uniting the kingdom in 1320, despite not being an active founder56. 53 Cf. Krasnowolski/Beiersdorf, Stary Sącz (n. 1), p. 32–35; Szymon Swoboda, “Średniowieczne relikty kultu św. Kingi. Historia i aranżacja kaplicy św. Kingi przy kościele klasztornym sióstr klarysek w Starym Sączu”,  in Varia medievalia. Studia nad średniowieczem w 1050. rocznicę Chrztu Polski, Kirył Marinow, Kamil Szadkowski, Katarzyna Węgrzyńska eds, Łódź 2016, pp. 197–198. 54 Cf. Krasnowolski/Beiersdorf, Stary Sącz (n. 1), p. 32–34; Przybyłowicz, “The architecture” (n. 1), p. 23; Swoboda, “Średniowieczne relikty” (n. 53), p. 198. 55 See Helena Soukupová, “Program Anežčina kláštera a jeho místo v evropské architektuře 13. a 14. století”,  in eadem, Anežský klášter v Praze, Praha 2011, pp. 103–105. 56 Cf. Leszek Kajzer, [review of:] “Piotr Lasek, Turris fortissimo nomen Domini. Murowane wieże mieszkalne w Królestwie Polskim od 1300 r. do połowy xvi w., Warszawa 2014”,  Kwartalnik Historii Kultury Materialnej, lxiii/3 (2015), pp. 544–545; idem, “Wstęp”,  in Zamki Lubelszczyzny w źródłach archeologicznych, Ewa Banasiewicz-Szykuła ed., Lublin 2015, pp. 9 –10.

summary Architektura kláštera klarisek v obci Stary Sącz Umělecké vztahy mezi Malopolskem a Horním Porýním na počátku čtrnáctého století

Klášter klarisek v obci Stary Sącz, která se nachází v nejjižnější části významného malopolského regionu, byl za časů středověkého Polského království jednou z nejvýznamnějších církevních institucí svého druhu. Nový ženský klášter založila v roce 1280 svatá Kinga Polská, původem uherská kněžna, poté krakovská a sandoměřská vévodkyně, která jej bohatě sponzorovala a – jak bylo v této době typické – sama vstoupila do kláštera hned po smrti svého manžela, vévody Boleslava Čistého z rodu Piastovců. Tento příspěvek se však nezaměřuje na nejranější období dějin kláštera, ale na první třetinu čtrnáctého století, kdy došlo k výstavbě dnešního kostela vysvěceného v roce 1332. Architektuře svatyně, ačkoli je ze středoevropského hlediska nejzajímavější, se kromě Polska v uměleckohistorickém bádání nedostalo téměř žádné pozornosti. O vybudování této památky se pravděpodobně zasloužili polský král Vladislav Krátký a jeho manželka

královna  Jadwiga, která rovněž ve svém vdovském věku vstoupila do kláštera. Tato domněnka je historicky opodstatněná z řady důvodů. Architektonické detaily nového kostela, zejména okenní kružby a klenební konzoly, vykazují jednoznačnou návaznost na dílnu nové katedrály v Krakově, jejíž stavba byla zahájena v roce 1320, tedy právě v roce Vladislavovy korunovace. Snad nejzajímavější je skutečnost, že vedoucí mistr, který působil v obou kostelích současně, přišel do Malopolska nepochybně z Horního Porýní, Alsaska a/nebo Švábska. Příspěvek obsahuje detailní architektonickou analýzu kláštera s ohledem na hustou síť uměleckých vztahů mezi jihovýchodními oblastmi říše a střední Evropou. Autoři článku dokládají, že zkoumaný kostel je nejen exemplárním případem dynastického zřízení ženského řádu, ale představuje také jeden z klíčových příkladů uměleckého fenoménu, který moderní historiografie označuje jako „architektonickou avantgardu kolem roku 1300“.

Abstract – Networking for Eternal Salvation? Agnes of Habsburg, Queen of Hungary and Co-Founder of Königsfelden – The artistic decoration of the Franciscan double monastery of Königsfelden reflects the efforts and aims of Agnes of Habsburg, daughter and ninth child of King Albrecht i (assassinated 1309). Before her father’s death, Agnes had been married (1296–1301) to the Árpád King Andrew iii of Hungary, but she remained childless. As a widow, she referred to herself as “Agnes, former Queen of Hungary”. The Königsfelden treasure inventory, which Agnes drew up 1357, provides a starting point for examining how Agnes used her wealth to assert her royal identity and reinforce dynastic claims – especially those of the Hungarian Árpád dynasty – by commissioning donations with Árpád family symbols. This article reconstructs the visual interplay between Königsfelden’s mobile liturgical furnishings in the monastery church’s larger architectural space and its stained-glass pictorial program. Agnes’ donations to Königsfelden outlived the monastery church’s liturgical rituals and can be interpreted as her extremely longlived offspring – her productive (if not reproductive) contribution to the maintenance and glory of both the Habsburg and Hungarian dynasties. Keywords – church treasure, female patronage, genealogy, memoria/memory, mobile liturgical elements, monastery, queen, representation, visual culture Susan Marti Bernisches Historisches Museum [email protected]

Networking for Eternal Salvation? Agnes of Habsburg, Queen of Hungary and Co-Founder of Königsfelden Susan Marti

Agnes of Habsburg was the daughter of the murdered German King Albrecht i, who was killed in 1308 in Windisch, in present-day Switzerland. On 28 July 1357, she had an inventory drawn up at the monastery of Königsfelden, which was founded at the location of her father’s death. The inventory includes liturgical vestments and church utensils, as well as some originally profane objects [Fig. 1]1. At the time of the inventory, Agnes was 76 years old and clearly sensed that her life would soon end; the inventory thus served to take stock of the objects that she and her family had given to the monastery, as well as to ensure that these gifts would be used in the manner in which they were intended in the future, after Agnes’ death. This paper examines the inventory to investigate how these objects spun a conceptual web across various media to

produce a visual (and material) system involving Agnes and her family. These objects were housed in the church that served the Franciscan double monastery in Königsfelden, where their uses oscillated between the self-representation  *

I thank Beate Fricke (Bern), Tobias Hodel (Bern) and Sasha Rossman (Berlin), for helpful suggestions and inspiring discussions. 1 All documents from Königsfelden are cited according to Digitale Edition Königsfelden. Kloster und Hofmeisterei Königsfelden: Urkunden und Akten, 1300 –1570, bearbeitet von L. Barwitzki, S. Egloff, C. Halter-Pernet, F. Henggeler, T. Hodel, M. Nadig, A. Steinmann and S. Stettler, Colette Halter-Pernet, Tobias Hodel, Simon Teuscher eds, 2017–2020: https://www.­koenigsfelden. uzh.ch/link-­zum-spezifischen-dokument [last accessed on May 13, 2021]. The inventory is held in the Staatsarchiv Aarau under call number Staag u.17/0276a: https://www.koenigsfelden.­ uzh.ch/exist/apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0276a.xml?odd=ssrq-­norm. odd [last accessed on June 18, 2021]. On the documents, see also Tobias Hodel, Schriftordnungen im Wandel: Produktions-, Gebrauchs- und Aufbewahrungspraktiken von klösterlichem Schriftgut in Königsfelden (1300 –1600), Konstanz 2020.

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of the Habsburgs and spiritual care for the soul. The role of the monastery at Königsfelden as a memorial to King Albrecht – murdered at the height of his power in 1308 – has been interpreted in different ways by historians2. What has remained unexplored, however, is how mobile objects, such as liturgical cloths, vestments, and sacred vessels placed in the sacred space of the church, conferred that space’s (visual) meaning, inflecting it with different significance depending on the ritual and liturgical context. Agnes, who had been actively engaged in running the monastery for over fifty years, thought in terms of networks and symbolic relational systems, as we will see. She acted on numerous levels simultaneously: politically, she tried to maintain Habsburg control of outlying regions3. She also served as an expert advisor to her Habsburg relatives when it came to fertility questions, a vital aspect of furthering the dynasty4. And in her seals and charters, she consistently portrayed herself as a Hungarian queen, although she was only briefly married to the last king of the Árpád dynasty. Agnes constructed visual networks at Königsfelden, as this paper will demonstrate, that revealed themselves especially during masses and anniversary festivities, at which times heraldic imagery and dynastic claims merged with religious ambitions. Queens were key agents in the cultural network of noble alliances in Europe. They left their families of origin to join other courts, where they had to incorporate themselves into a new cultural context. Agnes was no exception, although she returned to her family after her brief marriage, at which point she began to combine her married identity as Queen of Hungary with established modes of Habsburg memorialization and representation at Königsfelden [Fig. 2]. The “Hungarian” elements in the iconographic program and mobile church furnishings at Königsfelden will be explored below.

of the Árpád dynasty6. This marriage alliance meant that her father no longer needed to worry about the Árpáds attacking the Austrian dutchy, which enabled Albrecht to concentrate on his struggles with Adolf of Nassau7. The marriage was meant to have produced a Hungarian heir, but that did not happen, even though the couple was married for five years. Andrew died unexpectedly on 14 January, 1301, which resulted in a new struggle for the Hungarian crown. Since Andrew had a daughter from his first marriage, the royal couple’s barrenness was seen as a “flaw” in Agnes8. This probably explains why she did not remarry after her return to Vienna, although her 2

3

4

5 6

Agnes – weilant Königin ze Ungarn5 (former Queen of Hungary)

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Agnes was the second daughter of Albrecht von Habsburg and Elisabeth von Görz-Tirol (1262 – 28. 10. 1313). In 1296, she was married to the Hun­garian King Andrew iii (1265–1301),

7

8

On Königsfelden, see Claudia Moddelmog, Königliche Stiftungen des Mittelalters im historischen Wandel: Quedlinburg und Speyer, Königsfelden, Wiener Neustadt und Andernach (Stiftungsgeschichten 8), Berlin 2012, pp. 111–203; Martina Wehrli-Johns, “Von der Stiftung zum Alltag. Klösterliches Leben bis zur Reformation”,  in Königsfelden: Königsmord, Kloster, Klinik, Simon Teuscher, Claudia Moddelmog eds, Baden 2012, pp. 48 – 89 as well as Brigitte Kurmann-Schwarz, Die mittelalterlichen Glasmalereien der ehemaligen Klosterkirche Königsfelden (Corpus vitrearum medii aevi Schweiz), Bern 2008, pp. 27– 72. Martina Stercken, “’Saeldenriche frowen und gschwind listig wib” – Weibliche Präsenz Habsburgs im Südwesten des Reiches”,  in Mächtige Frauen? Königinnen und Fürstinnen im europäischen Mittelalter (11.–14. Jahrhundert), Claudia Zey et al. eds, Ostfildern 2015, pp. 337–364, sp. p. 346. Ellen Widder, “Überlegungen zur Wirksamkeit von Frauen im 14. Jahrhundert. Margarete Maultasch und Agnes von Ungarn als Erbtöchter, Ehefrauen und Witwen”,  in 1363–2013. 650 Jahre Tirol mit Österreich, Christoph Haidacher, Mark Mersiowsky eds, Innsbruck 2015, pp. 91–134, sp. pp. 107, 121. Like other widows of kings, Agnes continued to use her royal title throughout her life, for example in her charters. On Agnes’ biography, see most recently Stercken, “Saeldenriche frouwe” (n. 3), which contains an extensive bibliography, sp. p. 340, n. 7. See also Widder, “Überlegungen” (n. 4) and Angelica Hilsebein, “Das Kloster als Residenz: Leben und Wirken der Königin Agnes von Ungarn in Königsfelden”,  Wissenschaft und Weisheit, lxxii (2009), pp. 179 –250 and Angelica Hilsebein, “Prag - Longchamp - Königsfelden: Das Kloster als Residenz dynastischer Frauen im späten Mittelalter”,  in Pfalz - Kloster - Klosterpfalz. St. Johann in Müstair. Historische und archäologische Fragen, Hans-Rudolf Sennhauser ed., Zurich 2011, pp. 253–266. According to Boner, marriage negotiations were already taking place at the beginning of 1296, although we do not know the date of the wedding itself. The wedding festivities took place in Vienna in 1298, after which Agnes was anointed and crowned Queen of Hungary in the cathedral in Veszprém. See Georg Boner, “Königin Agnes von Ungarn. Gest. 11 Juni 1364”,  Brugger Neujahrsblätter, lxxiv (1964), pp. 3–30, sp. p. 10. Boner, “Königin Agnes” (n. 6), p. 10 and Stercken, „Saeldenriche frouwe” (n. 3), p. 341. On Habsburg marriage policy, see also Cyrille Debris, “Tu, felix Austria, nube”. La dynastie des Habsbourg et sa politique matrimoniale à la fin du Moyen Âge, Turnhout 2005, pp. 138 –142. Widder, “Überlegungen” (n. 4), p. 107.

1 / Inventory of the church treasure, Königsfelden, parchment, 1357, July 28, Staatsarchiv, Aarau, Staag u.17/0276a 2 / Agnes of Habsburg, Queen of Hungary, in Jakob Fugger, Ehrenspiegel des Hauses Österreich, Augsburg 1555, paper, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich, Cgm 895, fol. 206r

3 / Albrecht Kauw, View of Königsfelden, Bern 1669, gouache on paper, Bernisches Historisches Museum, Bern, inv. h/26104 4 / The coat of arms of Hungary, stained glass, nave, Königsfelden, ca 1314

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rank and status as a former queen would have been reasons for her Habsburg relatives to try to wed her into a powerful family again9. Agnes is not named in Königsfelden’s 1311 founding charter. However, upon the death of her mother Elisabeth in 1313, at the latest, Agnes began to care for and manage the monastery, cultivating commemoration of the murdered king and the connection with her Habsburg lineage10. After Elisabeth’s body was buried in the nave of the monastery church in 1316, Agnes moved permanently from Vienna to Königsfelden, taking over the management of the Franciscan monastic community. She never formally entered the convent herself, but rather lived in a small house south of the church choir [Fig. 3]. Not much is known about Agnes’ activities in Vienna after her return from Hungary. Her mother Elisabeth provided her with a role model of a politically engaged queen, as well as a patron of religious institutions. Examining the marriage history of Agnes’ siblings, we can see how her family used strategic marriages to weave itself into important positions across Europe11. In terms of religion, Agnes began to cultivate a relationship with the Franciscans early on. She had a Franciscan confessor in Hungary, and supported their monastery in Vienna as well. She also acted cunningly in Königsfelden by shoring up the foundation of a Franciscan double monastery, combining that order’s wish to uphold a strict vow of poverty with the goals of the Habsburgs as donors12. Ensuring ample memorial services for her dead husband was clearly a key factor in Agnes’ activities at Königsfelden13. Dated 16 October 1317, we have the first charter with guidelines on how the land rents and revenues from the monastic tenants ought to be used for annual celebrations of Andrew14. On 11 November, two years later, another similar arrangement is recorded15, and finally, an order from 2 February 1330 delineates how money, food, and wax should be distributed at the annual celebrations for the deceased king16. This document also states that exactly the same conditions should be met for Agnes’ own (future) memorial services, drawing a parallel between her and her deceased husband17.

Numerous regulations and orders at the monastery are filled with directions for these annual memorial celebrations, as well as for a rotating program of prayers for the Divine Office of the friars and the sisters18. It seems to have been important for Agnes to include both communities on an equal level, although with different practices for the commemoration of the dead. Whether this decision was guided by practical concerns, like avoiding overburdening the friars’ and sisters’ labor and spiritual capacity or spiritual reasoning, can only be speculated on19. The oldest pictorial sources featuring references to Hungary in the decoration of the church date to ca 1314, the year after Agnes’ mother’s death. A pair of stained glass windows outfitted with the Habsburg arms and the Hungarian double cross are among the first ornamental glazings in the nave, dating to 1314–1316 [Fig. 4]. This is clearly the first evidence of Agnes’ personal engagement with the pictorial program of the recently founded cloister, as Brigitte Kurmann-Schwarz has shown20. 9

Boner, “Königin Agnes” (n. 6), p. 10 and Stercken, „Saeldenriche frouwe” (n. 3), p. 341. e  u 10 “daz wir einwillechlich und einmuttechleich got und unser vrowen, o  u seiner lieben mu ter, ze lob und ze eren, allen heylegen ze drost, e unseres lieben herren und wirtes, chu nk Albrehtes, und aller u unser vorderen selen ze hilfe und ze troste einb vrowen chloso ter Sande Chlaren orden und ein chloster der Minneren Bruder e   orden in unserem lande ze Swaben in Argow in dem chilchspel e ze Windisch in Chostenizer pi stume gestiftet haben”. [That we, unanimously and with the unified will of God and God’s mother, Our Dear Lady, in praise of and in honor of all saints in solace for our dear master and husband, King Albrecht, and for the souls of all of our ancestors for help and in consolation, have founded a convent for the order of the Holy Clares and a monastary for the lesser brothers in our Swabian land in Aargau, in the parish of Windisch, and in the bishopric of Konstanz]. Urkunde im Staatsarchiv Aarau, Staag u.17/0020a, see Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1) [https://www.koenigsfelden.uzh.ch/exist/apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0020a.xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. 11 Cf. Widder, “Überlegungen” (n. 4), p. 130. 12 On this, see Wehrli-Johns, “Von der Stiftung” (n. 2), sp. p. 56. 13 Andrew iii was buried in the Franciscan church in Buda; see Tanja Michalsky, Memoria und Repräsentation. Die Grabmäler des Königshauses Anjou in Italien (Veröffentlichungen des Max-Planck-Instituts für Geschichte, 157), Göttingen 2000, p. 364. Agnes had already secured the commemoration for Andrew in 1307 through gifts to the double cloister in Engelberg; Susan Marti, Malen, schreiben und beten. Die spätmittelalterliche Handschriftenproduktion im Doppelkloster Engelberg (Zürcher Schriften zur Kunst-, Architektur- und Kulturgeschichte, 3), Zürich 2002, p. 69. She had apparently planned to establish a convent in her Habsburg homelands already prior to the founding of Königsfelden; see Wehrli-­ Johns, “Von der Stiftung” (n. 2), p. 52.

14 Staatsarchiv Aarau, Staag u.17/0059, Urkundentext s. Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1): [https://www.koenigsfelden.uzh.ch/ exist/apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0059.xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. 15 Staatsarchiv Aarau, Staag u.17/0065, Urkundentext s. Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1): [https://www.koenigsfelden.uzh.ch/ exist/apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0065.xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. 16 Staatsarchiv Aarau, Staag u.17/0103, Urkundentext s. Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1): [https://www.koenigsfelden.uzh.ch/ exist/apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0103.xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. 17 On the anniversaries, see Wehrli-Johns, “Von der Stiftung” (n. 2), p. 66. 18 For more on these stipulations, see Wehrli-Johns, “Von der Stiftung” (n. 2), pp. 64– 68. Scholars are not in agreement about the reasons why the friars and the sisters had to split the daily hours. Compare Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), pp. 68 – 69 with Carola Jäggi who assumes that the friars and the sisters thus must have shared the choir. See Carola Jäggi, “Eastern Choir or Western Gallery? The Problem of the Place of the Nuns’ Choir in Königsfelden and Other Early Mendicant Nunneries”,  Gesta, xl/1 (2001), pp. 79 – 93. 19 The question of whether practical or conceptual reasons were determinate in constructing a symmetrical groundplan for the male and female cloisters in Königsfelden remains to be determined, particularly when viewed in comparison with other central European Franciscan double cloisters from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. 20 Langhausfenster Nord xi, 1a and 1b, see Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), pp. 32, 185–186, 381–382. We can no longer determine where these pieces were originally arranged in the nave, just as we can no longer know whether further pieces with coats of arms were lost.

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Both coats of arms have a double function: they refer simul­ta­neously to the dead kings – Albrecht i and Andrew iii – as well as to their widows: Elisabeth and Agnes, who founded Königsfelden. The second coat of arms, featuring the Hungarian cross and now located in the nave, is presumably slightly older; it was fashioned as a part of the decoration of the cloister or the chapter house in the convent21. The two panels featuring the Hungarian coat of arms reveal that Agnes had already anchored her Hungarian identity in the convent prior to her move to Königsfelden. The assumption that the double cross had already, by the fourteenth century, become the insignia of the monastery itself, however, cannot be proven22. Instead, the heraldry featuring the double cross in the space of the church as well as on mobile objects is a manifestation of the ruler’s symbols, particularly when considered in tandem with the imperial coat of arms and that of the Austrian dutchy. The monastery’s seals from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries highlight this: beginning in 1318, Agnes consistently used the Hungarian double-cross on her charters [Fig. 5]23. The abbesses of the monastery used seals featuring St Francis, who welcomed St Clare into the order, while the Clarissan convent used the Adoration of the Three Kings before the Virgin with Child24. Ornaments for mass: displaying rulers’ coats of arms

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The 1357 treasury inventory lists around 220 more or less specifically described textiles and sacred vessels used in the liturgy at the monastery25. I will now concentrate on the inventory objects that feature coats of arms and reconstruct the ways in which they were linked to the immobile decorations adorning the church, and their role in liturgical ceremonies. Predictably, given that praying for the murdered king was the explicit reason behind the founding of Königsfelden, the objects described in greatest detail in the inventory are those connected to King Albrecht. Gifts from Elisabeth, his widow, include a silver apple, which was to be placed on Albrecht’s grave marker each year on the anniversary of his death26. As a German king,

Albrecht was buried in Speyer, not in the monastery founded to commemorate him27. There was therefore no royal tomb at the Königsfelden cloister. Instead, a tumba – an empty grave marker – was placed over the crypt as a burial place for him and other members of the Habsburg family on the middle axis of the nave [Fig. 6]. This tumba was endowed with royal status: Albrecht’s scepter, which was part of the treasury, was placed on the symbolic gravestone during memorial services for the king, as the inventory makes clear. Moreover, Elisabeth donated numerous items of clothing to Königsfelden, including “einen gêlwen gerùhten semit mitt swarzen adelaren, drù stukk, wz unsers herren und vatters, chûnig Albrehts, waffenkleit” [a yellow, rough cloth with black eagles, three of them, which was our Master and Father King Albrecht’s suit of armor]. Along with this vestment for Mass, she also donated a cloth for the altar that was embellished with imperial eagles28. This meant that the family’s coat of arms was integrated into the church on special occasions through objects that moved around the space. It was not only built into immobile parts of the architecture, such as glazing and ceiling decoration, but moved on the bodies of the priests wearing them around the church, thus recalling the bodies of the persons they were intended to commemorate29. Many important secular and clerical guests attended major memorial services at Königsfelden30. It was, therefore, important to set up the grave – which lacked a figurative program – in an effective manner. The vestments for Mass, i.e. a chasuble and two dalmatics31, fashioned from the cloth tunic that King Albrecht wore over his  21 Langhausfenster Nord x, 1a, Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), pp. 185–186, 380 –381. 22 Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), pp. 32, 378, and Wehrli-­ Johns, “Von der Stiftung” (n. 2), p. 60. 23 An image of the Hungarian king Bela iv’s seal is included in Attila Zsoldos, Gábor Thoroczkay, Gergely Kiss, Székesfehérvár története az Árpád-korban, Székesfehérvár 2016, p. 159; an image of Agnes’ seal while she was queen is included in Boner, “Königin Agnes” (n. 6), p. 17. 24 All of these seals are in the collection of the Staatsarchiv Aarau, Staag u.17/0061/01, see Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1): [https://www.koenigsfelden.uzh.ch/exist/apps/ ssrq/docs/U-17_0061_01.xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. 25 Jakob Stammler has done an initial analysis of these records, see Jakob Stammler, “Der sog. Feldaltar des Herzogs Karl des Kühnen von Burgund im histor. Museum zu Bern“, in Berner Taschenbuch auf das Jahr 1888, Bern 1888, pp. 1–233,

sp. pp. 69 – 75. First edited by Emil Maurer, Das Kloster Königsfelden (Die Kunstdenkmäler des Kantons Aargau), vol.  iii, Basel 1954, p. 251. For a new edition, see Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1) [https://www.koenigsfelden. uzh.ch/exist/apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0276a.xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. The inventory has barely been analyzed by scholars; the present author is planning a more extensive study of these records. In the meanwhile, see Susan Marti, “Königin Agnes und ihre Geschenke – Zeugnisse, Zuschreibungen und Legenden”,  Kunst+Architektur in der Schweiz, xlvii (1996), pp. 169 –180; eadem, “Der textile Schatz des Klosters Königsfelden gemäss der Schenkungsurkunde der Königin Agnes von Ungarn von 1357”,  in Seide im früh- und hochmittelalterlichen Frauenstift: Besitz – Bedeutung – Umnutzung, Thomas Schilp, Annemarie Stauffer eds, Essen 2013, pp. 269 –288 and Wehrli-Johns, “Von der Stiftung” (n. 2), pp. 72– 73. The inventory is not ordered primarily according to rational criteria in terms of object types, but according to who gifted them, so that Queen Elisabeth’s gifts are listed first, then those of Agnes and her siblings, as well as their spouses and, finally, Agnes‘ nephew Rudolf iv. e e 26 “Einen silbrin o phel, horet ze den jargeziten uffen daz grab”. [A silver apple belongs on the tomb during the anniversary festivities]; Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1) [https://www. koenigsfelden.uzh.ch/exist/apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0276a.xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. 27 Albrecht was buried in Speyer, since he was a German king – not in Königsfelden. For more on this, see Manuel Kamenzin, Die Tode der römisch-deutschen Könige und Kaiser (1150 –1349), Ostfildern 2021, pp. 432, 453–459. The tumba over the small,crypt-like space for the tombs with the remains of Elisabeth and other family members was staged during anniversary ceremonies as King Albrecht’s grave. On memorials to Albrecht, see Jana M. Schütte, “Königsmord und Memoria. Liturgisches und historiographisches Erinnern an Albrecht von Habsburg”, 

Concilium medii aevi, xv (2012), pp. 77–115, on Königsfelden specifically, see sp. pp. 95–109. 28 “Ein sidin alter twêhellen mitt einer bêrlohrter listen und an den orten dez riches schilt” [An altar cloth made of silk with a border enriched with pearls and an imperial shield on each corner]; Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1) [https://www. koenigsfelden.uzh.ch/exist/apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0276a.xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. 29 We can also place the eight surviving memorial banners from Königsfelden, now in Bern’s historical museum, in this context (Bern, Bernisches Histoirsches Museum, Inv. h/121, h/124, h/125, h/126, h/127, h/128, h/129 and h/130). The dating and exact original use of these objects is unclear and cannot be addressed here. On the banners, see Maurer, Das Kloster Königsfelden (n. 25), p. 304, and Germann Georg, Ungarisches im Bernischen Historischen Museum = a Berni Történelmi Múzeum magyar emlékei, Bern/Budapest 1996, pp. 11–12. Neither is there space here to address the dynastic cycles in the later stained glass of the nave in Königsfelden from ca 1360, which was another project of Agnes; on this topic, see Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), pp. 172–177. 30 We can conclude this on the basis of a mention about serving guests from an order of 15 August 1335: “und sol dù eptissin e  denne des selben tages rihten die gast usswendig, si sin geistlich oder weltlich, nach eren” [and so shall the abbess richly serve the distinguished guests, whether they are religious or profane], Staatsarchiv Aarau, Staag u.17/0152, Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1) [https://www.koenigsfelden.uzh.ch/exist/ apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0152.xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. 31 The mention “dru stukk” [three pieces] in the inventory that repeatedly occurs alongside the garments for mass points to the chasuble and the two dalmatics that belonged together; this is indicated by the descriptions of the objects following in the inventory; see Marti, “Der textile Schatz” (n. 25), p. 279 and Stammler, “Der sog. Feldaltar” (n. 25), p. 71.

5 / Seal of Agnes of Habsburg, 1357, detail of fig. 1 6 / Tumba in the nave of the church, marble, Königsfelden, ca 1320

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suit of armor, was an effective agent for doing so, vestments for mass, featuring a cross with pearls again revivifying the body of the assassinated and at the center above the arms and helmet of king in a symbolic fashion32. Once the church choir Austria]36. This golden chasuble was decorated was completed and consecrated in September 1330, with a chasuble cross and featured the Habsburg memorial masses for King Albrecht were held at arms and helmet. These liturgical textiles were the main altar of the church, which was erected certainly used in masses for Leopold, as well at the place of his death, as the Chronicles tell as other Habsburg family members. Like Duke us [Fig. 7]33. The altar table itself was then covered Leopold, and like her widowed mother, Agnes by the above-­mentioned cloth featuring the coat also gave textiles emblazoned with the coat of of arms with an eagle. We can no longer recon- arms of her deceased husband to the monastery37. struct how the tumba in the nave, illuminated by One is described in the inventory as follows: “Ein oil lamps and decorated with the apple and the guldin mêssgewant, dar uff ein crùtz mitt grossen bêro king’s scepter for memorial services, was integrat- len und mitt buchstaben, und an mitten an dem crùtz ed with liturgical performances into the ritual, der schilt von Ungern, drù stukk” [A golden cloth since no libri ordinarii from Königsfelden remain, for mass, featuring a cross with large pearls and and the charters for memorial donations do not letters, and in the center of the cross, the arms address this34. However, it was the heraldic ele- of Hungary, a three-part set]. This description ments of the textiles that allowed the otherwise shows that this chasuble was similar to the one unornamented grave to be included, visually and donated by Duke Leopold. Which of these obconceptually, in the various memorial celebrations, jects served as a model for the other – and what matching it with symbols used throughout the their chronological relationship was – remains space and thereby imbuing it with meaning. The unclear: the date of Agnes’ gift was not recordobject and fabrics not only linked the blank tumba ed. And neither of the textiles survives, as is the with architectural ornaments, but also recalled the case for most objects in the treasury. Both must dead king in an embodied form within the lived have been made of lavish, expensive cloth, since rituals unfolding in the space, thanks to the gifts they were most likely woven with threads of gold, of Elisabeth and their mise-en-scène by Agnes. and not simply embroidered with golden ornaThe years from ca 1320 to 1330 were, for Agnes, ments. The chasuble was probably decorated on characterized by the dramatic shrinking of her both the front and back with an appliqué cross, Habsburg family and, therefore, increasing con- including large pearls and the aforementioned cern for the future health of the dynasty. This “letters”38. The Hungarian arms were mounted concern perhaps goes a long way in explaining at the seam of the cross’ arms, or perhaps in the the importance of the ways mobile objects were middle of the cross trunk. It remains to be shown used to connect the past and the present in the how Agnes deployed the Hungarian double-cross manner described above, which enlivened a dy- as a reference to the Árpád dynasty, and to her nastic history and connected the lived present to role as a member of that dynasty. future salvation. Six of Agnes’ then nine living siblings died at this time; Leopold I, Henrich, and 32 See also Marti, “Der textile Schatz” (n. 25), pp. 280–281. Guta were all buried in Königsfelden35. Leopold 33 Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), p. 59 and Schütte, “Königsmord” (n. 27), p. 103, including the sources drawn had not expected such an early death (4 August from chronicles. 34 It is not clear whether there was another altar near the tumba. 1290 – 28 February 1326) when he donated mass We know of a second consecrated altar (dedicated to St Michel), vestments decorated with the Habsburg coat of but we don’t know where it was located. It must have been a raised altar, either on the nun’s mezzanine or the jube; see arms to the family monastery: Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), p. 59. “Aber hant si von unserm lieben bruoder hertzog 35 Her younger sister Katharina died in 1323 in Naples as the wife Lùpolt: ein guldin mèssgewant, drù stukk, mitt einem of Duke Carl of Calabria. In 1326, her older brother Leopold passed away, followed by her older sister Anna and youncrùtz von bêrlen und an mitten dar uff der schilt und der ger brother Heinrich in 1327, her sister Guta in 1329, and her helm von Oesterrich” [They got from our cherished brother Friedrich the Beautiful in 1330. Widder, “Überlegungen” (n. 4), p. 108. brother Duke Leopold a three-part set of golden

7 / The choir of the church, Königsfelden, consecrated in autumn 1330

36 These also include: “Dri alben. Dri umbler. Dri hantvann. Zwo e stolen, die sint viervarwig gewùrket. Und ein chorkappen mitt einer e kugel mit gold und mitt bêrlen und mitt gestein, horet ze dem selben mêssgewant”. [Three tunics, three humerals, three maniples, two stoles that are died four colors. And one pluvial with a golden sphere, with pearls and gemstones, all of which belong

to this garment]. Digitale Edition Königsfelden (n. 1) [https:// www.koenigsfelden.uzh.ch/exist/apps/ssrq/docs/U-17_0276a. xml?odd=ssrq-norm.odd]. 37 This list of gifts from Agnes is considerably longer than her mother’s, which is not surprising since Agnes lived longer. 38 It is not clear how this inscription would have looked.

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Titular saints at special places

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Of the very few textiles surviving today that are listed in the inventory, there are two antependia of nearly identical size; one is ornamented with seven scenes from the Passion and the Glorification of Christ and was, according to the treasury record, used on the high altar39. The other cannot be identified with certainty in the inventory, as the descriptions are too provisional. Its pictorial program shows, as Emil Maurer explained in 1954, an unconventional version of a traditional representation, modified to highlight saints that were especially important to the patroness Agnes [Fig. 8]. This unusual hanging presents two groups of figures that are similar in scale, but very different in terms of style and artistic quality. The group at the cross, featuring Maria as Mater Dolorosa, John the Evangelist, St Catherine, and John the Baptist, are stylistically unified, whereas the apostles Peter and Paul, St Andrew, and St Agnes appear to have been made by another workshop in a different stylistic register: they are rendered in different colors and with a different embroidery

technique [Figs 9a–b]40. The montage of these saints made by different artists on a fabric backing occurred after 1334; we know this because, under John the Baptist’s head, there is a layer of filling that includes a letter of credence signed by Emperor Ludwig of Bavaria to Agnes at that time  [Fig. 10]. We will not discuss here how the letter and other parchment fragments used as fillings became superfluous enough to be used as scraps41. Suffice to say that they all occur starting from the first half of the fourteenth century, so we can date the pastiche of holy figures in their current order under the unified pointed-arch arcade to the middle of that century. Agnes clearly wanted her own namesake and patron to be placed in the most dignified position in the image, alongside the namesake of her deceased husband. According to conventional iconographic tradition, one would usually have found Peter and Paul immediately adjacent to the group under the cross. The Apostles are, thus, shoved outwards to the right and left margins, to make room for the saintly representations of Agnes and her deceased husband. There is no written source confirming, whether this antependium

8 / Altar frontal with the crucifixion and six saints, embroidery with silk and metal threads, Königsfelden, before 1357, Bernisches Historisches Museum, Bern, inv. h/19/1 9a–b / Head of St Catherine and of St Agnes, details of fig. 8

was made for the memorial masses for Andrew and Agnes, yet it seems highly likely, given what was described above. Visual networks in space The anniversary celebrations and memorial masses for the souls of King Albrecht and Andrew, as well as for the Habsburgs buried in the crypt, could have been celebrated at the high altar after the choir was finished and consecrated in September 1330. The connection between the High Altar and the site where Albrecht was murdered is literally inscribed into the church dome, where the keystone of the polygonal choir is marked by a bust of Christ Pantocrator – holding his right hand aloft in benediction and carrying a globe in his left hand42. A sculpted shield with the imperial eagle flanks the keystone. Along the vault’s ribs, facing the church, one can read the words rex albertus [Fig. 11]. The three other keystones are decorated with oak leaves and acanthus. On the long axis, vertical coats of arms are attached to the keystones of the vaults: they show

– besides the imperial eagle – the Habsburg lion, the Austrian flag, and the Hungarian cross43. This corresponds to the three liturgical objects with heraldic arms listed in the treasure inventory. 39 On the antependium with the scenes of the Passion and Glorification of Christ (Bern, Bernisches Historisches Museum, Inv. h/27 mit Borte h/51), see Christiane Elster, “Sühne, Memoria und Verherrlichung des Hauses Habsburg. Das Antependium ‘mitt den siben ziten unsers herren‘ aus Kloster Königsfelden innerhalb der bildlichen Ausstattung des Königsfeldener Chores’”,  in Beziehungsreiche Gewebe. Textilien im Mittelalter, Kristin Böse, Silke Tammen eds, Frankfurt am Main 2012, pp. 203–227. It measures 88 × 327 cm. The antependium with the crucifixion and saints (Bern, Bernisches Historisches Museum, h/19) measures 89.5 × 318 cm. On the identity of the altars, see Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), p. 59. 40 Maurer, Das Kloster Königsfelden (n. 25), pp. 297–304. 41 The parchment pieces were removed when the object was restored in 1889. For over one hundred years, it was presumed that they were lost. See Jakob Stammler, “Königsfelder Kirchenparamente im Historischen Museum zu Bern”,  Berner Taschenbuch auf das Jahr 1891, xl (1891), pp. 26 –54, sp. pp. 32–33 and Maurer, Das Kloster Königsfelden (n. 25), p. 297. The fragments were recently discovered when the Bern Historical Museum inventoried its holdings. The present author is currently studying them. 42 The silver imperial apple listed in the inventory, which was placed on the grave during anniversary memorial celebrations is the earthly pendant to the globe held in heaven by Christ. See n. 26. 43 Maurer, Das Kloster Königsfelden (n. 25), p. 55.

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10 / Fragment of a letter of credence signed by Emperor Ludwig of Bavaria to Agnes and used as filling behind the embroidered applications, parchment, before 1334, Bernisches Historisches Museum, Bern, inv. h/19/3 11/ Vault rib with the inscription rex albertus, choir of Königsfelden, before 1330

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The visual relationships between objects featuring the Hungarian coat of arms, as well as the ones with the Habsburg coat of arms – both spanning various media – seem to have been planned and “orchestrated” by Agnes, at the very latest when the planning of the choir and its glazing were underway. As Kurmann-Schwarz has emphasized, the decorative program was not conceived all at once, but instead developed over time to promote a consciously varied set of visual messages that Agnes conceived with her religious advisors. They took into account the fact that different groups of people were present in the church at different times, for different liturgical and paraliturgical actions. These included the nuns, the friars, members of the Habsburg family, lay people from nearby, and guests from far away. The pictorial program in the church is thus interspersed with a variety of allusions and cross-references, providing the different groups of viewers with flexible interpretive possibilities44. As made clear by the description of the Hungarian coat of arms on the chasuble in the inventory, the double cross was a symbol of the unbreakable connection between spiritual aspirations and monarchic representation. The high altar in the choir of Königsfelden is dedicated to the flesh

and blood of Christ, as well as to the Holy Cross45: the profane monarchic heraldry also refers to the Holy Cross, and is a sign of the Árpád dynasty as beata stirps, i.e. a dynasty whose lineage extends back to saintly ancestors and is, therefore, sacred itself46. This idea was reiterated visually in the representation of St Elisabeth von Thüringen (1205–1235) on the glass window on the north side of the High Altar. Here, Elisabeth does not appear as a saintly servant of the poor and sick, but as the daughter of a king, in a brown-violet robe47, crowned and carrying the double cross instead of a basket or a jug in her hands [Fig. 12]48. She was also depicted with the double cross in a diptych from Venice (made around 1270 or 1290) for Andrew of Hungary, in a holy line of saints with the Hungarian kings Ladislaus, Stephan, and Emmerich, who the Árpád dynasty claimed as their forefathers [Fig. 13]. Agnes, of course, would have been very familiar with this type of icono­ graphy after her coronation and anointment as Queen of Hungary in Veszprémin in 1298. She may well have even taken part, alongside King Andrew, in the state assemblies of September 1299 and June 1300, which were held in Stuhlweissenburg and celebrated with processions and masses dedicated to St Stephen, the Hungarian king49.

Martina Stercken observed that the mediation of rulership in Königsfelden cannot simply be subsumed under the concept of representing sovereignty and monarchic power, but that it instead had to do with a “a mise-en-scène of memory elaborated in artistic media”50. My analysis of mobile objects in the architectural church space and their connections to the program of the stained-glass windows corroborates this suggestion. As the foundational charter of the monastery claimed – something that has been repeatedly stated in research on Königsfelden – the monastery was focused primarily on memorializing the murdered king, but it also included all members of the Habsburg 44 See also Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), pp. 215–216. 45 Ibidem, p. 59. 46 On the concept of beata stirps, see the short definition provided in Michalsky, Memoria und Repräsentation (n. 13), pp. 41–42; on the Angevine-Árpád beata stirps, pp. 64– 67. On the Hungarian beata stirps, see Gábor Klaniczay, Holy Rulers and Blessed Princesses. Dynastic Cults in Medieval Central Europe, Cambridge 2002, pp. 226 –233, 298 –299, 323. 47 According to the notes in the treasure inventory, Agnes had also given the monastery her own costly robe, which was this color. 48 Elisabeth von Thüringen was the daughter of the Hungarian King Andrew ii, and thus the aunt of Andrew iii. On this iconography, see Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), p. 283. 49 Zsoldos/Thoroczkay/Kiss, Székesfehérvár (n. 23), p. 256. 50 Stercken, “Saeldenriche frouwe” (n. 3), p. 347.

12 / St Elisabeth of Hungary, stained glass, choir of Königsfelden, after 1335 13 / St Elisabeth and St Ladislaus, detail of the diptych of king Andrew, miniature on parchment under rock crystal, ca 1265–1270 or ca 1290, Bernisches Historisches Museum, Bern, inv. h/301 51

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family by extension51. It was, in fact, dedicated to memorializing the entire Habsburg dynasty and marking the family’s domination over their traditional territory, namely the areas west of the Arlberg. This was crucial at a time when the center of Habsburg power was shifting eastward52. An integral part of Habsburg Memoria, however, was a Hungarian component – and this was indeed visually more strongly present at Königsfelden than has been previously acknowledged, as the use of mobile furnishings in the monastery indicates. Agnes, the widow queen, carried the torch of this memory forward, although she did not do so biologically. For her, the religious function of securing the soul of King Andrew appears to have gone hand in hand with her desire to establish her own political position as a member of the holy Hungarian dynasty. Through her work at Königsfelden, she created a self-portrait, which took St Elisabeth as a predecessor and a model53. She did not, however, plan her own tomb, to represent her royal status. Instead, following the family tradition, she placed herself under a tumba with no figurative images, although in a House of God the Franciscan imagery of which she interwove with subtle references to royal representation and references to her dynastic lineage. For her sister, Catherine of Austria, things unfolded very differently: after her seven-year, and most likely childless, marriage with Duke Carl of Calabria, the heir to the throne of Sicily, Catherine died on 18 January 1328 at her husband’s court in Naples54. The latter commissioned a magnificent tomb for his wife, full of figurative carvings, in the church of S. Lorenzo Maggiore. This was the beginning of a “series of comparable monuments, designed to display the holiness of the royal blood, the family’s piety, and also stake a claim for their enduring hold on power”55. For widowed queens who did not stay in the kingdom into which they had married, however, it was obviously more difficult to continue to claim queenly status56. Whether the constant references to her former royal status were intended to raise Agnes’ status, and whether they were actually successful in her efforts to mitigate contemporary political strife, must be investigated elsewhere by examining chronical records. But since royal

actions and kingly magnificence were important means allowing widows to maintain their royal status57, it would appear plausible that the frequent recourse to Hungarian heraldry in various artistic media allowed Agnes to cement her claim to belonging to two dynasties, the Habsburgs and the Hungarian Árpáds. Perhaps she also hoped that the visual allusions to the Hungarian beata stirps would bolster the Habsburgs’ ambitions toward the German throne. It was only after her death, probably actually after the Reformation, that the Hungarian cross became a symbol of the Königsfelden monastery rather than a dynastic emblem58. Viewed in this way, with an eye to the longue durée, Agnes was indeed successful in establish­ing her royal status. And she was able to maintain these claims in an enduring fashion, more effectively, in fact, than the memorial rituals – intended to 51 Stercken, “Saeldenriche frouwe” (n. 3), p.351; Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2); Moddelmog, Königliche Stiftungen (n. 2) and others. 52 Stercken, “Saeldenriche frouwe” (n. 3), p. 351. 53 Compare with Kurmann-Schwarz, Glasmalereien (n. 2), p. 32. 54 Werner Maleczek, “Katharina von Österreich (1295–1323), Tochter König Albrechts i., Ehefrau Prinz Karls von Kalabrien”,  Quellen und Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven und Biblio­ theken, xcii (2012), pp. 33– 84. 55 Michalsky, Memoria und Repräsentation (n. 13), pp. 281–289, sp. p. 288. On the relationship of the Franciscan philosophy of poverty and their concept of governance, see Tanja Michalsky, “Sponsoren der Armut. Bildkonzepte franziskanisch orientierter Herrschaft”,  in Medien der Macht: Kunst zur Zeit der Anjous in Italien. Akten der internationalen Tagung im Liebieghaus-Museum Alter Plastik Frankfurt am Main, 21.– 23.11. 1997, eadem ed., Berlin 2001, pp. 121–148. Agnes had different ambitions in endowing and directing the convent in Königsfelden than Sancha of Majorca with her foundation of the Franciscan double monastery of Santa Chiara in Naples. This interesting contrasting juxtaposition cannot be further discussed here. About Santa Chiara, see also Caroline Astrid Bruzelius, The Stones of Naples: Church Building in Angevin Italy, 1266 –1343, New Haven 2004, pp. 134–150 and La chiesa e il convento di Santa Chiara. Committenza artistica, vita religiosa e progettualità politica nella Napoli di Roberto d’Angiò e Sancia di Maiorca, Francesco Aceto et al. eds, Battipaglia 2014. 56 Compare, for instance, Foerster’s examination of German and English widowed queens from 1000 to 1250: Anne Foerster, Die Witwe des Königs. Zu Vorstellung, Anspruch und Performanz im englischen und deutschen Hochmittelalter, Ostfildern 2018, pp. 266, 268. 57 Ibidem, pp. 214, 260, 277. 58 The best preserved proof of this is a watercolor by Abrecht Kauw showing the Königsfelden monastery from 1669, now in the Bernisches Historisches Museum, inv. h/26104 [Fig. 3]. On other sources from the end of the sixteenth century, see Jeannette Rauschert, “Landvogteisitz und Erinnerungsort. Königsfelden im 16. bis 18. Jahrhundert”,  in Königsfelden: Königsmord, Kloster, Klinik, Simon Teuscher, Claudia Moddelmog eds, Baden 2012, pp. 170 –215, sp. p. 191.

14/ Memorial banner with the coat of arms of Hungary, silk, Königsfelden, end of 14th or early 15th century, Bernisches Historisches Museum, Bern, inv. h/129

last for eternity – that she and her family insisted upon59. The mobile material objects that she commissioned and donated to Königsfelden, or that were made for her commemoration60, outlived these rituals, and can be understood in a certain fashion as Agnes’ extremely long-lived offspring: her productive – if not reproductive – contribution to the maintenance and glory of both the Habsburg and Hungarian dynasties. Today, no one prays for the salvation of the Hungarian kings in Königsfelden, but when the Hungarian president makes a state visit to Switzerland, he comes to the Historical Museum in Bern to see the memorial banners featuring the Hungarian cross from Königsfelden, now considered to be the oldest Hungarian banners anywhere [Fig. 14]61. 59 On the dissolution of the monastery’s treasure during the Reformation, see Rauscher, “Landvogteisitz” (n. 58), p. 174–175; on how Bern dealt with the valuable stained glass from the church, see ibidem, p. 188, and on the transfer of the remains of the Habsburgs buried in the monastery church to St Blasien, see ibidem, pp. 209 –214. 60 See n. 29 on the previously mentioned memorial banners. 61 Translation by Aleksandr Rossman.

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summary Vytváření kontaktů pro věčnou spásu? Anežka Habsburská, uherská královna a spoluzakladatelka kláštera Königsfelden

Klášter Königsfelden u Brugg ve Švýcarsku byl založen v roce 1309 jako sdružený klášter klarisek a minoritů na památku německého krále Albrechta i., zavražděného v roce 1308. Jeho dcera Anežka Habsburská, provdaná v letech 1296–1301 za uherského krále Arpáda iii., se připojila ke své matce jako patronka kláštera. Od roku 1317 až do své smrti v roce 1364 stála v jeho čele. Organizovala zde každodenní náboženský život mužské i ženské řeholní komunity a klášteru darovala asi dvě třetiny kostelního pokladu (několik dochovaných předmětů je dnes ozdobou středověké sbírky Historického muzea v Bernu). Hrála také hlavní roli při rozhodování o výzdobě königsfeldského kostela, včetně ikonografie jeho slavného cyklu vitráží. Článek se zabývá vizuálními vztahy mezi výzdobou kostela a přenosnými předměty darovanými Anežkou, které dosud nebyly předmětem komplexního vědeckého zkoumání. Vychází z inventáře pokladu z roku 1357, který Anežka sepsala krátce před svou smrtí, a klade si za cíl rekonstruovat vizuální souhru mobilního liturgického vybavení s architektonickým

prostorem a obrazovým programem vitráží. Podle zakládací listiny kláštera bylo hlavní povinností klášterní komunity uctění památky zavražděného krále Albrechta. Zdá se však, že Anežce stejně tak záleželo i na zachování památky jejího zesnulého manžela, posledního z uherské dynastie Arpádovců. To se projevilo například v přepracování antependia se světci a vysvětluje to, proč se v šestnáctém století začal používat uherský erb jako symbol samotného kláštera. Jak ukazuje tato studie, Anežka Habsburská, ovdovělá a bezdětná královna, se prezentovala jako „Anežka, bývalá uherská královna“. Poté, co se z Uher vrátila do své vlasti, využívala svého bohatství a rodinných kontaktů k udržení někdejšího královského postavení. Ačkoli neměla děti a její vlastní rodová linie nepokračovala, přenosné předměty, které objednala a darovala Königsfeldenu lze do jisté míry chápat jako Anežčiny mimořádně dlouhověké potomky. Přežily liturgické rituály v klášterním kostele a staly se Anežčiným cíleným a věčným příspěvkem k posílení slávy uhersko-arpádovské i habsburské dynastie.

Abstract – Beyond Naples. Fourteenth-Century Royal Widows and their Clarissan Foundations in a Trans-Regional Perspective Comparative study of fourteenth-century monastery churches in locales as far-flung as present-day Italy, Switzerland, Portugal, and Spain reveals widespread common patterns of female royal patronage. Tombs at Naples’s Santa Maria Donnaregina and Corpus Christi (Santa Chiara), the monastery churches of Königsfelden, Santa Clara-e-Isabel in Coimbra, and Santa Maria de Pedralbes in Barcelona all reflect the choices of royal widows who lived close to these churches and elected to be buried in them. By comparing the queens’ tombs and considering the spatial arrangements within the churches, this paper demonstrates that a comparative trans-regional approach not only reveals widely diffused patterns of female royal patronage for female Franciscans, but also, at the same time, sharpens the profile of each foundation. Keywords – Clarissan Order, Corpus Christi in Naples, Franciscan Order, Königsfelden, queenship, Santa Clara-e-Isabel in Coimbra, Santa Maria Donnaregina in Naples, Santa Maria de Pedralbes, widowhood Michaela Zöschg Victoria and Albert Museum in London [email protected]

Beyond Naples Fourteenth-Century Royal Widows and their Clarissan Foundations in a Trans-Regional Perspective Michaela Zöschg

From the thirteenth century onwards royal families all over Europe, many of them closely related to one another, founded Franciscan houses, and developed relationships with Franciscan advisors and confessors1. Royal women in particular became closely associated with this phenomenon, patronised Franciscan communities,  *

This paper draws on material and arguments presented in greater depth and detail in my doctoral thesis, Michaela Zöschg, In signum viduitatis et humilitatis: European Queens and the Spaces, Art and Inhabitants of their Clarissan Foundations, ca 1250 –1350, PhD thesis, (University of London, Courtauld Institute of Art, supervisor: Joanna Cannon), 2022. I thank the organisers and participants of the conference Royal Nunneries at the Center of Medieval Europe: Art, Architecture, and Aesthetics (11th–14th centuries) for their helpful comments; Joanna Cannon, Stefania Gerevini, Christian Nikolaus Opitz, Elisabetta Scirocco, and the two anonymous peer-reviewers for their useful comments on this text, and Cristina Andenna and Joana Ramôa Melo for generously helping with a bibliography and image permission request.

1

For the relationship between specific royal families and the Franciscans, see for the Crown of Aragon, Francesca Español Bertran,“La beata stirps en la Corona de Aragón: Santa Isabel de Hungría y San Luis de Tolosa, culto e iconografía”,  in Hagiografia peninsular en els segles medievals, eadem, Francesc Fité eds, Lleida 2008, pp. 135–168; Nikolas Jaspert, “El perfil trascendental de los reyes aragoneses, siglos xiii al xv: santitad, franciscanismo y profecías”,  in La Corona de Aragón en el centro de su historia, 1208 –1458, José Angel Sesma Muñoz ed., Huesca 2010, pp. 185–219; for the Capetians, Sean L. Field, “Franciscan Ideals and the Royal Family of France (1226 –1328)”,  in The Cambridge Companion to Francis of Assisi, Michael J. P. Robson ed., Cambridge 2012, pp. 208 –223; for the Anjou of Naples, Roberto Paciocco, “Angioini e Spirituali: i differenti piani cronologici e tematici di un problema”,  in L’État angevin: pouvoir, culture et société entre xiiie et xive siècle; actes du colloque international organise par l‘ American Academy in Rome (Rome – Naples, 7–11 novembre 1995), Rome 1998, pp. 253–287; Rosalba Di Meglio, Ordini mendicanti, monarchia e dinamiche politico-sociali nella Napoli dei secoli xiii–xv, Raleigh, nc 2013; for the Přemyslids and Piasts, see now Kirsty Day, “Constructing Dynastic Franciscan Identities in Bohemia and the Polish Duchies”,  PhD thesis, (University of Leeds, super­visors: Emilia Jamroziak, Melanie Brunner), 2015.

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entered the female Franciscan ordo sanctae Clarae, Within the framework of Italian art history, and actively shaped a new form of dynastic sanc- the churches of Santa Maria Donnaregina and tity infused with Franciscan ideals2. The Angevin Corpus Christi in Naples were long regarded queen consorts Mary of Hungary (*ca 1255/1257; 2 The fundamental study of the relationship between royal †1323) and Sancia of Majorca (*ca 1281; †1345) women and the Mendicants remains Gábor Klaniczay, Holy Rulers and Blessed Princesses: Dynastic Cults in Medieval Central and their Clarissan foundations Santa Maria Europe, Éva Álmai trans., Cambridge 2001; see now also Kirsty Donnaregina and Corpus Christi in Naples, the Day, “Royal Women, the Franciscan Order, and Ecclesiastical latter also known as Santa Chiara, are important Authority in Late Medieval Bohemia and the Polish Duchies”,  in Authority and Power in the Medieval Church, c. 1000 – c. 1500, and comparatively well-studied examples within Thomas W. Smith ed., Turnhout 2020, pp. 236 –249. Particthis narrative3. Both royal women played an active ularly important for the present context are the essays in Queens, Princesses and Mendicants: Close Relations in a European part in securing these monasteries’ economic and Perspective, Nikolas Jaspert, Imke Just eds, Zürich 2019. For institutional stability, endowed them with lands the multi-layered history of the female Franciscan movement, and other goods, and secured papal privileges for outside the scope of this paper, see Lezlie S. Knox, Creating Clare of Assisi: Female Franciscan Identities in Later Medieval them4. Most importantly for the context of this paItaly, Leiden 2008; Bert Roest, Order and Disorder: The Poor per, Mary of Hungary and Sancia of Majorca also Clares between Foundation and Reform, Leiden 2013; Catherine M. Mooney, Clare of Assisi and the Thirteenth-Century Church: used their financial wealth to support the buildReligious Women, Rules, and Resistance, Philadelphia, pa 2016. ing of new, large and richly decorated monastery 3 These are only two of many Mendicant foundations the two churches5. From their inception, not only were queens supported; for their patronage of other religious houses in Naples and elsewhere, see Paola Vitolo, “Imprese these spaces conceived as physical expressions artistiche e modelli di regalità al femminile nella Napoli della of the two royal widows’ duties as keepers of dyprima età angioina”,  in “Con animo virile”: Donne e potere nel Mezzogiorno medievale (secoli xi–xv), Patrizia Mainoni ed., nastic memoria – among other visual markers also Rome 2010, pp. 263–318; Cristina Andenna, “‘Francescanemanifested through the presence of their heraldry simo di corte’ e santità francescana a corte: l’esempio di in the church space6. They also took into account due regine angioine fra xiii e xiv secolo”,  in Monasticum regnum: religione e politica nelle pratiche di governo tra Medioevo the needs of the different communities worshiped Età Moderna, Giancarlo Andenna, Laura Gaffuri, Elisabetta ping within them – first and foremost the large Filippini eds, Berlin 2015, pp. 139 –180. communities of enclosed Clarissan sisters who 4 Due to the survey nature of this paper, its bibliographic apparatus has to be limited to essential literature (all with ample were visually shielded from other groups worshipfurther bibliography). For Mary of Hungary, see Matthew ping within and visiting the monastery churches7. J. Clear, “Maria of Hungary as Queen, Patron, and Exemplar”,  in The Church of Santa Maria Donna Regina: Art, Iconography and In Santa Maria Donnaregina, the nuns’ choir was Patronage in Fourteenth-Century Naples, Jane Elliott, Cordelia conceived as an elevated gallery in the western Warr eds, Aldershot 2004, pp. 45– 60; Vinni Lucherini, “Il ‘testamento‘ di Maria d‘Ungheria a Napoli: un esempio di part of the nave, while in Corpus Christi the sisacculturazione regale”,  in Images and Words in Exile: Avignon ters assembled in the liturgical East, in a retro-­ and Italy in the First Half of the 14th Century, Elisa Brilli, Laura choir beyond the presbytery area [Figs 1, 2]8. Fenelli, Gerhard Wolf eds, Florence 2015, pp. 433–452; for Sancia of Majorca, see Matthew J. Clear, “Piety and Patronage To varying degrees, both queens intensified in the Mediterranean: Sancia of Majorca (1286 –1345), Queen their relationships with their foundations afof Sicily, Provence and Jerusalem”,  PhD thesis, (University of Sussex, supervisor: Evelyn Welch), 2000; Mario Gaglione, ter their husbands’ death9. They wished to be “Sancia d’Aragona-­Majorca: da regina di Sicilia e Gerusalemme buried not alongside their spouses, but in their a monaca di Santa Croce”,  Archivio per la storia delle donClarissan monastery churches, thus shaping ne, i (2004), pp. 28 –54; Núria Jornet-Benito, “Sança de Mallorca, reina de Nàpols: la fundació monàstica en un projecte de contheir identities as royal widows within a distinctly sciència genealògica i espiritualitat franciscana”,  in Redes femeFranciscan context. Sancia of Majorca was not burninas de promoción espiritual en los reinos peninsulares (s. xiii–xvi), Blanca Garì ed., Barcelona 2013, pp. 131–146; Cristina Andenna, ied in Corpus Christi, the Clarissan church which “Sancia, Queen of Naples and Soror Clara: A Life Lived between her husband Robert of Anjou (†1343) had chosen Secular Responsibilities and Religious Desire”,  in Franciscan Women: Female Identities and Religious Culture, Medieval and as his final resting place10. Instead, she opted for Beyond, Lezlie Knox, David B. Couturier eds, St Bonaventure, burial in the nuns’ choir of Santa Croce di Palazzo, ny 2020, pp. 115–132. the Clarissan monastery she had entered as a pro- 5 For Santa Maria Donnaregina, see, alongside the seminal study Émile Bertaux, Santa Maria di Donna Regina e l‘ arte senese fessed sister in 1344, after Robert’s granddaughter a Napoli nel secolo xiv, Naples 1899, now The Church of Santa and heir to the throne Queen Joanna i of Anjou Maria Donna Regina (n. 4); Antonio Bertini, Cristiana Di Cerbo, Stefania Paone, “Filia sanctae Elisabectae: la committenza had reached majority11.

di Maria d’Ungheria nella chiesa clariana di Donnaregina a Napoli”,  in Clarisas y dominicas: modelos de implantación, filiación, promoción y devoción, Gemma T. Colesanti, Blanca Garí, Núria Jornet-Benito eds, Florence 2017, pp. 11– 69; Pierluigi L de Castris, Donnaregina Vecchia a Napoli: la chiesa della regina, Rome 2018. For Corpus Christi, see Mario Gaglione, “La basilica ed il monastero doppio di S. Chiara a Napoli in studi recenti”,  Archivio per la storia delle donne, iv (2007), pp. 127–209; La chiesa e il convento di Santa Chiara: committenza artistica, vita religiosa e progettualità politica nella Napoli di Roberto d’Angiò e Sancia di Maiorca, Francesco Aceto, Stefano D’Ovidio, Elisabetta Scirocco eds, Battipaglia 2014; Caroline Bruzelius, Andrea Giordano, Andrea Basso, Elisa Castagna, Lucas Giles, Leopoldo Repola, Emanuela De Feo, “L’eco delle pietre: History, Modeling, and gpr as Tools in Reconstructing the Choir Screen at Sta. Chiara in Naples”,  in Progetti digitali per la Storia dell’Arte medievale / Digital Projects in Medieval Art History, Paola Vitolo ed., Sesto Fiorentino 2018, pp. 81–103; Elisabetta Scirocco, “La chiesa napoletana del Corpo di Cristo: reliquie e processioni”,  in Reliquie in processione nell’Europa medievale, Vinni Lucherini ed., Rome 2018, pp. 131–158. 6 In Santa Maria Donnaregina, Mary of Hungary’s coat of arms for example covers not only the vaults in the choir, but also the area below the nuns’ choir, where the laity congregated [Fig. 2]; see also Leone de Castris, Donnaregina Vecchia (n. 5), pp. 70 –  71, figs 10, 11. In Corpus Christi, much of the original decoration has been lost, but Sancia of Majorca’s heraldic devices are still present in prominent areas such as the high altar and the portal; Elisabetta Scirocco, “L’altare maggiore angioino della basilica napoletana di S. Chiara”,  in La chiesa e il convento (n. 5), pp. 313–359; eadem, “La chiesa napoletana” (n. 5), pp. 144, 152, fig. 5d. 7 Fundamental for our understanding of female monastic art, architecture, and space is Monastic Architecture for Women, Caroline A. Bruzelius, Constance H. Berman eds, New York 1992, and especially for the relationship between enclosure and architecture, Caroline Bruzelius, “Hearing is Believing: Clarissan Architecture, ca. 1213–1340”,  pp. 83– 91. See also Carola Jäggi, Frauenklöster im Spätmittelalter: Die Kirchen der Klarissen und Dominikanerinnen im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert, Petersberg 2006; Emanuele Zappasodi, Sorores reclusae: spazi di clausura e immagini dipinte in Umbria fra xiii e xiv secolo, Florence 2018. 8 For a discussion of the two Neapolitan choir solutions within the wider context of female Mendicant architecture, see Jäggi, Frauenklöster (n. 7), pp. 185–221. 9 Pre-modern notions of widowhood and their links to chastity, loyalty, and grief are discussed in Bernhard Jussen, Der Name der Witwe: Erkundungen zur Semantik der mittelalterlichen Busskultur, Göttingen 2000; The Profession of Widowhood: Widows, Pastoral Care, and Medieval Models of Holiness, Katherine Clark Walter ed., Washington dc 2018. For royal widowhood specifically, albeit with a focus on earlier centuries, see Anne Foerster, Die Witwe des Königs: zu Vorstellung, Anspruch und Performanz im englischen und deutschen Hochmittelalter, Ostfildern 2018. 10 For Robert’s tomb, see Stefano D’Ovidio, “Osservazioni sulla struttura e l’iconografia della tomba di Re Roberto d’Angiò in Santa Chiara a Napoli”, Hortus Artium Medievalium, xxi (2015), pp. 92–112 (with comprehensive bibliography). 11 Sancia’s role as Joanna of Anjou’s educator is emphasised in Adrian S. Hoch,“Beyond Spiritual Maternity: An Addendum to the Iconography of Sancia of Majorca”,  in La chiesa e il convento (n. 5), pp. 165–194, sp. pp. 176 –179. For Santa Croce di Palazzo, destroyed by the mid-nineteenth century, see Mario Gaglione, “Qualche ipotesi e molti dubbi su due fondazioni Angioine a Napoli: S. Chiara e S. Croce di Palazzo”,  Campania Sacra, xxxiii (2002), pp. 61–108, sp. pp. 102–108.

1 / Corpus Christi (Santa Chiara), nuns’ choir, Naples 2 / Santa Maria Donnaregina, monastery church, view towards the western nuns’ gallery, Naples

Venerated as Saint or Blessed Royal Widow founded and/or buried at Clarissan monastery

(1)

Gertrude of Merania c.1185–1213

Founded/supported Clarissan monasteries

(2)

Yolanda of Courtenay

Married, with number in brackets indicating whether 2nd, 3rd ... marriage for husband

c.1200–1233

Date of canonisation

Louis VIII of France

Maria Laskarina

Blanche of Castile

c.1206–1270

1188–1252

1187–1226

Louis IX of France Isabelle of France Charles I of Anjou 1214–1270 *1297

1224–1270 *1696

Beatrice of Provance c.1229–1267

1226/7–1285

Charles II of Anjou Elisabeth of Anjou 1261–1303

1254–1309

1244–1290

Ladislaus IV of Hungary

Charles Martel of Anjou Louis of Toulouse Robert of Anjou

Clemence of Austria

1271–1295

1262–1293/5

Charles I of Hungary 1288–1342

1274–1297 *1317

1239–1272

1275/8–1343

1273–1319

James II of Aragon 1267–1327

1239–1285

Isabel of Aragon

c.1269/70–1336 * 1625

(2)

Blanca of Anjou 1280–1310

(3 or 4)

Elizabeth of Poland 1305–1380

1327–1345

60

1236–1301

1221–1284

Mary of Cyprus

c.1255/7–1323

c.1215–1251

Violante of Aragon Peter III of Aragon

Alfonso X of Castile

(2)

Mary of Hungary

Andrew, Duke of Calabria

3 / Family networks of the royal women discussed in this paper

1242–1270 * 1943

Yolanda of Hungary

1207–1231 * 1235

c.1206–1270

Stephen V of Hungary Margaret of Hungary

Elizabeth the Cuman

1262–1290

Belà IV of Hungary Elizabeth of Hungary

as exceptions to the rule, especially when compared with the fluid and transitory architectural solutions that dominated the female monastic landscape elsewhere on the Italian Peninsula12. Over the last two decades, however, these Neapolitan foundations have become better understood within trans-­ r egional research frameworks concerned not only with dynastic sanctity, but also with queenship and the female mendicant movement13. In the wake of geographical and methodological shifts within the discipline of art history, it is becoming increasingly evident that these two examples are part of a much wider trend of royal female patronage for the ordo sanctae Clarae, and that royal women in other parts of Europe pursued similar building projects at about the same time, and sometimes on an equally ambitious scale14. Many of the queens and princesses associated with these foundations form part of a network of family

(2)

Marie of Valois

Charles, Duke of Calabria

1309–1331

1298–1328

Joanna I of Anjou 1328–1382

and marriage relations that stretches not only across the Mediterranean and beyond the Alps, but also back in time, to previous generations of women with Franciscan affiliations, some of whom were venerated as blessed or saints [Fig. 3]15. The comparatively well preserved royal Clarissan churches of Königsfelden in Windisch, Santa Clara-e-Isabel in Coimbra, and Santa Maria de Pedralbes in Barcelona offer particularly promising parallels for comparison with the Angevin foundations in Naples16. Their foundress queens 12 For an important re-assessment of the latter both in terms of architecture and artistic decoration, see recently Zappasodi, Sorores reclusae (n. 7). 13 Among the wealth of literature on these topics, see, in addition to notes 1 and 2, Amalie Fößel, Die Königin im mittelalterlichen Reich: Herrschaftsausübung, Herrschaftsrechte, Handlungsspielräume, Stuttgart 2000; Kathleen Nolan, Queens in Stone and Silver: The Creation of a Visual Imagery of Queenship in Capetian France, New York 2009; Theresa Earenfight, Queenship in Medieval Europe, New York 2013; Queenship in the Mediterranean: Negotiating the Role of the Queen in the Medieval and Early Modern

Belà III of Hungary

Agnes of Antioch 1154–1184

1148–1196

(2)

Ottokar I of Bohemia

Constance of Hungary

Andrew II of Hungary

c.1155–1230

1180–1240

c.1177–1235

(3)

Beatrice d´Este

c.1215 – bef. 8 May 1245

James I of Aragon 1208–1276

Tomasina Morosini

Stephen the Posthumous

1250–1300

c.1236–1271

Constance II of Sicily c.1249–1302

Denis of Portugal 1261–1325

James II of Majorca

Esclaramonde de Foix 1250–1315

1243–1311

(1)

Yolanda of Aragon 1273–1302

Andrew III of Hungary 1265–1301

(2)

Sancia of Majorca c.1281–1345

Eras, Elena Woodacre ed., New York 2013; Reginae Iberiae: el poder regio femenino en los reinos medievales peninsulares, Miguel García-Fernández, Silvia Cernadas Martínez eds, Santiago de Compostela 2015; Mächtige Frauen? Königinnen und Fürstinnen im europäischen Mittelalter, Claudia Zey ed., Ostfildern 2015; El ejercicio del poder de las reinas ibéricas en la Edad Media, Ana Echevarría, Nikolas Jaspert eds, special issue of Anuario de estudios medievales, xlvi (2016); Espacios de espiritualidad femenina en la Europa medieval: una mirada interdisciplinaria, Blanca Garí ed., special issue of Anuario de estudios medievales, xliv (2014); Women in the Medieval Monastic World, Janet Burton, Karen Stöber eds, Turnhout 2015; Clarisas y dominicas (n. 5). Fundamental for female agency in the medieval period more widely: Reassessing the Roles of Women as “Makers” of Medieval Art and Architecture, Therese Martin ed., 2 vols, Boston 2012. 14 For Central Europe see, for example, the royal clarissan foundations in Stary Sącz and Wrocław, discussed by Jakub Adamski and Piotr Pajor (pp. 22–37); and Agnieska Patała (pp. 112–135) in this volume. Roest, Order and Disorder (n. 2) is a useful starting point for tracing further royal Clarissan houses across Europe. 15 Klaniczay, Holy Rulers and Blessed Princesses (n. 2), pp. 195–194. The importance of royal marriages, especially in terms of cultural transfer, has been highlighted in Ana Maria S. Rodrigues, “Royal Marriages and the Circulation of People, Objects and Ideas in Medieval Europe”,  in Medieval Europe in Motion: The Circulation of Artists, Images, Patterns

Albert I of Austria Agnes of Bohemia

Elisabeth of Gorizia-Tyrol c.1262–1312

1255–1308

(2)

Agnes of Austria c.1280–1364

1211–1282 * 1989

Elisenda de Pinós i Canet

Peter de Montcada

?

1267–1300

(4)

Elisenda de Montcada 1292?–1364

and Ideas, Maria A. Bilotta ed., Palermo 2018, pp. 21–30; see also Karl-Heinz Spieß, ”Europa heiratet: Kommunikation und Kulturtransfer im Kontext europäischer Königsheiraten des Spätmittelalters”,  in Europa im späten Mittelalter: Politik – Gesellschaft – Kultur, Rainer Christoph Schwinges, Christian Hesse, Peter Moraw eds, Munich, 2006, pp. 435–464. 16 Here I build on on important observations made in Carola Jäggi, “Liturgie und Raum in franziskanischen Doppelklöstern: Königsfelden und S. Chiara / Neapel im Vergleich”,  in Art, cérémonial et liturgie au Moyen Âge. Actes du Colloque de 3e Cycle Romand de Lettres (Lausanne–Fribourg 2000), Nicolas Bock ed., Rome 2002, pp. 223–246; Pere Beseran i Ramon, “Incidències napolitanes a Catalunya: revisions sobre l’escultura i arquitectura trescentista”,  in El Trecento en obres: art de Catalunya i art d’Europa al segle xiv, Rosa Alcoy ed., Barcelona 2009, pp. 131–159; Eileen McKiernan González, “Decisiones finales: reinas catalano-aragonesas y su patronazgo religioso y fúnebre”,  in Reinas e infantas en los reinos medievales ibéricos: Contribuciones para su estudio; actas del congreso internacional, Santiago de Compostela, 21–23 de mayo de 2014, Silvia Cernadas Martínez, Miguel García-Fernández eds, Santiago de Compostela 2018, pp. 175–202. See also Caroline Bruzelius, The Stones of Naples: Church Building in Angevin Italy 1266 –1343, New Haven / London 2004, p. 103; Julian Gardner, “Clarifications: Poverty, Lineage and Display in S. Chiara at Naples”,  in La chiesa e il convento (n. 5), pp. 195–226; Andenna, “Sancia, Queen of Naples” (n. 4), pp. 126 –128.

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4 / Monastery church, view towards the eastern choir with sarcophagus marking the Habsburg crypt, Königsfelden 5 / Duke Albrecht ii of Austria, stained glass, monastery church, nave, window s xiii, 1b, Königsfelden, ca 1360

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not only form part of the above-mentioned web of relations but were also all royal widows who chose the churches of their Clarissan foundations as their burial place17. Focusing on the circumstances of the inception of these monasteries, and on the positioning of the queens’ tombs in the church spaces, the following paper offers some starting points for further enquiry18. The monastery of Königsfelden was established by Queen Elizabeth of Gorizia-Tyrol (* ca 1262; †1312) as a commemorative foundation on the spot where her husband Albert i of Habsburg, King of Germany, had died at the hand of his nephew in 1308 19. Albert himself was buried in the royal crypt at Speyer Cathedral, which had served as the final resting place of German emperors and kings since 1039, but in 1316 his widow Elizabeth was the first of several Habsburg family members to be interred in the Königsfelden crypt20. After Elizabeth’s death, her daughter Agnes of Austria (* ca 1280; †1364), the young widow of King Andrew iii of Hungary, took up residence at Königsfelden in close proximity to the Clarissan cloister, and continued her mother’s efforts as a keeper of the memory of her father and of the Habsburg family21. Unlike Sancia of Majorca, Agnes remained a lay woman throughout her life. She used her authority and status as a royal widow not only to further Königsfelden’s economic and spiritual stability, but also to augment the monastery’s material riches, and to exercise political power in both the local and trans-regional spheres 22. In the monastery church of Königsfelden, the foundation’s primary function as a memorial is visualised by a simple black and white marble sarcophagus marking the family crypt in the eastern part of the nave, between the area where a western gallery, now lost, would once have housed the Clarissan sisters, and the eastern choir in which Franciscan friars would have celebrated the liturgy [Fig. 4]23. During Queen Agnes’ time, most probably in the years between 1358 and 1364, an elaborate decoration of stained glass was inserted in the nave windows surrounding this monument24. The cycle is now lost except for a few fragments, but was recorded at some point before 1555 in the richly illuminated Ehrenspiegel des Hauses Österreich25.

In combination with the stained-glass fragments, these illuminations enable us to reconstruct the general layout of the windows [Figs 5, 6]. They once showed kneeling members of the Habsburg family under intricate architectural canopies, presumably oriented towards the eastern choir of the monastery church. The figures were accompanied by their coats of arms and by inscriptions which indicated their date of death, royal rank, and their relationship to King Albert i of Habsburg. Elizabeth of Gorizia-Tyrol and Agnes of Austria were further distinguished within the cycle by being shown with a model of the Königsfelden monastery church [Fig. 7]. The stained-glass cycle in the nave thus provided a genealogical and dynastic programme which complemented the imageless sarcophagus guarding the Habsburg bodies in the crypt26. Acting as luminous substitutes for a tomb effigy, these images not only commemorated the assassinated king for whom the monastery was founded, but also presented his whole stirps regia, the royal family, as a group27. 17 For the value of examining royal female patronage at various life stages, see Christopher Mielke, “’Out Flies the Web and Floats Wide’: Multi-Disciplinary Possibilities in Queenship Studies”,  Annual of Medieval Studies at Central European University Budapest, xix (2013), pp. 201–216, sp. p. 200. Another royal Clarissan house founded by a royal widow as her burial church is Elizabeth of Poland’s (*1305; †1380) monastery at Óbuda/ Altofen (Hungary), of which only the archaeological footprint remains. See Brian McEntee, “The Burial Site Selection of a Hungarian Queen: Elizabeth, Queen of Hungary (1320 –1380), and the Óbuda Clares’ Church”,  Annual of Medieval Studies at Central European University Budapest, xii (2006), pp. 69 – 82. 18 Due to the wide lens used in this paper, it is not possible to go into as much depth as would be desirable. For a more detailed analysis, see Zöschg, “In signum viduitatis et humilitatis” (n. *). For the present context, see also Susanna Blaser–Meier, Hic Iacet Regina: Form und Funktion figürlicher Königinnengrabmäler von 1200 bis 1450, Petersberg 2018; Tomb – Memory – Space: Concepts of Representation in Premodern Christian and Islamic Art, Francine Giese, Anna Pawlak, Markus Thome eds, Berlin/Boston 2018. 19 For the circumstances of Albert i’s murder and the foundation of Königsfelden, see Brigitte Kurmann-Schwarz,“‘Quam diu istud cadaver equitare permittemus?’ Die Ermordung König Albrechts i. im Jahre 1308 und das Kloster Königsfelden“, in 1308: Eine Topographie historischer Gleichzeitigkeit, Andreas Speer, Andreas Wirmer eds, Berlin 2010, pp. 539–556, sp. pp. 541–544; Heinz-Dieter Heimann, “Mord – Memoria – Repräsentation: dynastische Gedächtniskultur und franziskanische Religiosität am Beispiel der habsburgischen Grablege Königsfelden im späten Mittelalter“, in Imperios sacros, monarquías divinas: primer coloquio internacional del grupo europeo de investigación histórica ‘Religión, poder y

monarquía’ (Castelló de La Plana-Vinaròs, España, 19, 20 y 21 de Noviembre de 200), Carles Rabassa, Ruth Stepper eds, Castelló de la Plana 2002, pp. 269 –290; Jana M. Schütte, “Königsmord und Memoria: Liturgisches und historiographisches Erinnern an Albrecht von Habsburg“, Concilium Medii Aevi, xv (2012), pp. 77–115; Königsfelden: Königsmord, Kloster, Klinik, Simon Teuscher, Claudia Moddelmog eds, Baden 2012. 20 Rudolf J. Meyer, Königs- und Kaiserbegräbnisse im Spätmittelalter: von Rudolf von Habsburg bis zu Friedrich iii, Cologne 2000, pp. 41–52; Franz Laubenberger, “Grablegen der Habsburger und St. Blasien”,  Zeitschrift des Breisgau-Geschichtsvereins. Schau-ins-Land, cii (1983), pp. 25–38, sp. pp. 27–28. The sources on Elizabeth of Gorizia–Tyrol’s biography, few far and between, are discussed in Amalie Fößel, Die Königin im mittelalterlichen Reich: Herrschaftsausübung, Herrschaftsrechte, Handlungsspielräume, Stuttgart 2000, pp. 277–281; Brigitte Kurmann-Schwarz, Die mittalterlichen Glasmalereien der ehemaligen Klosterkirche Königsfelden, Bern 2008, pp. 30 –31. 21 For Agnes of Austria, see most recently Kurmann-Schwarz, Die mittelalterlichen Glasmalereien (n. 20), pp. 34–41; Angelica Hilsebein, “Das Kloster als Residenz: Leben und Wirken der Königin Agnes von Ungarn in Königsfelden”,  Wissenschaft und Weisheit, lxxii (2009), pp. 179 –250; Susan Marti, “Der textile Schatz des Klosters Königsfelden gemäß der Schenkungsurkunde der Königin Agnes von 1357“, in Seide im früh- und hochmittelalterlichen Frauenstift: Besitz – Bedeutung – Umnutzung, Thomas Schilp, Annemarie Stauffer eds, Essen 2013, pp. 269 –288; Martina Stercken, “Saeldenrîche frowen und gschwind listig wib – Weibliche Präsenz Habsburgs im Südwesten des Reiches“, in Mächtige Frauen (n. 13), pp. 337–364. 22 Agnes of Austria’s fundamental role in assembling the monastery’s rich church treasure is discussed in Susan Marti’s contribution (pp. 38–55) to this volume. 23 For the art and architecture of the monastery church still fundamental is Emil Maurer, Das Kloster Königsfelden, Basel 1954; and now Kurmann-Schwarz, Die mittalterlichen Glasmalereien (n. 20). See Jäggi, “Liturgie und Raum” (n. 16); eadem, Frauenklöster (n. 7), pp. 201–202, 220 –221, for the suggestion that the nuns only initially occupied the western gallery, but may have had access to the eastern choir after its completion, whereas the friars were assigned a space in the nave, and for the possibility that male and female communities may at times have used the choir in alternation. For the tomb, whose unusual appearance may echo French models as well as the imperial tombs at Speyer, see most importantly Brigitte Kurmann-Schwarz, “Die Sorge um die Memoria: das Habsburger Grab in Königsfelden im Lichte seiner Bildausstattung”,  Kunst und Architektur in der Schweiz, l (1999), pp. 12–22; eadem, “Die Präsenz der abwesenden Dynastie: die Bilder und Wappen der Habsburger im Chor und im Langhaus der ehemaligen Klosterkirche von Königsfelden”,  Österreichische Zeitschrift für Kunst und Denkmalpflege, lxvi (2012), pp. 308 –319. 24 Kurmann-Schwarz, “Die Sorge um die Memoria” (n. 23); eadem, Die mittelalterlichen Glasmalereien (n. 20), pp. 229 –233. This campaign replaced a first non-figurative heraldic decoration: ibidem, pp. 127–133, 185–186. 25 Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Cod. 8614*, folia 232r-238v; folio 231v shows the tomb. 26 This is expanded on in Kurmann-Schwarz, “Die Sorge um die Memoria” (n. 23). 27 In the context of this paper, it is not possible to elaborate on the important stained-glass cycle in the eastern choir of Königsfelden, where this network of family members is further reinforced through the representation of those who supported Agnes of Austria’s memorial efforts; for a discussion of these images alongside the stained glass in the nave, see Kurmann-Schwarz, “Die Präsenz” (n. 23).

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By contrast, the well-known tombs of the Angevins in Naples are notable for their sophisticated display of dynastic memory by highlighting an individual’s role within the larger family network28. Mary of Hungary’s marble tomb in the monastery church of Santa Maria Donnaregina is one of the earliest and most important examples among them [Fig. 8]. This queen’s involvement with the already existing Clarissan monastery of Santa Maria Donnaregina is often traced back to the year 1293, when an earthquake destroyed a large part of this community’s living quarters29. The queen first supported the sisters with the building of a new dormitory, and subsequently initiated the building of a new monastery church, in which she eventually requested in her will to be buried30. Her tomb, however, was executed only after her death, presumably in 1325–1326, by Tino di Camaino31. Today the tomb is placed against the northern wall of the nave of the monastery church, but most scholars agree that this is not its original position; it has repeatedly been argued that the tomb may have been positioned behind the high altar, thus anticipating the arrangement of Robert of Anjou’s tomb in Corpus Christi32. While its effigy, with accompanying censing deacons, focuses on the liturgical commemoration of Mary of Hungary’s soul, and its upper part, with two angels presenting the deceased and a model of the church of Santa Maria Donnaregina to the enthroned Virgin, visualizes the queen’s hopes for the afterlife, the inscription and reliefs on the sarcophagus highlight the queen’s illustrious blood line and crucial role in securing the future of the Angevin family33. During her time as a consort queen to Charles ii of Anjou, Mary of Hungary gave birth to at least fourteenth children, among them most prominently Louis of Toulouse, who famously renounced the throne to join the Franciscan Order and was canonized in 1317. Surrounded by his siblings, the new family saint occupies the central arch on the tomb’s sarcophagus, his prominent placement underlining the queen’s central role in securing the Angevins’ reputation as a beata stirps, a dynasty ruling through divine approval. Like Mary of Hungary, Isabel of Aragon (* ca  1269–1270; †1336) is said to have come to

the rescue of an already existing Clarissan house, Santa Clara-e-Isabel in Coimbra, in around 131434. 28 Lorenz Enderlein, Die Grablegen des Hauses Anjou in Unteritalien: Totenkult und Moumente 1266 –1343, Worms am Rhein 1997; Tanja Michalsky, Memoria und Repräsentation: die Grabmäler des Königshauses Anjou in Italien, Göttingen 2000; Vinni Lucherini, “Le tombe angioine nel presbiterio di Santa Chiara a Napoli e la politica funeraria di Roberto d’Angiò”,  in Medioevo: i committenti; atti del convegno internazionale di studi, (Parma, 21–26 settembre 2010), Arturo Quintavalle ed., Milan 2011, pp. 477–504. An important recent contribution to the broader landscape of Neapolitan tomb monuments specifically for women is Vinni Lucherini, “Un contributo per la memoria sepolcrale nella Napoli angioina”,  in Inedita mediævalia: scritti in onore di Francesco Aceto, Francesco Caglioti, Vinni Lucherini eds, Rome 2019, pp. 247–257. 29 Most recently, Bertini / Di Cerbo / Paone, “Filia sanctae Elisabectae” (n. 5), p. 19; a different reading of the sources, suggesting the queen’s involvement only from 1313, is offered in Leone de Castris, Donnaregina Vecchia (n. 5), pp. 20 –22. 30 For the church, see Caroline Bruzelius, “The Architectural Context of Santa Maria Donnaregina”,  in The Church of Santa Maria Donna Regina (n. 4), pp. 79 –106; and now Cristiana Di Cerbo, “L’intenzionalità retorica e identitaria di Maria d’Ungheria a Donnaregina tra architettura e arti figurative: teologia della storia e Beata Stirps”,  in Il monachesimo femminile nel mezzogiorno peninsulare e insulare (xi–xvi secolo): Fondazioni, ordini, reti, committenza, Gemma T. Colesanti, Maria G. Meloni, Stefania Paone, Patrizia Sardina eds, Cagliari 2018, pp. 351–419. 31 For the tomb, see Enderlein, Die Grablegen (n. 28), pp. 89 – 98, 191–193; Michalsky, Memoria und Repräsentation (n. 28), pp. 289 –297 (cat. no. 22); eadem, “Mater serenissimi principis: The Tomb of Maria of Hungary”,  in The Church of Santa Maria Donna Regina (n. 4), pp. 61– 78; Architettura e arti figurative di età gotica in Campania, Francesco Aceto, Paola Vitolo eds, Battipaglia 2017, pp. 181–185; de Castris, Donnaregina Vecchia (n. 5), pp. 53–58. According to the execution document of the queen’s will, Tino collaborated with Gagliardo Primario, architect and protomagister of Santa Chiara, on this tomb project. The nature of the collaboration is eloquently discussed in Francesco Aceto, “Tino di Camaino a Napoli: una proposta per il sepolcro di Caterina d’Austria e altri fatti angioini”,  Dialoghi di Storia dell’Arte, i (1995), pp. 10 –27, sp. pp. 10 –14. 32 For the tomb’s various possible locations, see the recent summary in Architettura e arti figurative (n. 31), pp. 182–183, and for its fate in later centuries, Alessandro Grandolfo, “Patronati gentilizi e memorie funebri in Santa Maria Donnaregina Vecchia a Napoli nei secoli xiv–xvii: il ciclo scultoreo dei Loffredo di Monteforte”, Napoli Nobilissima, vi (2014), pp. 3–30, sp. pp. 12–15. 33 For a comprehensive analysis of these aspects, see Michalsky, “Mater serenissimi principis” (n. 31). 34 Santa Clara-e-Isabel, now better known as Santa Clara-aVelha, was founded by the local noblewoman Mor Dias in ca 1283, but then underwent a period of institutional difficulties; for this complex early history, see Anna P. Figueira Santos, “A fundação do Mosteiro de Santa Clara de Coimbra (da instituição por D. Mor Dias à intervenção da rainha Santa Isabel)”,  Master’s thesis, (University of Coimbra), Coimbra 2000; Giulia Rossi Vairo, “Isabella d’Aragona, Rainha Santa de Portugal, e il monastero di Santa Clara e Santa Isabel di Coimbra (1286 –1336)”,  Collectanea Franciscana, xxx (2001), pp. 139 –170, sp. pp. 141–147; Maria F. Andrade, In oboedientia, sine propio,

6 / Richard A. Nüscheler, Reconstruction of the Habsburg windows in the nave of the Monastery church of Königsfelden (using surviving fragments and the manuscript illuminations in the Ehrenspiegel des Hauses Österreich), watercolour, 1900, Schweizerische Nationalbibliothek, Eidgenössisches Archiv fur Denkmalpflege, Bern, ead–1841 7 / Queen Elizabeth of Gorizia–Tyrol with the model of Königsfelden Monastery church (after lost stained glass paintings in the nave of this church, in Ehrenspiegel des Hauses Österreich), drawing, before 1555. Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna, Cod. 8614*, fol. 233r

et in castitate, sub clausura: a ordem de Santa Clara em Portugal (sécs xiii–xiv), PhD thesis, (University of Lisbon, supervisor: Iria Vicente Gonçalves), Lisbon 2011, pp. 88 – 99, 369 –386. For Queen Isabel of Aragon, who was canonised in 1625, still fundamental: Antonio Garcia Ribeiro de Vasconcellos, Evoluçao do culto de Dona Isabel de Aragão, esposa do Rei Lavrador, Dom Dinis de Portugal (a Rainha Santa), 2 vols, Coimbra 1894. Important recent contributions to her biography are Imagen de la Reina Santa: Santa Isabel, Infanta de Aragón y Reina de Portugal, Alfredo Romero Santamaría ed., exhibition catalogue (Zaragoza, Real Capilla de Santa Isabel [San Cayetano]), 2 vols, Zaragoza 1999; Maria F. Andrade, Rainha Santa, mãe exemplar: Isabel de Aragão, Lisbon 2012; Giulia Rossi Vairo, “La storiografia d’Isabella d‘Aragona: da santa a regina (secoli xiv–xxi)”,  in La participaciòn de las mujeres en lo politico: mediación, representación y toma de decisiones, Isabel del Val Valdivieso, Cristina Segura Graíño eds, Madrid 2011, pp. 49 – 64; eadem, “Isabel di Aragona, regina consorte di Portogallo (c. 1270 –1336): potere, ambizione e limiti di una sovrana medievale”,  Reti Medievali, xxi/2 (2020), pp. 147–179.

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For most of her life as a consort queen to King  Denis of Portugal, Isabel of Aragon shared her husband’s predilection for the Cistercian Order, and planned, at first, to be buried alongside him at the Monastery of Santa Maria de Alcobaça, subsequently changing the location to the nunnery of St Dinis de Odivelas35. However, the civil war of 1317–1324, marked by disagreements not only between the king and his son, but also between the royal spouses, seems to have presented a significant rupture to these plans. Only when widowhood was imminent does the queen seem to have been able to shift her memorial and spiritual interests towards the community of Clarissan sisters at Santa Clara-e-Isabel36. In so doing, she aligned herself with mendicant patronage traditions rooted among royal Aragonese women: her mother Constance of Sicily (*ca 1249; †1302), for example, had been an important early supporter of the Clarissan Order, as had her aunt Violante of Aragon (*1236; †1301), whose foundation of Santa Clara in Allariz (Galicia) may have been the first Clarissan monastery serving as a burial place for a royal widow on the Iberian Peninsula [Fig. 3]37. Shortly before her husband’s death in 1325, Isabel of Aragon issued a document in which she not only expressed her wish to be buried in the monastery church of this Clarissan house, but also declared that should the king die before her she would wear the habit of a Clarissan sister – not as a professed nun, but as a sign of humility and widowhood38. Echoing Elizabeth of Gorizia-Tyrol’s concern for her husband’s soul, the widowed queen also undertook a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela to pray for the soul of King Denis39. And, like Agnes of Austria at Königsfelden, she retreated to a palace built on the grounds of Santa Clara-e-­Isabel, while at the same time remaining involved in political and diplomatic matters concerning her family and her country40. In 1327 Isabel of Aragon also had a hospital with chapel and cemetery erected in the immediate vicinity of Santa Clara-e-Isabel, where she increasingly engaged in charitable work41. Like the monastery church of her Clarissan residence, the chapel was consecrated to St Elizabeth (Isabel) of Hungary, Isabel’s great-aunt via her father [Fig. 3]42. A royal widow herself, St Elizabeth

had been disowned by her husband’s family and gained a saintly reputation especially through her charitable work at a hospital she had founded in Marburg43. She was canonised in 1235 and, although never formally affiliated with the Friars Minor, was soon not only particularly venerated within Franciscan circles, but also viewed as a mendicant role model for lay women44. It is noteworthy that an early manuscript containing a cycle of the saint’s life may be connected to Violante of Aragon, Isabel of Aragon’s aunt45. Like Isabel of Aragon, Mary of Hungary and Sancia of Majorca were both related to Elizabeth of Hungary46. The extensive cycle with scenes from the saint’s life in the nuns’ choir of Santa Maria Donnaregina may in fact be due to Mary of Hungary’s direct intervention; according to the execution of her will, her library contained two versions of her great-aunt’s life.47 Unique on the Italian Peninsula in its scale and iconographic detail, the cycle bears witness to Elizabeth of Hungary’s enduring impression on female royal consciousness nearly one hundred years after her death [Fig. 9]48. Isabel of Aragon’s decision to wear the Clarissan habit as a widow, and to found a hospital for the poor, may both be read as modelling her  35 As demonstrated in Giulia Rossi Vairo, “Isabel de Aragão e a Ordem de Cister em Portugal”,  in Para a história das ordens e congregações religiosas em Portugal, na Europa e no mundo, Cristiana Lucas da Silva ed., Prior Velho 2014, vol. 2, pp. 287–300; see also, within a wider study of the couple’s memorial projects, eadem, D. Dinis del Portogallo e Isabel d’Aragona in vita e in morte: creazione e trasmissione della memoria nel contesto storico e artistico europeo, PhD thesis, (University of Lisbon, supervisor: José Custódio Vieira da Silva), Lisbon 2014. For S. Dinis de Odivelas, see also this author’s contribution to the present volume on pp. 76–91. 36 Rossi Vairo, “Isabel di Aragona, regina consorte” (n. 34), pp. 163–167. 37 Nikolas Jaspert, “Testaments, Burials and Bequests. Tracing the ‘Franciscanism’ of Aragonese Queens and Princesses”,  in Queens, Princesses and Mendicants (n. 2), pp. 85–134. For Constance of Sicily, see also idem, “Zwei Mal Konstanze. Die staufisch-aragonesischen Verbindungen und die Möglichkeiten reginaler Herrschaft in der Fremde”,  in Civiltà a contatto nel Mezzogiorno normanno svevo: economia, società, istituzioni; atti delle ventunesime giornate normanno-sveve, (Melfi, Castello federiciano, 13–14 ottobre 2014), Maria Boccuzzi, Pasquale Cordasco eds, Bari 2018, pp. 131–168, sp. pp. 154–167. For Violante’s foundation of Santa Clara in Allariz, see Melissa R. Katz, “A Convent for ‘La Sabia’: Violante de Aragón and the Foundation of Santa Clara de Allariz”,  in Culture and Society in Medieval Galicia: A Cultural Crossroads at the Edge of Europe, James D’Emilio ed., Leiden/Boston 2015, pp. 812– 836.

38 António Caetano de Sousa, Provas da istória genealógica da casa real Portuguesa, Coimbra 1946 –1954, vol. 2, pp. 142–143. The text reappears a couple of days later, on 8 January 1325, in another document, this time written in Portuguese; see Frederico Francisco de la Figanière, Memórias das rainhas de Portugal, Lisbon 1859, pp. 273–275. Both documents are discussed in Giulia Rossi Vairo, “O túmulo de Isabel de Aragão, Rainha de Portugal: propostas para uma cronologia antecipada”,  in O fascínio do gótico: um tributo a José Custódio Vieira da Silva, Joana Ramôa Melo, Luís Urbano Afonso eds, Lisbon 2016, pp. 17–32, sp. pp. 17–19. For the architecture of the Monastery of Santa Clara-e-Isabel, see Francisco Manuel Teixeira, A arquitectura monástica e conventual feminina em Portugal, nos séculos xiii e xiv, PhD thesis, (University of Algarve, supervisor: José Custódio Vieira da Silva), Faro 2007, pp. 272–290; Catarina Villamariz, A Arquitectura Religiosa Gótica em Portugal no Século xiv: o Tempo dos Experimentalismos, PhD thesis, (University of Lisbon, super­visor: José Custódio Vieira da Silva), Lisbon 2012, pp. 253–270; Rossi Vairo, D. Dinis del Portogallo (n. 35), pp. 250 –262; Francisco Pato de Macedo, Santa Clara-a-Velha de Coimbra: singular mosteiro mendicante, Casal de Cambra 2017. 39 For the sources and stories surrounding the queen’s pilgrimage, see Maria de Lourdes Cidraes, “A Rainha Peregrina – Lendas e Memórias”,  in Da Galiza a Timor: a lusofonia em foco; actas do viii Congresso da Associaçâo Internacional de Lusitanistas: Santiago de Compostela, 18 a 23 de Julho de 2005, Carmen Villarino Pardo, Elias J. Torres Feijó, José Luís Rodrigues eds, Santiago de Compostela 2009, vol. ii, pp. 1411–1420. 40 For this palace, now mostly lost, see Macedo, Santa Clara-aVelha de Coimbra (n. 38), pp. 755– 769. 41 Ibidem, pp. 771– 798; and also Francisco Pato de Macedo, “O hospital de Santa Isabel junto a mosteiro de Santa Clara-­ a-Velha de Coimbra”,  in João Afonso de Santarém e a assistência hospitalar escalabitana durante o antigo regime, exhibition catalogue (Santarem, Museu Municipal de Santarém), Carlos Amado, Luís Mata eds, Santarém 2000, pp. 146 –159. 42 For Elizabeth of Hungary and Isabel of Aragon’s natal family, see Nikolas Jaspert, “Els descendents piadosos d’una princesa hongaresa. Heretgia i santedat al casal de Barcelona durant els segles xiii i xiv”,  in Princeses de terres llunyanes: Catalunya i Hongria a l’etat mitjana, exhibition catalogue (Barcelona, Museu d’Història de Catalunya / Budapest, Magyar Nemzeti Múzeum), Barcelona 2009, pp. 291–305. 43 Useful recent studies on the saint are Elisabeth von Thüringen – eine europäische Heilige, exhibition catalogue (Eisenach, Wartburg 2007), Dieter Blume, Matthias Werner eds, 2 vols, Petersberg 2007; Ottó Gecser, The Feast and the Pulpit: Preachers, Sermons and the Cult of St. Elizabeth of Hungary, 1235 – ca 1500, Spoleto 2012. 44 For the Franciscan versions of the saint’s legend, see Lori Pieper, St. Elizabeth of Hungary and the Franciscan Tradition, PhD thesis, (Fordham University, supervisor: Richard Gyug), New York 2002; Gecser, The Feast and the Pulpit (n. 43), pp. 19 –26. For a useful discussion of Elizabeth of Hungary’s cult in the wider context of the emergence of the Franciscan lay movement, see Alison More, “Lay Piety and Franciscan Tertiary Identity”,  in “Non enim fuerat Evangelii surdus auditor…” (1 Celano 22): Essays in Honour of Michael W. Blastic, ofm on the Occasion of his 70th birthday, Michael F. Cusato, Steven J. McMichael eds, Leiden 2020, pp. 334–347. 45 Paris, Bibiliothèque Nationale, ms n.a.l. 868; see Dieter Blume, Diane Joneitis, “Eine Elisabeth-Handschrift vom Hof König Alfons’ x. von Kastilien”,  in Elisabeth von Thüringen (n. 43), vol. ii, pp. 325–339. 46 Elizabeth of Gorizia-Tyrol and Agnes of Austria, on the other hand, undertook a pilgrimage to the saint’s shrine in Marburg

after Albert i of Austria’s death; see Claudia Moddelmog, Königliche Stiftungen des Mittelalters im historischen Wandel: Quedlinburg und Speyer, Königsfelden, Wiener Neustadt und Andernach, Berlin 2012. For Elizabeth of Hungary’s veneration at Köngisfelden see the essay by Susan Marti (pp. 38–55) in this volume. 47 Vinni Lucherini, “Il ‘testamento‘” (n. 4), p. 444; Dávid Falvay, “The Multiple Regional Identity of a Neapolitan Queen: Mary of Hungary’s Readings and Saints”,  in Cuius Patrocinio Tota Gaudet Regio: Saints’ Cults and the Dynamics of Regional Cohesion, Stanislava Kuzmová, Ana Marinković, Trpimir Vedriš eds, Zagreb 2014, pp. 211–230, sp. pp. 222–228. 48 A marble fragment from an altarpiece showing St Agnes and St Elizabeth of Hungary, possibly once on the high altar of Santa Maria Donnaregina and now in the Salini Collection, should also be mentioned here; see La collezione Salini. Dipinti, sculture e oreficerie dei secoli xii, xiii, xiv e xv, Luciano Bellosi ed., Florence 2009, vol. ii, pp. 102–109, cat. no 16 (Francesco Aceto); Francesco Aceto, “Tino di Camaino a Napoli”,  in Scultura gotica senese (1260 –1350), Roberto Bartalini ed., Turin 2011, pp. 183–193, sp. pp. 190 –192, n. 24. For the cycle in the nuns’ choir, which forms part of a much larger decorative scheme outside the scope of this essay, see Cordelia Warr, “The Golden Legend and the Cycle of the ‘Life of Saint Elizabeth of Thuringia-Hungary’”,  in The Church of Santa Maria Donna Regina (n. 4), pp. 155–174; Bertini/Di Cerbo/ Paone, “Filia sanctae Elisabectae” (n. 5), pp. 36 –57 (Stefania Paone). It is discussed in the wider context of Elizabeth-cycles for aristocratic and royal women in Dieter Blume, Grit Jacobs, Anette Kindler, “Wechselnde Blickwinkel: Die Bildzyklen der Heiligen Elisabeth vor der Reformation”,  in Elisabeth von Thüringen (n. 43), vol. ii, pp. 271–292, sp. pp. 273–276.

8 / Tino di Camaino, Tomb monument for Queen Maria of Hungary, white marble and mosaic inlay, Santa Maria Donnaregina, monastery church, Naples, ca 1325–1326

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9 / The Wedding of St Elizabeth of Hungary and Louis of Thuringia, wall painting, Santa Maria Donnaregina, nuns’ choir, Naples, ca 1320–1330

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widowhood on the example of her saintly relative49. Queen Isabel’s effigy emerges as the virtuous This is, to a degree, reinforced by the iconogra- “Franciscan widow” she had pledged to be at the phy of the tomb that the queen had commissioned time of her husband’s death: she wears wimple while she was still alive, in the years around and veil, sandals, and a mantle and a habit with 1325–1327 [Fig. 10]50. The monument was moved knotted girdle. In addition, she is shown carryto the Baroque church of Santa Clara-a-Nova in ing a pilgrim staff, and with a purse filled with the seventeenth century51, but was originally po- coins and decorated with St James’ shell slung sitioned in Santa Clara-e-Isabel on an elevated over her shoulder. Both staff and purse reference funerary chapel, accessible from both the publicly objects with which the queen had been buried, accessible monastery church and the nuns’ choir and which had been given to her by the bishop in the eastern part of the nave52. The tomb, which of Santiago de Compostela on the occasion of the has been attributed to the workshop of Master aforementioned pilgrimage for her husband’s soul, Pero, a sculptor originating – like the queen – from thus adding further evidence of Isabel’s virtuous Aragon, represents a radical departure from tradi- behaviour as a royal widow to the choices made tional Portuguese funerary sculpture at the time, in the tomb’s design55. and perhaps thus indicates the degree of agency Isabel of Aragon’s example may have served Queen Isabel was able to exercise in her widow- as one of the inspirations for her younger sisterhood53. It consists of a monumental freestanding in-law, Queen Elisenda de Montcada’s (*1292?; sarcophagus supported by six lions which carry †1364) Clarissan foundation in Barcelona56. Fourth the queen’s effigy54. The life-size crowned figure wife of Isabel’s brother, James ii of Aragon, is framed by the coat of arms not only of the hous- Elisenda founded the Monastery of Santa Maria es of Portugal and Aragon, but also by the im- de Pedralbes in Barcelona in 132557. When the perial eagle, highlighting the queen’s illustrious elderly king died in 1327, Elisenda de Montcada Hohenstaufen lineage via her mother Constance. also resided as a lay woman in a palace at Among these signifiers of dynastic representation, Pedralbes, from where she was not only involved

49 For parallels between Isabel of Aragon and Elizabeth of Hungary in terms of iconography, see Giulia Rossi Vairo, “Alle origini della memoria figurativa: Sant‘Elisabetta d‘Ungheria (1207–1231) e Isabella d‘Aragona, Rainha Santa de Portugal (1272–1336) a confronto in uno studio iconografico comparativo”,  Revista de História da Arte, vii (2009), pp. 221–235. 50 The tomb’s current color scheme is a result of the restoration campaign carried out in 1762. For the tomb, see Francisco Pato de Macedo,“O túmulo gótico de Santa Isabel”,  in Imagen de la Reina Santa (n. 34), vol. 2, pp. 93–114; Carla Fernandes, Poder e representação: iconologia da família Real Portuguesa. Primeira Dinastia; Séculos xii a xiv, PhD thesis, (University of Lisbon, supervisor: Vitor Serrão), Lisbon 2004, pp. 317–323; Joana Ramôa Melo, O género feminino em discussão: re-presentações da mulher na arte tumular medieval portuguesa; projectos, processos e materializações, PhD thesis, (University of Lisbon, supervisors: José Custódio Vieira da Silva and Etelvina Fernández González), Lisbon 2012, pp. 258 –299; Rossi Vairo, “O túmulo de Isabel de Aragão” (n. 38), with arguments for a dating of the tomb to 1325–1327; Joana Ramôa Melo, “Poder gravado na pedra: túmulos de rainhas e nobres do Portugal medieval”,  Arenal, xxv (2018), pp. 323–356, sp. pp. 332–338. 51 The nuns were forced to leave Santa Clara-e-Isabel, as the monastery and church had become increasingly uninhabitable because of regular floodings. For Santa Clara-a-Nova, see António Filipe Pimentel, “Mosteiro-panteão/mosteiro-palácio: notas para o estudo do mosteiro novo de Santa Clara de Coimbra”,  in Imagen de la Reina Santa (n. 34), vol. ii, pp. 129 –153. 52 For the reconstructions of this funerary chapel, with partially diverging interpretations of the archaeological evidence, see, Macedo, Santa Clara-a-Velha de Coimbra (n. 38), pp. 755– 769; Rossi Vairo,“O túmulo de Isabel de Aragão”(n. 34), pp. 19 –20. 53 For Master Pero, documented as the maker of the tombs of archbishop D. Gonçalo Pereira in the Cathedral of Braga (1334) and the tomb of D. Vataça Lascaris in the Old Cathedral of Coimbra (1337), see Carla Fernandes,“Maestro Pero y su conexión con el arte de la Corona de Aragón (La renovación de la escultura portuguesa en el siglo xiv)”,  Boletín del Museo e Instituto “Camón Aznar”,  lxxxi/243–272 (2000), pp. 43–271; Francisco Pato de Macedo, Francisco Gil, “A oficina escultórica de Mestre Pêro: uma abordagem interdisciplinar”,  Rua Larga: Revista da Reitoria da Universidade de Coimbra, xxix (2010), pp. 32–37. The parameters of Queen Isabel’s agency as a queen are eloquently discussed in Rossi Vairo, “Isabel di Aragona, regina consorte” (n. 34). 54 For comprehensive descriptions of the tomb, see Rossi Vairo, “O túmulo de Isabel de Aragão” (n. 38); Ramôa Melo, “Poder gravado na pedra” (n. 50), pp. 332–338. 55 The staff is now kept at the Confraria da Rainha Santa Isabel in Coimbra, while the purse is lost; see Luísa Penalva, Anísio Franco, “Matéria e devoçao: O tesouro da Rainha Santa”,  in O tesouro da Rainha Santa: imagem e poder, exhibition catalogue (Lisbon, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga), Luísa Penalva ed., Lisbon 2016, pp. 26 –47, sp. pp. 32–38. 56 The queen could, however, also draw upon patronage traditions of her natal family, first and foremost the Trinitarian Monastery at Avinganya. See Francesca Español i Bertràn, Marc Escolà i Pons, “Avinganya i els Montcada. La transformació d’una casa trinitària en panteó familiar”,  D’art, xiii (1987), pp. 147–182; Francesc Fité, “Les dones Montcada i Avinganya”,  Shikar, vii (2020), pp. 172–173. For Elisenda de Montcada and her foundation at Pedralbes, see the important compilation of sources in Eulalia Anzizu, Fulles historiques del Real Monestir de Santa María de Pedralbes, etc., Barcelona 1897; and more recently Elisenda de Montcada: una reina lleidatana i la fundació del Reial Monestir de Pedralbes, Esther Balasch,

Francesca Español eds, Lleida/Lérida 1997; Anna Castellano i Tresserra, Pedralbes a l’edat mitjana: història d’un monestir femení, Barcelona 1998; Cristina Sanjust i Latorre, L’obra del Reial Monestir de Santa Maria de Pedralbes des de la seva fundació al segle xvi: un monestir reial per a l’Orde de les Clarisses a Catalunya, PhD thesis, (University of Barcelona, super­visor: Anna Muntada Torrellas), Barcelona 2008 (published under the same title in Barcelona, 2010); Anna Castellano i Tresserra, “La reina Elisenda de Montcada i el monestir de Pedralbes: Un model de promociò espiritual femenina al segle xiv”,  Redes femeninas (n. 4), pp. 109 –130; Francesca Español Bertran, “L’univers d’Elisenda de Montcada i el seu patronatge sobre el monestir de Pedralbes”,  Lambard: Estudis d’art medieval, xxv (2013/2014), pp. 9 –35; Anna Castellano i Tresserra, “El projecte fundacional del monestir de Santa Maria de Pedralbes i el palau de la reina Elisenda de Montcada a través de dos inventaris del 1364,” in Espacios de espiritualidad femenina (n. 13), pp. 103–139. 57 The queen’s foundation is perhaps best known for the important italianising wall paintings in the Chapel of St Michael commissioned in 1346 from Ferrer Bassa; leaving aside the vast body of literature concerned with questions of attribution, see Manuel Trens, Ferrer Bassa i les pintures de Pedralbes, Barcelona 1936; Rosa Alcoy, “Clarisse, monarchia e mondo francescano nella Capella di San Michele nel monastero de Pedralbes ed oltre”,  Ikon, iii (2010), pp. 81– 94. It is clear that together with a lost, or never executed, wall painting of a Tree of Life in the nuns’ choir, which was based on an Italian iconographic model (see Alessandro Simbeni, “Gli affreschi di Taddeo Gaddi nel refettorio: programma, committenza e datazione, con una postilla sulla diffusione del modello iconografico del Lignum vitae in Catalogna”,  in Santa Croce, Andrea De Marchi, Giacomo Pira eds, Ori 2011, pp. 113–141, sp. pp. 127–137), these paintings are evidence for other trans-regional connections at work in the monasteries discussed here, involving agents such as artists, friars, and also nuns. See, for example, the documented transfer of three nuns from Corpus Christi in Naples to Santa Maria de Pedralbes in Barcelona in 1345; Castellano i Tresserra,“La reina Elisenda” (n. 56), p. 128.

10 / Tomb monument for Queen Isabel of Aragon, Ançã limestone with modern polychromy, Santa Clara–a­– Nova, nuns’ choir, Coimbra, ca 1326–1327

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in the administration of her Clarissan foundation, but also took an active role in diplomatic and family matters at the Aragonese court, thus assuming a threshold position between the cloister and the court similar to that of Agnes of Austria in Königsfelden, and Isabel of Aragon in Coimbra58. Like Isabel, Elisenda commissioned a tomb monument while she was still alive, and like Isabel, Elisenda also took great care to present herself as both royal consort and royal Franciscan widow59. In this case, the tomb demonstrates a distinctive spatial sensibility with regards to the Clarissan sisters and Franciscan friars who were in charge of the queen’s liturgical memory. In its current state – the result of extensive restoration, repair, and modification – it is positioned on the right wall of the presbytery of the monastery church [Fig. 11]60. Under a monumental canopy, Queen Elisenda’s effigy is shown lying on a sarcophagus; the image of the queen displays the dress, crown, and sceptre of a reigning consort, and her head rests on a cushion displaying the coat of arms of Montcada and Aragon. This heraldic imagery is repeated throughout the presbytery, with sculpted shields on its walls, and the coat of arms is also repeated in the stained-glass windows61. On the other side of the same wall, a second monument, at first glance exactly mirroring the arrangement in the monastery church, addresses the community of Clarissan sisters in the cloister  [Fig. 12]. Here, the queen appears stripped of any worldly status symbols, in a simple habit with knotted girdle, similar to that already encountered on the effigy of Isabel of Aragon in Coimbra62. In both instances, the queens’ girdles exhibit more than the three knots usually associated with the depiction of Franciscans; this may signal their lay status as widows, and their lay affiliation to the Clarissan Order63. This double arrangement, which has precursors in France and parallels in Catalonia64, brings us back to Naples, where Queen Sancia of Majorca’s tomb, now lost but partially documented in two drawings, may have been positioned in a comparable double-sided arrangement at the threshold between the monastery church and nuns’ choir of Santa Croce di Palazzo, possibly located behind the high altar [Figs 13, 14]65.

Commissioned by Queen Joanna i of Anjou in about 1352, possibly in an attempt to support a campaign for Queen Sancia’s canonization, the reliefs on the sarcophagus highlight the particularly close relationship with the Franciscans that this queen had fostered throughout her lifetime. The relief facing the monastery church offers a hagiographic portrait of Sancia as royal protector and advocate of the order: it shows her as an enthroned queen, flanked by two kneeling groups of Franciscan friars and Clarissan sisters. The relief addressing the sisters in the nuns’ choir, on the other hand, shows Sancia as a member of the Clarissan community she had entered after her husband’s death. Depicting her as “Sister Clare”, as she called herself, at a long table among her fellow sisters, the relief not only alludes to the Eucharistic theme of the Last Supper, but may also reference Queen Sancia’s primary role model, St Clare of Assisi, and the food multiplication miracles recounted in her legend66. This ties in with Sancia of Majorca’s well-known quest 58 For a reconstruction of Queen Elisenda’s palace which, as she requested in her will, should have been destroyed after her death, see Castellano i Tresserra, “El projecte fundacional” (n. 56). 59 For the tomb, see Pere Beseran Ramon, “Un taller escultòric a la Barcelona del segon quart del segle xiv i una proposta per a Pere de Guines”,  Lambard: Estudis d’art medieval, vi (1994), pp. 215–230; Pere Beseran i Ramon, “Noves observacions a l’entorn del sepulcre d’Elisenda de Montcada”,  in I Jornades de recerca històrica de les Corts (14–15 maig de 1997). Ponències i comunicacions, Barcelona 1998, pp. 87– 99; Rosa M. Manote, M. Rosa Terés, “El mestre de Pedralbes i l’activitat barcelonina els anys centrals del segle xiv”,  in L’art gòtic a Catalunya: Escultura i, Antoni Pladevall i Font ed., Barcelona 2007, pp. 181–182; Eileen McKiernan González, “Reception, Gender, and Memory: Elisenda de Montcada and Her Dual-Effigy Tomb at Santa Maria de Pedralbes”,  in Reassessing the Roles of Women (n. 13), vol. i, pp. 309 –352; Español Bertran,“L’univers d’Elisenda de Montcada”(n. 56), pp. 22–32. For a discussion of the tomb in the context of memorial patronage of Catalan-Aragonese queens and the Crown of Aragon’s predilection for Franciscan churches respectively, see Eileen McKiernan González, “Decisiones finales” (n. 16); Francesca Español,“Formas artísticas y espiritualidad: el horizonte franciscano del círculo familiar de Jaime ii y sus ecos funerarios”,  in Poder, piedad y devoción: Castilla y su entorno (siglos xii–xv), Isabel Beceiro Pita ed., Madrid 2014, pp. 389 –422. 60 The tomb’s condition is discussed in detail in Español Bertran, “L’univers d’Elisenda de Montcada” (n. 56), pp. 22–32. 61 A nineteenth-century drawing published in Valentín Carderera’s Iconografía Española (1855–1864, vol. 1, p. xxii) suggests that the sarcophagus may originally have been decorated with heraldic motifs; for a discussion and contextualisation with other 19th-century documents, see Español Bertran, “L’univers d’Elisenda de Montcada” (n. 56), sp. p. 25, fig. 6.

For the stained-glass decoration at Pedralbes, some of which dates to the 14th century, see Ainaud de Lasarte, Juan Anscari Manuel Mundó, Joan Vila-Grau, Maria Assumpta Escudero i Ribot, Silvia Cañellas, Antoni Vila i Delclòs, Els vitralls de la Catedral de Barcelona i del Monestir de Pedralbes, Barcelona 1997, pp. 209 –336; Els vitralls del monestir de Pedralbes i la seva restauració, muhba Documents 4, Barcelona 2011. 62 The effigy of Maria of Cyprus (†1322), Queen Elisenda’s predecessor as queen consort to James ii of Aragon, originally in the Barcelonese friars’ church but now at the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, Barcelona, has a knotted girdle as well; for this effigy, see Español Bertran, “Formas artisticas” (n. 59), pp. 392–399. 63 Rossi Vairo, “Isabel di Aragona, regina consorte” (n. 34), p. 168, n. 100; Ramôa Melo, “Poder gravado na pedra” (n. 50), p. 336, n. 29. However, there seems to have been a less rigid iconographic tradition in Portugal, as seen in the representation of Clarissan sisters and Franciscan friars on the tomb sarcophagus for Leonor Afonso in the Clarissan church of Santarém. For the ambiguity of dress for the emerging female tertiary movements in the late medieval period, see the useful remarks in Alison More, Fictive Orders and Feminine Religious Identities 1200 –1600, Oxford 2018, pp. 52–54. 64 See for example the lost tomb of Jean de Montmirail at the Abbey of Longpont (Jean Adhemear, “Les tombeaux de la collection Gaignières. Dessins d’archaéologie du xvii siècle”,  Gazette des Beaux-Arts, lxxxiv [1974], fig. 64; Español Bertran, “L’univers d’Elisenda de Montcada” [n. 56], p. 24); the now lost tomb of Count Guifré ii of Cerdanya, made in ca 1332 for the Abbey of San Martì de Canigò, or the sarcophagus for Bertran de Castellet (d. 1323) in the church of San Francesc de Vilafranca del Penedès (Beseran i Ramon, “Incidències napolitanes” [n. 16], pp. 154–55). In all three instances, the deceased was shown on his tomb twice, once in military uniform and once in monastic habit, albeit in no case with the same double-sided spatial division as the effigies in the female monastic setting at Santa Maria de Pedralbes. A curious instance in a Clarissan setting is the tomb of Isabelle of France at her Clarissan foundation of Longchamp near Paris. Originally placed in the nuns’ choir, in the context of the increasing veneration of Isabelle, it was oriented so that it was half in the nuns’ choir in the western part of the nave, and half jutting out into the public area of the monastery church; Sean L. Field, “Imagining Isabelle: The Fifteenth-­Century Epitaph of Isabelle of France at Longchamp”,  Franciscan Studies, lxv (2007), pp. 371–403, sp. p. 384. 65 For a detailed comparison of the two tombs in Barcelona and Naples, see Beseran i Ramon, “Incidències napolitanes” (n. 16), pp. 146 –159. For Santa Croce di Palazzo, see Mario Gaglione, “Qualche ipotesi e molti dubbi” (n. 11); and for the tomb specifically, Adrian Hoch, “Sovereignity and Closure in Trecento Naples: Images of Queen Sancia, Alias ‘Sister Clare’”,  Arte Medievale, x (1996), pp. 121–139; Francesco Aceto, “Un’opera ‘ritrovata’ di Pacio Bertini: il sepolcro di Sancia di Maiorca in Santa Croce a Napoli e la questione dell’”usus pauper”,  Prospettiva, c (2000), pp. 27–35; Michalsky, Memoria und Repräsentation (n. 28), pp. 121–123, 171–172, 342–345; Aislinn Loconte, “Constructing Female Sanctity in Late Medieval Naples: The Funerary Monument of Queen Sancia of Majorca”,  in Representing Medieval Genders and Sexualities in Europe: Construction, Transformation, and Subversion, 600 –1530, Elizabeth L’Estrange, Alison More eds, Farnham 2011, pp. 107–125. Another Angevin tomb taking into account two distinct audiences is, of course, that of Sancia’s husband Robert of Anjou in Corpus Christi, still occupying such a threshold position in the church today; see D’Ovidio, “Osservazioni sulla struttura” (n. 10). 66 Loconte, “Constructing Female Sanctity” (n. 65), pp. 116 –122.

11 / Tomb monument for Queen Elisenda de Montcada, marble and alabaster with modern polychromy and later restorations, Santa Maria de Pedralbes, monastery church, Barcelona, ca 1340 12 / Tomb monument for Queen Elisenda de Montcada, marble and alabaster with modern polychromy and later restorations, Santa Maria de Pedralbes, cloister, Barcelona, ca 1340

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13 / Drawing of the sarcophagus of the tomb of Sancia of Majorca in Santa Croce di Palazzo, Naples, late 18th century, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vatican City, Vat. Lat. 9840, fol. 58v 14 / Drawing of the sarcophagus of the tomb of Sancia of Majorca in Santa Croce di Palazzo, Naples, late 18th century, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vatican City, Vat. Lat. 9840, fol. 59r

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for a return to the Clarissan Order’s origins, a project which she seems to have pursued increasingly during the last years of her life, and which culminated in the foundation of Santa Croce di Palazzo, a house which the queen tried to model as closely as possible on Clare of Assisi’s first female Franciscan settlement at San Damiano in Assisi67. While the other Clarissan foundations discussed here followed the rule for the ordo sanctae Clarae as instituted by Pope Urban iv in 1263, which allowed for the communities to hold possessions, it is likely that Queen Sancia’s last foundation, populated by sisters from San Damiano in Assisi, followed the rule composed by Clare of Assisi, which included the privilege of poverty and was approved by Innocent iv in 1235 for the Assisan community68. For Corpus Christi, as well, the queen obtained permission to use an institutional framework pre-dating the Urbanist rule, in this instance the one approved by Innocent iv in 124769. While the other royal widows discussed in this paper seem, to various degrees and with various emphases, to have followed a model of royal widowhood at the threshold between royal court and Clarissan cloister, perhaps referencing their ancestor and soror in seculo70, Elizabeth of Hungary, the iconography of Queen Sancia’s tomb sarcophagus visualises her as an “exception to the rule”, and as a royal widow shaping the last stage of her life more closely aligned to traditional monastic ideals71. Sancia of Majorca conceived of both Santa Croce di Palazzo and Corpus Christi in Naples as dual foundations and gained papal permission to found small convents of Franciscan friars alongside her Clarissan communities, who not only took care of the cura animarum for the sisters, but in the shared church space assumed the priestly duties for the liturgical memory of the Angevin family. The queen herself wrote a set of ordinationes for Corpus Christi in 1321, which not only laid out the economic and administrative framework for her foundation, but also carefully detailed the sisters’ and friars’ respective duties, thus ensuring the foundation’s resilience both from an economic and a liturgical point of view72. Since Agnes of Bohemia’s first royal foundation in Prague, such dual arrangements, with small

communities of friars dwelling alongside the sisters, seems to have been characteristic of many, often royal, female Franciscan foundations, especially in Central Europe73. Thus, Agnes of Austria’s foundation of Königsfelden was also set up as a dual house with communities of sisters and friars from the beginning, and alongside accommodations for secular clergy a Conventet of friars was built next to Elisenda de Montcada’s monastery church at Santa Maria de Pedralbes soon after its inception74. In the context of this paper, it is important to note that these two queens also took great care to regulate the symbiotic coexistence of the two communities in the shared monastery church, by issuing documents similar to those of Queen Sancia75. They show, in varying detail, how the royal widows envisioned not only the economic and financial stability of their foundations, but also the division of memorial duties between the friars and the sisters76. At Königsfelden, for example, Queen Agnes had the friars and the sisters alternate the Nocturns; Prime, None, and Compline were performed by the sisters, while Terce, Sext, and Vespers were the responsibility of the friars. The male and female communities also alternated the duties of singing mass, but on certain feast days friars and sisters celebrated together77. 67 Andenna, ‘‘Francescanesimo di corte” (n. 3), pp. 168 –180. 68 Eadem, “Sancia, Queen of Naples” (n. 4), pp. 123–124; see also Mario Gaglione, “Francescanesimo femminile a Napoli: dagli statuti per il monastero di Santa Chiara (1321) all’adozione della prima regola per Santa Croce di Palazzo”,  Frate Francesco n.s., lxxix (2013), pp. 29 – 95. A helpful introduction to the complex regulatory framework for female Franciscans is Bert Roest, “Rules, Customs, and Constitutions within the Medieval Order of Poor Clares”,  in Consuetudines et Regulae: Sources for Monastic Life in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period, Carolyn Marino Malone, Clark Maines eds, Turnhout 2014, pp. 305–330. 69 Andenna, ‘‘Francescanesimo di corte” (n. 3), pp. 160 –161. 70 The expression is reported as having been used by Elizabeth in the so-called Dicta, testimonies given by Elizabeth’s four handmaidens, which began to circulate shortly after her canonization in 1235; see Albert Huyskens, Der sog. Libellus de dictis quatuor ancillarum s. Elisabeth confectus: Mit Benutzung aller bekannten Handschriften zum ersten Male vollständig und mit kritischer Einführung herausgegeben und erläutert, Kempten/Munich 1911, p. 135. 71 See Andenna,“Sancia, Queen of Naples”(n. 4), with plenty of evidence that this queen’s interests also combined a variety of secular and religious concerns. 72 For a detailed analysis of the ordinationes, see Mario Gaglione, “Dai primordi del francescanesimo femminile a Napoli fino agli statuti per il monastero di S. Chiara”,  in La chiesa e il convento (n. 5), pp. 27–128, sp. pp. 59 – 84.

73 For the Prague foundation, see Helena Soukupová, Anežský klášter v Praze, Prague 2011. Other dual foundations, some of them non-royal, were for example Brixen/Bressanone, Óbuda/Altofen, Zawichost, Breslau/Wrozlaw, Eger/Cheb, Krumau/Český Krumlov, and Znaim/Znojmo; see Roest, Order and Disorder (n. 2), pp. 73, 87, 147, 149. These houses are often described as double monasteries, a sometimes misleading label with misconceptions regarding labour division, the common use of space, and the balance between male and female communities; see now Alison I. Beach, Andra Juganaru, “The Double Monastery as an Historiographical Problem”,  in Cambridge History of Medieval Monasticism in the Latin West, Alison I. Beach, Isabelle Cochelin eds, Cambridge 2020, pp. 561–578. The phenomenon deserves further study specifically for Mendicant contexts. 74 Kurmann-Schwarz, Die mittelalterlichen Glasmalereien (n. 20), pp. 27–31; Castellano i Tresserra, Pedralbes a l’edat mitjana (n. 56), pp. 174–180; eadem, “Los franciscanos del ‘conventet’ de Pedralbes (Barcelona)”,  in Los Franciscanos Conventuales en España : actas del ii Congreso Internacional sobre el franciscanismo en la península ibérica. Barcelona, 30 de marzo – 1 de abril de 2005, Barcelona 2006, pp. 149 –158. For an important discussion of possible Benedictine dual houses as predecessors to Königsfelden, see Sabine Sommerer, “Sub uno tecto? Überlegungen zu den Doppelklosteranlagen von Engelberg, Interlaken und Königsfelden”,  in Ordo et

paupertas: českokrumlovský klášter minoritů a klarisek ve středověku v kontextu řádové zbožnosti, kultury a umění, Daniela Rywiková, Roman Lavička eds, Ostrava 2017, pp. 27–42. 75 Agnes of Austria’s Gottesdienstordnung of 1332 was edited, alongside other documents of a similar nature, in Hermann von Liebenau, “Urkundliche Nachweise zu der Lebensgeschichte der verwittw. Königin Agnes von Ungarn 1280 –1364”,  Argovia, v (1866), pp. 1–192, sp. pp. 56 –57. For Queen Elisenda de Montcada’s various ordinationes, first issued in 1327 and modified in 1334, 1341 and again in 1345, see Castellano i Tresserra, Pedralbes a l’edat mitjana (n. 56), pp. 52– 77. 76 For Königsfelden, the symbiotic liturgical relationship between the two communities and the shared church space has been analysed in detail in Brigitte Kurmann-Schwarz, “‘... ein vrowen chloster sande Chlaren orden und ein chloster der minneren Bru(e)der orden...’ - Die beiden Konvente in Königsfelden und ihre gemeinsame Nutzung der Kirche”,  in Glas. Malerei. Forschung. Internationale Studien zu Ehren von Rüdiger Becksmann, Hartmut Scholz, Ivo Rauch, Daniel Hess eds, Berlin 2004, pp. 151–164; eadem, Die mittelalterlichen Glasmalereien (n. 20), pp. 66 – 70; see also, with differing conclusions, Jäggi, “Liturgie und Raum” (n. 10). 77 Hermann von Liebenau, “Urkundliche Nachweise” (n. 75), sp. pp. 56 –57; Kurmann-Schwarz, “‘...ein vrowen chloster“ (n. 76), p. 161.

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Perhaps even more interesting are the ordinationes Queen Elisenda issued for Pedralbes in 1345. In them she prescribes how the friars and sisters shall assemble on their respective sides of her tomb to celebrate her anniversary mass, offering a rare insight into the ways the spatial disposition of double-sided tombs played out in memorial contexts78. While these examples show that each of the royal women at the centre of this study devised certain individual solutions for her Clarissan foundation, comparing them as a group has brought to light a number of common features and patterns. Intensifying the relationship with their Clarissan foundations when widowhood was imminent, or already a lived reality, the queens shaped their identities at the threshold between the court and the cloister. This threshold position was frequently reflected in the placement of their tombs within the monastery church, while the tomb monuments themselves focused, with various emphases, on dynastic representation, family memory, virtuous widowhood and Franciscan affiliation. Mary of Hungary, Elizabeth of Gorizia-­Tyrol, Agnes of Austria, Isabel of Aragon and Elisenda  de Montcada all staged their lives as royal widows

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in close proximity to the monasteries they had founded, while residing as lay women in palaces close to their foundations, sometimes in emulation of projects previously undertaken by female ancestors such as St Elizabeth of Hungary. In this respect only Sancia of Majorca, who professed as a nun and also in other aspects aligned herself more closely to St Clare of Assisi, emerges clearly as an exception. The survey offered here thus demonstrates that, alongside detailed regional studies, broad trans-regional approaches to these foundations not only enhance our understanding of wider patronage patterns for the ordo sanctae Clarae in late medieval Europe from an art historical point of view, but also help in sharpening the individual patronage profile of these Clarissan monasteries and the royal widows who founded them. 78 “Apres los dies de la dita senyora reyna per aytal dia com ella passara d’aquesta vida, faran lo dit aniversari les dites dones e la absolucio sobre la sepultura de la dita senyora reyna, vinent del cor per la clausura processionalment, e cantant los dits responses, segons que damunt es dit. E los frares e los clergues vendran a la dita sepultura dins per la Esgleya.”Anna Castellano i Tresserra, Origen i formació d’un monestir femení: Pedralbes al segle, xiv (1327–1411), PhD thesis, (University of Barcelona, super­visor: José Enrique Ruíz-Domènec), 1996, pp. 798 – 799.

summary Za hranicemi Neapole Královské vdovy ve čtrnáctém století a jejich zakázky pro řád klarisek v transregionální perspektivě

Od třináctého století zakládaly královské rodiny po celé Evropě františkánské kláštery a navazovaly vztahy s františkánskými rádci a zpovědníky. S tímto „francescanesimo di corte“ byly úzce spojeny především ženy z těchto rodin, které sponzorovaly františkánské komunity, vstupovaly do ženského františkánského ordo sanctae Clarae a aktivně utvářely novou formu dynastické svatosti prodchnuté františkánskou minoritas. Anjouovské královny Marie Uherská a Sancia z Mallorky a jejich františkánské fundace Santa Maria Donnaregina, Corpus Christi (Santa Chiara) a Santa Croce di Palazzo v Neapoli jsou v rámci tohoto vyprávění důležitými a dobře prostudovanými příklady. Tyto dvě ženy z královského rodu sehrály zásadní roli při zajištění ekonomické a institucionální stability svých fundací, ale nechaly také nově postavit klášterní kostely bohatě vyzdobené některými z nejslavnějších umělců své doby, a nakonec se rozhodly, že budou ve svých fundacích i pohřbeny. V kontextu italských dějin umění byly tyto anjouvské stavby dlouho vnímány jako anomálie v jinak proměnlivé ženské klášterní krajině. Nedávné posuny v geografickém zaměření však ukázaly, že jsou součástí mnohem širší sítě královského ženského mecenášství pro ordo sanctae 

Clarae a že ženy z královských rodů v jiných čás­tech Evropy – mnohé z nich vdovy – realizovaly podobné projekty ve stejně ambiciózním měřítku. Předkládaný článek zasazuje neapolské kostely do tohoto nadregionálního kontextu a porovnává některé jejich rysy s prvky klášterních kostelů z Königsfeldenu ve Windischi, Santa-Clara-e-Isabel v Coimbře a Santa Maria de Pedralbes v Barceloně. Tyto fundace vděčí za svůj vznik mecenášství Alžběty Goricko-Tyrolské, Anežky Rakouské, Isabely Aragonské a Elisendy de Montcada – královských žen, které také zintenzivnily své vztahy se svými klariskými fundacemi, když se blížilo (nebo již bylo žitou realitou) jejich ovdovění. Toto srovnání, zaměřené na hrobky královen jako nositele dynastické reprezentace, liturgické paměti a v různé míře i individuální biografie, ukazuje, že všechny tyto královské vdovy utvářely svou identitu na pomezí dvora a řádu klarisek a poslední etapu svého života modelovaly podle svatých vzorů, jako byla Alžběta Uherská nebo v případě Sancie Mallorské Klára z Assisi. Článek tedy ukazuje, že podobnosti a rozdíly vyplývající z takového komparativního přístupu nejen zlepšují naše chápání širších souvislostí, ale také vyostřují profil každé konkrétní královské fundace konventu klarisek i jeho královny zakladatelky.

Abstract – Seeing Double in Odivelas. Nuns and Monks at the Monastery of St Dinis, a Royal Pantheon in Late Medieval Portugal The Monastery of St Dinis was founded at Odivelas (Lisbon) in 1295 by King Dinis of Portugal with his consort, Queen Isabel of Aragon, and entrusted to the female branch of the Cistercian Order. In 1318, when the founder-benefactor couple decided they would be buried in the monastery’s church, the abbey became the royal family’s pantheon. In the same year, King Dinis instituted a chaplaincy comprising five monks who were to celebrate five daily masses for his soul, even whilst the king still lived, as well as for the souls of his relatives. The small male community was housed in a hospice built opposite the nunnery. Although the two communities were independent institutions, their proximity and the fact that both were patronized by the monarch combined to make them de facto a double-convent. In addition to the evidence and memory of this unusual arrangement inferred from archival sources, the iconographic program displayed on King Dinis’s imposing sarcophagus presents a further, intriguing testimony. Keywords – Cistercians, double-monastery, enclosure, history of late medieval Portugal, iconography, monastic architecture, tomb monument Giulia Rossi Vairo Nova University of Lisbon [email protected]

Seeing Double in Odivelas Nuns and Monks at the Monastery of St Dinis, a Royal Pantheon in Late Medieval Portugal Giulia Rossi Vairo

Following the Concordat of the Forty Articles, which re-established peace between the Portuguese Monarchy, the Apostolic See, and the Lusitanian Church1, King Dinis of Portugal, together with his queen-consort Isabel of Aragon, decided to found a Cistercian monastery at Odivelas, about 10 km north of Lisbon, in 12942. The abbey was dedicated to the Virgin Mary and named after the martyr-bishop St Denis, the monarch’s patron saint, and also

1

António D. da Sousa Costa, “As concordatas portuguesas”,  Itinerarium, xii/51 (1966), pp. 24–46; Maria A. Fernandes Marques, O Papado e Portugal no tempo de D. Afonso iii, unpublished PhD Thesis, (University of Coimbra, supervisor: Avelino de Jesus da Costa), Coimbra 1990. 2 On the foundation process, see Herminia Vilar, Maria João Branco, “A fundação do Mosteiro de Odivelas”,  in Actas del Congreso Internacional sobre San Bernardo e el Cister en Galicia y Portugal, Ourense 1992, vol. i, pp. 589 – 602; Giulia Rossi Vairo, “As origens do mosteiro de S. Dinis e S. Bernardo de Odivelas: contributos e novas propostas para uma revisão do tema”,  in Os territórios de Lisboa medieval, João Luís Fontes, Luís Filipe Oliveira eds, Lisbon 2022 (forthcoming).

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after St Bernard of Clairvaux [Fig. 1]. The house was entrusted to the female branch of the Cistercians and placed under the tutelage of Santa Maria of Alcobaça, the Order’s motherhouse in the kingdom. The abbot of Alcobaça, fully aware of the royal project and its supporter from the outset, played a crucial role in the foundation process by championing the king’s petition for the new foundation at the annual Cistercian General Chapter in Citeaux in September 12943. Having obtained the Chapter’s approval, he was entrusted with the cura monialium of the convent. The abbey of St Dinis and St Bernardo was the last Cistercian nunnery to be founded in Portugal4, and the only Cistercian house to be established in the environs of Lisbon, which was at the time on its way to becoming the caput regni5. King Dinis’s monumental plan for the new monastery

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According to the foundation charter and endowment of the monastery, dated 27 February 1295, the building was conceived for the salvation of the king’s soul – pro remedio animae – and for the benefit of the souls of his relatives, especially Dinis’s father, Afonso iii6. Furthermore, it was apparently a truly family affair, given the involvement of the royal spouse Queen Isabel7 and the presence of the couple’s children at the solemn ceremony to lay the foundation stone. Considering that the new foundation was intended to resonate in terms of the prestige and glory it would secure for King Dinis in posterity, it can also be understood as a “political act”, especially since the venture, from the outset, had the support of the most power­f ul forces in the kingdom. Indeed, the first two substantial donations to the religious community at Odivelas, both dated 23 March 1295 and constituting the core assets of the nunnery, were supported by various members of the royal court and, importantly, by the entirety of the Portuguese episcopate8. This specific circumstance is a clear indication that the abbey’s venture was the result of an ideal convergence of interests and shared intentions that brought the Crown, the Lusitanian Church, and the Cistercian Order together in close union9.

At the king’s request, the monastery was to be subject to a rigorous enclosure10. Reading the text of the foundation charter, one might detect some foreshadowing of the contents of the papal decretal Periculoso issued by Pope Boniface viii some four years later11. In addition, the charter specifies that between the choir and the main altar there should be a doorway with a wooden shutter facing the choir on one side and, on the other side, a grill with stout, pointed spikes protruding towards the nave. The wooden shutter was to be opened only at the moment of the elevation of the host during the mass and for the sisters’ conversing with their relatives, with the nuns remaining behind the shutter, under the supervision of their abbess. The nuns were also allowed access to the church when they were to receive the Holy Communion, or when they went to the cemetery12. Currently, very little remains of the old church with its three naves and of the fourteenth-­century convent, due to various earthquakes and successive building programmes over the centuries designed to embellish or extend the complex, or to repair collapses and general deterioration. The only remnants of the medieval compound are the gothic portal, soberly decorated with capitals sculpted with plant motifs, the apse, the main chapel and the two lateral apse chapels, an external building sharing one wall with the church and communicating with the temple through a small doorway, one wing of the older of the two cloisters (the Claustro Novo, otherwise known as the Claustro de D. Dinis) with a few of the original capitals remaining, and the plan of the chapter house. Thus, the abbey complex is now bereft of much of its original configuration, displaying hybrid architecture on the outside and predominantly late-baroque decoration on the interior. Despite these losses, the monastic compound retains the undeniable majesty of its impressive size [Figs 2–3] 3

Reading the minutes of the General Chapter of 1294, we do not find any echo of the approval granted by the Order for the foundation of the nunnery of Odivelas. However, it is certain that the royal project was discussed during the assembly, the fact that is confirmed in a letter from Abbot General Robert, who praised the king’s purpose and the actions undertaken by the abbot of Alcobaça, speaking out on behalf of the monarch: Apud Cistercium tempore Capituli Generalis, Anno Domini 1294: Lisbon, Arquivo Nacional da

4

5 6

7

8 9

10

11 12

Torre do Tombo (antt), Ordem de Cister, Mosteiro de Santa Maria de Alcobaça 1a incorporação, Documentos particulares, maço 19, doc. 53, published in Francisco Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana. Parte Quinta, Lisbon 1976, pp. 327–328. Luís Rêpas, “Os mosteiros cistercienses femininos em Portugal: a herança medieval. Fundações e fundadores”,  in Fundadores, fundaciones y espacios de vida conventual: nuevas aportaciones al monacato feminino. Congreso Internacional del Monacato Feminino en España, Portugal y America 1492–1992, Maria I. Viforcos Marinas, Maria D. Campos Sanchez-Barbosa coord., León 2005, pp. 51–78. Adelaide Millán da Costa, “Le discours politique de la caput regni portugaise (xive–xve siècles)”,  Histoire Urbaine, xlvi/2 (2016), pp. 157–175. Monastery of Odivelas, 27 February 1295: antt, Colecção das Gavetas, Gaveta 1, maço 2, doc. 14, published in António C. de Sousa, Provas da História Genealógica da Casa Real Portuguesa, Coimbra 1947, vol. ii, pp. 133–140. Traditionally associated with the Order of the Poor Clares, Isabel of Aragon, Queen consort of Portugal, canonized in 1625 and also known as Saint Elisabeth of Portugal, was closely linked to the Cistercian universe and spirituality until maturity: Giulia Rossi Vairo, “Isabel of Aragon and the Cistercian Order in Portugal”,  in Portuguese and International Orders and Congregations – A Contemporary Approach, José E. Franco, Luís Abreu eds, Lisbon 2018, pp. 346 –376 and eadem, “Isabel di Aragona, regina consorte di Portogallo (c. 1270 –1336): Potere, ambizione e limiti di una sovrana medievale”,  Reti Medievali Rivista, xxi/2 (2020), pp. 147–179. Lisbon, 23 March 1295: antt, Livro 3 da Estremadura, ff. 145v–146r and 146r–147v. On the historical context and background of the foundation, the origins of the monastery, and the provenance of the first community of Odivelas, see Rossi Vairo, “As origens do mosteiro” (n. 2). Sousa, Provas da História Genealógica (n. 6), pp. 134–135: Verum quia ex occasione vagandi extra proprias domos discurrendi consueverunt Dominabus prefati Ordinis multa pericula, et infamia provenire, idem Dominus rex affectans super haec salubriter provideri, voluit, statuit et ordinavit de consensu et auctoritate nostra, et Capituli Ulixbonensis et de consensu ipsius Abbatissae et Dominarum eiusdem Monasterii, Abbate de Alcobatia haec penitus approbante, quod nec Abbatissa, nec Dominae ipsius Monasterii ultra ambitum dicti Monasterii aliquatenus exeant, sed interclusae degant […]. Nulli ergo hominum liceat claustrum nec officinas eiusdem monasterii ingredi. Elizabeth Makowski, Canon Law and Cloistered Women: Periculoso and Its Commentators 1298–1545, Washington d.c. 1997. Sousa, Provas da História Genealógica (n. 6), pp. 135–136: Intra chorum vero et altare debet esse unum portale habens duo paria ostiorum, quorum quaedam debent esse integra, alia vero de gradizela, et haec omnia ostia debent esse lignea bona et fortia, ostia vero integra sint versus chorum, caetera vero de gradizela usque altare respiciant, et sint bene clausa; eorum vero ostiorum, quae chorum respiciunt, Monachus sacrista semper clavem teneat, reliquum ostium, quod usque chorum est, habeat clavos densos et acutos versus altare conversos. et sit bene clausum, claves vero eiusdem ostii conservet Monacha sacrista, et qaelibet praedictorum ostiorum continue sint clausa, excepto tamen quod integra ostia debent aperiri in elevatione corporis Christi, vel quando aliqua Monacha voluerit cum aliquo colloqui, quod nulli Monachorum liceat, nisi de licentia propriae Abbatissae: cum vero colloquium huiusmodi fieri contigerit, sit inter Dominas et ostia gradizelae inter medium mandile. Non negamus tamen eisdem Dominabus qui veniant ad Ecclesiam cum necesse fuerit ad sanctam Communionem recipiendam, et ad cimiterium ad sepeliendum Dominas eiusdem domus secundum Ordinis instituta.

1 / Church of St Dinis at Odivelas, apse (detail)

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The medieval fabrica

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The chosen spot for the nunnery of Odivelas was an area of sparsely populated land, partly cultivated, fertile, and well-irrigated, belonging to the king. Identified by the toponym Vale das Flores (Valley of the Flowers), here Dinis had possessed a câmara de morada (residence) along with a chapel, as mentioned in the foundation charter. This provided a temporary dwelling for the first community of nuns to settle at Odivelas while they awaited the construction of their church and convent13. The Crónica de D. Dinis, produced by the royal chronicler Rui de Pina at the end of the fifteenth century, states that the building of the monastery took ten years14. Accordingly, we are meant to understand that the fabrica, begun soon after February 1295, was completed in about 1305. Yet it is apparent that only some parts of the monastic complex were ready at this time, since archival sources indicate that the construction of annexes, dependencies, and various enhancements would continue for at least another two decades. Thus, on 14 July 1306, while the building was still in progress, with the consent of the abbess

of Odivelas and the bishop of Lisbon, Dinis and the abbot of Alcobaça modified the 1295 statutes (ordenações) of the convent in order to mollify their excessive rigor15. The document specifies that the locutory be placed inside the temple between the choir and the main altar, and that there was to be only a single door for the entire monastery, that is, the door to the church16. No one was to have access, save for confessors, the physician in case of sickness among the nuns, and workers admitted to build houses and other structures or to carry out repairs. In the latter case, architects (mestres), carpenters (carpinteiros), and masons (obreiros) were to be always accompanied by a monk of the monastery. In addition, the diploma listed the prerogatives of the royal couple and prince in the convent. Importantly, the queen-consort, who had appeared in the foundation charter merely as a subscriber, was now bestowed with the same privileges as her husband. These included the right of entry into the forbidden enclosure, accompanied by up to two honest persons. It was also established that nuns could leave the house

in case of serious illness, but only if authorized by the king and queen. From the contents of the document, it is clear that the fabrica was still ongoing at the time of its drafting. A few months later, in September 1306, the king granted his protection to the abbess and convent of Odivelas, its lands, livestock, and workers, further strengthening his links with the institution17. Meanwhile, apostolic letters issued by Pope Clement v, one in 1308 and two in 1312, whereby the pontiff granted indulgences to the faithful who visited the church for specific feasts18, testify not only to the prestige Odivelas had attained by this time, but also to the papal willingness to subsidise building campaigns by attracting alms dutifully bestowed on the abbey by visiting pilgrims, anxious for the forgiveness of their sins. In 1318, with the principal phase of building completed, King Dinis and Queen Isabel expressed their desire to be buried in the Church of St Dinis and St Bernardo, on account of their “special devotion” to the convent. Although we learn of this in a letter written by Pope John xxii

on 27 February 131919, the royal couple’s decision was likely made during the second half of 131820. In thus binding their earthly remains and their memory to Odivelas, they automatically transformed the nunnery into a royal family pantheon, the first to be established ex nihilo 13 Sousa, Provas da História Genealógica (n. 6), pp. 136 –137: Dominus Rex […] primo dedit, contulit et assignavit capellam, domos et aedificia sua in quibus est Monasterium praedictum institutum. 14 Rui de Pina, Crónica de D. Dinis (segundo o Códice inédito n. 891 da Biblioteca Municipal do Porto seguida da versão actualizada da Edição Ferreiriana de 1726), Porto 1945, p. 155. 15 Near Lisbon, 14 July 1306: antt, Ordem de Cister, Mosteiro de Santa Maria de Alcobaça, Documentos régios, maço 3, doc. 11. 16 Ibidem, f. 161v: O parlatório das mongas será facto em na egreia antre o coro e o altar e nom em outro lugar […] E pera se cavidarem muitos perigos que aqueeceo de vir aos mosteiros pela multidom das portas, queremos ordenamos et estabelecemos que se nom faça no dicto moesteiro alguma porta per que entrem ou saiam no dicto moesteiro tirada a porta da egreia. 17 Lisbon, 2 September 1306: antt, Ordem de Cister, Mosteiro de São Dinis de Odivelas, Livro 1, doc. 40. 18 Poitiers, 28 April 1308 and Priorate of Grouseau, 15 July 1312: Vatican City, Vatican Apostolic Archive (vaa), Regesta Vaticana, 55, ep. 394, f. 74v, 59, ep. 470, f. 98r– 98v, ep. 471, f. 98v. 19 Avignon, 27 February 1319: vaa, Regesta Vaticana, 69, ep. 375, f. 119v. 20 See below.

2 / Planta Geral do Convento d’Odivellas, 1897, scale 1:2000, antt, Ministério das Obras Públicas, Comércio e Indústria, mç. 442, proc. 16 3 / General view of the Monastery of St Dinis at Odivelas at present

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in medieval Portugal21. Then Dinis and Isabel abandoned their earlier decision for entombment in the chancel of the abbey church of Alcobaça22 and established their sepultura ecclesiatica in the middle of the temple at Odivelas. A new phase in the life of the monastery began. In May 1318, the royal couple and the prince donated a farmhouse to the convent, the revenues from which were to be applied to meeting the expenses of the sisters’ infirmary23. Importantly there was another reform to the statutes of the community in September 1319. This time, the abbess and nuns of the convent confirmed to the monarch and the abbot of Alcobaça that they would never “put their feet outside the door of the church, or any other door” of the monastery, and not leave it, as required in the original charter of foundation and endowment24. At the same time, they begged for there to be no impediment – “no grill, no wheel nor wall” – preventing their access in procession to the church, for the specific purpose of praying at the king’s tomb. The implication here is that, at this time, there was no real separation between the choir and the main altar, a situation reinforced by a statement from the mother superior that stipulated, in case of visits from relatives, that nuns must speak inside the church under the supervision of the abbess, with no requirement of being behind any grill or in the locutory, suggesting that such features were not in existence at that time25. Furthermore, the nuns requested that some “good women” approved by the abbess be allowed entrance into the enclosure, in addition to members of the royal family26. As the project of transforming Odivelas into a royal pantheon began to take shape, it is likely that, among the various building schemes, plans were afoot to convert Dinis’s câmara de morada and its chapel into a palace. From here, the royal family were afforded convenient access to the cloister in order to join the sorores on specific occasions, or simply to pray alongside them, as the reformed statutes of 1306 and 1319 permitted them to do. It is also known that, after the king passed away, the widowed Isabel spent some months at Odivelas, lodging in “royal houses” located inside the monastic enclosure27. Intriguingly in this respect, photographic evidence shows that, until the first

half of the twentieth century, there was a ruined building in situ [Fig. 4]. This edifice was located alongside the north corridor of the Claustro da Moira, the second cloister of the complex built in the seventeenth century. The fabrica of St Dinis and St Bernardo continued for several years after the king’s death on 7 January 1325. As late as November 1324, Dinis donated another farmhouse with land to the convent to cover the expenses of refashioning and adorning the altars of the church, and to provide for necessary liturgical furnishings and vestments28. Moreover, the Alcobacencian chronicler Francisco Brandão recalls an instrument from 1324 he inspected in the archive of Lisbon Cathedral, where a certain Afonso Martins, described as mestre da obra de Odivelas (architect of Odivelas), appears as a witness – a further strong indication that construction was still in progress at the time29. The institution of the chaplaincies of King Dinis at Odivelas As mentioned earlier, while John xxii’s letter dated February 1319 states the royal couple’s decision to be buried in the abbey church of St Dinis and St Bernardo, it is likely King Dinis had made that resolution in the preceding year. With a document dated 1 October 1318, the king donated to the abbess and convent of Odivelas goods and lands, the revenue from which to be applied to the maintenance costs of five chaplains. The clerics were to celebrate five masses every day and recite the canonical hours and the Office for the Dead daily next to the king’s tomb for the souls of the late Afonso iii, for Dinis himself, although he was still alive, and for all the members of the royal family buried in the church. The charter exists in two versions, both kept in the Portuguese National Archive, one from the royal chancellery30, the other from the fundo of Alcobaça31 – copies are also contained in the publica forma in the cartulary of Odivelas32. The Alcobaça version, differing slightly in several respects, is more extensive. The document of the royal chancellery is substantially shorter and personally addressed to the abbess and convent of Odivelas. In essence, it underscores the role of the abbess

in the maintenance and supervision of the five chaplains. In fact, although the abbot of Alcobaça oversaw the officium corretionis for both religious communities, the abbess was tasked with watching over the conduct of the chaplains. She was also to provide them with good beds, clothes, and food, in addition to twenty libras for their annual salary. Differing in its emphasis, the Alcobaça version highlights the substantial autonomy of the small male community. Although they were expected to share the same place of worship – the abbey church –, the monks and nuns were to live in separate buildings. In order to administer the Eucharist, the five chaplains, all required to be ordained priests from Alcobaça, also had to be honest, of good reputation, and elderly (!). They were strictly forbidden access to the convent and barred from speaking to, or having any contact with, the sisters. Nevertheless, with the abbess’s permission, they could confess them. Otherwise, they were to have no other duties, save for those entrusted to them by the king, with no further responsibilities vis-à-vis the nuns. 21 On the Monastery of St Dinis and St Bernardo, the first royal pantheon of medieval Portugal, see Giulia Rossi Vairo, D. Dinis del Portogallo e Isabel d’Aragona in vita e in morte. Creazione e trasmissione della memoria nel contesto storico e artistico europeo, unpublished PhD thesis, (University of Lisbon, supervisor: José Custódio Vieira da Silva), Lisbon 2014, pp. 135–214, resumed in eadem, “O Mosteiro de S. Dinis e S. Bernardo de Odivelas, primeiro panteão régio no reino de Portugal medievo”,  in Portugal. Uma Retrospectiva. 1290, vol. xx, Rui Tavares dir., Lisbon 2019, pp. 84– 98. 22 In their first wills, both the king and the queen expressed their wish to be buried together in the abbey church of Alcobaça. Specifically, King Dinis stipulated the main chapel as locus sepulcralis, explicitly mentioning the presence of his wife (8 April 1299), but Queen Isabel was more specific, indicating the place under the steps of the main altar for the couple’s burial place (19 April 1314). For the first will of King Dinis, see Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana. Parte Quinta (n. 3), pp. 329 –331; for the first will of Queen Isabel, see Sousa, Provas da História Genealógica (n. 6), pp. 144–147. 23 Torres Vedras, 4 May 1318: antt, Chancelaria de D. Dinis, Livro 3, ff. 118v–119r. 24 Monastery of Odivelas, 6 September 1319: antt, Colecção das Gavetas, Gaveta 1, maço 1, doc. 10: E pedimos por merçee do muy nobre senhor don Denis pela graça de Deus Rey de Portugal e do Algarve que ffondou e dotou este Moesteiro por amor de Deus e por sua alma et do abbade de Alcobaça que he nosso visitador que eles nem os que depos eles veerem que […] nunca nos ponham grade, nem roda, nem outro mayor enssarramento de parede, nem de madeyra, nem doutra cousa por que leyxemos dir aa egreia hu a destar o moimento do dito Senhor rey para ffazermos sobre el nossas oracçoes e rogar Deus por el. Comparing the 1306 statutes, it appears that, in 1319, the door of the church was not the only entrance to the entire monastery, as had previously been the case.

25 Ibidem: e prometemos que non ayamos ffala na egreia, nem en outro logar do moesteiro com nenhuum homem, salvo quando nos ouvermos de confessar ou de ffazer as outras cousas que non podemos scusar ou sse quisermos ffalar com alguuns nossos parentes ou outros que ffalemos na egreia per leçença da nossa abadessa, stando ela hi deante, ou duas ou tres donas quaes ela hi enviar para esto e que de outra guisa nao ffalemos com nenhuma pessoa segral ou de religiom de qualquer stado e condiçom que seia senon como dito he. 26 Ibidem: outrossi prometemos de non leyxar entrar homem nenhum nem molher no moesteiro dentro hu nos vivemos, salvo as sergentes e algumas bonas donas quaes a abadessa vir que som para entrar dentro. 27 Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana. Parte Sexta, Imprensa Nacional-Casa da Moeda, Lisboa 1980, p. 488: Depois de sepultado ElRey e officiadas suas exequias […] a Santa Rainha que era principal testamenteira se deixou ficar em Odivellas nas casas Reaes, que ainda se conservão dentro do Mosteiro, fazendo dar cumprimento ao testamento e legados d’elRey seu marido […] Aqui se deteve quasi até o mez de Mayo. The royal palace was still described as having four floors in 1898, and was demolished only in the 1940s. 28 Santarém, 24 November 1324: antt, Chancelaria de D. Dinis, Livro 3, f. 161r–161v. 29 Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana (n. 3), p. 224. 30 Frielas, 1 October 1318: antt, Chancelaria de D. Dinis, Livro 3, f. 125r–125v. 31 Frielas, 1 October 1318: antt, Ordem de Cister, Mosteiro de Santa Maria de Alcobaça, 1a incorporação, Documentos particulares, maço 27, doc. 1. 32 Frielas, 1 October 1318 (transumpt dated Lisbon, 15 July 1678): antt, Ordem de Cister, Mosteiro de São Dinis de Odivelas, Livro 3, ff. 165r–171r.

4 / Ruins of the royal palace, Odivelas, first half of 20th century

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In September 1319, aware of the onerous costs of maintaining both nuns and monks at Odivelas, the king exempted the monastery from the legislation that prohibited religious houses and orders from buying and inheriting land and assets for a ten-year period33. A few years later, in his last will, dated 31  December 1324, drafted just seven days before his death, King Dinis confirmed his benevolence and protection not only to the nunnery, but also expressly to the male community34. He bequeathed 4000 libras to the monastery of St Dinis and St Bernardo to buy land and properties: 3000 was to be allocated to the nuns, while 1000 was reserved for the monks. Additionally, the monarch established yet another chaplaincy at Odivelas, ordering the construction of a new chapel in the monastery in honor of St Louis, bishop of Toulouse, canonized in 1317. This was meant to be served by two chaplains, who were to celebrate sung masses for the salvation of king’s soul. For the building of the chapel, the purchase of the associated vestments and ornaments, and also

for the maintenance of its chaplains, King Dinis allocated the extraordinary sum of 6000 libras35. Research carried out in recent years has enabled me to identify the St Louis chapel with the external building (mentioned earlier) next to the entrance of the temple, which shares one wall with the church [Fig. 5], on account of its appearance, construction features, and masonry techniques, which are similar to those of the apse dating from the late 1290s [Fig. 6]. The small chapel is equipped with a separate doorway [Fig. 7] and communicates with the chapel of the Gospel inside the church through an opening on its north wall. Later, in 1325, it is clear that a new building program began, and that the male community at Odivelas welcomed two more chaplains, just as the king had stipulated in the documents of 1318. A double-monastery sui generis The chaplains had to lodge at Odivelas, in what has now been identified as the Hospício do Reguengo de Odivelas, but which in modern sources

5 / St Louis Chapel (?), Church of St Dinis at Odivelas, external view 6 / Church of St Dinis at Odivelas, plant of the church and the portico, s.d., scale 1:100, 87 × 73 cm. Ministério das Obras Públicas – Direcção Geral dos Edifícios e Monumentos Nacionais.

from the seventeenth century onwards has been referred to as the Mosteiro de São Dinis or Hospício de S. Dinis de Odivelas36. It is impossible to say whether the câmara de morada, with its private chapel, which received the first nuns, had also been used by the monks starting from 1318. More likely, perhaps, is that the primitive residence was transformed into a palace, as mentioned earlier, to accommodate sojourning members of the royal family. However, currently, we find what is still known today as the “chaplain’s house” or “prior’s house” on the forecourt in front of the church portico. Although this is a seventeenth-century building, it is reasonable to suppose it occupies the site where the chaplains’ hospice once stood, built at the behest of King Dinis following the institution of his chaplaincy. It was located at the “correct distance” from the convent, and it allowed for an entrance to the church that was separated from the nuns’ entrance [Fig. 8]. This small monastery, which in fact can hardly be called a “monastery”, since it did not reach the minimum number of brethren necessary to constitute a Cistercian community, at least not at 

the time of its foundation, suffered the same fate as the other great religious institutions of the kingdom and was outlawed by the decree of extinction of male religious orders in 183437. From the inventory compiled on that occasion, we learn that the 33 Lisbon, 9 September 1319: antt, Chancelaria de D. Dinis, Livro 3, f. 127r. 34 Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana (n. 27), pp. 582–589. 35 Ibidem, pp. 585–586: Item tenho por bem et mando que os meus testamenteiros fação fazer no meu Mosteiro de Odivellas huma Capella à honra de S. Luis em que sé o seu orago, et ponhão hi dous Capellaens que cantem em esta Capella pera sempre à honra do dito Santo pela minha alma. E pera se fazer a dita Capella, et se comprarem herdades per que se mantenhão os ditos Capellaens, et outrosi pera vestimentas et ornamentos pera a dita Capella mando seis mil libras. Saint Louis, Franciscan Bishop of Toulouse, was canonized in 1317 by Pope John xxii. He was one of the brothers of Blanche of Anjou, the second wife of Jaime ii of Aragon, brother of Isabel, Queen consort of Portugal. 36 On the modern history of the Hospício de S. Dinis de Odivelas, see the description of the fundo of the Hospício do Reguengo de Odivelas in antt: https://digitarq.arquivos.pt/details? id=1430350. 37 In 1834, by the decree of 30 May, all male convents, monasteries, hospices, and religious houses of all orders were extinguished, leaving the female houses subject to the respective bishops until the death of the last nun: “Extinção das ordens religiosas”,  in Dicionário de História religiosa de Portugal, Carlos Moreira de Azevedo dir., Lisbon 2000, vol. ii, pp. 232–235.

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“monastery” consisted of a chapel, ten cells, a chapter room, a cloister, a refectory, a kitchen, a library, and a garden, and we find that it was headed by an “abbot”38. By the early nineteenth century, the anomaly of this small monastery had become clear. While, on the one hand, the reasons for its foundation indicated it should have been allowed to continue (presumably in perpetuity), on the other hand, account was taken of the scant utility of the institution, in terms of the common good and within the Odivelas community, an aspect that ultimately led to its end. In this regard, in 1834, the abbess of Odivelas was consulted regarding the possibility of keeping the male house in operation. It was without the slightest hesitation that she declared herself in favor of its suppression39. Odivelas is certainly a unicum in the late medieval kingdom of Portugal, especially considering that the male community arose in the wake of the female community. Thus, when contemplating the monastic reality that was experienced there, albeit with a certain caution, it is possible to view it as a sui generis double-monastery40, since it is undeniable that the two institutions lived in a sort of symbiosis. To the extent that the case of Odivelas was unique in Portugal, similar situations were not so rare at that time in Europe, if we think for example of the double-monasteries of Poor Clares of Saint Agnes, Prague (from 1231), of Königsfelden Monastery, Windish (from 1308), and Santa Chiara, Naples (from 1317). Unlike the Odivelas nunnery, all the cases listed are mendicant foundations; nevertheless, they were all royal ventures chosen by their founders and patrons as a burial place. Although economically independent from each other, the nuns and monks of Odivelas shared the most important of monastic facilities, the church. From the choir, the nuns participated in common prayer, processions, and the masses of suffrage for the soul of the founder celebrated by the chaplains. Furthermore, as we have seen, in 1319, almost a year after the institution of the chaplaincy and the royal pantheon, the abbess and convent of Odivelas asked the king and the abbot of Alcobaça that there be no impediment to their access in procession to the church, specifically in order to pray at the king’s tomb41. Four days later, Dinis responded to the nuns’ petition in the affir­mative42.

This circumstance suggests that nuns and monks still had no physical contact or conversation with each other, but visual contact was no longer forbidden, as it had been initially, under the terms of Dinis’s foundation charter43. Just as the two religious communities of Odivelas were established at the behest of their king, they would likewise owe their continued existence, subsistence, and survival to him, following the collapse of the royal pantheon project due to the civil war that swept through the kingdom from 1319 to 132444. At the end of the first phase of hostilities (May 1322), the royal couple decided to separate in death, decreeing their individual entombment in different monasteries, geographically distant from each other, and distinct in observance. This was a completely new phenomenon in Portugal. Queen Isabel chose the monastery of Santa Clara and Santa Isabel at Coimbra, which she had re-founded in 131745. At the outset, the foundation of this nunnery in Coimbra at the queen’s initiative had seemed like a family enterprise, given that it had the initial support of King Dinis46 who generously favored the Mendicant Orders throughout his life, granting his protection especially to the several female convents of the kingdom, most of which belonged to the Poor Clares47. Nevertheless, his Franciscan religiosity and devotion and his progressive inclination towards the Friars Minor notwithstanding48, Dinis confirmed his desire to be buried, alone, at Odivelas49. Therefore, the monastic church of St Dinis and St Bernardo, which had been intended to receive the double funerary monument of the royal spouses50, ended up accommodating only the king’s tomb. 38 Monastery of Odivelas, near the grill of the convent, 3 July 1834: antt, Ministério das Finanças, Direcção-Geral da Fazenda Pública, Hospício de S. Dinis de Odivelas, caixa 2240, inv. n. 286 (without foliation). 39 Ibidem. 40 The phenomenon of double-monasteries in Portugal in the Middle Ages has never been a subject of specific analysis, often being included in the broader framework of studies relating to the Iberian Peninsula. Although double-monasteries were strongly opposed by the Church throughout Christendom, from East to West, from the time of their prohibition at the Second Council of Nicaea (787), it appears they continued to have a certain acceptance in the Hispanic region. Meanwhile, beyond the Pyrenees and in the rest of Europe, they disappeared, awaiting their “rebirth” from the tenth century onwards. See José Orlandis Rovira, “Los monasterios dúplices españoles en la Alta Idade Media”,  Anuário de Historia del Derecho

41 42

43 44

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46

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Español, xxx (1960), pp. 49 – 88; Antonio Linage Conde, “La tardia supervivencia de los monasterios dobles en la Peninsula Ibérica”,   in Doppelklöster und andere Formen der Symbiose männlicher und weiblicher Religiosen im Mittelalter, Kaspar Elm, Michel Parisse eds, Berlin 1992, pp. 81– 95; for the Portuguese case, see also José Mattoso, “Sobrevivência do monaquismo frutuosiano em Portugal durante a Reconquista”,  Bracara Augusta, xx (1968), pp. 42–54, and Geraldo J. A. Coelho Dias, Quando os monges eram uma civilização, Porto 2011, pp. 152–157. See note 23. It is curious that the abbess mentions the wheel among the impediments listed. Lisbon, 10 September 1319: antt, Chancelaria de D. Dinis, Livro 3, f. 127v.: e prometo que nunca lhis ponha nem mande poner grades nem rodas nem fazer mayor enserramento que o que elas prometem de fazer de ssa voontade per que leixem de vinir aa dita eigreia sobrelo meu moymento com dito he. See note 12. José Mattoso, “A guerra civil entre 1319 e 1324”,  in Estudos de História de Portugal. Homenagem a H. de Oliveira Marques. I Sécs. x–xv, Lisbon 1982, pp. 163–175; José Augusto Pizarro, D. Dinis, Lisbon 2005, pp. 237–-258; Bernardo Vasconcelos e Sousa, D. Afonso iv, Lisboa 2009, pp. 39 – 75; Rossi Vairo, D. Dinis del Portogallo (n. 21), pp. 107–134. António Vasconcelos, Evolução do culto de Dona Isabel de Aragão, esposa do rei lavrador Dom Dinis de Portugal (a Rainha Santa), Coimbra 1893– 94, vol. i, pp. 68 –133; Giulia Rossi Vairo, “Isabella d’Aragona, Rainha Santa de Portugal, e il monastero di Santa Clara e Santa Isabel di Coimbra (1286 –1336)”,  Collectanea Franciscana, lxxi/1–2 (2001), pp. 139 –169. A study of archival sources, especially fiscal data, reveals the support and involvement of King Dinis starting from its origins, and at least during the early years of life of the nunnery. Indeed, the monarch created the material conditions for Queen Isabel’s project to be put into action, favouring transactions and authorizing the consort to spend money from the Crown coffers to buy goods and land for the religious house. Two days after the queen publicly stated her intention of founding a monastery of Poor Clares in Coimbra, on 19 May 1316, the king authorized her to buy goods intended for the monastery under construction. In 1318, the monarch placed the abbess and the convent, their goods and properties, under his protection. However, coinciding with the outbreak of the civil war, the sovereign’s support progressively lessened. On the involvement of King Dinis in the foundation process of the Monastery of Santa Clara and Santa Isabel, see Giulia Rossi Vairo, “As pedras falam. O mosteiro de S. Dinis e S. Bernardo de Odivelas e o Mosteiro de Sta. Clara e Sta. Isabel de Coimbra: arquitetura e espiritualidade”,  in Cister. Tomo i – Património e Arte (Colecção: História & Memória 6), José Albuquerque Carreiras et alii eds, Alcobaça 2019, pp. 355–369. Scrutiny of the king’s three wills (1299, 1322, 1324) reveals his special interest in the female world, both religious and lay. Especially notable is the monarch’s constant concern for the conditions of women, be they emparedadas (voluntary enclosed lay women), nuns, maidens without dowries, orphaned girls, or “ashamed women”. Regarding nuns, King Dinis generously endowed all the communities of Augustinian, Benedictine, Cistercian, Poor Clare, Dominican, and Santiaguist nuns. Nevertheless, a certain predilection towards the Cistercian and Poor Clare convents is clear, since all of those in existence in the kingdom at the time are mentioned. My own research in recent years has led me to conclude that Dinis grew progressively closer to the mendicant spiritual universe, an aspect hitherto undiscussed in historiography, which has over­looked the monarch’s association with Franciscan devotion. It appears Dinis was inspired in his spiritual path by members of his family, particularly his father Afonso iii, his sister

7 / Chaplain’s house, Odivelas 8 / Portal of St Louis Chapel (?), on the left, and detail of the Church of St Dinis’s portal, on the right, Odivelas

Leonor Afonso, and his wife Isabel of Aragon, following a trend well in line with the Mediterranean politics of the period. An additional factor encouraging this predilection for Franciscan religiosity is likely to have been the presence of Friars Minor in the royal household serving as confessors, chaplains, and counsellors. For example, the last confessor of Dinis, and the executor of his will, was the Franciscan, Vasco Fernandes. 49 In his last two wills, on 10 June 1322 and 31 December 1324, King Dinis confirms his desire to be buried in the church of Odivelas, but makes no mention of his wife. See Sousa, Provas da História Genealógica (n. 6), pp. 125–132; and Brandão, Monarquia Lusitana (n. 27), p. 582. 50 Giulia Rossi Vairo, “Il progetto monumentale dei re Dinis e Isabel per il monastero di San Dinis e San Bernardo di Odivelas, primo pantheon reale nel Portogallo medievale”,  in Domus sapienter staurata. Scritti di storia dell’arte per Marina Righetti, Anna M. D’Achille, Pio Pistilli, Antonio Iacobini eds, Cinisello Balsamo 2021, pp. 457–467.

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The King Dinis stone monument and the church-mausoleum Carved in the white, ductile and resistant Ançã stone of the Coimbra region, the imposing sarcophagus of King Dinis is composed of a tomb chest decorated on all four sides, surmounted by a lid with recumbent effigy [Fig. 9], and presently resting on six bases51. The mausoleum, which, at the time, was located in the middle of the temple, suffered extensive damage in the earthquake of 1 November 1755, which caused the collapse of the vault of the church. The sepulchre was conceived and built while Dinis was alive, bet­ween the second half of 1318 and November 1324, when, according to sources, it already stood in situ. The name of the master – probably more than one – who sculpted the work is unknown, however it is reasonable to assume the involvement of the artists from the area of Santarém, the hometown of the king, where a thriving local school had emerged, attracting sculptors and masons from all over the country on account of numerous ongoing building projects for churches and monasteries, including the nearby abbey of Santa Maria of Alcobaça. Despite having suffered various and clumsy restoration work starting from the late eigh­teenth–early nineteenth century, the influence of the French model is recognizable in the funerary monument, given its similarities to French funerary sculpture from the second half of the thirteenth and the first half of the fourteenth century, perhaps conveyed by the Portuguese Cistercian motherhouse52. For the creation of the tomb and its iconographic program, the masters followed the instructions of the founder assisted by a religious counsellor, most likely a Cistercian monk. However, the artists in charge were not mere executors. While respecting the instructions received, they provided their own personal contribution to the design and iconographic conception of the work. This can be seen in the general “architecture” of the sarcophagus, the variety of certain iconic motifs, the choice to fill all available spaces, the use of different techniques – from painting to very low relief – and in the method of applying color, of which several vestiges of the original

polychromy are still visible (yellow ochre, red, blue, dark brown, green)53. The sarcophagus features several lacunas, especially at the level of the supports, consisting of historiated plastic groups which, with their allegorical message54, recall the caryatids of the almost coeval Neapolitan Angevin tombs. The recumbent effigy and the figures of the religious visible on the four fronts of the tomb chest are also seriously mutilated and were subject to heavy reconstruction during the nineteenth-century restorations55. Despite this, due to the erudition of its icono­ graphic program, the stone monument of King Dinis must be considered unique in the panoramaof Portuguese Gothic art in the first half of the fourteenth century, and an emblematic work of the fourteenth-century European funerary sculpture. The iconography of the sepulcher transformed into images the memory of himself that the monarch had decided to transmit to posterity, celebrating his potestas, auctoritas, and dignitas, as well as his religiosity and devotion. It also reflected the cultural, religious, spiritual, and material context within which, and for which, the tomb was conceived. In fact, it was designed to be housed in the middle of the empty median nave of the church, between the choir and the main chapel. Thus, if the main altar was the “heart” of the temple, the sarcophagus was its “fulcrum”. The iconographic program, deeply imbued with Cistercian spirituality, was meant to commemorate the king, yet it was also meant to “speak” to the living – to all those who would attend the church to witness its ceremony, partake of its liturgy, and win precious indulgences granted by papal decree – and to those who would gather around the king’s sepulcher to pray for the monarch’s soul and be inspired by contemplating his stone monument. The first addressees and interlocutors were the nuns and monks of Odivelas, individuals readily able to decode the message conveyed by the complex iconography of the sepulcher, a sort of ‘sermon in pictures’ delivered by Bernard of Clairvaux. Here, nuns and monks found themselves united in their common role as privileged intermediaries in a silent dialogue between God and monarch, and as custodians and guardians of the memory of Dinis, who had

entrusted to them the salvation of his soul and the souls of his loved ones. Indeed, observing the sculpted decoration of the tomb chest, we find these very same nuns and monks of Odivelas. On each of the long sides of the sarcophagus, there are four niches. On one side, eight monks are arranged in pairs [Fig. 10], similarly on the other side, these are eight nuns [Fig. 11]. All the religious figures are presented standing, with a hieratic and composed attitude, in stark contrast to the small figures featured elsewhere in the decorative scheme – acrobats, bats, evil creatures, dragons, small heads – appearing as peculiar marginalia. Every monk and nun wears the cowl. The monks are holding books, save for the last pair, which carry a box reliquary; the nuns likewise carry books, the final pair holding up what appears to be an antiphonary: all these figures are an eloquent testimony to the monastic reality experienced at Odivelas. Until relatively recently, I thought the presence of monks on the king’s tomb was an allusion to the link between the convent of Odivelas and the motherhouse of Alcobaça, which had played a key role in the life of the nunnery from its outset. Yet, it seems eminently possible to overlay another reading to this one, an interpretation according to which those images depict and evoke the “double-monastery” of Odivelas, or perhaps it would be better to speak of a “double religious community”. This reading is especially enticing when contemplating the likelihood that the nuns and monks were, in fact, separately deployed 51 The dimensions of the tomb chest are 292 × 137 × 98 cm, those of the six bases are 76/82 x 36 cm. For a description and analysis of King Dinis’s tomb monument, see Giulia Rossi Vairo, “Un caso emblematico (e dimenticato) della scultura funeraria trecentesca europea: il monumento funebre del re Dinis di Portogallo (1279 –1325)”,  Arte Medievale, 4 serie, vii (2017), pp. 167–192. 52 On the influence of French art on the tomb monument of King Dinis, see José Custódio Vieira da Silva,“Memória e Imagem. Reflexões sobre Escultura Tumular Portuguesa (séculos xiii e xiv)”,  Revista de História da Arte, i (2005), pp. 47– 81, sp. p. 60. 53 See Beat Brenk, “Il contributo dell’artista alla concezione progettuale e iconografica”,  in L’artista medievale (Annali della Scuola Normale di Pisa, serie iv, Quaderni 16, Classe di Lettere e Filosofia), Maria Monica Donato ed., Pisa 2003, pp. 79 – 88. 54 For a detailed description and analysis of the bases, see Rossi Vairo, “Un caso emblematico” (n. 51), sp. pp. 176 –183. 55 Eadem, “Ad futuram Regis memoriam. A história conservativa do túmulo do rei D. Dinis: mitos e realidades”,  Conservar Património. Revista da arp – Associação Profissional de Conservadores – Restauradores de Portugal, xxxv (2020), pp. 131–140.

9 / Tomb Effigy of King Dinis, Chapel of the Gospel, Church of St Dinis at Odivelas, ca 1319–1324 10 / Tomb Monument of King Dinis, decoration of the tomb chest, side of the monks, Church of St Dinis at Odivelas, ca 1319–1324 (photo 1949) 11 / Tomb Monument of King Dinis, decoration of the tomb chest, side of the nuns, Church of St Dinis at Odivelas, ca 1319–1324 (photo 1949) 12 / Tomb Effigy of King Dinis, Church of St Dinis at Odivelas (detail), ca 1319–1324

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around the stone monument to pray, just as they are arranged on the sides of the tomb chest. In addition, the same nuns and monks appear almost like “human pillars”, symbolically holding up the funerary litter where the king’s gisant lies in slumber, awaiting the resurrection of the flesh  [Fig. 12]. Here then are the religious custodians and guardians of the king’s memory presented in stone, watching over and looking after his lifeless body, just as they had done in flesh and blood. Conclusions Dinis was the only king of the first Portuguese dynasty, and also the only monarch in the medieval kingdom of Portugal, to choose to be buried inside the church of a female monastery: no king after him would make such a decision. In the wake of a tradition that may be thought to have origins in the twelfth century with the Premonstratensian double-monastery of the Royal Abbey of Our Lady of Fontevrauld, housing the tombs of several members of the royal Plantagenet dynasty56, and which would find its ideal Iberian epigone in the Cistercian monastery of Las Huelgas Reales in Burgos, pantheon of the Crown of Castile57, King Dinis, who was familiar with Las Huelgas through his sister Branca’s close relations with the nunnery58, decided to associate his memory and entrust his body to a female monastic community. Founded in 1295, the Cistercian monastery of St Dinis and St Bernardo at Odivelas was initially a family venture and saw the involvement and participation of the Queen consort Isabel in a project to make it the new, indeed, the first pantheon of the Portuguese Crown, to be created ex nihilo in the kingdom. Inaugurated in 1318, the royal pantheon of Odivelas was to be short-lived, since it would not survive the civil war which put

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the stability of the kingdom in crisis and caused an irremediable fracture in the royal couple, who decided to “separate in death”. Thus, the church of Odivelas, which was supposed to house the funerary monuments of the royal spouses, ended up receiving the sarcophagus of the king only. In light of the foregoing reflections, the stone monument of Dinis can be seen as the final consummation of a grand monumental project that began in 1295 with the laying of the first stone of the abbey church. In this reading, the sepulcher of the monarch became not only the “fulcrum” of the temple, but also the “barycenter” of the ecclesiastical space, literally crossed, penetrated, and encircled by the liturgical rites, prayers, and hymns of praise that the double religious community of nuns and monks, established at the behest of their patron and benefactor, intoned from the main altar, from the choir, and from around the tomb itself. Although his plans for a royal pantheon had crumbled to dust, the entire building was nevertheless transformed by the will of King Dinis into a majestic individual funerary chapel, its function now to serve as a church-mausoleum exclusively celebrating the figure of its founder. In this, the temple fulfilled the essential motivation for the institution of the monastery, the construction of which had been conceived precisely as an exquisite and magnificent building pro remedio animae. 56 Charles T. Wood, “Les gisants de Fontevraud et la politique dynastique des Plantagenêts”,  in La figuration des morts dans la Chrétienité medievale jusqué a la fin du premier quart du xive siècle, Fontevraud, Abbaye royale de Fontevraud, Centre Culturel de l’Ouest, 1989, pp. 195–208. 57 James D’Emilio, “The royal convent of las Huelgas: dynastic politics, religious reform and artistic change in Medieval Castile”,  Studies in Cistercian Art and Architecture, vi (2005), pp. 191–282. 58 Carlos M. Reglero de la Fuente, “Las señoras de las Huelgas de Burgos: infantas, monjas y encomenderas”,  e-Spania [on-­ line], 24 June 2016, consulted on 14 November 2021.

summary Dvojí vidění v Odivelas Jeptišky a mniši v klášteře sv. Diviše, královském panteonu pozdně středověkého Portugalska

Klášter sv. Diviše a sv. Bernarda v Odivelas u Lisabonu založil v roce 1295 král Dinis i. Portu-­ galský a jeho manželka Isabela Aragonská. Na královo přání bylo opatství předáno ženské větvi cisterciáckého řádu a bylo přímo podřízeno opatovi ze Santa Maria de Alcobaça, mateřského kláštera tohoto řádu v portugalském království. Klášter v Odivelas byl posledním ženským cister­ ciáckým klášterem založeným v zemi a jediným v okolí Lisabonu, města, které v té době aspirovalo na statut hlavního města království. Po reformě stanov řeholní komunity v roce 1306 a po dokončení hlavní fáze stavebních prací se klášter v roce 1318 stal panteonem královské rodiny a zároveň první stavbou, která byla za tímto účelem vytvořena ex nihilo, podle rozhodnutí královského páru být pohřben mezi chórem a hlavním oltářem, uprostřed klášterního kostela. V témže roce Dinis zřídil také pohřební kaplanství pěti mnichů pověřených sloužením pěti denních mší za spásu jeho duše i duší jeho příbuzných. Tito kaplani sídlili v hospici postaveném naproti klášteru.

Ačkoli se jednalo o samostatné a ekonomicky nezávislé budovy, jejich blízkost a skuteč­nost, že obě byly pod patronací krále, z nich dohromady vytvořily de facto sdružený klášter, což byl v pozdně středověkém Portugalsku ojedinělý jev. Královský panteon Odivelas nakonec přestal fungovat v důsledku občanské války (cca 1319–1324), která mimo jiné urychlila rozdělení panovnického páru i po smrti. Královna Isabela se rozhodla být pohřbena v klášteře svaté Kláry a svaté Isabely spravovaném řádem klarisek, který založila s počáteční podporou svého manžela o několik let dříve v Coimbře. Král Dinis naopak dostál svému přání být pohřben v Odivelas. V současné době stojí v ponuré samotě dramaticky rekonstruovaného kostela sv. Diviše málo známé mistrovské dílo evropské pohřební plastiky, kamenný náhrobek krále Dinise. Kromě připomínky panovníkových ctností nese toto dílo také mimořádný ikonografický program, který odráží život neobvyklé dvojí komunity v Odivelas a svědčí o historickém vývoji opatství.

Abstract – Art, Architecture, and Aesthetics in the Baronial Convents of Medieval Latium – Despite extensive recent scholarly attention to female monastic art and architecture, no comprehensive analysis of late-medieval conventual communities in Rome and Latium has been done to date. Archival study, cross-referenced with in-depth analysis of material evidence from convents directly endowed by baronial families, raises a challenge to traditional “top-down” readings in favor of an interdisciplinary network perspective. This article highlights common and diverse features of “baronial” nunneries by using evidence from case studies in a comparative framework. The nunneries selected for this multifocal analysis were those with the most promising documentary, architectural, and artistic remains, with particular attention to five characterizing features: ground plan, liturgical furnishings, family chapel, fresco decoration, and choir. In the absence of an overreaching study of medieval conventual realities in Rome and Latium, this article provides an in-depth analysis of the characterizing features of the principal convents endowed by barons in the region. This investigation should foster a deeper understanding of the fragmented and inherently stratified material culture of medieval Rome its environs. Keywords – baronial patronage, clausura, conventual art, female religious architecture, Roman nunneries Angelica Federici Università degli Studi di Roma Tre [email protected]

Art, Architecture, and Aesthetics in the Baronial Convents of Medieval Latium Angelica Federici

1. Introduction: the historiographic perspective Between the thirteenth and the fourteenth centuries Rome and Latium witnessed a powerful ascent of local baronial clans. The rise and inevitable fall of families like the Boccamazza, Caetani, Conti, Orsini, or Savelli saw the expansion of baronial influence and possessions both in the city and the region. These names also frequently appear in documents pertaining to conventual communities in Central Italy, testifying to the presence of pulzelle from local noble families, and to their influence in female religious communities. In the absence of an overreaching study of medieval

conventual realities in Rome and Latium, this article aims to provide an overview of the characterizing features of the convents endowed by barons in the region. The subject of female monastic art and architecture is a thriving international field, one that has received exceptional scholarly attention over the course of the last twenty years. Through the lens of gender, agency, and patronage historio­ graphic research has thoroughly reconsidered the role of religious women in medieval society. In spite of earlier contributions by pioneering scholars such as Eileen Power and Lina Eckenstein,

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contemporary readings of the cloister only gathered pace during the 1990s1. Within an international framework, Caroline Bruzelius set the tone for medieval scholarship on conventual communities in Italy, fostering new innovative findings on the subject of female piety and religious patronage alongside Jeraldine Wood, Janis Elliott, Carola Jäggi, and Cordelia Warr2. Italian academia too – under the aegis of Marina Righetti, Gabriella Zarri, Giulia Barone, Anna Esposito, and, more recently, Emanuele Zappasodi – consistently pushed forward research on religious women and their material culture3. To date, however, no comprehensive analysis of medieval conventual communities in Rome and Latium during the late medieval period exists. Literature on the subject is usually confined to single case studies, as demonstrated by the nunneries of San Cosimato, San Sisto Vecchio, Sant’Aurea investigated respectively by Joan Barclay Lloyd, Karin Bull-Simonsen Einaudi and Ann Dunlop4. The situation in Latium is not dissimilar. The relationship between these convents and secondary literature is uneven. While some nunneries remain largely unknown, others have been thoroughly published. This is the case for conventual settlements like San Sebastiano at Alatri or San Pietro in Vineis at Anagni5. While presenting material to a broader audience, these collaborative works also share a meticulous architectural and art historical analysis. Nunneries in Rome and Latium have generally been surveyed in broader narratives. In the last two volumes of Corpus e Atlante della pittura di Roma, Serena Romano touches upon female artistic patronage in Roman nunneries6. Romano affirms that the information on conventual communities in Rome is sparse. Not only is a sufficiently detailed and overarching overview lacking to date, but preliminary investigations also remain a desideratum7. Due to the greater availability of documents and sources, inquiries linked to the Renaissance and the early modern period attract more attention. Recent publications by Alessandra Lirosi and Emily Dunn on conventual culture in post-Tridentine Rome are a clear example of this8. The reasons behind the lack of an overreaching study are manifold and cannot be solely ascribed

to the fragmented nature of primary sources. Conventual complexes in Rome and Latium have been greatly altered during the course of the centuries, making their medieval guise difficult or impossible to read. Despite this, there has been an ongoing historiographic tradition to dismiss the Roman cultural production during the so-called long Trecento. This tendency coincides with the Avignon period in which Rome is perceived as falling prey to a cultural paralysis that negates all types of cognitive research. This has been clearly refuted. In fact, in the last decade scholars have pushed forward the image of an international and cultivated artistic production generated by baronial classes, religious women, and lay patrons9. Claudia Bolgia affirms that “Rome continued both to attract artists and to export art”, and if the absence of the Pope in Rome undoubtedly left a vacuum in the city’s socio-artistic fabric, it also left a space for other agents10. With these considerations in mind and as part of broader research pertaining to baronial presence within conventual communities, I conducted a survey on all nunneries in Rome and Latium between the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. I then performed a more in-depth analysis of convents directly endowed by baronial families, selecting nunneries which had the most promising documentary, architectonic, and artistic remains. Working between the archives in Rome and Latium while cross-referencing material evidence in the region, I attempted to challenge traditional top-down readings in favor of an interdisciplinary network perspective. This was achieved by selecting five characterizing features of a nunnery: ground plan, liturgical furnishing, family chapel, fresco decoration, and choir. I highlighted common and diverse features of nunneries patronized by barons using evidence from my case studies in a comparative framework. 2. Nunneries in Latium and baronial hegemony A politico-historical context framing the importance of nunneries endowed by barons in late medieval society will be offered before exploring the characterizing features of female religious

settlements in the region. A broader insight into the real motives underlying baronial hegemony towards religious women will hopefully foster an understanding of convents beyond the cloister and into medieval society more broadly. The study of nunneries in Latium has revealed a common pattern of patronage by baronial families in order to secure strategic landholdings in the region. Indeed, in par with male monastic institutions, nunneries had extensive land portfolios which apparently guaranteed a steady income and a form of sustenance to the community. The close relationship between the layout of baronial domains and main communication routes was some­times strengthened either by the presence of a convent or by its manorial property. At the end  of the thirteenth century, San Silvestro in Capite, San Lorenzo in Panisperna, San Sisto Vecchio, and possibly even Santi Cosma e Damiano in Mica Aurea were significantly bestowed with patrimonial assets11. Abbesses and prioresses were sometimes chosen from amongst baronial families, giving a leeway to barons to closely monitor conventual properties12. 1 Eileen Power, Medieval English Nunneries c. 1275–1535, Cambridge 1922; Linda Eckenstein, Women under Monasticism, Cambridge 1896; Jeffrey Hamburger, The Visual and the Visionary. Art and Female Spirituality in Late Medieval Germany, New York 1998; idem, Nuns as Artists: The Visual Culture of a Medieval Convent, Berkeley 1997; Elizabeth Valdez de Alamo, “Lament for a Lost Queen: The Sarcophagus of Doña Blanca in Nájera”,   The Art Bulletin, lxxviii/2 (1996), pp. 311–333. Also, Julian Gardner, “Nuns and Altarpieces: Agendas for Research”,   Römisches Jahrbuch der Bibliotheca Hertziana, xxx (1995), pp. 27–57. The author considers a series of altarpieces mostly in Florentine conventual communities, he concludes by asking: what kind of control did the nuns have over artworks that were commissioned through middlemen? Did the nuns even see the altarpieces located beyond the grills required by clausura? Also refer to https:// inpress.lib.uiowa.edu/feminae/Default.aspx. 2 Caroline Bruzelius, “Hearing is Believing: Clarissan Architecture, ca. 1213–1340”,   Gesta, xxxi/2 (1992), pp. 83– 91; eadem, “Nuns in Space: Strict Enclosure and the Architecture of the Clarissas in the Thirteenth Century”,   in Clare of Assisi: A Medieval and Modern Woman, Clarefest Selected Papers, 3, Ingrid Peterson ed., New York 1996, pp. 53 – 74; eadem, The Stones of Naples: Church Building in Angevin Italy, 1266 –1343, New Haven 2004; The Church of Santa Maria Donna Regina: Art, Iconography and Patronage in Fourteenth-Century Naples, Janis Elliott, Cordelia Warr eds, Aldershot 2004; Carola Jäggi, Frauenklöster im Spätmittelalter: die Kirchen der Klarissen und Dominikannerinnen im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert, Petersberg 2006; Jeraldine M. Wood, Women, Art, and Spirituality: The Poor Clares of Early Modern Italy, Cambridge 1996. 3 Marina Righetti Tosti-Croce, “La chiesa di Santa Chiara in Assisi: architettura”,   in Santa Chiara in Assisi, Alessandro Tomei ed., Cinisello Balsamo 2002; Giulia Barone, “Margherita Colonna

e le Clarisse di San Silvestro in Capite”,   in Roma anno 1300. Atti della iv settimana di studi di storia dell’arte medievale dell’Università di Roma “La Sapienza” (Rome, 1980), Angiola Maria Romanini ed., Rome 1983, pp. 799 – 805; eadem, “Presenza degli Ordini Religiosi nella Roma di Martino v”,   in Alle origini della nuova Roma Martino v (1417–1431), Acts of the conference (Rome, 2–5 March 1992), Maria Chiabò ed., Rome 1992, pp. 353–365; Il monachesimo femminile in Italia dall’alto medioevo al secolo xvii a confronto con l’oggi, Gabriella Zarri ed., Verona 1997; eadem, “I monasteri femminili a Bologna tra xiii e xvii secolo”,   Atti e memorie della Deputazione di Storia Patria per le province di Bologna, xxiv (1973), pp. 133–224; Anna Esposito, “Il mondo della religiosità femminile romana”,   Archivio della Società romana di Storia Patria, cxxxii (2009), pp. 149 –172; Emanuele Zappasodi, Sorores reclusae. Spazi di clausura e immagini dipinte in Umbria fra xiii e xiv secolo, Florence 2018. 4 Joan Barclay Lloyd, “The Medieval Benedictine Monastery of SS. Cosma e Damiano in Mica Aurea in Rome, c. 936 –1234”,   Tjurunga. An Australian Benedictine Journal, xxxiv (1988), pp. 25–35; SS. Cosma e Damiano in Mica Aurea, Joan Barclay Lloyd, Karen Bull-Simonsen Einaudi eds, Rome 1998; Joan Barclay Lloyd, “Paintings for Dominican Nuns: a New Look at the Images of Saints, Scenes from the New Testament and Apocrypha, and Episodes from the Life of Saint Catherine of Siena in the Medieval Apse of San Sisto Vecchio in Rome”,   Papers of the British School at Rome, lxxx (2012), pp. 189 –232; Anne Dunlop, “Dominicans and Cloistered Women: The Convent of Sant’Aurea in Rome”,   Early Modern Women, ii (2007), pp. 43– 71. 5 Walls and Memory. The Abbey of San Sebastiano at Alatri (Latium) from Late Roman Monastery to Renaissance Villa, Elizabeth Fentress et al. eds, Turnhout 2005; Il Collegio Principe di Piemonte e la chiesa di San Pietro in Vineis in Anagni, Michele Rak ed., Anagni 1997; Alessandro Bianchi, “Affreschi duecenteschi nel S. Pietro in Vineis in Anagni”,   in Roma anno 1300 (n. 3), pp. 379 –392; Margret Boehm, Wandmalerei des 13. Jahrhunderts im Klarissenkloster S.Pietro in Vineis zu Anagni. Bilder für die Andacht, Münster 1999. 6 Serena Romano, La pittura medievale a Roma 312–1431: Corpus e Atlante. Il Duecento e la cultura gotica (1198 –1280), 5, Milan 2012; eadem, La pittura medievale a Roma 312–1431: Corpus e Atlante. Apogeo e fine del Medioevo (1288 –1431), 6, Milan 2017. 7 Romano, Il Duecento e la cultura gotica (n. 6). 8 Marylin Dunn, “Roman Nuns, Art Patronage, and the Construction of Identity”,   in Wives, Widows, Mistresses and Nuns in Early Modern Italy. Making the Invisible Visible through Art Patronage, Katherine A. McIver ed., Farnham 2012, pp. 183–224; Alessandra Lirosi, I monasteri femminili a Roma tra xvi e xvii secolo, Rome 2012. 9 For example, Claudia Bolgia’s research within the project The Long Trecento: Rome without Popes (c. 1305–1420) or the biannual Andrew Ladis International Trecento Conference which “emphasizes trecento Italian art as a fruitful area of research” https:// fristartmuseum.org/andrew-ladis-memorial-trecento-conference/ (accessed: 1/12/21). The pioneering words of Angiola Maria Romanini against the so-called black hole scenario of the Avignon period: “Introduzione”,   in Serena Romano, Eclissi di Roma. Pittura murale a Roma e nel Lazio da Bonifacio viii a Martino v (1295–1431), Rome 1992, p. 7. 10 Claudia Bolgia, “The ‘Long’ Trecento: Rome Without the Popes, c. 1305–1420”,   in Members’ Research Report Archive (National Gallery of Art), Washington dc 2016/2017, pp. 61– 63. 11 Sandro Carocci, Baroni di Roma. Dominazioni signorili e lignaggi aristocratici nel Duecento e nel primo Trecento, Rome 1993, p. 162. 12 Carocci, Baroni di Roma (n. 11), p. 163; Jean-Claude Maire-­ Vigueur, L’autre Rome Une histoire des Romains à L’époque des comunes (xii–xiv siècle), Paris 2010, see especially chapter 5 which discusses in detail baronial clans in the city during the article’s time frame.

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This, for example, was the case at San Sisto Vecchio where Angelica Boccamazza became abbess of the Dominican convent in 129013. Angelica was related to the powerful Giovanni Boccamazza who, after being elected cardinal by Pope Honorius  iv (Savelli), proceeded to expand his family domain in Sabina, Narni, and the Cicolano. He undoubtedly temporarily benefitted from the downfall of the Colonna family during the pontificate of Boniface viii. According to Francesco Maria Torrigio who cites the registry of Benedetto from Montefiascone – prior of San Sisto – at the end of the thirteenth century, Cardinal Boccamazza “ricevendo ogni anno una parte di denari per sua parte del censo, che li re di Sicilia Carlo e Roberto dovevano alla Sede Apostolica per non averlo pagato alcun tempo piacque di divedere questa sua parte in tre porzioni al Monastero di Santa Maria sopra Minerva al Monastero di San Sisto e ai suoi nipoti”14. After gifting the convent with a new dormitory and territorial assets he also ensured that part of his testamentary bequest would benefit the nuns directly. It is likely that the impressive thirteenth-century fresco cycle was financed by Angelica through the Cardinal’s generous donations15. This pattern also repeats itself at San Sisto in the later pictorial decoration likely promoted by the abbess Sophia de Sant’Eustachio, as indicated by the family coat of arms and possibly her donor portrait. The Colonna family was no exception to this scheme. After the death of their sister Margherita Colonna, Cardinal Giacomo, and Senator Giovanni transferred her loosely formed religious community from the family fief in Palestrina to one of the most prestigious monastic institutions in the city, namely the nunnery of San Silvestro in Capite. Along with San Lorenzo in Panisperna, another Colonna family foundation, the newly installed community at San Silvestro, adhered to the Rule of the Sorores Minores approved by Alexander  iv. According to Giulia Barone, it is no coincidence that this rule was also employed at Longchamp by the royal penitent, Isabella of France, sister of Saint Louis16. This rule was more lenient on the rigorous pauperism promoted by Saint Clare, thus allowing the convent to secure a considerable number of landholdings

previously owned by the Benedictine community17. The project of strict pauperism expressed in the rule of San Damiano, the only community which remained faithful to the teaching of St Clare by that time, was thus resolutely discarded. The newly formed congregation acquired control of the vast possessions of the monastery both to the north and to the south of Rome. As demonstrated by the economic registries preserved at the Archivio di Stato di Roma, San Silvestro in Capite had extensive domains north of the Tiber beyond Ponte Milvio, an area which secured the river’s traffic to northern Latium18. This region, which was historically controlled by the Orsini, had been difficult for the Colonna to penetrate19. Obtaining a sphere of influence over San Silvestro meant that these lands were automatically secured without the need to threaten alliances. Nevertheless, under Boniface  viii the clash between the Caetani-­Colonna barons due to the territorial conflicts for the control of southern Latium was exacerbated to such a degree to cause the deposition of the abbess Giovanna daughter of senator Giovanni. Sandro Carocci states that until 1350 Roman baronial families had impressive financial capacities and the will to build real principalities20. For example, at the dawn of the jubilee of 1300, the Caetani secured territorial hamlets south of Rome, creating a small feudal state to contrast the growing influence of the Kingdom of Naples21. Connecting control of castles as well as convents became particularly crucial during Boniface’s papacy. Indeed, this was the case for the nunnery of Santa Maria in Viano in Sgurgola, a strategic Conti fief in the province of Frosinone. Through Abbess Gemma, Mazia, and Maria, Santa Maria in Viano had inherited more than half the Conti estate in Sgurgola by the end of the thirteenth century22. Pietro Caetani, the Pope’s favorite nephew, was responsible for the sales agreement with the religious community which marked the final supremacy of the Caetani over the Conti in the area of the Lepini mountains. Something similar also occurred north of Rome in province of Rieti whereby the Mareri – a family originating from the Counts of Marsi, part of a minor local aristocracy – secured a stronghold

over the local dioceses through the nunnery of Borgo San Pietro founded by Filippa Mareri23. Its authority relied on the dependence of several small churches and chapels in the area such as Sant’Andrea, San Rufizio, and San Giovanni. Members of the Mareri family likewise maintained territorial control over their lands through San Pietro and its dependent chapels24. By promoting and maintaining cohesion through direct familial control, the Mareri brothers would consolidate their feudal properties without the pretext of the jus patronatus. 3. Roman nunneries and baronial patronage As previously mentioned, medieval Rome and Latium are characterized by a stratified and fragmented heritage. This seems to be particularly true in the context of nunneries in which conventual apartments and especially churches were the objects of several restorations and radical overhauls. Indeed, with the exception of San Sisto Vecchio today, most thirteenth-century female religious settlements were transferred to male orders. Even within the framework of nunneries endowed by baronial families, the settlement of female communities in pre-existing structures, the loss of a significant number of convents, and the perishable nature of the chosen construction materials has too often impaired the study of female monastic material culture. For these reasons, even within the context of nunneries supported by barons, when it comes to religious women, fixed architectural schemes cannot be traced on the basis of surviving elements. By studying ground plan, family chapel, frescoes, and choir present in nunneries in Latium I will, however, attempt to define characteristic features of conventual settlements in the region. 3.1. Ground plan This investigation commences its analysis with ground plans where available. By starting from the foundations, the aim is to provide the most holistic view possible. Although San Silvestro in Capite’s original conventual apartments are occupied by the administrative offices of the Italian Postal Services, the Benedictines, who had originally

inhabited the monastery, likely had a standard disposition around the area of the rectangular cloister. These living quarters most probably 13 Raimondo Spiazzi, Cronache e fioretti del monastero di San Sisto all’Appia, Bologna 1993; Domenica Salomonia,“Memorie del Monastero dei SS. Domenico e Sisto 1652–1656”,   in Joachim J. Berthier, Chroniques du Monastere de San Sisto et de San Domenico e Sisto, 2, Levanto 1919/1920; Federica Vitali, “Gli affreschi medievali di S. Sisto Vecchio in Roma”,   in Roma anno 1300 (n. 3), pp. 433–447. 14 Francesco Maria Torrigio, Historia della Veneranda Immagine di Maria Vergine posta nella Chiesa del Monastero delle Monache di Santi Sisto e Domenico di Roma, Rome 1641, p. 54: Every year cardinal Boccamazza received a part of denarii from the census, which the kings of Sicily Charles and Robert owed to the Apostolic See for having failed to pay, divided this in three, and respectively distributed them to the Monastery of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, the Monastery of San Sisto, and his nephews. 15 Vitali, “Gli affreschi medievali” (n. 13), pp. 445–447; Daniela Sgherri, “La decorazione ad affresco nell’antica abside e nella navata di San Sisto Vecchio” in Romano, Apogeo e fine (n. 6), p. 269; Barclay Lloyd, “Paintings for Dominican Nuns” (n. 4), p. 211. 16 Barone, “Margherita Colonna” (n. 3), p. 801. 17 Emily Graham, “Memorializing Identity: The Foundation and Reform of San Lorenzo in Panisperna”,   Franciscan Studies, lxxv (2017), pp. 467–495. 18 Etienne Hubert, “Un censier des biens romains du monastère S. Silvestro in Capite (1333–1334)”, Archivio della Societa’ romana di Storia Patria, cxi (1988), pp. 93–140; Vincenzo Federici, “Regesto del Monastero di S. Silvestro in Capite”, Archivio della Società romana di Storia Patria, xxii (1899), pp. 213–300, pp. 498-538; xxiii (1900), pp. 67–128, pp. 411–439; Antonio Montefusco, “Secondo: non conservare. Per una ricostruzione dell’archivio di San Silvestro in Capite a Roma”, Archivio della Società romana di Storia Patria, cxxxv (2013), pp. 5–29. 19 Barone, “Margherita Colonna” (n. 3), pp. 799 – 805. 20 Carocci, Baroni di Roma (n. 11), p. 56; Pierre Toubert, Les structures du Latium médiéval. Le Latium méridional et la Sabine di ix à la fin du xii siècle, Rome 2015, p. 1038. 21 Giuseppe Marchetti Longhi, “Il Lazio meridionale triplice via di espansione della Civiltà Latina”,   Bollettino dell’Istituto di Storia e di Arte del Lazio Meridionale, iv (1966), pp. 187–233. Giorgo Falco, Albori d’Europa. Pagine di storia medievale, Rome 1947, pp. 335–343; Bonifacio viii, Maria Anadaloro ed., Rome 2006, p. 59; Donatella Fiorani, Tecniche costruttive murarie medievali: il Lazio meridionale, Rome 1996, pp. 24–26. 22 Gelasio Caetani, Domus Caietana, Rome 1927, p. 126; Menotti Morgia, Sgurgola e la sua badia, Rome 1962, p. 21. 23 Alfonso Marini, “Filippa Mareri Francescana”,   in Santa Filippa Mareri: atti del ii Convegno Storico di Greccio (Greccio, 5– 6 December  2003), Alvaro Cacciotti, Maria Melli eds, Rome 2007, pp. 77– 92; Robert Brentano, “Santa Filippa Mareri nel movimento religioso femminile del secolo xiii”,   in Santa Filippa Mareri e il monastero di Borgo S. Pietro nella storia del Cicolano. Atti del Convegno di studi di Borgo S. Pietro (Borgo San Pietro, 24–26 October 1986), Borgo S. Pietro di Petrello Salto 1989, pp. 27–44. 24 Le più antiche pergamene del monastero di Santa Filippa: i Mareri, Borgo San Pietro e il cicolano fra 12. e 14. Secolo, Tersilio Leggio, Roberto Marinelli eds, L’Aquila 2016, p. 5. This was achieved by following a pattern similar to the Bishops of Rieti, who consolidated their power through the great Benedictine abbeys in the region.

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1 / Antonio del Tanghero, San Silvestro in Capite, floor map, Archivio Buonarroti Ricordi 1518, pen on paper 2 / Monastero di Santa Filippa Mareri, historical photograph before construction of lake Salto dam

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comprised a refectory on the opposite side of the church below the dormitories and chapter hall adjacent to the eastern end of the Basilica. It is likely that when Giovanni and Giacomo Colonna installed the newly formed Clarissa community, they gradually adapted the conventual spaces in order to accommodate to the needs of the female religious group. As far as the church space is considered, a letter sent by the Florentine sculptor Antonio del Tanghero to Michelangelo on the 25th of November 1518 provides a detailed plan of this area  [Fig. 1]25. Michelangelo had been the recipient of several letters from Pietro Rosselli – for whom Tanghero worked – to ask for his advice regarding the commission of an altar by Pietro Soderino the Florentine gonfaloniere26. The plan predates the renovations of the altar and presbytery by Carlo Rinaldi in 1629. The drawing, which is both schematic and surprisingly accurate, displays the rectangular plan of the church (33,51 x 10,70 m) preceded by a sort of antechamber and a covered portico on four columns. A cross on the plan traces the left altar dedicated to St John the Baptist upon entry, and the Tedalini, Palombara, and Colonna family chapels on the right. From the drawing, this family sanctuary was adjacent to the presbytery area and seems to have had a direct access to the altar and the choir. The latter was found at the eastern end of the church and consisted of an ample rectangular room later replaced by a shallow apse. If we remain within the Clarissa realm but move outside of Rome, the planimetric survey executed by the Genio Civile for the nunnery of Santa Filippa Mareri (before the construction  of  the Lake Salto dam in the 1930s) provides an invaluable comparative framework27. Filippa had been granted the use of their family home Villa Casardita to accommodate her newly founded community by her brothers Tommaso and Gentile Mareri. Historic photographs represent a massive fortress-like building which dominated the entire valley [Fig. 2]. Both the church and the conventual spaces of the nunnery had a north-west / south-east orientation that developed around a cloister which consisted of low-barrel vaults sustained by arches [Figs 3a, 3b]. The Chapter hall and the refectory were found

around the cloister on the south-eastern end, while the kitchens and the deposits were located on the south-western portion. An elaborately decorated wooden entrance portal – which survives to date in the convent’s museum – opened from the bell tower in the north-­eastern perimeter. Before reaching the cloister, the portal opened onto a room with an altar. At the first floor the convent had a loggia sustained by smaller pilasters, this comprised the choir next to the church and the nuns’ cells. A chapel dedicated to Saint Filippa Mareri, preserved in the modern convent, was built during the fourteenth century. This measured 9,7 x 5 m and was characterized by two bays, the first room with a cross vault and the second one with a vaulted ceiling on pilasters. This chapel was located in a liminal space on the eastern side of the complex between the ground and the first floor and communicated with the choir and the church through small, grated windows. The Benedictine Conti family foundation of Santa Maria in Viano at Sgurgola shares a somewhat similar disposition of living quarters [Fig. 4]. While the church is still extant and largely maintains its late medieval structure, the conventual apartments were heavily dismantled when the adjacent cemetery was built at the end of the nineteenth century. The remains of the monastery and the planimetric surveys conducted by the Mayor’s Office during the expansion of the cemetery grounds in 2010, confirm that it was a building of considerable size28. It consisted of a ground floor and a second floor, which occupied the entire surface of the land now used as a cemetery area, including uncovered spaces. At present, only the perimetral walls of two large halls and the stairwell, which connected the ground floor to the first level, are still visible. The exposed façade is characterized by an irregular arrangement of coarsely cut limestone blocks with a thicker layer of mortar between the stones. This type of masonry consists of compact limestone rags bedded with lime mortar and calcareous aggregates29. The existing buttresses on the exterior wall appear to testify that the scale of this construction likely included the exposed area of the cemetery. Even the two columns inserted in the wall behind

the church may have provided partial support for the roof above the rooms. Yet perhaps they were more likely to have been a part of the cloister, which has not survived, where there were rainwater cisterns. The presence of a truncated octagonal column in blocks of scarped stone in the hall adjacent to the rear perimeter wall of the church, would appear to indicate a Chapter house. The church itself has a rather simple rectangular plan preceded by an antechamber on two levels and a rectangular room at its eastern end. Like San Silvestro in Capite, this may have acted as the choir space reserved for the community. The analysis of surviving ground plans suggests a particularly homogeneous disposition of conventual apartments and church spaces. It appears that the Benedictines had a rather systematic scheme which was also adopted by other religious orders. Despite the grandiosity and political prestige of conventual settlements endowed by baronial families, chapter halls, dormitories, and refectories were essential components of all convents. As testified by San Silvestro in Capite and the convent of Santa Filippa Mareri, the presence of family chapels should also be highlighted. 3.2. Liturgical furnishing Although not a baronial family foundation per se, the surviving sixteenth-century plan of Sant’Agnese fuori le mura by Alberto Alberti  (1525–1598), prior to the restoration and the addition of the side 25 Giustina Scaglia,“Antonio del Tanghero in Rome with Pietro Rosselli Michelangelo Buonarroti and Antonio da Sangallo il Giovane”,   Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz, xxxviii (1994), pp. 218 –245; Juan-Santos Gaynor, Ilaria Toesca, “San Silvestro in Capite”,   in Le chiese di Roma illustrate, 73, Rome 1963. 26 Scaglia, “Antonio del Tanghero” (n. 25), p. 218. 27 asfm: Stato di Consistenza del Vecchio Monastero Redatto dal Genio Civile di Rieti nel 1937; Stato di Consistenza della Chiesa Parrocchiale di Borgo S. Pietro Eseguito dall’Ufficio del Genio Civile di Rieti 27 luglio 1940, Cartella 21, Titolo iii, Edilizia e Beni immobili sez. 1 Affari generali; Massimo De Angelis, “Il monastero di Borgo San Pietro di Filippa Mareri ricostruzione storico-architettonica”,   in Santa Filippa Mareri (n. 23, 2007), pp. 95–114. 28 Angela Ferrazzano, Paola Iecco, Nicola Temperilli, Il restauro della facciata e del nartece della “Badia della Madonna de Viano”,   Frosinone 2004. 29 Fiorani, Tecniche costruttive (n. 21), pp. 335–343; Please refer to summary tables, the type which appears to be employed at Sgurgola is Gruppo c iiib.

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5/ Alberto Alberti, Sant’Agnese fuori le mura, fn 800 1v Cod. a fol. 35v (tav. lx), ca 1550s, pen on paper

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chapels by Cardinal Sfondrati  (1560–1618), displays the original extension of the Cosmatesque thirteenth-century liturgical furnishing [Fig. 5]30. As demonstrated by Alberti’s plan, the original schola cantorum had a considerable width and occupied almost the entire perimeter of the central nave. A set of steps divided the choir from the original presbytery where the four columns delineated the area occupied by a ciborium. According to Serena Romano and Peter C. Claussen, this impressive enclosure was allegedly financed by the noblewoman Jacopa, sacristan of the convent, whose name is recorded in the inscription presently found in the monumental staircase connecting the church to the nunnery31. The inscription declares that in 1256, on the day of the feast of Saint Vitalis, three altars were consecrated in the presence of the Pope, the Curia, and the entire female community32. Onofrio Panvinio, who visited the church at the time of Alberti’s plan, describes the choir enclosure, the three altars, and reports a second inscription which currently survives in a fragmentary state and that apparently recited: “Odericius Stephani fecit hoc opus. Domna Jacopa devota sacrista”33. Next to the inscription, Panvinio sketches a disc divided horizontally

in the middle, the upper part is filled by three stripes of a horizontal wavy band, which alternated in gold and red colors, while the lower half was divided by diagonal stripes in the same colors, running from upper left to lower right34. As Claussen rightly suggests, it is quite obviously a coat of arms used to designate the patron’s (possibly Jacopa’s) baronial/aristocratic lineage. A third fragmentary mosaic inscription recorded by Pompeo Ugonio in 1594 in the pergula which divided the choir from the presbytery area recited:

+gavdeat in celis est vt dedit op’ hoc devota rcsita [sacrista?] … sissa … cvdig (?) … ere … olet … e …eg… tv … honor35. 30 Emanuele Gambuti, “Ricondurre all’ordine un’antica fabbrica: l’opera del cardinale Alessandro dei Medici in S. Agnese fuori le mura”,   Palladio, lxv/lxvi (2021), pp. 123–146. The corpus of Alberto di Giovanni Alberti’s drawings was published in Giovanni M. Forni, Antichi monumenti di Roma nei disegni di Alberto Alberti, Rome 1991. 31 Peter C. Claussen, Die Kirchen der Stadt Rom im Mitterlater, 1050 –1300. a–f, Corpus Cosmatorum ii, 1: Forschungen zur Kunstgeschichte und christlichen Archaologie, Stuttgart 2002, p. 55; Serena Romano, “Agnese e le altre donne. Marmi e pitture del Duecento romano”,   in Attorno al Cavallini Frammenti del gotico a Roma nei Musei Vaticani, Tommaso Strinati ed., Milan 2008, p. 24. 32 ANNO DOMINI MCCLVI INDICTIONE XIV EO DIE QUO STATIO BEATI VITALIS CELEBRATUR DOMINUS

ground floor

3a / Monastero di Santa Filippa Mareri, axonometric view, Borgo San Pietro 3b / Monastero di Santa Filippa Mareri, ground floor plan, Borgo San Pietro

first floor

ALEXANDER PAPA IV CUM TOTA CURIA CONSECRAVIT IN HAC ECCLESIA SANCTE AGNETIS TRIA ALTARIA VIDELICET ALTARE BEATI IOHANNIS BAPTISTE IN QUO RELIQUIAS MULTORUM SANCTORUM RECONDIDIT ALTARE BEATI IOHANNIS EVANGELISTE IN QUO EST DE MANNA SEPULCRI EIUS CUM RELIQUIIS MULTORUM SANCTORUM ALTARE BEATE EMERENTIANE IN QUO SUNT DE RELIQUIIS SANCTORUM SATURNINI SISINII ALIORUM MULTORUM CONCEDENS OMNIBUS VEREPENITENTIBUS ET CONFESSIS ANNUATIM AD HUNC LOCUM ACCEDENTIBUS USQUE AD TRES ANNOS TRES QUADRAGENAS HUIC CONSECRATIONI INTERFUERUNT STEFANUS EPISCOPUS PENESTRINUS EPISCOPUS TUSCULNUS UGO TITULI SANCTE SABINE IOHANNES SANCTI LAURENTII IN LUCINA PRESBITERI CARDINALES IOHANNIS SANCTI NICOLAI IN CARCERE TULLIANO PETRUS SANCTI GEORGII AD VELLUM AUREUM OCTAVIANUS SANCTE MARIE IN VIA LATA OCTOBONIS SANCTI ADRIANI DIACONES CARDINALES LAURENTIUS EPISCOPUS SCLAVINENSIS EPISCOPUS MAROCENSIS CUM ALIIS PLURIBUS RELIGIOSIS VIRI HONESTIS RESIDENTE DOMNA LUCIA ABBATISSA HUIUS MONASTERII THEODORA PRIORISSA DOMNA JACOBA DEVOTA MONIALI SACRISTA CUM TOTO CONVENTU IPSIUS MONASTERII RELASARUNT RECTIS CORDE. Claussen, Die Kirchen der Stadt Rom (n. 31), p. 55. 33 Ibidem, p. 60; Onofrio Panvinio, Schedae De Ecclesiis Urbis Romae, bav, Vat. lat. 6780, fol. 278r (transcription Santi Pesarini, Appunti copie, estratti e schede riguardanti in massima parte le chiese di Roma, bav, Vat. lat. 13127, fol. 454r). 34 Claussen, Die Kirchen der Stadt Rom (n. 31), p. 61. 35 Ibidem; Pompeo Ugonio, Theatrum Urbis Romae, 1594, Biblioteca Comunale Ariostea di Ferrara, Classe i. 161, fol. 966 (transcription Santi Pesarini, Appunti copie, estratti e schede riguardanti in massima parte le chiese di Roma, bav, Vat. lat. 13127, fol. 458r).

4 / Santa Maria in Viano, floor plan, from Archivio del Comune di Sgurgola traced on Autocad

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6/ Altar paliotto of SS. Stephen and Lawrence, fragments of the schola cantorum, Sant’Agnese fuori le mura, Rome, ca 1250s 7/ Santi Nereo e Achilleo, interior, Rome

Both Romano and Claussen propose that Jacopa, a noblewoman – as the epithet domna would appear to suggest – inscribed her name throughout church and financed the construction of the 1256 renovations. These included the pavement by Odericus Stephani, the schola cantorum, and the three altars. While neither Claussen nor Romano cite Alberti’s plan, the documentary evidence provided by Panvinio and Ugonio together with surviving fragments of the choir enclosure allows them to “reconstruct” the extent of this im­­pressive enterprise. It is impossible to assert whether Jacopa was actually responsible for the thirteenth-century renovations on the basis of surviving research. Nevertheless, combining archival sources with sculptural fragments, and the new evidence brought forward by Alberti’s plan, allows us to draw different conclusions on spatial divisions inside churches. Although it has always been assumed that the nuns’ choir was in the suspended galleries of the Basilica, the extent of the choir’s perimeter as well as the prestige of the commission would seem to suggest otherwise. Claussen timidly puts forward this hypothesis which appears to become even more credible on the basis of the new evidence. The surviving choir revetments at Sant’Agnese fuori le mura, preserved in the altar palliotto of the chapel of Saint Lawrence and Stephens, is characterized by two rows of inlaid marble with mosaic incrustations (98 x 177 cm) [Fig. 6]. If we use Alberti’s plan as a visual map to relocate the fragments, they may be securely placed in the enclosure barriers before the presbytery. In his Memorie istorico critiche della chiesa, e monastero di S. Silvestro in Capite di Roma, Giuseppe Carletti identifies the ambo and choir revetments at Santi Nereo and Achilleo as originally part of the Cosmati schola cantorum at San Silvestro in Capite [Fig. 7]36. These are strikingly similar to the ones at Sant’Agnese. They consist of twelve rectangular inlaid marble porphyry encrusted fields in two rows of six, placed one above the other and measuring 250 x 98 cm. Tanghero’s measurements of the church prior to the sixteenth-century renovations (central nave 10,70 m) supports our thesis that these were used as presbytery barriers, leaving an opening to access the main altar.

Nevertheless, the puzzling absence of liturgical furnishings within the other nunneries endowed by barons examined in this article, makes this analysis somewhat limited. At San Sisto Vecchio, Joan Barclay Lloyd has put forward the possibility that a tramezzo screen divided the church at three quarters length and that the nuns occupied the space in front of the apse37. A similar solution is also put forward for San Lorenzo in Panisperna. Here, with the assistance of Giacomo Colonna, the nuns made substantial transformations to the conventual complex to reconcile the church with their liturgical needs, while simultaneously opening it up to the local population. According to Padre Andrea Rocca di Papa, who wrote a guide to the nunnery at the end of the nineteenth century, the original church was reduced from three naves to a single one like San Sisto38. One of the lateral aisles was transformed into the chapel inside the sacristy and the chaplain’s house, and the other into the parlor and additional spaces serving the nuns. Outside Rome, at Santa Maria in Viano, the rectangular room at the eastern end of the church likely functioned as a choir; however, the broken bench seats inside the church appear to suggest the presence of the congregation inside the main church space. The presence of modest liturgical furnishing starkly contrasts the power and prestige exercised by the community. This analysis suggests that an attempt was always made to divide the religious congregation from the laity and the officiating clergy. However, at Sant’Agnese fuori le mura, Alberti’s plan advances the possibility that the female congregation was not relegated to the matroneum but sat in the schola cantorum allegedly financed by Jacopa. Although we do not have any hard evidence for 36 Giuseppe Carletti, Memorie istorico critiche della chiesa, e monastero di S. Silvestro in Capite di Roma, Rome 1795, p. 28. This claim should be advanced with caution, as Carletti is a late source, with respect to the assembly of the furnishings, and the previous fragmented documentation does not allow to go beyond a mere hypothesis. 37 Joan Barclay Lloyd, “The Architectural Planning of Pope Innocent iii’s Nunnery of S. Sisto in Rome”,   in Innocenzo iii: Urbs et Orbis. Atti del Congresso Internazionale (9th–15th September 1998), Andrea Sommerlechner ed., Rome 2003, p. 1299; Barclay Lloyd, “Paintings for Dominican nuns” (n. 4), p. 192. 38 Andrea Rocca di Papa, Memorie storiche della chiesa e monastero di San Lorenzo in Panisperna, Rome 1893, p. 8.

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the relaxation of clausura, it is possible that architectural solutions were more diverse than what has been imagined. As Bruzelius points out these divisions were made of perishable materials such as wood, linens, or even mud and their loss might have conditioned our general understanding of church space destined for women. The picture that we are now able to reconstruct of women’s monasticism may, therefore, be biased in favor of those with more permanent, stone structures.39 3.3. Family chapels and fresco decorations

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Only a few family chapels survive in the convents endowed by baronial families. We certainly may attest the presence of a Colonna shrine commissioned by the papal chaplain Pietro Colonna in 1290 inside the church of San Silvestro in Capite. This is neatly drawn in Tanghero’s plan – it measured 12,91 x 4,90 m, had a barrel vault covering, and was likely decorated in the latest Gothic style. The only vestiges of the impressive political enterprise undertaken by Giovanni and Giacomo at the death of Margherita are the two Colonna

Coats of Arms visible in the side chapel to the left of the main altar [Fig. 9]. Although the nunnery of Borgo San Pietro rests at the bottom of Lake Salto, the chapel dedicated to the family saint Filippa Mareri was dismantled block by block and reconstructed in the new conventual foundation [Fig. 10]. The chapel consists of two bays covered by a barrel vault separated by an arch on masonry pillars. It is largely covered by wall paintings superimposed upon one another as juxtaposed panels. This practice is similar to an ex voto, a devotional custom that was popular from the fourteenth to the sixteenth centuries. Within a white and red frame with the Mareri family’s coats of arms adorned with rosettes and decorations with plant motifs, there is a large – and unfortunately very ruined – composition depicting the Death of the Virgin and Coronation  [Fig. 11]. In the lower registers, the apostles mourn the dead Madonna lying on a bed. She is wearing a purple-red dress with decorative motifs. Six figures are arranged around her body among whom John and Peter can be clearly identified. They wear  brightly colored vests and their

8/ Santa Maria in Viano, interior, Sgurgola 9/ San Silvestro in Capite, Colonna Chapel, Colonna Coats of Arms, Rome 10 / Monastero di Borgo San Pietro, Chapel of Saint Filippa Mareri

physiognomic traits are clearly characterized. The upper scene representing the Coronation of the Virgin displays an enthroned Virgin with a white tunic, a dark green cloak, and Christ at its center. Finally, two angels playing musical instruments are portrayed on the sides of the dossal. A terminus post quem for dating the frescoes could be determined by examining the Mareri Coat of Arms. This is characterized by three pyramids crowned by roses on a vermillion backdrop40. We are aware that the seal originally comprised of the pyramids, while the rose was an addition granted by the Norman kings. By the beginning of the 1300 this version had replaced the old one. Archival documents indicate that at the beginning of the Trecento Caterina Mareri was abbess of the convent and three miracles tied to Filippa’s close family members took place during this period, which might indicate a commission on their part41. In 1301, a long parchment (asfm Perg. 39) preserved in the nunnery’s archive cites Caterina de Mareri alongside fifty-six witnesses in a legal dispute against Giovanni Boccamazza42. The latter

had tried to expropriate the convent of Casardita, the family fortress donated to Filippa by her brothers. As previously mentioned, Cardinal Boccamazza was heavily involved in another convent, namely the nunnery of San Sisto Vecchio, which had significantly benefited from his generous donations. Indeed, it is no coincidence that abbess Angelica Boccamazza was most probably responsible for commissioning the Marian fresco cycle inside the apse of the nunnery’s church. While these paintings are not inside a family chapel, they offer an insight into the decorative schemes within conventual communities of which so little survives in Rome and Latium. According to Barclay Lloyd, “it is likely that these nuns played an important role in planning and commissioning 39 Caroline Bruzelius, “Architecture monastic”,   in Women and Gender in Medieval Europe: An Encyclopedia, Margaret Schaus ed., New York 2006, pp. 31–35. 40 Rosalba Cantone, “Il ciclo pittorico della Cappella di Santa Filippa”, in Santa Filippa Mareri e il monastero (n. 23), pp. 257–275. 41 Ibidem, p. 262. 42 Angela Ianconelli,“Il monastero di San Pietro de Molito”, in Le più antiche pergamene (n. 24), pp. 61– 83, sp. p. 68.

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the paintings, which thereby constitute an interesting example of convent art or paintings that was specifically designed for the Dominican sisters in Rome”43. Given that these paintings have been thoroughly published, I will limit this discussion to brief mentions of the surviving scenes. These were executed at the turn of the thirteenth century and depict a Presentation of the Virgin, Presentation of Christ to the temple, a Pentecost, and possibly either an Assumption, a Dormitio, or a Nativity. I follow Romano’s view that while the cycle was particularly suited to a female religious community, it also celebrated the revered Icona Tempuli, transferred from the Monasterium Tempuli, when San Sisto was founded44. The existence of family chapels inside convents patronized by barons is extremely limited. While it is possible that family chapels existed in Roman nunneries, their absence calls for caution when we treat convents endowed by barons. As far as decorative programs are considered, a great deal of which has been lost or reworked, this undoubtedly leaves us with a partial and fragmented account which is not necessarily representative of the actual state of affairs. 3.4. Choir and hagioscopes

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Any comprehensive survey of female religious art and architecture requires a brief but necessary analysis of choir spaces. For the case studies advanced in this survey, the analysis is somewhat problematic given that the chronological time frame extends from before and after Periculoso, and that the communities adhered to different religious orders (Benedictine, Clarissan, Dominican). At Sant’Agnese fuori le mura and San Silvestro in Capite, I am tempted to suggest the presence of a choir – at least initially – on the ground floor of the church. These were likely modified and altered when the stricter needs for clausura came into play, necessitating the transfer of nuns at Sant’Agnese to the suspended galleries of the matroneum. As per San Silvestro in Capite, we know the nuns moved the choir to the counter façade in the sixteenth century, but we have no clear indication as to whether there was a transitional phase. Finally, the position of the choir in San Sisto Vecchio is extremely

controversial. While the tramezzo screen solution advanced by Barclay Lloyd is viable and a liturgical arrangement similar to Sant’Agnese may have been adopted, the position of the choir inside the alcove of the apse does not really account for the numbers recorded in the Catalogo di Torino45. This lists 70 nuns and 17 friars. We must therefore imagine a coro a latere which would have also guaranteed an access to the highly revered Icona Tempuli by the lay congregation. After the stricter obligations of clausura brought by the Periculoso, especially insofar as Clarissa communities in Ciociaria are concerned, one can observe a consistent pattern of choir arrangements. This entailed the existence of a suspended room overlooking the church. Indeed, this solution is adopted at San Pietro in Vineis at Anagni, San Sebastiano at Alatri, San Michele Arcangelo at Amaseno, and Santa Filippa Mareri at Borgo San Pietro. At Anagni, the choir was obtained by creating a recessed room directly above the side nave of the church inside the clearstory; while at Alatri and Amaseno, the choir was in a suspended room overlooking the church on the opposite side of the altar. However, Benedictine settlements in the province of Frosinone, like Santa Maria del Monacato at Castrocielo or San Luca at Guarcino, had choirs positioned at ground level behind the presbytery. These trends do not shed further light on the suspended room at Sgurgola over the main entrance of the church, which could be accessed through a passageway between the mountain and the convent [Fig. 12]. If this room was indeed a choir built to observe the stricter needs for clausura, it would be difficult to justify the presence of the opening in the façade which overlooks the main square in front of the church [Fig. 13]. Although exceedingly uncommon in Italy, we may hypothesize that this was a hagioscope or a squint (more common in late medieval England, France, and Spain than in Italy) where visiting dignitaries – ecclesiastics or members of the nobility, for example – could view mass without being seen [Fig. 8]46. There are few written testimonies pertaining to these rooms whose definition literally translates to “window on holy things”. However, we know that they were often present in churches which had hermit cells built

11/ Monastero di Borgo San Pietro, Chapel of Saint Filippa Mareri, fresco, beginning of the 14th century

43 Barclay Lloyd, “Paintings for Dominican nuns” (n. 4), p. 193. 44 Romano, Eclissi di Roma (n. 9), p. 102. 45 Giovanni Falco, “Il Catalogo di Torino delle chiese, degli ospedali dei monasteri di Roma nel secolo xiv”, Archivio della Società romana di Storia Patria, xxxii (1909), pp. 411–439. 46 This might be compared with the “royal pew” from which Henry iii viewed the mass at Westminster Abbey. From this raised position on the west wall of the south transept, the king would be able to see the monks in choir, the high altar, as well as the shrine of St Edward the Confessor. Christopher Wilson, “Calling the Tune? The Involvement of King Henry iii in the Design of the Abbey Church at Westminster”,   Journal of the British Archaeological Association, clxi (2008), pp. 64– 66. On squints in medieval England, see Michelle M. Sauer, “Architecture of Desire: Mediating the Female Gaze in the Medieval English Anchorhold”,   Gender & History, xxv/3 (2013), pp. 545–564. For methodology, refer to Robert G. Ousterhout, “Sightlines, Hagioscopes and Church Planning in Byzantine Cappadocia”,   Art History, xxxix/5 (2016), pp. 848 – 867. We have examples of royal/ princely chapels in France and Spain with hagioscopes, refer to Pierre-Yves Le Pogam,”The Hagioscope in the Princely Chapels in France from the Thirteenth to Fifteenth Century”,   in Court Chapels of the High and Later Middle Ages and Their

Artistic Decoration (Karlstein-Prague 23–25 septembre 1998), Jiří Fajt ed., Prague 2003, pp. 171–178; Amadeo Serra Desfilis, “Patterns of Intention: Royal Chapels in the Crown of Aragon (Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries) and the Capilla de los Reyes in the Convent of Saint Dominic, Valencia”,   in Gothic Architecture in Spain: Invention and Imitation, Tom Nickson, Nicola Jennings eds, Courtauld Books Online 2020. In particular, Francesc Baldomar hagioscope on the eastern wall of the Kings’ Chapel (1439 –1463) in the Convent of Saint Dominic, Valencia. Although geographically and chronologically distant from our case study, and in no way aspiring to its grandiosity, the German Carolingian westwerk, destined for rulers and important benefactors of religious communities, also comes to mind; Richard Plant, “Architectural Developments in the Empire North of the Alps: The Patronage of the Imperial Court”,   in The White Mantle of Churches: Architecture, Literature, and Art Around the Millennium, Nigel Hiscock ed., Turnhout 2003, pp. 45–46. Finally, we could also take into account the avant-nef solutions which we know were present in Northern Italy: Avant-Nefs & espaces d’accuiel dans l’église entre le iv et le xii siècle, Christian Sapin ed., Paris 2002; Savario Lomartire, “Organisation des avant-corps occidentaux. À propos de quelques exemples de L’Italie du nord au Moyen Âge”,   in Sapin, Avant-Nefs (n. 46), pp. 351–371.

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adjoining their main body. We have a questionable testimony from Berardo da Soriano who claimed that Pope Boniface viii had a strange window-like opening inside the thickness of the wall in his Lateran room, a kind of closet closed by doors in which he kept an idol containing a diabolical spirit, which he adored47. That window did actually exist, but it was a hagioscope – that is, an opening that provided unmediated visual access directly onto the adjacent church and allowed the pontiff to attend mass while remaining in his room. The implied secrecy of these openings makes it difficult to identify and assess. The size and the position of this room on the opposite side of the conventual apartments possibly suggest that it was used as a hagioscope, this would have been consistent with the high-­ ranking status of the inhabitants of Santa Maria in Viano. This claim must, however, be advanced with caution, as this space might have been used by the convent’s guardian or served another purpose altogether. 4. Conclusions

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In contrast to Southern Italy and in particular Angevin Naples, nunneries in Rome and Latium did not benefit from royal female patronage directly. While a royal Roman nunnery never existed, this investigation will hopefully foster a deeper understanding of a fragmented and inherently stratified medieval material culture in the region. In the absence of an overreaching study of medieval conventual realities in Rome and Latium, this article provided an in-depth analysis of the characterizing features of the principal convents endowed by barons in the region. This study has attempted to contextualize convents on a synchronic and diachronic scale through the lens of nunnery art. Spanning architecture, liturgical furnishing and painting, the collected evidence extends beyond the period’s defining element of clausura by exploring the socio-political implications of baronial presence in conventual communities in Latium in a bottom up – top down dynamic. As Sandro Carocci brilliantly demonstrates, not only is the inadequacy of an old stereotype of a brutal and uncultivated baronage

now obvious, but also the vastness of its cultural interests and knowledge is rather surprising. This study selected characterizing features of convents and retraced their presence within nunneries patronized by barons. Conventual apartments followed the standard Benedictine scheme of arrangement around the space of the cloister. Churches either consisted of a large rectangular hall or a tripartite division. Liturgical furnishings appeared in the plans of Sant’Agnese fuori le mura and San Silvestro in Capite. As far as Sant’Agnese was considered we were able to reconstruct the extent of the schola cantorum and the pergula both from literary sources and the fragments present in the church. Although this was not directly supported by a baronial family, both Claussen and Romano suggest that we should identify Jacopa as a member of the Roman barony/aristocracy and the force behind this large-scale enterprise. This is not an isolated case, we are aware of several “extraordinary”nuns like Angelica Boccamazza at San Sisto Vecchio or Iacopa Cenci at San Cosimato. Outside of Rome the absence or modest quality of these installations was also noted. This is the case for the vast majority of conventual communities in Latium as exemplified by San Luca at Guarcino (a Patrassi-­Caetani stronghold) or San Sebastiano at Alatri (under the patronage of Cardinal Stefano Conti). Plans displaying family chapels were only present at San Silvestro in Capite and in the nunnery of Saint Filippa Mareri. Although it was not possible to reconstruct the internal decoration of San Silvestro in Capite, it was likely adorned by a rich fresco cycle in the latest Gothic style. The chapel of Saint Filippa was better preserved but probably underwent major transformations and overhauls when the nunnery was submerged, and the chapel transferred due to the construction of the artificial Lake Salto dam. Despite not being located in a family chapel, the decoration at San Sisto represents a rare survival of conventual art that was likely financed 47 Boniface viii én procès. Articles d’accusations et depositions des témoins (1303–1311), Jean Coste ed., Rome 1995, p. 896; Barbara Frale, L’inganno del gran rifiuto, Novara 2013, n. 62; Thomas Schmidt, “Papst Bonifaz viii. und die Idolatrie”,   Quellen und Forschungen aus Italianischen Archiven und Bibliotheken, lxvi (1986), pp. 75–107; Agostino Paravicini Bagliani, Bonifacio viii, Turin 2003, p. 330.

12a–b/ Santa Maria in Viano, lateral side view steps leading to choir/hiogioschope, Sgurgola 13 / Santa Maria in Viano, façade, Sgurgola

by Angelica through the generous donations of Cardinal Boccamazza. As far as the choir space was concerned, we did not discuss a common architectural pattern but several solutions to a shared problem, namely the one of dividing the religious congregation from the officiating clergy and the lay community. A hagioscope was tentatively described in Santa Maria Viano, although these were extremely rare in Italy and their identification in other settlements has remained somewhat problematic. In a nutshell, the analysis of choir arrangements inside convents supported by barons has not revealed a standard norm or practice. The evidence presented by these case studies is extraordinarily varied, testifying to the diverse use of space inside the cloister. At the same time, it also indicates that this is a productive research field which leaves us hopeful for new surprising findings in the near future.

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summary Umění, architektura a estetika šlechtických klášterů středověkého Latia

Téma ženského klášterního umění a architektury je na mezinárodní úrovni dynamicky se rozvíjející obor, kterému se v posledních dvaceti letech dostává mimořádné vědecké pozornosti. Dosud však nebyla provedena žádná komplexní analýza pozdně středověkých klášterních komunit v Římě nebo Latiu. Na základě archivního výzkumu a komparace hmotných dokladů z tohoto regionu se autorka pokusila zpochybnit tradiční interpretace a nahlédnout na toto téma z interdisciplinární perspektivy. Provedla proto důkladnější analýzu klášterů přímo obdarovaných šlechtickými rodinami a vybrala ženské kláštery, které disponovaly nejslibnějšími písemnými, architektonickými a uměleckými doklady. Za tímto účelem vybrala pět charakteristických znaků kláštera: půdorys, liturgické vybavení, rodinné kaple, freskovou výzdobu a chór. Na základě důkazů z jednotlivých případových studií pak porovnala společné a rozdílné rysy šlechtických ženských klášterů. Autorka se domnívá, že toto zkoumání přispěje k hlubšímu pochopení roztříštěné a ze

své podstaty stratifikované středověké hmotné kultury v regionu. Dochovaná svědectví, jako například hospodářské rejstříky, záznamy o návštěvách nebo kroniky, ukazují, že tyto ženské instituce, stejně jako jejich mužské protějšky, fungovaly jako „náborová“ centra pro ženy z řad římské aristokracie a vyšší střední vrstvy. Jména jako Boccamazza, Caetani, Cenci, Colonna nebo Orsini se v těchto dokumentech objevují na předních místech a svědčí o bohatství a vysokém společenském postavení těchto klášterů. Stejně jako jejich mužské protějšky i ženské kláštery fungovaly pro přední rodiny v regionu jako bašty, které umožňovaly kontrolu nad územími na sever a na jih od Říma. Je nepochybné, že mezi třináctým a čtrnáctým stoletím bylo ženské mnišství kulturně určujícím prvkem římské společnosti. Shromážděný materiál také naznačuje, že ženské řeholní komunity nepůsobily jen jako kulturní náhražka uvolněného papežského stolce, ale že udržovaly kontinuitu po celé období, které bylo dosud v historiografii obecně považováno za umělecky nevýznamné.

Abstract – The Convent of Poor Clares in Breslau and its Medieval Furnishings The lost medieval convent of the Poor Clares in Breslau [since 1945 Wrocław] with its gothic furnishings and artworks used for private worship, can be envisioned from iconographical, functional, and inspired by posthumanism analysis of medieval artworks (preserved or known from archival sources), such as: the crucifix (ca 1350), five reliefs from the former main altarpiece (1360–1370); portable quadriptych (1360), panel painting featuring Virgin Mary with Child (1450); the now lost painting with the Tree of Jesse; panel painting featuring Anne of Bohemia (now lost); and a statue of a knight being interpreted as an effigy of Henry II the Pious. The reconstruction offered here delineates the characteristics of Breslau Poor Clares’ religious practices and the convent’s role in the memorializing the Silesian Piasts. The works of art, created mostly in local workshops between the mid-fourteenth to the early sixteenth centuries, are among the highest quality examples of medieval Silesian production. The iconography of objects from the church and cloister corresponds with the most important themes of Breslau Poor Clares’ pious and intellectual reflection – the cult of the Virgin Mary and Infant Jesus, Incarnation and Passion of Christ. The St Hedwig Chapel was furnished with works intended to preserve the memory of the convent’s benefactors from the Breslau Piast line; despite the many burials in the chapel, no consistent visual strategy to prolong the benefactors’ memory was introduced. Keywords – crucifix, Madonna on a lion, Piast dynasty, Poor Clares, Silesia, tabernacle shrine, Tree of Jesse Agnieszka Patała University of Wroclaw [email protected]

The Convent of Poor Clares in Breslau and its Medieval Furnishings Agnieszka Patała

The convent run by the Poor Clares order of Breslau (now Wrocław) was regarded the most elite nunnery in medieval Silesia1. Its high stature was due to its generous founders and patrons, good relations with the ruling dynasties and the town’s elite and clergy, the effective management of its ever-growing property holdings, and strict criteria for selecting postulant nuns. Although they followed the rule of St Clare granted by Pope Urban iv in 12622, the nuns, who were active in Breslau until 1810, constituted a living community

that was shaped by the generations of their abbesses and professed members, each bringing their own aspirations, intellectual potential, 1

2

Anna Sutowicz, Życie wewnętrze w klasztorze klarysek wrocławskich w średniowieczu, PhD thesis (University of Wrocław, supervisor: Kazimierz Bobowski), Wrocław 2002, pp. 42, 78, 90. Aleksander Horowski, “Ordinationes Monasterii Wratislaviensis: i più antichi statuti per le monache dell’Ordine di San Damiano”,  Collectanea Franciscana, lxxxviii (2018), pp. 91–145, sp. p. 101. The Ordinationes Monasterii Wratislaviensis are preserved in the codex held by the University of Wrocław Library (bu, iv q.202).

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and far-reaching networks to the convent. This article, however, is focused on the Middle Ages and has two main objectives. First, it aims to determine the shape of St Clare’s Church and the adjacent St Hedwig’s Chapel in the medieval era, along with their Gothic furnishings and other artwork intended for the nuns’ devotional practices. Within this framework, illuminated manuscripts belonging to the Breslau convent will be selectively analyzed, with reference to particular images serving mostly as visual sources and reference material, since these rich, intriguing artworks deserve their own separate study. Second, based on the analysis of these objects, the article will outline the characteristics of religious practices of the Poor Clares, as well as their role in memorializing Piast members of the dynasty’s Silesian line. According to the bull of Alexander iv dated December 13, 1256 and addressed to the bishops of Breslau (Thomas i) and Leubus (Wilhelm i), the Convent of Poor Clares in Breslau was founded and endowed by Anne of Bohemia, Duchess of Silesia. Anne had carried out the plan and wishes of her deceased husband, Henry ii the Pious, Duke of Silesia, Cracow, and Greater Poland, for the salvation of his soul3. Establishing the order in Breslau was a part of Henry’s broader foundation plan, continued by Anne and their son Henry iii, which included establishing a complex of three monasteries in the area adjacent to the Piast castle, a territory within the chartered town which remained at the disposal of the Breslau Piasts4. The eastern sector was given to the Franciscans, who arrived from Prague in ca 1236 (1239 at the latest)5. Shortly afterwards, the Knights of the Cross with the Red Star were brought, also from Prague, establishing the St Matthias Church where a hospital had functioned in the site’s western area6. Between the two monasteries, the Convent of Poor Clares began to rise in 1256. The Breslau monastic enclave’s striking similarity to Na Františku, the double monastery in Prague founded by Saint Agnes of Bohemia, was anything but a coincidence7, and resulted from close relations maintained in the thirteenth century by the Silesian Piasts and the Přemyslids. Anne of Bohemia was daughter of Ottokar  i,

King of Bohemia, and Constance of Hungary8. From the age of fourteen, she was brought up in Silesia, and she married Henry ii the Pious in 1238. According to her Vita9, Anne distinguished herself with her outstanding piety, influenced by her mother-in-law, Saint Hedwig of Silesia, who founded the Cistercian convent in Trebnitz (now Trzebnica), and by Anne’s sister, Saint Agnes of Bohemia, who founded the monastery complex in Prague, uniting the Franciscan and Poor Clares communities10; she had lived as a child in Trebnitz in Saint Hedwig’s care between 1214 and 121711. Anne of Bohemia and Henry ii probably witnessed the ceremony in which Saint Agnes made her profession of vows and joined the Poor Clares in Prague12. Establishing the Franciscan and Poor Clares convents in Breslau can therefore be taken as a part of Henry’s  ii broader political strategy, aimed at strengthening relations with the Bohemian court and his position in Central Europe, and crucial to his efforts to become king of Poland13. Less important, yet vital in this respect, were other motivations of the ducal founders, including care for religious needs and the commemoration of deceased Piast dynasty members, as well as a desire to present Prague as a key model for Franciscan reform in Central and Eastern Europe. The first Poor Clares group came from Prague to Breslau in 1257, settling initially in a wooden building14. In 1260, their new masonry monastery and St Clare’s Church were consecrated. St Hedwig’s Chapel was added on the church’s south side by 128215. It became the burial site of Duchess Anne and then several other Piast dynasty members. The convent continued developing its property16, being richly endowed by its founder and her son Henry iii, and due to the generosity of several donors, including Kazimierz the Great when he was king of Poland. In the fifteenth century, the nuns managed sources of income including a considerable number of landed estates (17 villages), farms (17), forests (3), and mills (4). After Silesia was incorporated by the Bohemian Crown, the Breslau Poor Clares maintained good relations with the ruling dynasty, receiving privileges from John of Luxemburg and Charles iv. The steady flow of funds and the convent’s elite status

were supported by the fact that, from its founding, it had been established as a place of residence for daughters of the most prominent Silesian, Bohemian, and Polish families. Initially, only noble women were admitted. From the 1330s, this included the first daughters of patricians as well, but financial criteria would remain important17. Before the Reformation, eight Piast duchesses served as abbesses at the Breslau Poor Clares. Their high position and wealth gave the nuns ready access to European culture and maintained them within international networks. The scriptorium, operating in the convent from the mid-fourteenth century on, was also pivotal in this regard18. The nuns survived the turbulent times of the Reformation. From 1693 to 1701, at the initiative of Abbess Brygida Wambowska, an extensive remodeling of the church and chapel and the construction of a new, larger convent building began19. Furnishings of both the church and chapel were replaced and only a few medieval works of art remained. Upon the secularization ordered in 1810, the entire complex was transferred to the Ursulines20. The Poor Clares’ library and some old furnishings were dispersed. Due to severe damage to the church and chapel in the Second World War, and subsequent reconstruction in the 1970s, their initial Gothic forms have become even less traceable21. According to the most recent research, based on post-war excavations and analysis of the convent’s remnants, the first brick-built church of the Breslau Poor Clares featured a single rectangular nave of three bays covered with quadripartite rib vaulting22, including an altar bay separated by a transversal arch, created by masons, who erected the Franciscan church nearby around the same time23. The atypical lack of a gallery with a separate nuns’ choir, which archaeologists found no traces of, has been interpreted as due to the strict enclosure of the whole church, which long remained inaccessible to lay people24. This hypothesis has found recent confirmation in the research of Aleksander Horowski, who provided an extensive analysis of Ordinationes Monasterii Wratislaviensis, 3

Magne Polonie ducis fuit prepositum coram nobis quod dux ipse firmum haberet prepositum dum vivebat aliquod in civitate Wrtislaviensis ordinis sancti Damiani monasterium construendi.

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10 11

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

A tam pii operis prepositum quod idem morte preventus adimplere non potuit eodem relicta /Anna/ pro ipsius ducis et sue anime sancte effectu cupiat prossequente complere. Littera benignitatis fratribus Wratislaviensi et Lubicensi episcopis, 13 xii 1256, Copiarium monasterii Sanctae Clarae, Archiwum Państwowe Wrocławia, Rep. 135 syg. 372, f. 433. In 1256, four papal documents were issued, confirming the foundation of the convent, setting the number of nuns at forty, as well as granting indulgences to visitors and donors to St Clare’s Church, then under construction. See Codex Diplomaticus Silesiae, Bd. 7: Regesten zur schlesischen Geschichte, vol. ii: Bis zum Jahre 1280, Colmar Grünhagen ed., Breslau 1875, Nos. 940, 941, 942, 943. Marta Młynarska-Kaletynowa, “Od początków do lokacji miasta na prawie niemieckim”,  in Atlas Historyczny Miast Polskich, vol. iv: Śląsk, 13/1: Wrocław, Rafał Eysymontt, Mateusz Goliński eds, Wrocław 2017, p. 6. Ewald Walter, “Zu den Anfängen des Franziskanerklosters St. Jakob und des Klarissenklosters St. Klara auf dem Breslauer Ritterplatz”,  Archiv für schlesische Kirchengeschichte, liii (1995), pp. 225–240. Arkadiusz Wojtyła, Idea Ordo Militaris w sztuce barokowej Krzyżowców z Czerwoną Gwiazdą, Wrocław 2012, pp. 39 –40. Janina Eysymontt, “Architektura pierwszych kościołów franciszkańskich na Śląsku”, in Z dziejów sztuki śląskiej, Zygmunt Świechowski ed., Warszawa 1978, pp. 45–46; Anna Michalska, Legenda obrazowa św. Klary z dawnego klasztoru klarysek we Wrocławiu, Wrocław 2013, pp. 60 – 61; Jakub Adamski, Gotycka architektura sakralna na Śląsku w latach 1200–1420. Główne kierunki rozwoju, Kraków 2017, p. 110. Augustyn Knoblich, Herzogin Anna von Schlesien 1204–1265, Breslau 1865; Anna Michalska,“Księżna, fundatorka, ‘błogosławiona’. Przedstawienia Anny Czeskiej w sztuce od xiii do początku xx w.”,  Quart, xl (2016), pp. 3–19. Aleksander Semkowicz,“Vita Annae ducissae”,  in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, vol. iv, idem ed., Lwów 1884, pp. 654–661. Original version, in the manuscript from the collection of the University of Wrocław Library (iv f.193). Christian-Frederik Felskau, Agnes von Böhmen und die Klosteranlage der Klarissen und Franziskaner in Prag. Leben und Institution, Legende und Verehrung, Nordhausen 2008. Anna Sutowicz, “Fundacja klasztoru klarysek wrocławskich we Wrocławiu na tle fundacji innych placówek żeńskiego zakonu franciszkańskiego na ziemiach polskich”,  Perspectiva. Legnickie Studia Teologiczno-Historyczne, ii/9 (2006), pp. 122–140, sp. p. 124. Michalska, Legenda obrazowa (n. 7), p. 61. Przemysław Wiszewski, Henryk ii Pobożny. Biografia polityczna, Legnica 2011, p. 184. “Spominki wrocławskich klarysek”,  in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, vol. iii, August Bielowski ed., Lwów 1878, pp. 691–695, sp. pp. 691–692. Eysymontt, “Architektura pierwszych” (n. 7), p. 51. Sutowicz, Życie wewnętrze (n. 1), pp. 26 –40. Ibidem, p. 47. Irena Czachorowska, “Książka w rękach klarysek śląskich”,  Śląski Kwartalnik Historyczny “Sobótka”,  xxxi (1966), pp. 407–419; Michalska, Legenda obrazowa (n. 7), p. 66. Michalska, Legenda obrazowa (n. 7), pp. 63–65. August Meer, Der Orden der Ursulinen in Schlesien, vol. i: Geschichte des Ursulinenklosters in Breslau, Breslau 1878. Edmund Małachowicz, Książęce rezydencje, fundacje i mauzolea w lewobrzeżnym Wrocławiu, Wrocław 1994, pp. 30 – 87. Eysymontt, “Architektura pierwszych” (n. 7), p. 51. For the most recent analysis containing references to earlier pub­lications, see Adamski, Gotycka architektura (n. 7), pp. 108 –110. Eysymontt, “Architektura pierwszych” (n. 7), p. 52.

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which contains norms and liturgical regulations in force at the Breslau convent. Horowski concluded that the rules regulating life for the Breslau Poor Clares do not refer to a separate choir25, with that element being, after all, an integral part of enclosed religious orders26. What is more, according to the Statues of Narbonne, stone vaulting was allowed only above the maiori capella (choir) in Franciscan architecture27, which suggests that, functionally, the Breslau church could be regarded a separate choir belonging to the clausura. The slightly narrower St Hedwig’s Chapel, the plan of which seems to simulate a second nave of the convent church, initially had a wooden ceiling covering its whole interior, only replaced by vaulting in the second half of the fourteenth century. It remains unknown how these two spaces were connected and, as a consequence, how nuns participated in the liturgy. Carola Jäggi has suggested that it may have resembled the solution used in the double monastery of the Gilbertine order in Watton (similar in arrangement to the Breslau “two naves” scheme), where nuns could attend the mass aurally by opening a small window28. What is more, the model of a convent with two separate sacred spaces, functioning similarly to the one in Breslau, can be found in some Cistercian convents, including those in Bersenbrück (Niedersachsen), Kaldern, and the Marienthal in Netze29. When analyzing the medieval architecture of the convent in Breslau, most scholars have not taken into account four preserved iconographic sources that provide the premise for minor modifications and additions to existing hypothetical reconstructions of its architecture30. The oldest of these is a drawing from a fourteenth-century manuscript written in the convent scriptorium31, featuring Duchess Anne and her husband, Henry ii the Pious, kneeling and holding a model of the Poor Clares convent [Fig. 1]. St Clare’s Church is depicted as the highest building (probably because it is the most remote, from the viewer’s perspective), with a rectangular tower adjacent from the west. St Hedwig’s Chapel, with a separate roof, seems lower and longer than the church. It has four windows, two entrances, and two bells, one of which hangs in the western part, next to the door, with the second above the roof of a lower eastern

extension with two windows. This undoubtedly highly schematic and conventional drawing cannot serve as a basis for any far-reaching conclusion. Nevertheless, it is of great importance, as it provides an important premise for the presence of the western tower, not taken into account by most researchers. The second iconographic source, a now-lost late Gothic image of Duchess Anne, painted over in 1641 and 174932, portrayed the founder with a model of the convent church and St Hedwig’s Chapel, the two separate naves of which were already covered by a common roof [Fig. 2]. The chapel entrance preceded a porch, and its walls had attached buttresses. These buttresses and the church’s western tower can also be discerned on the Breslau map executed by Barthel Weiner the Elder and his son Barthel Weiner the Younger in 1562 [Fig. 3]33, and in a drawing by Friedrich Bernhard Wernher featuring a view of the convent before its Baroque remodeling34. In light of these generalized, imprecise images, two drawings that portray the interior of the convent seem equally enigmatic [Fig. 4]. The drawings, in red and black ink, were executed by the same hand in the margins of a manuscript of the Ordinationes Monasterii Wratislaviensis text completed between 1260 and 127535. The first image, corresponding to the rubric De electione abbatisse, depicts a nun standing in front of an altar above which there is a Silesian Piast coat of arms36. The heraldry may identify the space as the interior of St Hedwig’s Chapel and could provide an implicit message about one of the duties of its abbesses, that is, to cultivate the memory of the convent’s founders and donors. This does not preclude another interpretation, as the image may depict an unwritten rule, generally kept throughout the mid-fourteenth century37, by which abbesses were selected from Piast family members. The second drawing, featuring two nuns inside the church – one ringing the large bell in the tower, another ringing the small bell hanging inside the church – provides a view of the main altar with ostensory and two burning candles. When compared to the illumination from Traité de la Sainte Abbaye (France, ca 1290) depicting the Mass celebration38, which depicts a monstrance’s prominent place on the altar

1 / Anne of Bohemia and Henry ii the Pious with the model of the Breslau Poor Clares convent, Breslau, first half of the 14th century, Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, iv f. 193, fol 156v 2 / Anne of Bohemia, St Hedwig Chapel in Breslau (lost after 1945), 15th century (overpainted in 1641, 1749)

25 Horowski, “Ordinationes Monasterii” (n. 2), pp. 122–125. 26 Caroline A. Bruzelius, “Hearing Is Believing: Clarissan Architecture, ca. 1213–1340”,  Gesta, xxxi/2, 1992, p. 83; Carola Jäggi,“Eastern Choir or Western Gallery? The Problem of the Place of the Nuns’ Choir in Königsfelden and Other Early Mendicant Nunneries”,  Gesta, xl/1 (2001), pp. 79 – 93, sp. p. 82. 27 Margit Mersch, “Programme, Pragmatism, and Symbolism in Mendicant Architecture”,  in Self-Representation of Medieval Religious Communities: The British Isles in Context, Anne Müller, Karen Stöber eds, Berlin 2009, p. 146. 28 Carola Jäggi, Frauenklöster im Spätmittelalter. Die Kirchen der Klarissen und Dominikanerinnen im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert, Petersberg 2006, pp. 217–218. 29 Ibidem, p. 218. 30 There are two exceptions, however: Hans Lutsch, Verzeichnis der Kunstdenkmäler der Provinz Schlesien, vol. i: Die Kunstdenkmäler der Stadt Breslau, Breslau 1886, p. 44; Horowski, “Ordinationes Monasterii” (n. 2), pp. 122–125. 31 Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, iv f. 193, f. 156v. 32 Michalska, “Księżna, fundatorka” (n. 8), pp. 5– 7. 33 Facsimile of the map Contrafactur der Stadt Breslau painted on canvas by Barthel Weiner the Elder and Barthel Weiner the Younger in 1562, printed in 1826 in Breslau by Carl Foerster, now in Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, nr. 2318. 34 Friedrich Bernhard Wernher, Topographia seu Compendium Silesiae, 1744–1748, after: Małachowicz, Książęce rezydencje (n. 21), p. 34. 35 Horowski, “Ordinationes Monasterii” (n. 2). 36 Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, sygn. iv q.202, 5v. 37 Bogusław Czechowicz, “Anna Ducissa Filia Regis Bohemiae hic sepulta. Wokół memorii fundatorki wrocławskiego konwentu klarysek”,  in Svatá Anežka Česká a velké ženy její doby / Die heilige Agnes von Böhmen und die großen Frauengestalten ihrer Zeit, Miroslav Šmied, František Záruba eds, Praha 2013, pp. 217–232. 38 Yates Thompson 11, f. 6v, British Library in London, see Justin Clegg, The Medieval Church in Manuscripts, London 2003, pp. 30–32, pl. 25.

3 / Barthel Weiner the Elder and Barthel Weiner the Younger, Contrafactur der Stadt Breslau (detail), 1562 (facsimile printed in 1826 in Breslau by Carl Foerster), Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, nr 2318

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4 / The St Clare’s Church and St Hedwig’s Chapel in Breslau (?), Ordinationes Monasterii Wratislaviensis, Breslau, 1260–1275, Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, iv q. 202 5 / Crucifix, from the St Clare’s Church in Breslau, limewood, ca 1350, Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie

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flanked by candles and is far more sophisticated and artistically and iconographically elaborate, the Breslau scene is a view of the Mass celebration on feasts days (duplex feasts) in the convent church, when the bells were rung at the canonical hours, according to custom39. What is more, the monstrance could constitute a reference to Saint Clare and her strong devotion to the Eucharist, resulting in many miracles40, manifoldly described in her Vita by Thomas of Celano41, illustrated by Guido da Siena ca 127042, and depicted on the painted wings of two tabernacle-altarpieces from the Nuremberg Poor Clares’ church (1360–1370)43. Early fifteenth-­ century depictions of Saint Clare holding a chalice with a host can also be found on the charters of two manuscripts from the collection of the Breslau Poor Clares [Fig. 7]44, proving that Saint Clare was also associated visually with the cult of the consecrated host in Breslau45. Moreover, it should be noted that the host used to be kept on permanent display in Santa Chiara in Assisi at the convent altar46 – one cannot exclude a similar custom existing in Breslau. Nevertheless, attention paid in the analyzed drawing to the veneration of the host probably demonstrates a new, more direct, mystical and sensuous approach to liturgical participation and Eucharistic devotion observed by nuns in Europe in the thirteenth century, resulting in a strong need for a view of the altar and the host47. Therefore, these drawings seem to be an illustration of two selected issues described in the Ordinationes, probably remaining pivotal to the Breslau convent and singled out for this reason. However, the images could give a very general idea of the appearance of the convent’s interior, at least some of its parts. Most crucial in this respect seems to be the bell tower, whose presence may suggest that the church was erected with reference to Italian examples (St Damiano in Assisi) rather than those in Prague. Among the earliest furnishings of St Clare’s Church were several ornamenta altaris provided by its founder, including four gilded chalices and patens, a cross, and Saint Hedwig’s arm reliquary, framed in gold and silver48. All these had been lost long before 1886, when Hans Lutsch cited only a thirteenth-century bronze crucifix in his inventory, which once belonged to the convent,

even though he had not seen it, as it was already missing49. However, Lutsch presumed it could have been brought there by the Ursulines, rather than belonging to the oldest furnishings of the Breslau Poor Clares. Even more puzzling is the information provided in 1875 by Augustyn Knoblich, who noted that he had seen a monumental carved statue of the Virgin and Child lying on the floor in what was then the Ursuline convent house, which to him seemed to have been made in the thirteenth century50. In the twentieth century, however, no trace of any such piece remained51. Also in the group of artwork listed by Knoblich, which probably went missing in the twentieth century, there is a medieval “Palmesel”, stored in the Ursuline convent52. Despite losses documented by such inventories, both St Clare’s Church and St Hedwig’s Chapel were much more richly furnished with works of art than is suggested by the two red-ink drawings analyzed above. The first from the group of the oldest preserved works of art from St Clare’s Church is the crucifix [Fig. 5], dating to ca 135053 or the third quarter of the fourteenth century54, originally measuring almost two meters high55. Its high artistic value was well recognized in the nineteenth century, when it hung above the northern side altar of the inner church (as St Clare’s Church was called after 1810)56. The work’s poor state of preservation at present is a result of damage to the church at the end of the Second World War. When analyzing its formal and stylistic features, scholars emphasized the very flat modelling of its torso, 39 Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, sygn. iv q.202, 18r: Item in festis duplicibus duo cerei in utriusque vesperis et matutino semper ante altarem habeantur. 40 Nirit Ben-Aryeh Debby, “St. Clare Expelling the Saracens from Assisi: Religious Confrontation in Word and Image”,  The Sixteenth Century Journal, xliii/3 (2012), pp. 643–665. 41 The Life of Saint Clare: Ascribed to Fr. Thomas of Celano of the Order of Friars Minor (a.d. 1255–1261), Fr. Paschal Robinson ed., Philadelphia 1910. 42 Diptych of Saint Clare with a scene depicting St Clare expelling the Saracens, Siena, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Inv. No. 4. 43 Stephan Kemperdick, “Tabernacle-Altarpieces in Central Europe: Examples, Types, Iconography”,  in The Saint Enshrined: European Tabernacle-altarpieces, c. 1150–1400, Fernando Gutiérrez Baños et al. eds, Bellaterra 2020, pp. 129 –155, sp. pp. 136 –138. 44 Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, sygn. i q. 252 [Fig. 7] and sygn. i f.430. 45 Caroline Walker Bynum, Holy Feast and Holy Fast: The Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women, Berkeley / Los Angeles / London 1987, p. 101.

46 Jäggi, Frauenklöster im Spätmittelalter (n. 28), p. 266. 47 Bynum, Holy Feast (n. 45), pp. 48 – 70; Bruzelius, “Hearing Is Believing” (n. 26), pp. 83, 87– 89. 48 Semkowicz, “Vita Annae ducissae” (n. 9), p. 660. 49 Lutsch, Verzeichnis der Kunstdenkmäler (n. 30), p. 189. 50 Augustyn Knoblich, “Mittelalterliche Sculpturen im Ursuliner-Kloster zu Breslau”,  Schlesiens Vorzeit in Bild und Schrift, vol. ii (1875), pp. 8 –11, sp. p. 9. 51 Erich Wiese, Schlesische Plastik vom Beginn des xiv bis zur Mitte des xv. Jahrhunderts, Breslau 1923, p. 19. 52 Knoblich “Mittelalterliche Sculpturen” (n. 50), pp. 9 –10. 53 Wiese, Schlesische Plastik (n. 51), p. 21. 54 Małgorzata Kochanowska-Reiche, The Mystic Middle Ages: Museum Treasures, National Museum in Warsaw, Olszanica 2002, p. 29. 55 In the collection of the National Museum in Warsaw since 1946 (inv. Śr.416/1 mnw), polychromed wood, 91 x 30.4 x 21.5 cm; the cross is modern. Before 1945, it measured 197 cm along with the cross. 56 Wiese, Schlesische Plastik (n. 51), p. 21.

the leanness of the disproportionally short arms57, the schematically sculpted chest with protrud­ing ribs58 – and it was attributed to the local workshop from the circle of the so-called Master of Madonnas on a Lion59. Despite constituting one of the most standard elements of sacred-space furnishings, the artwork must have played an essential role in the church of the Breslau Poor Clares on several accounts. First, the Passion of Christ and veneration of Jesus suffering on the cross formed a focal point in Franciscan piety, being closely related to the doctrine of Transubstantiation as well as to the Eucharistic devotion promoted by the Minorites60 and Saint Clare61. Second, the importance of the cross in the Poor Clares’ sacred space and its devotional potential could have been enhanced by the legend referring to the extant painted crucifix from San Damiano in Assisi, which had spoken to Saint Francis as he prayed, providing a message that determined his vocation62, as well as by the Vita of Saint Clare, which was read aloud three times a day in the Breslau convent63 and contained references to the importance of prayer at the cross and to miracles taking place during and after it. Finally, Saint Bonaventure, in his writings addressed to the Poor Clares, recommended the nuns “touch” Christ and his wounds while contemplating his passion to most nearly approach him by means of imagination and meditation64. Whether or not the Breslau Poor Clares were familiar with this particular text65, in their prayers they definitely addressed the crucified Christ and his martyred body directly, as evidenced by the adoration prayer of Good Friday from the fourteenth-century lectionary that belonged to the convent66. Therefore, the carved, three-dimensional, larger-than-life statue of Christ martyred, being a tangible, corporeal image of God’s body, could enhance a praying nun’s emotional experience by activating all her senses while “touching the Passion”67, crossing boundaries between physical (her) and metaphysical (God’s) existence. The original location of this crucifix within the space of the Breslau Poor Clares’ church is a matter of speculation, but its size indicates that it probably served the entire convent community, hanging either on a rood beam or on a wall, accessible at all times.

Five reliefs, featuring the Nativity, Adoration of the Magi, Presentation in the Temple, the Last Supper, and the Pentecost, and the sole remnants of what is supposed to be the main altarpiece of St Clare’s Church, were executed in the 1360s, thus at time similar to that of the crucifix [Fig. 6]68. Originally rectangular in shape, and in all probability reduced in the Baroque period, these works are now regarded as the most important set of narrative reliefs in fourteenth-century Silesian woodcarving and are also attributed to the local workshop from the circle of the Master of Madonnas on a Lion69. The reliefs formed two iconographic cycles, 57 Wiese, Schlesische Plastik (n. 51), p. 21. 58 Marcin Wisłocki, ”xiv-wieczne krucyfiksy na Śląsku”,  Dzieła i Interpretacje, vol. i (1993), pp. 5–26, sp. pp. 13, 19. 59 Heinz Braune, Erich Wiese, Schlesische Malerei und Plastik des Mittelalters, Breslau 1929, p. 16; Wisłocki, “xiv-wieczne” (n. 58), p. 13. 60 Anne Debres, Picturing the Passion in Late Medieval Italy: Narrative Painting, Franciscan Ideologies, and the Levant, Cambridge 1996, pp. 16 –24; Anna Welch, Liturgy, Books and Franciscan Identity in Medieval Umbria, Leiden 2015, pp. 70–131. 61 For her correspondence with Saint Agnes of Bohemia on the contemplation of images of Christ crucified, see Mateusz Kapustka, “Das Entfalten der Lektüre von imitatio. Ein Passionsaltärchen aus dem mittelalterlichen. Klarenstift in Breslau als performatives Bilderwerk”,  in Frauen – Kloster – Kunst, Jeffrey Hamburger, Carola Jäggi eds, Turnhout 2007, pp. 105–112, sp. p. 113. 62 Michael Robson, The Franciscans in the Middle Ages, Woodbridge 2006, pp. 12–13. 63 Sutowicz, Życie wewnętrze (n. 1), p. 102. 64 Michelle Kames, Imagination, Meditation and Cognition in the Middle Ages, Chicago/London 2011, pp. 136 –137. 65 We know that the convent possessed the text of Saint Francis’ Vita written by the saint, see Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, iv f.193, ff. 81–102. 66 Domine ieshu criste filii dei vivi gloriosissime conditor mundi qui [...] gloriosas palmas tuas in crucis patibulo permisisti perfigi [...] noli nos, derelinquere gloriosissime domine sed dignare indulgere qui malum egimus axaudi nos prostratos coram te ad adorandam crucem tuam sanctum, Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, I q.256 f. 141–141a. 67 Here I refer to Donna L. Sadler, Touching the Passion – Seeing Late Medieval Altarpieces through the Eyes of Faith, Leiden/ Boston 2018, who discusses how late Gothic altarpieces (featuring carved Passion scenes) stimulated multi-sensorial immersion (touching by seeing, which helped to believe) in the narrative, which consequently provided beholders with a very deep theological, liturgical, and ecclesiastical experience. This approach could also be applied to the analysis of the non-narrative artworks. 68 Wiese, Schlesische Plastik (n. 51), pp. 26 –27, 75; Braune/ Wiese, Schlesische Malerei (n. 59), p. 16; Zofia Białłowicz-­ Krygierowa, Studia nad snycerstwem xiv wieku w Polsce, vol. i: Początki śląskiej tradycji ołtarza szafowego. Katalog, Warszawa/­ Poznań 1981, pp. 117–118. Since 1898, these reliefs (limewood, 43 – 45 × 42 – 44 cm.) belong to the collection of the Museum of the Archdiocese in Wrocław. 69 Białłowicz-Krygierowa, Studia nad snycerstwem (n. 68), p. 118.

6 / Reliefs from the former main altarpiece (?) of St Clare’s Church in Breslau, linden with tempera polychromy and gilding, 1360–1370, Muzeum Archidiecezjalne we Wrocławiu

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illustrating the lives of Mary and Christ, each including at least four, but conceivably even more, scenes constituting the wing-panel decoration. According to research, the altarpiece may have had the form of either a winged or a tabernacle altarpiece70. Although determining its original shape seems impossible today, there are at least two reasons to presume that the latter may be the more probable alternative. First, referring to a recently published taxonomy of medieval Swedish tabernacle altarpieces and their relation to other European works of art, the Breslau reliefs seem to bear similarities to selected altarpieces of the Fröskog type, especially late examples from outside Scandinavia71. Taking into account the reliefs’ composition schemes, compressed to the most important actors and objects in particular scenes, the shape of the flat panels, which is not only due to Baroque-era trimming but probably also due to the outline of shallow niches of the wing registers they were originally inserted in, as well as scenic iconography suggesting their arrangement into probably two elaborate cycles, the Breslau set bears resemblance, both structurally and iconographically, to Marian altarpieces from St Marienberg Monastery in Helmstedt (Lower Saxony, ca 1350), St Stefano in Aosta (now in Musico Civico in Turin, 1330–1340), and the cathedral in Altari (ca 1250)72. What is more, the Helmstedt altarpiece features Saint Francis’ stigmatization, which implies its creation for the purpose of Franciscan devotion. Second, contemporaneous to the Breslau set of reliefs being analyzed here, four tabernacle altarpieces were executed for the Poor Clares’ church in Nuremberg (ca 1360)73. Even though the wings of all four sets are decorated with paintings rather than relief carvings, their existence can be interpreted as manifesting a trend or preference for a particular type of altarpiece among Poor Clares churches established in this part of Europe. One must consider the Breslau reliefs as fitting into this same pattern. Still, there is the issue of the altarpiece’s shrine, especially its decoration, which must have been sculptural. Considering the program of both relief cycles, as well as the strong Marian devotion in the Breslau convent, it can be assumed that a statue of the Virgin

and Child stood at the center of the altarpiece. Perhaps one of the now-lost or unidentified sculptures mentioned in 1875 by Augustyn Knoblich served this role, since he listed two other wooden sculptures in addition to the thirteenth-century Marian statue, both executed in the fourteenth century, representing the Virgin with Child and Anne of Bohemia74. One reason for considering the hypothesis of the probable presence of the Marian figure in the shrine is the statue of the enthroned Mary with the Child on Lions from the altar of the Poor Clares’ church in Ribnitz-Dammgarten75. Even though it was only created at the end of the fourteenth century, or around 1410, and seems stylistically distant from the reliefs in consideration, it falls into the Madonna on a Lion type that was popular in Silesia and was represented there by statues from Hermsforf and Krosnowice76. Therefore, it seems plausible that artwork representing the formal and iconographical trend referred to as Madonnas on a Lion was preferred by the Poor Clares across Central Europe. A painted quadriptych, the last element in the group of the oldest preserved works of art from the St Clare convent, is a rare example of an object meant for private devotion and direct contact with a user that survives today in its original shape [Fig. 8]77. In terms of its form and structure, being a portable, multipart painterly ensemble, it resembles a traveling altarpiece; to some scholars, however, its form and outer parts recall a book’s cover78. The position of the hinges and protruding extended edges on the second and third wings determine how it folds: the wings cannot fold over each other freely, the first and fourth wings must 70 Białłowicz-Krygierowa, Studia nad snycerstwem (n. 68), p. 33. Białłowicz-Krygierowa provided analogies to both alternatives: altarpieces from Tyrvis and Wirmo (winged altarpieces) as well as altarpieces at Madonna di Constantinopoli, S. Maria Maggiore, Alatri (tabernacle altarpieces). 71 Justin Kroesen, Peter Tångeberg, Helgonskåp: Medieval Tabernacle Shrines in Sweden and Europe, Petersberg 2021, pp. 40– 80. 72 Ibidem, pp. 68 – 70. 73 Die Gemälde des Spätmittelalters im Germanischen Nationalmuseum. Franken, vol. i, Daniel Hess, Dagmar Hirschfelder, Katja von Baum eds, Regensburg 2019, pp. 57– 94; Stephan Kemperdick, “Tabernacle-Altarpieces in Central Europe: Examples, Types, Iconography”, in The Saint Enshrined: European Tabernacle-altarpieces, c. 1150–1400, Fernando Gutiérrez Baños et al. eds, Bellaterra 2020, pp. 129 –155, sp. pp. 136 –138; idem, Avantgarde 1360: ein rekonstruierter Baldachinaltar aus Nürnberg, Frankfurt am Main 2002.

7 / St Clare with a kneeling nun adoring Mary with Christ, drawing, late 14th century, Biblioteka Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu, i q. 252

74 Knoblich, “Mittelalterliche Sculpturen” (n. 50), p. 9. 75 Białłowicz-Krygierowa, Studia nad snycerstwem (n. 68), p. 99. 76 Recently, Romuald Kaczmarek, “O proweniencji trzech najważniejszych śląskich rzeźb Madonn na lwach”,  Roczniki Sztuki Śląskiej, xxiv (2015), pp. 9 –25. 77 Migrations: Late Gothic Art in Silesia, exhibition catalog (Wrocław: Muzeum Narodowe, 2018), Agnieszka Patała ed., Wrocław 2019, pp. 272–273. Tempera on linden panel, 26.7 × 64  m, Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie (Śr. 24/1–4 mnw). 78 Mateusz Kapustka, “Das Entfalten der Lektüre von imitatio. Ein Passionsaltärchen aus dem mittelalterlichen. Klarenstift in Breslau als performatives Bilderwerk”,  in Frauen – Kloster – Kunst, Jeffrey Hamburger, Carola Jäggi  eds, Turnhout 2007, pp. 105–112.

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8 / Quadriptych, tempera on linden panel, ca 1360, Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie Śr. 24/1–4 mnw

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be folded over the second and third, respectively. A similar solution can be seen in the fourteenth-­ century Catalan polyptych attributed to the Master of San Marcons (now held in the Morgan Library in New York); this method was less popular than the “concertina-like” option79. The lack of any additional stand and its small size suggest that it was not placed on display, but rather hand-held. When closed, it features Saint Francis and Saint Clare venerating the Veraicon on the obverse and the Crucifixion on the reverse. The first opening showcases four scenes from Christ’s early life (the Annunciation, Adoration of the Magi, Flight into Egypt, and the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple), whereas the final opening includes scenes arranged in two groups. The four outer wings feature scenes from the Passion (the Agony in the Garden, Arrest of Christ, Flagellation, Crowning with Thorns); the inner-wing scenes refer to the major festivals of the liturgical year (the Resurrection, Nativity, Pentecost, Assumption of the Virgin). Throughout the nineteenth century, the quadriptych was dated to the early fourteenth century and regarded one of the earliest examples of panel painting from Breslau80, but subsequent research has shifted the date to 136081. The issue of the quadriptych’s artistic origins remains unresolved. Scholars have pointed out connections to Cologne, Bohemia and Silesia82. Regardless of its place of execution and the date of its arrival in Silesia, and although a Silesian origin seems the least possible, the iconography leaves no doubt about having been created for a member of the Poor Clares’ community. Moreover, the quadriptych’s structure, which allows it to be opened, closed, and operated in different ways, suggests it may have been intended as a mnemotechnical aid for acts of private devotion. Scholarly attention has been given predominantly to its “cover” images, providing two visions of Christ: as human on the Cross and as God, with his transfigured face venerated directly by Saint Francis and indirectly by Saint Clare (as she looks at Saint Francis, the alter Christus)83. These two scenes were meant to provide the key to understanding and interpreting the narrative scenes within, determining this object as self-referential84, which indeed it is.

Particularly striking is the contrast between the  work’s structural simplicity and pictorial conciseness and its iconographic and substantive completeness. It contains key scenes, both narrative and devotional, essential to both the daily and the festive practices of a pious Poor Clare. It could substitute a crucifix, not only a carved one but also of the type popular in Italy with a painted figure of Christ crucified and accompanying Passion scenes. The featured Crucifixion provided stimuli for both contemplating and experiencing the Passion of Jesus, whereas the scenes in the first opening did so for his infancy and the role of Mary in the history of salvation85. Thus, it also served as a substitute for carved and painted Marian altar retables, which often contained visual references to Saint Clare. The image of the Veraicon would have guided the nun in her meditative pilgrimage to Rome86, while the four central scenes within served for celebrating the liturgical year’s most important feasts. This luxurious artwork was most probably executed on special commission, and was owned by a well-educated, elite member of the convent, who had a miniature year-round meditation and devotional set at her disposal, a visual capsular compendium allowing this now-­a nonymous nun to “survive” beyond the shared sacred space, with its standard furnishings, for an entire liturgical year. The religious themes and devotional preferences of the Breslau Poor Clares, as discussed above, did not change in the following century, as the painting featuring the Virgin Mary with the naked Christ [Fig. 9] testifies. It is dated to ca 1450 and attributed to the workshop of Wilhelm Kalteysen von Oche, one of the most important fifteenth-­century studios operating in Silesia. It was brought into the collection of the Königlichen Museums für Kunst und Altertümer Breslau as early as in 181587. The painting depicts Mary as Queen of Heaven and Mother of God – therefore, as a crucial protagonist in the future redemption of humankind. Her Child – who stands naked, in a token of his double nature as God and human – holds a rosary in both hands and looks directly at the viewer. The presence of a painted parapet, separating and, at the same time, connecting the realms of the divine and the human

(a device common in Italian Marian paintings), reduces the distance between Christ and the viewer, providing a more personal connection to the figures in the painting. The golden background, in turn, enhances the impression of placing Mary in an undefined extraterrestrial space, suggesting relations between this work and icon painting. Both the image and the text inscribed on the panel’s frame of the responsory for Matins of the Virgin Mary address the Virgin as the Mother of God and of mankind: Congratulamini mihi omnes qui diligitis dominum quia cum essem parvula placui altissimo et de meis visceribus genui deum. In all probability, this Marian chant echoed within the convent walls: the Breslau nuns did not adhere to Saint Clare’s recommendations to abstain from cantillation traditions88. The painting, based on its size and subject matter, was probably also meant for private devotion and close inspection. What is more, its composition and iconography (Christ as the New or Final Adam) recalls the ink drawing of Saint Clare with a kneeling nun adoring Mary with Christ [Fig. 7]. The depiction can be read as a visionary dimension of the act of prayer, experienced by the Poor Clares and other convents, as with a very similar late-Gothic panel from Cistercians in Trebnitz, which was overpainted in the Baroque era89. The rarest late-Gothic panel painting belonging to the Breslau convent in iconographical terms, which was executed in the early sixteenth century and lost in 1945, featured the Tree of Jesse combined with the theme of Holy Kinship  [Fig. 10]90. This image type, interpreted inaccurately as an Arbor Virginis variant91, emerged due to the growing 79 Victor Schmidt, Painted Piety: Panel Paintings for Personal Devotion in Tuscany 1250–1400, Florence 2005, pp. 290–292. 80 Alwin Schultz, Schlesiens Kunstleben im dreizehnten und vierzehnten Jahrhundert, Breslau 1870, p. 10. 81 Joanna Sikorska, ”Quadriptychon mit Szenen aus dem Leben Christi und Marias”,  in Meisterwerke mittelalterlicher Kunst aus dem National Museum Warschau, Suzanne Greub, Thierry Greub, Małgorzata Kochanowska-Reiche eds, München 2006, pp. 56 –57. 82 See Tadeusz Dobrzeniecki, Malarstwo tablicowe. Katalog Muzeum Narodowego w Warszawie, Warszawa 1972, pp. 179 –182; Alicja Karłowska-Kamzowa, Malarstwo śląskie 1250–1450, Wrocław 1979, p. 121. 83 Jeffrey Hamburger, The Visual and the Visionary: Art and Female Spirituality in Late Medieval Germany, New York 1998, pp. 379 –380. 84 Kapustka, “Das Entfalten” (n. 78).

9 / Workshop of Wilhelm Kalteysen von Oche, Virgin with Child, tempera and oil on linden panel, ca 1450, Muzeum Narodowe we Wrocławiu, xi-229

85 These two themes are among the most popular in the iconography of the thirteenth- and fourteenth-century portable altarpieces from the territories of Italy and France; see Schmidt, Painted Piety (n. 79), pp. 281–313. 86 Hamburger, The Visual (n. 83), pp. 322–323. 87 Bożena Guldan-Klamecka, Anna Ziomecka, Sztuka na Śląsku xii–xvi w. Katalog zbiorów, Wrocław 2003, pp. 267–270; Migrations (n. 77), pp. 132–133. 88 Sutowicz, Życie wewnętrze (n. 1), p. 92. 89 Agnieszka Patała, Pod znakiem świętego Sebalda. Rola Norymbergi w kształtowaniu późnogotyckiego malarstwa tablicowego na Śląsku, Wrocław 2018, p. 105. 90 Ludwig Burgermeister, Günther Grundmann, Die Kunstdenkmäler der Provinz Niederschlesien, vol. i: Die Stadt Breslau. Zweiter Teil, Breslau 1933, p. 37; Iwona Błaszczyk, “Wyobrażenie drzewa Jessegow sztuce średniowiecznej”,  in Wielkopolska, Polska, Europa. Studia dedykowane pamięci Alicji Karłowskiej-Kamzowej, Jacek Wiesiołowski, Jacek Kowalski eds, Poznań 2006, pp. 237–258, sp. p. 254. Until 1945, this artwork belonged to the collection of Schlesisches Museum für Kunstgewerbe und Altertümer in Breslau. 91 Błaszczyk, “Wyobrażenie drzewa” (n. 90), p. 254.

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10 / Tree of Jesse, early 16th century, before 1945 in the collection of Schlesisches Museum für Kunstgewerbe und Altertümer in Breslau, now lost 11 / Two panels from St Clare’s convent in Breslau on a permanent exhibition of Schlesisches Museum für Kunstgewerbe und Altertümer in Breslau, now lost 12 / Gethsemane, early 16th century, Ursulines Convent in Breslau

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popularity of Saint Anne’s cult in the late fifteenth century92. In this painting, the tree grows from Jesse’s chest, bearing busts of Christ’s ancestors and prophets who had announced his coming on its branches. At the top, the infant Christ stands as the future King, accompanied by God the Father and the Holy Spirit. Jesse, in the foreground, is surrounded by Mary and Saint Anne, and in the background, two of Saint Anne’s daughters are portrayed with their children. In the upper corners, the unknown Silesian painter placed separate scenes: Mary playing with the Child and the Virgin Weaving the Seamless Robe. Both can be interpreted as prefiguring the Passion of Christ and as a metaphor for the Incarnation93. The artwork, therefore, interweaves several motifs, biblical and apocryphal, important to the Breslau Poor Clares’ devotions, stressing Mary’s virginity, her future pain, and pivotal role (being the rod from the Tree of Jesse, whose flower is Christ94) in the history of salvation, as well as the contributions of her female relatives in this process. Special consideration is given to Saint Anne, featured as Mater Matris Domini and mother of the “Apostles’ lineage”95, becoming

visually almost as important as Jesse. The painting could also be interpreted as a reference to the tree standing in front of St Anne’s Church in Jerusalem until the fifteenth century, which grew there from the time of the Virgin Mary’s birth and was venerated mostly by female pilgrims96. Following this interpretative path, one may assume that praying before such an image could turn into a spiritual pilgrimage taking place in the nuns’ imaginations, similarly to the Veraicons97, as in principle they could not travel to Jerusalem. Nevertheless, this bespoke, multifaceted painting served as a prompt to prayer and contemplation of the essential articles of faith, practiced by nuns individually or in groups. A similar object, dated to 1506, which probably functioned as a pendant, features Christ appearing to his mother [Fig. 11]. This panel was found in 1810 by Johann Gustav Gottlieb Büsching in the nuns’ Baroque choir98, but also went missing in 1945. The two works of art belong to a large body of devotional images (including two painted panels from the Poor Clares’ convent in Ribnitz99) created for nuns’ meditative and spiritual needs, with compositional patterns, iconography, and narratives that,

while they elude entrenched standards of late-­ medieval art, still deserve scholarly attention. The only medieval artwork that survives in the former Poor Clares convent is a set of monumental wood figures from Gethsemane [Fig. 12], probably carved in the early sixteenth century100. Although no trace has ever been found of a separate medieval Gethsemane Chapel on the convent grounds, this group of works in all probability embellished a separate space, presumably a chapel located in or near the cemetery, in keeping with a common tradition observed across Central and Western Europe101. According to archival sources, both the Breslau Poor Clares and the Franciscans shared a common cemetery, situated between the convent and the monastery. One may suppose that a chapel was also found at this very imprecise location, perhaps serving both religious communities. 92 On this phenomenon, see Werner Esser, Die Heilige Sippe: Studien zu einem spätmittelalterlichen Bildthema in Deutschland und den Niederlanden, Bonn 1986; Virginia Nixon, Mary’s Mother: Saint Anne in Late Medieval Europe, University Park 2004; Pamela Scheingorn, “Appropriating the Holy Kinship: Gender and Family History”,  in Interpreting Cultural Symbols: Saint Anne in Late Medieval Society, Kathleen Ashley, Pamela Sheingorn eds, Athens 1990, pp. 169 –198.

93 Zofia Herman, “Saint Luke Painting the Virgin in the Collection of the National Museum in Warsaw: Artistic Self-Reflection versus the Cult Function”,  Rocznik Muzeum Narodowego w Warszawie. Nowa Seria / Journal of the National Museum in Warsaw: New Series, ii/38 (2013), pp. 243–262, sp. p. 251; Robert L. Wyss, “Die Handarbeiten der Maria”,  in Artes minores. Dank an Werner Abegg, Mechthild Flury-Lemberg, Werner Abegg, Michael Stettler eds, Bern 1973, pp. 113–118. 94 This idea, originating from the Book of Isaiah (11.1), was commonly used by Christian theologians including Saints Augustine and Hieronymus, Rabanus Maurus, and Saint Bonaventure; see Krzysztof Przylicki, “Geneza i znaczenie motywu Arbor Virginis w sztuce Północnej Europy do Soboru Trydenckiego”,  Studia Humanistyczne, lxii (2014), pp. 5–31. 95 Nixon, Mary’s Mother (n. 92), p. 51. 96 Esser, Die Heilige Sippe (n. 92), p. 113. 97 Hamburger, The Visual (n. 83), pp. 322–323. 98 Johann G. G. Büsching, “Das alteste Bild der Gemäldesammlung der Hochschule zu Breslau”,  Wöchentliche Nachrichten für Freunde der Geschichte, Kunst und Gelehrtheit des Mittelalters,  i (1816), pp. 12–18. Until 1945, this artwork belonged to the collection of Schlesisches Museum für Kunstgewerbe und Altertümer in Breslau. 99 Christoph Gerhardt, “Meditationsbilder aus dem ehemaligen Klarissenkloster Ribnitz (Bez. Rostock, Ddr)”,  Pastor bonus: Trierer theologische Zeitschrift, xcviii (1947), pp. 95–112; Kristina Wegner, Kleinbildwerke des Mittelalters in den Frauenklöstern des Bistums Schwerin, vornehmlich im Zisterzienserinnenkloster zum Heiligen Kreuz in Rostock und im Klarissenkloster Ribnitz, Leipzig 1994. 100 Burgermeister/Grundmann, Die Kunstdenkmäler (n. 90), p. 35; Michalska, Legenda obrazowa (n. 7), p. 67. 101 Dieter Munk, Die Ölberg-Darstellung in der Monumentalplastik Süddeutschlands: Untersuchung und Katalog, PhD Thesis (Universität Tübingen), Tübingen 1968.

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13 / Tombstone of Henry vi from St Hedwig’s Chapel, ca 1360, Ursulines Convent in Breslau

As was common among women’s communities founded by local dynasties102, the Poor Clares order in Breslau devoted itself to prayer on behalf of the souls of ruling-dynasty members and the local community103. Besides fulfilling this duty, they played another important role by taking care of the Piast mausoleum. Its establishment in St Hedwig’s Chapel had been initiated by Duchess Anne’s burial there in 1265, with her grave located on the altar’s north side, covered with a stone slab104. Until the end of the thirteenth century, Duchess Anne’s closest relatives were also buried there, including her children Henry  iii and Hedwig (the convent’s second abbess), her niece Beatrice of Bohemia (wife of Otto iii, Margrave of Brandenburg), her grandson Henry v, his wife Elisabeth, and their daughters (Elisabeth and Margaret). They were followed by the next generations of both male and female Piast family members, including kin who were Poor Clares abbesses105. A special place in the family mausoleum was occupied by the tomb of Henry vi (1294–1336)  [Fig. 13], the last of the Breslau Piast line106. Its construction involved architectural changes in the chapel, which was covered with a vault in the second half of the fourteenth century107. The chapel’s special role in the collective memory of Silesia was attested to in 1707, when an urn with the heart of Karolina, the last member of the Piast dynasty, was placed there108. Moreover, unlike St Clare’s Church, St Hedwig’s Chapel was open to the laity from the very beginning, becoming a space where Breslau citizens could both commemorate deceased Piasts and, above all, attend Franciscan holy masses and sermons. This was particularly important every time papal interdicts banning religious practices were imposed on Breslau. The Poor Clares obtained a bull from Pope Alexander iv allowing them to celebrate mass during such circumstances – on the condition, however, that they close the church gate and refrain from ringing the bells109. Therefore, St Hedwig’s Chapel must have played a pivotal role on the ecclesiastical map of the medieval city and for its inhabitants. In addition to works of sepulchral art covering several stone slabs, at least two other Gothic works were originally part of St Hedwig’s Chapel’s

medieval furnishings. Their existence and artistic features indicate that the Poor Clares and the  convent’s benefactors made efforts to preserve the memory of the Piast family. According to scholars who examined or at least glimpsed the painting depicting Duchess Anne, standing between the Franciscan and Knights of the Cross with the Red Star monasteries and holding the Poor Clares convent model [Fig. 2], it was executed in the fifteenth century but lost its medieval features with overpainting in 1631 and 1749110. From the eighteenth century until 1945, it was hung on the chapel’s north wall above the duchess’ tombstone. The circumstances of its creation are unknown; it may be assumed that, since it remained in its initial location, it may have served as an epitaph commemorating the founder and encouraging the faithful to pray for her soul. The second overpainting is not coincidental, as her cult grew among the Poor Clares and the local community in the eighteenth century in Breslau, as two copies indicate: a copperplate by Christian Bückling (1730s or 1740s) and an illumination from 1745 illustrating the German translation of the duchess’ Vita111. At that time, two prayers were written, containing requests for her intercession as the saint she never became. The creation of her Vita had already caused controversy in the medieval period112. In all probability, it was written by a member of the Franciscan community in the thirteenth or fourteenth century (the most recent analysis provides a more exact time span of 1328 to 1335113), providing a hagiographic formula for the Poor Clares. However, in comparison to the hagiographies of other ducal saints and the blessed who lived in Piast domains in the thirteenth century (Saints Hedwig and Kinga of Poland, the Blessed Salomea), this very short text is best considered as a draft memoir or list of memories about the duchess114. Perhaps it was a prelude to further work aimed at her commemoration and beatification, which was then abandoned for some unknown reason. Nevertheless, along with the fifteenth-century painting, it demonstrates that her memory was cultivated by the local Franciscan community. Far more enigmatic is a free-standing, life-size carved statue of a knight with a reservaculum in

his chest, dated to the second third of the fourteenth century and attributed to a local Breslau workshop, which stood in St Hedwig’s Chapel until 1945 [Fig. 14]115. The knight’s identity remains an unsolved riddle, for which two solutions have been suggested. The first of these, which regards the presumed original presence of holy relics, identifies him as a saint and a knight – either Saint Wenceslaus or Saint Moritz. However, the lack of unambiguous attributes that would help identify him with either of these, as well as the absence of any trace of their having cults among the Breslau Poor Clares, make it impossible to confirm either of these identifications. The second solution, much more popular, suggests that the statue is an image of Anne’s husband, Henry ii the Pious, buried in the neighboring Franciscan church and never canonized, despite his contemporaries’ 102 For Polish territories, see Julia Burkhardt, “Friars and Princesses in Late Medieval Poland: Encounters, Interactions and Agency”,  in Queens, Princesses and Mendicants: Close Relations in a European Perspective, Imke Just, Nikolas Jaspert eds, Zürich 2019, pp. 239 –261. 103 Michalska, Legenda obrazowa (n. 7), p. 39, 104 “Spominki wrocławskich” (n. 14), p. 692; Czechowicz, “Anna Ducissa” (n. 37), pp. 219 –232. 105 “Spominki wrocławskich” (n. 14), pp. 691–693. 106 Romuald Kaczmarek, Italianizmy. Studia nad recepcją gotyckiej sztuki włoskiej w rzeźbie środkowo-wschodniej Europy (koniec xiii – koniec xiv wieku), Wrocław 2008, pp. 172–184. 107 Adamski, Gotycka architektura (n. 7), p. 109. 108 Michalska, Legenda obrazowa (n. 7), p. 62. 109 Liceat familiaribus suis in monasterii sui servitis continuo commorantibus in monasterio eodem audire divina dummmodo ibidem sumissa voce, januis claustris, non pulsatis campanis interdictis et excomunicatis exlusis eadem celebrantur, after Sutowicz, Życie wewnętrze (n. 1), p. 95. 110 Samuel B. Klose, Von Breslau Dokumentirte Geschichte und Beschreibung. In Briefen, vol. i, Breslau 1781, p. 473; Alvin Schultz, Urkundliche Geschichte der Breslauer Maler-Innung in den Jahren 1345 bis 1523, Breslau 1866, p. 136; Knoblich, Herzogin Anna von Schlesien (n. 8), p. 120; Lutsch, Verzeichnis der Kunstdenkmäler (n. 30), p. 189; Burgermeister/Grundmann, Die Kunstdenkmäler (n. 90), p. 36 (this publication includes an image of Saint Hedwig). 111 Michalska, “Księżna, fundatorka” (n. 8), pp. 5– 8. 112 Patrycja Marta Ksyk, “Vita Annae ducissae Silesiae”,  Nasza Przeszłość, lxxviii (1992), pp. 127–150; Marek Cetwiński, “‘Anna beatissima’ Wokół średniowiecznej biografii dobrodziejki benedyktynów krzeszowskich”,  in Krzeszów uświęcony łaską, Henryk Dziurla, Kazimierz Bobowski eds, Wrocław 1997, pp. 31–37; Maciej Michalski, Kobiety i świętość w żywotach trzynastowiecznych księżnych polskich, Poznań 2004, pp. 56 –60. 113 Czechowicz, “Anna Ducissa” (n. 37), p. 219. 114 Michalski, Kobiety i świętość (n. 112), p. 60. 115 Guldan-Klamecka/Ziomecka, Sztuka na Śląsku (n. 87), pp. 82– 83. Limewood, second third of the fourteenth century, 158 cm, Muzeum Narodowe we Wrocławiu (xi 258).

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14 / Knight (Henry ii the Pious), limewood, 2nd third of the 14th century, Muzeum Narodowe we Wrocławiu, xi-258

great interest in the circumstances of his death during the Battle of Legnica in 1241. Despite the thirteenth- and fourteenth-century accounts in Saint Hedwig’s Vita depicting Henry as miles Christi, a knight who died defending the Christian faith, his canonization never occurred116. Several arguments support this second alternative in identifying the sculpture’s subject. The first holds that the memory of Henry’s intention to bring the Poor Clares to Breslau remained alive in the fourteenth century, as witnessed by a drawing in a manuscript executed in the convent’s scriptorium, which depicts the couple as founders [Fig. 1], as mentioned above. Assuming this identification to be correct, the statue of Henry would have ensured his presence within the Poor Clares’ sacred space and a burial place for his wife, as its cofounder. Such a visual strategy of representation has a precedent in Silesia. Around 1290, stone statues of the Piast ducal couple Salomea and Konrad, founders of the Glogau collegiate church, were mounted in its choir, although Konrad was buried in another location117. Second, the statue was created precisely in the period of the greatest interest in Henry, as attested in Silesian chronicles and by his image appearing several times in the illustrated legend of the life of Saint Hedwig118. Consequently, the reservaculum could have been created in advance, in anticipation of his canonization. Third, by the time the statue was completed, several less-heralded descendants of Henry already had tombs with effigies in Breslau, including Henry iv, in the Collegiate Church of the Holy Cross119 and, as mentioned above, Henry vi, in St Hedwig’s Chapel. Perhaps this statue was created to compensate for this, as Henry’s tomb was finished some years later120. Finally, although it may seem to be the riskiest hypothesis, his effigy may have been intended to initiate a gallery of Piast dukes in St Hedwig’s Chapel, an enterprise later abandoned. In all probability, this knight’s identity was clear in the Baroque period, when a wooden statue of Saint Hedwig was mounted on the opposite wall as its pendant. Nevertheless, the second hypothesis above has points of weakness, as the figure lacks insignia, such as a coronet, which would make it possible to identify the subject

as having ducal stature. What is more, the knight is beardless, although Henry’s iconography, known from the illustrated life of Saint Hedwig and from his effigy, portrays him with facial hair. Finally, the statue’s original location is unknown and, as proven by the example of the statue of Saint Hedwig discussed below, sculptures, once moved, could lose their original context and be employed in a new context, sometimes a very distant one. In searching for solutions to this impasse, Assaf Pinkus’ essay on the Bamberg Rider comes to mind121. To solve the problem of the Bamberg Rider’s enigmatic identity, Pinkus provided a sort of compromise, regarding the Rider to be a simulacrum, that is, an object representing neither a specific person nor that person’s image, being rather “a replica of a real presence opened to the speculation of the viewers”. Consequently, the identity of such a simulacrum is never fixed, as it is purposefully conceived in a way “enabling different spectators to assign the sculptures a wide range of flexible identities”. Pinkus’ approach, although applicable to every statue of ambivalent iconography and therefore tempting, seems to be an act of capitulation, which should not yet be declared with reference to the knight from the Breslau Poor Clares, even if that means it must remain enigmatic. The sculpture of Saint Hedwig mentioned above is interesting in its own right as an example of Baroque “recycling” [Fig. 15]. In 1961, the conservator Daniela Stankiewicz decided to remove the ducal miter, the model of the church, and the overpainting that had been applied in the seventeenth century122. The statue was then revealed to be a Virgin Mary, carved in ca 1420, stripped of the accompanying Christ Child, and of a type characteristic of the Beautiful Madonnas123. Its original location within the Convent of St Clare in Breslau can unfortunately no longer be determined. The emergence of mendicant orders in European towns at the turn of the thirteenth century represented one of the most significant breakthroughs in the history of Western spirituality and culture. Although the Breslau Poor Clares were never especially engaged in politics, economy, or the city’s daily life, their convent marked an important place on the religious map of the medieval town.

15 / St Hedwig, state before restoration of a medieval statue representing the Virgin Mary, limewood, ca 1420, Muzeum Narodowe we Wrocławiu, xi-259

116 Joanna Utzig,“Postrzeganie księcia Henryka Pobożnego oraz najazdu tatarskiego na średniowiecznym Śląsku w świetle dzieł sztuki xiv–xvi wieku”,  in Historyzm – tradycjonalizm – archaizacja. Studia z dziejów świadomości historycznej w średniowieczu i okresie nowożytnym, Marek Walczak ed., Kraków 2015, pp. 61– 82; Anna Sutowicz,“Motyw Miles Christi w legendzie o księciu Henryku Pobożnym w źródłach śląskich z xiii–xiv w.”,  Perspectiva. Legnickie Studia Teologiczno-Historyczne, xxviii (2016), pp. 225–244. 117 Ibidem, pp. 145–146. 118 Utzig, “Postrzeganie księcia” (n. 116); Sutowicz, “Motyw Miles” (n. 116). 119 Guldan-Klamecka/Ziomecka, Sztuka na Śląsku (n. 87), pp. 146 –153. 120 Ibidem, pp. 163–165. 121 Assaf Pinkus, “Imaginative Responses to Gothic Sculpture: The Bamberg Rider”,  Viator, xlv (2014), pp. 1–30. 122 Daniela Stankiewicz, Konserwacja zbiorów w latach 1948 –1978, Wrocław 1978, p. 29. 123 Guldan-Klamecka/Ziomecka, Sztuka na Śląsku (n. 87), pp. 234–236.

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In addition to praying for souls entrusted to them and engaging in other activities prescribed by their rules, the nuns acted as caretakers of the Breslau Piasts’ necropolis. This dual role is reflected in the bipartite structure of their church and chapel, as well as in the furnishings of both spaces, created in local workshops between the mid-fourteenth and early sixteenth centuries, evincing mostly local iconographical, stylistic, and formal tendencies. The Breslau Poor Clares, despite their capabilities and extensive network, did not import art on a broader scale. At the same time, many of the works analyzed in this article are among the finest surviving examples of Silesian sculpture and painting of the time, open to inspiration from Bohemia and southern Germany. The iconography of the works of art functioning within the clausura corresponds with the essential themes which the pious and intellectual reflections of the Breslau Poor Clares were concentrated on: the cult of the Virgin Mary and the Infant Jesus, the phenomenon of Incarnation, and meditation devoted to the deeply experienced Passion of Christ. On the other hand, St Hedwig’s Chapel, open to the laity, was furnished with works intended to cultivate the memory of the convent’s benefactors from the Breslau Piast line. It remains unknown who initiated these artistic foundations. In addition, despite the large number of Piast family members buried in St Hedwig’s Chapel and the existence of their mausoleum, no consistent visual strategy was instigated to prolong local memory of the family. What was done, however, ultimately sufficed to ensure that the memory of the convent’s founders survived in Breslau over the centuries.

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summary Konvent klarisek ve Vratislavi a jeho středověké vybavení

Klášter klarisek ve Vratislavi, považovaný za nejelitnější ženský klášter ve středověkém Slezsku, byl založen v roce 1256 a financován slezskou vévodkyní Annou Českou podle plánu a přání jejího zesnulého manžela Jindřicha ii. Pobožného. Založení klášterů minoritů a klarisek ve Vratislavi lze interpretovat jako součást širší politické strategie Jindřicha ii. zaměřené jak na posílení vztahů s českým dvorem, tak na jeho vlastní postavení ve střední Evropě. Obojí bylo klíčové v jeho úsilí stát se polským králem. První vratislavský kostel svaté Kláry, vysvěcený v roce 1260, byl ploše uzavřená jednolodní stavba, sklenutá třemi poli křížové klenby a zakončená na západě věží. Důsledkem přísné klauzury byla absence odděleného, vyvýšeného chóru jeptišek. O něco užší kaple svaté Hedviky, jejíž půdorys připomínal druhou loď kostela, byla s kostelem spojena portálem. V kapli byla pohřbena zakladatelka, její nejbližší rodina i řada dalších představitelů vratislavského rodu Piastovců, včetně osmi piastovských vévodkyň zastávajících úřad abatyše tohoto konventu klarisek. Kromě modliteb za svěřené duše a dalších činností předepsaných řeholí působily klarisky také jako správkyně vratislavské piastovské nekropole v kapli svaté Hedviky. Tato dvojí role se odráží nejen ve dvoudílné struktuře kostela a kaple, ale také ve vybavení obou prostor,

které vznikalo v místních dílnách od poloviny čtrnáctého do počátku šestnáctého století. Klarisky se navzdory svým možnostem a široké síti kontaktů nerozhodly pro dovoz umění ze vzdálenějších oblastí. Ikonografie uměleckých děl z kostela a kláštera, fungujících uvnitř klauzury, koresponduje s tématy, kolem nichž se soustředila zbožná a intelektuální reflexe vratislavských klarisek zaměřená na kult Panny Marie a dítěte Ježíše, Vtělení a Umučení Krista. Z dochovaných archivních pramenů a známých středověkých děl si několik zaslouží pozornost i pro svou uměleckou hodnotu: krucifix (asi 1350), pět reliéfů z někdejšího hlavního oltáře (1360–1370, s největší pravděpodobností šlo o svatostánek tabernáklu), přenosný kvadriptych (1360), deskový obraz s Pannou Marií s dítětem  (1450) a dnes ztracený Strom Jesse. Kaple svaté Hedviky, přístupná laikům, byla vybavena díly, která měla kultivovat památku mecenášů konventu z rodu vratislavských Piastovců. Svědčí o tom pozdně gotická desková malba s Annou Českou, pravděpodobně její (dnes ztracený) epitaf a socha rytíře, která je podobiznou Jindřicha ii. Pobožného. Přes velký počet pohřbů členů rodu Piastovců v kapli svaté Hedviky a faktickou existenci jejich mauzolea však nebyla zavedena žádná důsledná vizuální strategie k uchování rodové památky.

Abstract – Helisabet filia Stephani regis Ungarorum illustris. Image of a Saintly Nun of the Arpad Dynasty as Reflected in Hagiographic Sources Princess Elizabeth (1255?–1321?), daughter of King Stephen v of Hungary, spent most of her life in Dominican convents, first on the Island of the Hares near Buda (including about a decade with her saintly aunt Margaret), then in Naples. Elizabeth was not a nun her entire life, however, but was also a wife and mother. Despite the uncertain chronology, her biography is relatively well studied, but the development of her figure as a beata in hagiography has not yet been systematically explored. Drawing on hagiographic and historical works produced primarily by the Order of Preachers until the eighteenth century, in which Elizabeth’s years spent outside religious communities are not recorded, this paper looks first at the life, then at the circumstances, of the “rediscovery” of a holy Arpadian princess at the time of the Observant reform, investigating factors that could have motivated her inclusion in various works produced throughout Europe. It shows how the image of her life was shaped over time by additions of new, everyday details, such as contemplation and miracles, and hitherto unknown or differently understood information that strengthens her image as a saint. Sixteenth- and seventeenth-century works reporting the life of Elizabeth also reflect the emergence of history as a discipline. Keywords – Buda, Charles ii of Sicily, Dominican hagiography, dynastic sanctity, Island of the Hares, Margaret of Hungary, Mary of Hungary, Naples, prioress, S. Pietro a Castello Eszter Konrád Eötvös Loránd University (elte), Budapest University Library and Archives [email protected]

Helisabet filia Stephani regis Ungarorum illustris Image of a Saintly Nun of the Arpad Dynasty as Reflected in Hagiographic Sources Eszter Konrád

Princess Elizabeth (1255?–1321?), daughter of King Stephen v of Hungary (r. 1270–1272), spent most of her life in the Dominican convent dedicated to the Virgin Mary on the Island of the Hares (now called Margitsziget), located in the middle of the Danube between the Buda and Pest areas. There, she lived for about a decade with her aunt Margaret, whose saintly fame started to rise soon after her death in 1270, before eventually becoming the prioress. In 1288, Elizabeth caused a scandal when she ran away from the convent, with the help of her brother, Ladislaus iv (the Cuman; r. 1262–1290), to marry a Bohemian aristocrat, Záviš of Falkenstein (ca 1250–1290).

In all probability, she was also married to the Serbian ruler Stephen Milutin (1282–1321), but it is not known exactly when. In 1301, she moved to the Dominican convent of S. Pietro a Castello, recently founded in Naples by her sister, Mary of Hungary (ca 1247–1323), wife of Charles ii, King of Sicily (r. 1285–1309). She lived there for the rest of her life, becoming a central figure in the community of pious women. In the second half of the fifteenth century, Elizabeth appeared in the Observant Dominican Johannes Meyer’s Liber de viris illustribus, among the eminent members of the Dominicans. Meyer was the author of several important works in German and Latin written

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on the reform. Until the mid-seventeenth century, Elizabeth’s short biography was incorporated in a number of hagiographic and historiographical works, not only Dominican ones1. Despite the considerable scholarly interest in Elizabeth’s life and her role in the two above-mentioned convents, her afterlife in hagiographic literature has not yet been systematically explored, even though it was through these sources that the princess was known until the second half of the nineteenth century. Drawing primarily on hagiographic sources from the Late Middle Ages to the seventeenth century, the aim of this paper is first to shed light on the circumstances in which Elizabeth, presented as beata, found her way first into Dominican hagiography and then also into hagiographic-historiographical works by authors not related to the order. Second, the paper aims to trace the transformation of her saintly image over the centuries. However, before entering into the heart of these questions, a detailed presentation of Elizabeth’s life and lifestyle on the Island of the Hares and in Naples is necessary in order to better understand why she moved to a region far away from her birthplace, and to see the discrepancy between contemporary diplomatic sources and later hagiographic sources 2. Life

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The nunnery dedicated to the Virgin Mary on the Island of the Hares, where Elizabeth spent about thirty years of her life, had been founded by her paternal grandfather, King Béla iv (r. 1235–1270)3. Princess Elizabeth was the daughter of King Stephen v and Elizabeth, the daughter of a Cuman chieftain, and had four siblings: Mary, Catherine, Anne, and Ladislaus. The Hungarian Arpad dynasty united with the French-Neapolitan dynasty, the Angevins, with a double marriage between Charles of Anjou (Charles ii, King of Naples and Sicily) and her sister Mary, and her brother Ladislaus with Isabelle of Anjou (also called Elizabeth of Sicily), Charles’s sister, in 1270. The Neapolitan royal couple’s marriage lasted for thirty-nine years and produced fourteen children, while the Hungarian royal couple’s union was an unhappy one, producing no offspring.

The Island of the Hares was a favored dwelling place for Arpad rulers in the second half of the thirteenth century. Elizabeth’s grandparents, King Béla iv and Mary Laskaris, had made a vow to offer their future child, if a daughter, to God, to deliver themselves and the country from the invasion of the armies of the Mongolian Empire in 1241–1242. When a girl arrived, they kept their promise, and a convent placed under the super­vision of the Dominicans was built for their daughter Margaret on the Island of the Hares, on the site of a mansion owned by her mother in the early 1250s4. It housed several female members of the royal family and the daughters of the most important aristocratic families, including Princess Elizabeth, who appears in documents related to the convent as early as in 12705. This new-style court of Margaret, in the words of Gábor Klaniczay, could be seen as a celestial counterpart of the neighboring royal court and manor6. Various religious orders had houses on the island, including a Dominican house for friars entrusted with the spiritual care of the nuns [Fig. 1]7. Elizabeth’s name appears in the protocol inquiry for Margaret’s canonization, performed in 1276, when she gave an account of Margaret’s religiosity and ascetic practices, and reported how humbly she performed her duties in household chores8. When she was asked how she knew all this, Elizabeth said she had been with Margaret on her duty weeks9. This short episode, as we shall see, would be important for Johannes Meyer one hundred and ninety years later. She is also mentioned in the protocol due to her miraculous healing from a severe illness, with the help of Margaret’s scapular and veil10. This miracle was included in the new legend about Margaret, the so-called Legenda maior, by Garin Gy l’Évêque (Garinus de Giaco), Master General of the Dominican Order between 1346 and 1348, who assembled it in Avignon around 1340 based on the protocols of the canonization process11. During the reign of King Ladislaus iv, who was crowned when he was barely ten years old, the presence of “his dearest sister Elizabeth” was 1

I am grateful for the help of Gábor Klaniczay, Ditta Szemere, and Balázs Zágorhidi Czigány in obtaining literature, and to the anonymous reviewers for their careful reading of the paper and their suggestions for improvement.

1 / The ruins of the Dominican nuns’ convent on the Island of the Hares (today Margitsziget), Budapest, 13th century, rebuilt in 15th century

2

For the historical context of the Arpad rule in Hungary (1001–1300), see Pál Engel, The Realm of St Stephen. A History of Medieval Hungary, 895–1526, London 2001, pp. 100 –139; for a short overview, see Attila Zsoldos, “Arpadiens, dynastie royale hongroise”,  in Démystifier l’Europe centrale: Bohême, Hongrie et Pologne de viie au xvie siècle, Marie-­Madeleine de Cevins et al. eds, Paris 2021, pp. 276 –278. I rely primarily on the most recent biography on Elizabeth, reflecting also on the chronological problems: Ferenc Kanyó, “Az apáca, a szerető, a királyné és a boldog: Egy életrajz az utolsó Árpádok idejéből” [The Nun, the Lover, the Queen, and the Blessed: A Biography from the Last Period of the Arpad Dynasty], in Történelmi töredékek: válogatás a Napi Történelmi Forrás szerzőinek írásaiból iii., Márton Balogh-Ebner, Sándor György, Tamás Hajnáczky eds, Budapest 2019, pp. 11–33; see also Adatok a Szent Domonkos-rend magyarországi rendtartományának történetéhez. A rendtartomány alapításától 1526-ig [Additions to the History of the Dominican Province of Hungary. From its Foundation until 1526], Lajos Implom, László Drimmer, Balázs Zágorhidi Czigány eds, Vasvár 2017, pp. 140 –144. 3 See Gábor Klaniczay’s entry “Béla iv, roi de Hongrie”,  in Démystifier (n. 2), p. 292. 4 For the artistic context, see The Art of Medieval Hungary, Xavier Barral i Altet, Pál Lővei, Vinni Lucherini, Imre Takács eds, Rome 2018. 5 For the diplomatic sources on Elizabeth, see Mór Wertner, Az Árpádok családi története [The Family History of the Arpads], Nagybecskerek 1892, pp. 527–531.

6

7 8

9 10 11

Legenda vetus, Acta Processus Canonizationis et Miracula Sanctae Margaritae de Hungaria, Ildikó Csepregi, Gábor Klaniczay, Bence Péterfi eds, Ildikó Csepregi, Clifford Flanigan, Louis Perraud transl., Budapest 2018, p. 12. Beatrix F. Romhányi, “The Monastic Topography of Medieval Buda”,  in Medieval Buda in Context, Balázs Nagy, Martyn Rady, Katalin Szende, AndrásVadas eds, Leiden 2016, pp. 204–228. Elizabeth was the fifth witness to be heard. Her testimony is reported in Legenda vetus (n. 6.), pp. 192–203. On Margaret’s spirituality, see Viktória H. Deák O.P., “Beguines in Hungary? The Case of St Margareta of Hungary (1242– 71): A Mystic without a Voice”,  in Mulieres religiosae: Shaping Female Spiritual Authority in the Medieval and Early Modern Periods, Veerle Fraeters, Imke de Gier eds, Turnhout 2014, pp. 87–105. For a recent comparison of Agnes of Bohemia and Margaret’s religious vocation and their relations with the mendicants, see Gábor Klaniczay, “Agnes of Bohemia and Margaret of Hungary: A Comparison”,  in Queens, Princesses, and Mendicants: Close Relations in European Perspective, Nikolas Jaspert, Imke Just eds, Zürich 2019, pp. 263–281. Legenda vetus, (n. 6), pp. 194–195. Ibidem, pp. 178 –179. On the Legenda maior, see Viktória H. Deák O.P., La Légende de sainte Marguerite de Hongrie et l’hagiographie dominicaine, Alexis Léonas transl., Paris 2013. The legend is edited in Catalogus fontium historiae Hungariae, Albin Gombos ed., Budapest 1937–1938, vol. iii, pp. 2481–2525, the miracle is at p. 2477. The name of Elizabeth is not mentioned, only: “Filia regis Stephani”.

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a frequently quoted justification given for repeated donations to the Dominican convent12. She is mentioned as its prioress in 1278, and probably remained in that role at least until 128513. The pending seal of the nuns’ convent on a charter from 1282, representing the Virgin with an Infant Christ at its top and the royal couple offering up their baby to her at the bottom, as well as a new chapel dedicated to St Stephen Martyr, built in 1285, reveal that Elizabeth had a knack for representation14. It seems that, even without having any formal title, she played an important role in the royal court, too15. Her brother Ladislaus’ rule was marked by instability, and when he reached adulthood, he made many enemies among the nobles and the Church leaders as he solidified his position, and because of his favor toward the Cumans and their lifestyle. He cast off his wife Isabelle and lived with a Cuman concubine. Things reached a point where Isabelle was held in captivity in the convent (or the adjacent royal manor) in 1286–1287 and deprived of all her revenues and estates; allegedly, Elizabeth played a role in the strained relationship between the two. This, as well as Elizabeth’s scandalous escape from the convent, is known to us from a letter written by Lodomer of Monoszló, Archbishop of Esztergom (r. 1279–1298), to Pope Honorius iv, dated May 8, 128816. According to Lodomer, Elizabeth, who was not so much a sanctimonialis but an antimonialis, had her brother, the king, break down the door of the convent, pretending it was against her will, and take her away to marry Záviš of Falkenstein. The archbishop described in detail how the king’s allies forced their way into the convent, despite the resistance of the Dominican prior and the friars (a layman was even badly hurt) and also dragged Elizabeth’s young niece out from the convent17. Záviš, who sought an alliance with the Hungarian King against his Bohemian and German adversaries, had already agreed with Ladislaus on the marriage during his visit to the Hungarian court. Elizabeth’s religious vows and the Church’s protest against the marriage because of her close kinship with Záviš notwithstanding, they were married on May 4, 1288 and soon moved to Svojanov Castle in Bohemia18. Their son John was

born in the same year19. Nevertheless, the name of Elizabeth (without being referred to as prioress) appeared in some donation charters to the convent even after her marriage, and her husband is even mentioned on one occasion20. In 1289, Záviš invited King Wenceslaus ii of Bohemia to take part in a banquet celebrating their newborn son. The king accepted the invitation but ordered Záviš’s detention. Záviš was decapitated on August 24, 129021. We do not know what happened to Elizabeth between 1290 and 1300. Their son must have died at an early age, as nothing is known about him. There was another man in Elizabeth’s life, of whom there is no reference in Archbishop Lodomer’s letter: the Serbian King Stephen ii (known also as Stephen Milutin or Uroš). He was the second son of King Uroš and Helen of Hungary, and his brother Dragutin’s wife was Catherine, Elizabeth’s sister. There is no scholarly consensus as to whether this relationship took place in the mid-1280s or the 1290s, how long it lasted, or what its legal status was, also because the title “Queen of Serbia” does not turn up in connection to Elizabeth in Hungarian sources22. In any case, it seems very likely that the aim of Milutin, whose many marriages were always in line with his current political aspirations, was to strengthen further ties with Hungary. According to the contemporary Byzantine chronicler Georgius Pachymeres, Milutin seduced her when she paid a visit to Serbia23. As reported by Theodorus Metochites’ Presbeutikos from 129924 and the Descriptio Europae Orientalis, written in 1308 or 1311 probably by someone closely related to the Curia, a daughter was born from this relationship or marriage25. As stated by Nicephoros Gregoras, a fourteenth-century Byzantine chronicler, the Orthodox Church did not acknowledge this marriage, and Milutin dismissed Elizabeth in order to marry Anne Terter, the daughter of the Bulgarian Tsar Theodore Svetoslav, in 128426. Regardless of whether Elizabeth’s marriage or relationship with the Serbian ruler took place before or after her union with Záviš of Falkenstein (1288–1290), on July 11, 1290, upon the death of her only brother Ladislaus, the male branch of the Arpad dynasty died out. The new king, Andrew iii (“the Venetian”; r. 1290–1301) was

not universally recognized as a legitimate ruler, and Elizabeth’s sister, Mary, demanded the crown of Hungary for herself and for her descendants. The Neapolitan royal couple’s first candidate was their son Charles Martel. After his death in 1295, it was their grandson, Charles Robert (known in Italy as Caroberto)27. Mary and her husband Charles ii knew that the support of local prelates and barons would be necessary to ensure their rule, so they sent emissaries and messengers to Hungary28. In the spring of 1300, Charles ii sent Peter, the Dominican Prior of Košice/Kassa (in present-day Slovakia), as a harbinger of the young pretender, 12 On his reign, see Nóra Berend, “Ladislas iv le Couman”,  in Démystifier (n. 2), p. 569. 13 Kanyó, “Az apáca” (n. 2), p. 21. 14 On the seal, see Tünde Wehli,“‘A szülei adták őtet az Istennek és asszonyunk, Szűz Máriának örökké való szolgálatára...’ A margitszigeti dominikánák konventi pecsétje” [“Her parents offered her for the eternal service of God and Our Lady the Virgin Mary...” The Seal of the Dominican Nuns on the Island of the Hares], in Memoriae tradere: tanulmányok és írások Török József hatvanadik születésnapjára, Ádám Füzes, László Legeza eds, Budapest 2006, pp. 621– 630. On the chapel: György Györffy, Az Árpád-kori Magyarország történeti földrajza [Historical Geography of the Arpad-Age Hungary], Budapest 1998, vol. iv, p. 657. 15 Kanyó, “Az apáca” (n. 2), p. 23. One of the sources is the letter of Archbishop Lodomer (see n. 16 below), the other is a charter in which Isabelle attributed her difficult situation to the machinations of her adversaries, referring to Elizabeth; Attila Zsoldos, The Árpáds and Their Wives. Queenship in Early Medieval Hungary 1000 –1301, Tamás Pálosfalvi transl., Rome 2019, p. 67. 16 János Karácsonyi, “A mérges vipera és az antimoniális: korkép Kun László király idejéből” [The Venomous Viper and the “antimonialis”: A Portrait of the Era of Ladislaus the Cuman], Századok, xliv (1910), pp. 1–24; the letter is reported on pp. 2–11. 17 Karácsonyi, “A mérges vipera” (n. 16), p. 6. Záviš of Falkenstein descended from the Vítek family (Witigonen) belonging to the Rosenberg dynasty. He was the opponent of the Bohemian King Přemysl Ottokar ii (1253–1278), and after the king’s death, he married the widowed queen, Kunegund, whose mother, Anne, was the granddaughter of King Béla iv. With this marriage, he gained noteworthy power in the kingdom, but this was deeply shaken when the Bohemian king Wenceslas ii married Judith, daughter of Rudolf of Habsburg, and Wenceslas’s father-in-law tried to remove him from power. Thus, Záviš, who sought for an alliance with the Hungarian King against his Bohemian and German adversaries, had already agreed with the Ladislaus on the marriage; see Wertner, Az Árpádok (n. 5), pp. 531–533; Kanyó, “Az apáca” (n. 2), pp. 23–24. 18 The Church opposed this matrimony because of Elizabeth’s vow of chastity and due to their close kinship (see n. 17 above) for which a papal consent would have been necessary; Karácsonyi, “A mérges vipera” (n. 16), p. 17. 19 Kanyó, “Az apáca” (n. 2), pp. 26 –27. 20 Gusztáv Wenzel, Árpádkori új okmánytár. Codex diplomaticus Arpadianus continuatus, Budapest 1871, vol. ix, p. 471.

21 For the marriage as reported in the Zbraslav Chronicle, see [Peter of Zittau] Petra Žitavského Kronika Zbraslavská (= Chronicon Aulae Regiae i), Fontes rerum Bohemicarum iv, Josef Emler ed., ch. xxiv–xxv, pp. 31–33. For the events that led to his execution, see also Central Europe in the High Middle Ages: Bohemia, Hungary and Poland, c. 900 –c. 1300, Nóra Berend, Przemyslaw Urbaʼnczyk, Przemyslaw Wieszewski  eds, Cambridge 2013, pp. 417–418. 22 Cf. Élisabeth Malamut, “Les reines des Milutin”,  Byzantinische Zeitschrift, xciii/2 (2000), pp. 490 –507, sp. p. 494. As to the date of the marriage or relationship, Karácsonyi dates it to around 1285, see Karácsonyi, “A mérges vipera” (n. 16), p. 17; in the opinion of Malamut, it took place after 1292 and lasted until 1297 or 1298, see Malamut, “Les reines des Milutin” (n. 22), p. 499. According to Vlada Stanković, in turn, it lasted from 1276 to 1284, it ended with a divorce, and a couple had a son named Stephen, see idem, “King Milutin and His Many Marriages (* 1254, † November 21, 1321, r. 1282–1321)”,  in Portraits of Medieval Eastern Europe, 900 –1400, Donald Ostrowski, Christian Raffensperger eds, London 2018, pp. 109 –120, 114–116. Without taking a firm stance on the date of the marriage, in the opinion of Kanyó, it occurred before Elizabeth’s marriage with Záviš. See Kanyó, “Az apáca” (n. 2), p. 22. 23 For the detailed presentation of the controversies related to this marriage, see Kanyó, “Az apáca” (n. 2), pp. 19 –22. According to Wertner, Elizabeth was not the wife of Milutin and they did not have any children, see Wertner, Az Árpádok (n. 5), p. 73. 24 Theodorus Metochites, Presbeutikos, in Léonidas Mayromatis, La fondation de l’Empre serbe, le kralj Milutin, Thessaloniki 1978; the reference to the daughter of the Serbian king and Elizabeth as his legitimate wife is on p. 130. 25 The work has two critical editions. For the most important differences regarding its author and date of composition, compare the introductions to Anonymi descriptio Europae Orientalis, Olgierd Górka ed., Cracow 1916, Prefatio i–il, and Anonymi descriptio Europae Orientalis, Tibor Živković, Vladeta Petrović, Aleksandar Uzelac, Dragana Kunčer eds, Belgrade 2013; summarized in English on pp. 185–188. In Górka’s opinion, it was probably written by a French Dominican who travelled to the Balkan Peninsula partly for diplomatic-missionary purposes. The reference to their daughter is at Anonymi descriptio, p. 35. On the work, see Enikő Csukovits, “Description de l’Europe orientale”,  in Démystifier (n. 2), p. 423. 26 Kanyó, “Az apáca” (n. 2), p. 18. 27 On Charles i of Hungary (known also as Charles Robert or Caroberto; r. 1308 –1342), see Engel, The Realm (n. 2), pp. 124–139, and the entry of Enikő Csukovits,“Charles Robert”,  in Démystifier (n. 2), 346 –347; Gusztáv Wenzel, Magyar diplomácziai emlékek az Anjou-korból [Hungarian Diplomatic Records from the Angevin Period], Budapest 1874, vol. i, pp. 144–145. On the relationship between Naples and Hungary in the period, see Adalgiso De Regibus, Le contese degli angioini di Napoli per il trono d’Ungheria (1290 –1310), Pinerolo 1934; Enikő Csukovits,“Le innovazioni istituzionali nell’età angioina”,  in L’Ungheria angioina, eadem ed., Dávid Falvay, Andrea Moravcsik trans., Rome 2013, pp. 59 –120, sp. pp. 72– 75. On the papacy’s involvement, see Andreas Kiesewetter, “L’intervento di Niccolo iv, Celestino v e Bonifacio viii nella lotta per il trono ungherese (1290 –1303)”,  in Bonifacio viii. Ideologia e azione politica. Atti del Convegno organizzato nell’ambito delle celebrazioni per il vii centenario della morte, Città del Vaticano-­ Roma 2004, Rome 2006, pp. 139 –198. 28 Péter Báling,“Personal Network of the Neapolitan Angevins and Hungary (1290–1304), in Specimina Nova Pars Prima Sectio Medievalis viii, Gábor Barabás, Gergely Kiss eds, Pécs 2015, pp. 83–107.

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in order to represent his interests in Hungary29. Meanwhile, Charles Robert arrived in Split (Croatia) with his escort in August and began promoting his Neapolitan claim to the Hungarian throne. Only a few weeks before this, Elizabeth turns up again in a source – this time a Neapolitan one. It is unclear what had happened to her in the decade before, but with the death of her brother in 1290 and her mother sometime between 1292–1294, Elizabeth lost her main supporters in Hungary. A new phase started in Elizabeth’s life when she left Hungary, although her close relatives, and presumably also some friar preachers in the Neapolitan entourage, must have been aware of her past. On July 9, 1300 Charles ii sent the royal chaplain, the Dominican Stephen, to Manfredonia, to receive and accompany her to Naples30. The following year, Mary of Hungary and Charles ii received permission from Pope Boniface viii to transform the city’s Benedictine monastery into a Dominican female convent, and to concede all its possessions to the nuns31. This site, dedicated to St Peter and located in close proximity not only to San Domenico Maggiore, but also the freshly built Castelnuovo, must have been of crucial importance since, as pointed out by Rosalba di Meglio, the Benedictine male community, whose members were transferred to three of the order’s other monasteries, did not show any sign of decay32. Mary of Hungary, with origins in a region where there were plenty of examples of monasteries or convents organized around female members of the royal family33, was active in the ecclesiastical realm, as well: she funded the building and remodeling of female religious houses, especially mendicant ones34. In S. Pietro, she created a safe environment where two widowed family members from Hungary, Isabelle and Elizabeth, could spend the rest of their lives35. As observed by Péter Báling, Isabelle’s return was important to Charles ii in order to prevent his sister from being used as a hostage by future opponents of his grandson Charles Robert, and this could also be true for Elizabeth, the sister of the queen36. Little is known about the early life of S. Pietro al Castello: in 1303, a group of nuns from the Dominican Convent of Santa Anna in Nocera visited Elizabeth, and a document of Charles  ii informs us that S. Pietro was transformed into

a proper dwelling place for his dear sister, Elizabeth (that is, Isabelle of Anjou), Queen of Hungary, and other nuns living similarly under the rule of St Dominic37. In contrast, in the Dominican Bernard Gui’s list of the order’s male and female convents from the same year, it is Elizabeth, not Isabelle, who is mentioned as a key figure in S. Pietro: “the king and queen placed Elizabeth here, the sister of the queen and daughter of the Hungarian king, previously a member of the convent on the island of the order’s sisters in Hungary”38. In the same work, Gui gives an account of the convent on the island, founded by the King of Hungary, where his sister Margaret, the virtuous, excellent, and holy daughter of King Béla lived, whose sanctity was also testified to by miracles after her death39. In this way, Gui underscores that Elizabeth came from the same convent in Hungary where a candidate for sainthood had lived. It was also Gui who informs us that in 1306 the King of Hungary (in all likelihood Charles Robert, who had claimed this title starting in 1301 but was still fighting for the kingdom) sent a Dominican friar, Andrew of Hungary, as a procurator to the Holy See to petition Pope Clement v in the cause of Margaret’s canonization40. The Neapolitan royal couple ensured revenues for both Isabelle and Elizabeth41. As Antonella Ambrosio has shown, documents attest Charles ii’s particular affection toward the community of S. Pietro, especially because of Elizabeth42. That said, thanks to Ambrosio’s research, it is clear that Elizabeth was not the prioress of the convent43. It can be presumed that, after at least one, but probably two marriages, she was not considered ideal for the position. There are several reasons why the two widows’ transfer to Naples was both necessary and rewarding for Charles ii. First, Isabelle, the widow of a ruler of the holy lineage of the Arpad dynasty, and Elizabeth, a member of the same illustrious family, who had been in the proximity of Margaret of Hungary as a fellow sister for more than a decade, gave the Neapolitan royal couple another opportunity to transfer this “holiness” to the Angevin dynasty, for whom, as Klaniczay pointed out, the cult of holy ancestors was central44. Second, far from the places she had lived earlier, in Naples, Elizabeth could be presented again as a pious sister.

Third, thanks to these two royal family members and the other Dominican nuns from a nearby community, as Ambrosio observed, the Neapolitan nobility started to consider S. Pietro an ideal place for their daughters45. Unfortunately, the convent was destroyed by Catalan forces in 142346. The project of the Neapolitan royal couple was successful, and Elizabeth ended her life as a respected sister – at least based on contemporary documents – and it seems that she continued to live as a member of the royal family, as far as we can tell. Besides the benefices Charles ii provided for his sister-in-law, little is known about Elizabeth’s lifestyle in S. Pietro, although, as Matthew J. Clear noted, it must have been suited to its illustrious residents47. She had a room (domus) there, and it is known from the executors of the testament of Mary of Hungary that she 29 Wenzel, Magyar diplomácziai (n. 27), pp. 144–145. 30 Ibidem, p. 154. 31 Antonella Ambrosio, Il monastero femminile domenicano dei SS. Pietro e Sebastiano di Napoli. Registri dei documenti dei secoli xiv–xv, Salerno 2003, p. 3. See also Caroline Bruzelius, The Stones of Naples, New Haven 2004, p. 99; Adriana Valerio, I luoghi della memoria: istituti religiosi femminili a Napoli dal iv al xvi secolo, Naples 2006, pp. 366 –371; Gemma T. Colesanti, “Le fondazioni domenicane femminili nel Mezzogiorno medievale: problemi e prospettive di ricerca (secoli xi–xiv)”,  in Clarisas y Dominicas: Modelos de implantación, promoción y devoción en la Península Ibérica, Cerdeñ, Nápoles y Sicilia, eadem, Blanca Garí, Núria Jornet-Benito eds, Florence 2017, pp. 71– 94, sp. pp. 81– 86; Rosalba Di Meglio, Ordini mendicanti, monarchia e dinamiche politico-sociali nella Napoli dei secoli xiii–xv, Raleigh 2013, pp. 58 – 61. 32 Di Meglio, Ordini mendicanti (n. 31), p. 58. 33 Gábor Klaniczay, Holy Rulers and Blessed Princesses: Dynastic Cults in Medieval Central Europe, Éva Pálmai transl., Cambridge 2002, pp. 195–294. 34 On Mary of Hungary’s relations with the Franciscans and Clarisses, see Cristina Andenna, “Francescanesimo di corte e santità francescana a corte”,  in Monasticum regnum. Religione e politica nelle pratiche di governo tra Medioevo ed Età moderna, Giancarlo Andenna, Laura Gaffuri, Elisabetta Filippini eds, Berlin/Münster/Wien/London 2015, pp. 139 –180, sp. pp. 142–156. 35 Isabelle also lived in the S. Pietro until her death in 1304; Wenzel, Magyar diplomácziai (n. 27), p. 172. A lot has been written about Queen Mary’s life and her role as a patron, here I give only a selective list: Vilmos Fraknói, “Mária, V. István király leánya, nápolyi királyné 1271–1323” [Mary, Daughter of King Stephen v, Queen of Naples, 1271–1323], Budapest 1906, pp. 1–47; Andreas Kiesewetter, “Maria d’Ungheria, regina di Sicilia”,  Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, Rome 2008, vol. lxx, pp. 218 –221; Mario Gaglione, Donne e potere a Napoli. Le sovrane angioine: consorti, vicarie e regnanti (1266 –1442), with a preface by Adriana Valerio, Soveria Mannelli 2009, pp. 73–103; Enikő Csukovits, “Marie de Hongrie”,  in Démystifier (n. 2), p. 610; see also various studies in the volume The Church of Santa Maria Donna Regina, Janis Elliott, Cordelia Warr eds, Aldershot 2004.

36 Báling, “Personal Network” (n. 28), p. 93. 37 “Monasterium Sancti Petri ad Castellum ad claustralem mansionem Magnifice mulieris domine Elisabet Regine Vngarie sororis nostre carissime, aliarum que religiosarum similiter sub regula Sancti Dominici monacharum ampliatur necessariis accomodis etc.” Wenzel, Magyar diplomácziai, (n. 27), vol. i, pp. 169 –170. 38 “Ubi Rex et Regina posuerunt Sororem Elisabeth, germanam ipsius Regina, filiamque Regis Hungaria, qua alias fuerat Soror in Monasterio de Insula Sororum Ordinis in Hungaria” in “Notitia provinciarum et domorum ordinis Praedicatorum. Ab initio ad annum md”,  in Scriptores ordinis Praedicatorum recensiti, notisque historicis et criticis illustrati[…], Jacobus Quetif, Jacobus Echard eds, Paris 1719 –1721, vol. i, p. viii. 39 “Notitia provinciarum” (n. 38), p. ix. 40 Stephanus de Salaniaco, Bernardus Guidonis, De quatuor in quibus Deus Predicatorum ordinem insignivit, Thomas Kaeppeli  ed., Rome 1949, pp. 102–103; Deák, La légende (n. 11), p. 221; Gábor Klaniczay, “Efforts at the Canonization of Margaret of Hungary in the Angevin Period”,  Hungarian Historical Review, ii (2013), pp. 313–340, sp. p. 320. 41 Antonella Ambrosio, Oratrices nostrae. Un’esperienza monastica a Napoli fra xiv e xv secolo, PhD thesis (Università degli Studi di Palermo), Palermo 2001, pp. 68 – 69. In 1306, King Charles financed the paying off of Elizabeth’s debts; Wenzel, Magyar diplomácziai (n. 27), p. 176, no. 226; Kanyó, “Az apáca” (n. 2), p. 27. 42 Ambrosio, Oratrices nostrae (n. 41), pp. 73, 122. 43 Ibidem, pp. 73– 74. For the documents pertaining to the S. Pietro convent, see eadem, Il monastero femminile (n. 31), pp. 3–22. 44 On Charles Robert’s use of the Capetian and Arpad cult of saints in support of his own claim to the throne, see Gábor Klaniczay, “Le culte des saints dynastiques en Europe Centrale (Angevins et Luxembourgs au xive siècle)”,  in L’Église et le peuple chrétien dans le pays de l’Europe du Centre-­ Est et du Nord (xive–xve siècles), Actes du colloque de Rome (27–29 janvier 1986), Rome 1990, pp. 221–247; idem, Holy Rulers (n. 33), pp. 295–367; Tanja Michalsky, Memoria und Repräsentation. Die Grabmäler des Königshauses Anjou in Italien, Göttingen 2000, pp. 64– 67. On the artistic context in Hungary during his reign, see Vinni Lucherini, “L’arte alla corte dei re ‘napoletani’ d’Ungheria nel primo Trecento: un equilibrio tra aspirazioni italiane e condizionamenti locali”,  in Arte di Corte in Italia del Nord. Programmi, modelli, artisti (1330 –1402 ca.), Atti del convegno (Losanna, 24–26 maggio 2012), Serena Romano, Denise Zaru eds, Rome 2013, pp. 370–396; eadem, “Raffigurazione e legittimazione della regalità nel primo Trecento: una pittura murale con l’incoronazione di Carlo Roberto d’Angiò a Spišská Kapitula (Szepeshely)”,  Medioevo. Natura e figura. Atti del convegno (Parma, 20 –25 settembre 2011), Arturo C. Quintavalle ed., Milano  2015, pp. 675– 687; eadem, “Nobilissimae picturae purpureae: i funerali del re Carlo  i d’Ungheria (1342) e la proiezione del potere monarchico nel tardo Medioevo”,  in Scripta in honorem Igor Fisković. Festschrift on the Occasion of his 70th Birthday, Miljenko Jurković, Predrag Marković eds, Zagreb 2015, pp. 109 –126; eadem, “La rinuncia di Ludovico d’Angio al trono e il problema della successione nei regni di Napoli e d’Ungheria: sfide giuridiche e artistiche”,  Da Ludovico d’Angiò a san Ludovico di Tolosa. I testi e le immagini, Atti del convegno (Napoli – Santa Maria Capua Vetere, 3–5 novembre 2016), Teresa D’Urso, Alessandra Perriccioli Saggese, Daniele Solvi eds, Spoleto 2017, pp. 137–152. 45 Ambrosio, Oratrices nostrae (n. 41), p. 267. 46 Ibidem; Valerio, I luoghi (n. 31), p. 378; Matthew J. Clear,“Maria of Hungary as Queen, Patron, and Exemplar”,  in The Church of Santa Maria Donna Regina (n. 35), pp. 45– 60, sp. p. 54. 47 Clear, “Maria of Hungary” (n. 46), p. 54.

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possessed two silver seals (one large and one small) that had belonged to Elizabeth. The same document shows that Mary bequeathed a silver gilt reliquary arm of San Biagio and a silver cross to the S. Pietro convent48. Elizabeth most likely died in 1321, since, as mentioned above, Mary of Hungary’s treasurer registered a payment for construction works done at S. Pietro in the room where Elizabeth used to reside in 132249. In the same year, on July 3, the queen dispensed a certain sum for wax candles to be burnt on the mass of the anniversary of her death in the church of the convent50. Keeping her memory did not cease for some time, even after the death of Mary of Hungary in 1323. The celebrated Dominican theologian Giovanni Regina of Naples († ca 1348), whose links to the Neapolitan royal court extended back as early as 1298, composed a sermon for Elizabeth’s translation to a more solemn place in their church, at the request of the nuns51. The sermon is an example of sermones de mortuis, an oratory genre that was quite popular at that time, written to commemorate members of the royal family while praising the whole dynasty52. The date the sermon was composed is not known exactly, but it was surely after July 18, 132353. The participants in Elizabeth’s translation must have included her nephew, King Robert of Anjou (r. 1309–1343) and his family, as well as the nun community of S. Pietro and the local Dominicans. In the sermon, Elizabeth is praised as an honorable person who, rejecting worldly privileges, wanted to live in poverty, who would discipline her body in many ways, was obedient to her superiors in everything, and whose memory was cherished by her community, also because the convent itself, together with all its possessions, was given to them on account of her person. Her marriage (or marriages) is not mentioned. This is the first source attesting the creation of the image of a humble nun who chose to live in poverty based on the rules of St Dominic rather than in courtly pomp – as a sort of alter Margarita – which would be developed later in hagiography. This sermon seems to be the last written record we have related to the Angevins about Elizabeth in Naples. Robert of Anjou, unlike his father, did not show any interest in the S. Pietro convent, and dealt with

it only when it was absolutely necessary54. Here ends the part of Elizabeth’s biography based on (nearly) contemporary sources, demonstrating that, as an Arpad princess, she was an important figure in both local ecclesiastic and secular realms. We got some insight into her personal network, the benefices the two Dominican female communities received for the sake of her person, and the events that motivated her to move to Naples. This overview will allow us to note what details and events turn up later in Elizabeth’s idealized biography, her hagiography. Hagiography After nearly 150 years in oblivion, Elizabeth ap­peared unexpectedly in hagiography in the second half of the fifteenth century, when she turned up in the Dominican reformer Johannes Meyer’s Liber de viris illustribus ordinis praedicatorum, composed in 146655. Meyer lived at the reformed Dominican Convent of Basel from 1442 onwards and was a chronicler of the contemporary observant reform movement in the Province of Teutony. During the second half of the fifteenth and the first half of the sixteenth century, authors from various orders wrote institutional histories with Viris Illustribus in the title, although it was far from being a standardized genre56. Meyer wanted to instruct his companions about who founded, constructed, and reformed the Order of Preacher Friars, and about how they could boast countless saints of both sexes, whose memory was scattered in various catalogues among their ranks57. The work is comprised of short biographies of more than two hundred and thirty illustrious members of the order in a hierarchical list (saints, martyrs, prelates, doctors, observant reformers, and holy women), including three princesses from Hungary: Margaret, Elizabeth, and another Elizabeth, the daughter of Andrew iii, who lived in the convent of Töss between 1310 and 1338. In the last section dedicated to holy virgins, venerable widows, and holy sisters, Meyer writes the following about our protagonist: “Elizabeth, daughter of Stephen, the illustrious King of Hungary. She was most exceptional in preserving her

humility. She did the cooking when it was her turn, as the other sisters, washing the dishes and sweeping the house. Her sister, Lady Mary, the wife of Charles, King of Sicily, with the authority and permission of Pope Boniface viii, founded the convent of St Peter martyr in the Kingdom of Sicily. For its renewal, the aforementioned Elizabeth was brought from the convent of the Island of the Danube in the Kingdom of Hungary”58.

In all likelihood, Meyer took this information from the above-mentioned protocol of Margaret’s canonization59, which, in my opinion, he combined with Bernard Gui’s account of the S. Pietro Convent. Meyer, like other Dominican chroniclers-hagiographers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, did not mention the less glorious aspects of Elizabeth’s life, presumably because he did not know about them. Emphasizing the contradiction between Elizabeth’s royal origin and humble lifestyle, he made her the second figure in a series of Dominican holy princesses of the Arpad dynasty, although her connection to Margaret is not revealed in the account, which caused problems in dating her life for later authors. He came up with a plausible motive for Elizabeth’s move to Naples. It is thanks to Meyer that, from a simple witness to Margaret of Hungary’s conversatio, Elizabeth “came to life” and her story started on its own path as a holy sister in the order’s hagiography. Possibly, her attitude towards the simple life notwithstanding, her high rank was an example that Meyer, as a reformer, wanted to present to his readers60. Her inclusion could also be motivated by the Observant’s enterprise in the spiritual education of the female members of their order, for whom the saintly “foremothers” would have been of special value. Surprisingly, Georg Epp, a Dominican from Güglingen, did not say a word about Elizabeth’s move to Naples in his collective biography entitled Libellus de illustribus viris ac sanctimonialibus sacri ordinis Praedicatorum, published in Cologne in 1506. He followed Meyer’s work closely and included the short biographies of the three princesses from  Hungary61. We do not know why he discarded this piece of information, but it affected the authors who used him as a source. The Bolognese Dominican, Ambrogio Taegio,

relied on Epp’s work in his Chronicae ampliores ordinis Praedicatorum or Chronica maior, probably composed in the first decades of the sixteenth century62. 48 Wenzel, Magyar diplomácziai, (n. 27), pp. 245, 255. 49 Clear, “Maria of Hungary” (n. 46), p. 54, notes 75, 78 on pp. 59  – 60. See also Vinni Lucherini, “Il ’testamento’ di Maria d’Ungheria a Napoli: un esempio di acculturazione regale”,  in Images and Words in Exile. Avignon and Italy in the First Half of the 14th Century, Elisa Brili, Laura Fenelli, Gerhard Wolf eds, Florence 2014, pp. 433–452. 50 Clear, “Maria of Hungary” (n. 46), p. 59, note 76; cf. also Fraknói, “Mária, V. István király leánya” (n. 35), p. 43, note 16. 51 The codex containing altogether 48 sermons is preserved in the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Napoli, ms viii. aa 11, the sermon In translacione corporis sororis Helisabeth is on fols 38ra–39ra. Thomas Kaeppeli, “Note sugli scrittori  domenicani di nome Giovanni di Napoli”,  Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum, x (1940), pp. 48 – 78; Johannes B. Schneyer, Repertorium der lateinischen Sermones des Mittelalters für die Zeit von 1150 –1350, Münster 1999, vol. iii, pp. 604– 615. For Giovanni Regina’s service in the Neapolitan royal court, see Kirsten Schut, “Politics and Power in the Works of John of Naples”,  Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum, n. s. iii (2018), pp. 37– 79, sp. pp. 40 –48. 52 Jean-Paul Boyer, “Prédication et l’État napolitain dans la première moitié du xive siècle”,  in L’état Angevin: Pouvoir, culture et société entre xiiie et xive siècle. Actes du colloque international organise par l’American Academy in Rome, l’École française de Rome, l’Istituto storico italiano per il Medio Evo, l’u.m.r Telemme et l’Université de Provence, l’Università degli studi di Napoli “Federico ii” (Rome/Naples, 7–11 novembre 1995), Rome 1998, pp. 127–157, sp. pp. 133–134. 53 Given that Thomas Aquinas is referred to as one of the canonized saints of the Order of Preachers, it must have been written after July 18, 1323. In the opinion of Michalsky, Elizabeth’s new tomb was made in the 1330s, the period of the construction of large sepulcher monuments, see Michalsky, Memoria und Repräsentation (n. 44), p. 279. 54 Ambrosio, Oratrices nostrae (n. 41), pp. 105–106. 55 Johannes Meyer, O.P., Liber de Viris Illustribus Ordinis Praedicatorum, Paul von Loë, O.P. ed., Leipzig 1918. The manuscript is ms Basel Universitätsbibl. d. iv. 56 Anne Huijbers, “De viris illustribus ordinis praedicatorum: A ‘Classical’ Genre in Dominican Hands”,  Franciscan Studies, lxxi (2013), pp. 297–324. On the Dominican Observant models of sanctity, see eadem, Zealots for Souls: Narratives of Self-Understanding during Observant Reforms, c. 1388 –1517, Berlin 2018, pp. 24–280. 57 Meyer, Liber de Viris (n. 55), p. 16. 58 “Elizabeth, filia Stephani, regis Ungarorum illustris. Hec ob custodiam humilitatis quam plurimum excellebat. Faciebat coquinam per septimanam suam, sicuti alie sorores, lavando scutella et domum scopando. Germana sua domina Maria, uxor Karoli, regis Cicilie, auctoritate et consensu pape Bonifacii octavi fundavit monasterium sancti Petri martyris in regno Cicilie, pro cuius instauracione translata est de monasterio Insule Danubii, regni Ungarie, prefata soror Elizabeth”. Meyer, Liber de Viris (n. 55), p. 66. 59 It was the editor of Meyer’s Liber de Viris, Paul von Loë, who pointed this out; see Meyer, Liber de Viris (n. 55), p. 66, note 3. It is an open question how Meyer could have had access to the canonization documents. 60 I am grateful to Cristina Andenna for raising this possibility. 61 Georg Epp, Libellus de illustribus viris ac sanctimonialibus sacri ordinis Praedicatorum, Cologne 1506, p. 12. 62 On Taegio’s work on the illustrious Dominicans, see Huijbers, Zealots for Souls (n. 56), pp. 149 –154.

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Taegio included the legend of Margaret of Hungary in his work, and mentions her brother, King Stephen, father of Elizabeth, highlighting how the two were connected63. Besides, similarly to his predecessors, he also reported the brief vita of Elizabeth of Töss. Taegio’s collection was, in turn, used by the Dominican theologian-inquisitor Giovanni Michele Pio’s (or Plodio’s) voluminous work titled Delle vite degli huomini illustri di s. Domenico, published in Bologna in 160764. Pio discussed the above-mentioned Due Suore Elisabette Ongare together, who were “both virgins in mind and body, [abounding] in prayers, spirituality and holiness in life”65. About the first Elizabeth, he writes that she was the Hungarian king’s daughter and describes how humbly she performed chores around the convent. Pio’s account presented two noteworthy features: first, he expressed clearer than Taegio how Margaret and Elizabeth were connected66, and second, he proposed an estimate of when Elizabeth lived: from around 1270 or a bit later67. Meyer’s work was used by another Dominican, Konrad of Sittard (Conradus Zittardus), in a collection of outstanding leaders and members of the order, the Kurtze Chronica... published in Dillingen in 159668. This work is one of those large compilations of Dominican history written in vernacular for the nuns that appeared from the end of the sixteenth century onwards69. The portrayal of Elizabeth is again built on the theme of a saintly Dominican nun of royal origin, living the life of the poor and doing menial labor for the community – even in S. Pietro. Teodoro Valle da Piperno’s Breve compendio… on the history of the Dominican Province of the Kingdom of Naples, published in 1651, follows the tradition represented by Johannes Meyer and Konrad of Sittard, namely, that Elizabeth was a sister in S. Pietro70. The author, who made use of multiple available sources, including Giovanni Regina’s sermon, writes that Elizabeth, who could have lived as a queen, wanted to embrace poverty as a Dominican nun and was engaged in the lowliest duties one could imagine. He also quotes at length what Pio had written about her, but without trying to harmonize it with the information he himself had found about her in various documents. While Elizabeth had already figured in previous

works among holy women, she is explicitly called Beata suor Elisabetta in this work. Elizabeth was not forgotten in Hungary either. The Dominican convent on the Island of the Hares maintained its importance and, as a shrine to Margaret, remained a popular pilgrimage site throughout the centuries71. The convent was reformed in the early 1470s and the nuns left it for good in 1541 due to the Ottoman threat. Out of the eleven extant codices written in Hungarian vernacular between 1506 and 1531 and used or possessed by the nuns, eight were copied in their scriptorium. Out of these, as has been pointed out by other scholars, Elizabeth’s role in the vernacular legend of Margaret of Hungary, preserved in a 1510 copy by the nun Lea Ráskai, is much more central than in the above-mentioned Latin sources written for Margaret’s canonization in the 1270s72, and in the Legenda maior in the 1340s73. This legend must have been translated from a Latin compilation, based primarily on the Legenda vetus and the acts of canonization protocols, but with the addition of other documents related to the convent. Although some scholars have hypothesized that it may have been translated from a lost Latin original dating to the fourteenth century, there is no solid evidence for this; it is equally possible that the Latin texts were put together in the process of creating the vernacular text [Fig. 2]74. Elizabeth’s connection with her aunt is more highlighted: she is not only a witness to the miraculous healing of one of their fellow sisters attributed to Margaret75 and to her wearing a cilicium76 present in the canonization protocols, but she becomes a key figure in the healing of her brother, King Ladislaus, with the help of Margaret’s relics77. The young ruler was on the verge of death in the proximity of the convent when some high-ranking noblemen and prelates requested Margaret’s veil, in order to try to heal the king with it. Elizabeth immediately sent the requested relic with two preacher friars and prayed for the recovery of her brother together with the sisters, other women, relatives, and other friends. Ladislaus regained his health,  and visited the shrine of Margaret as a pilgrim, praising both her and Elizabeth for his healing78. In the Legenda vetus, it was originally Duchess Anne, the sister of Margaret and aunt of Ladislaus,

that provided Margaret’s precious relic for the healing, and Elizabeth did not figure in the story at all79. Another remarkable feature of the legend is the emphasis on Elizabeth’s performance of lowly household chores with her aunt, to the point that the scribe remarks: “O, what shame to the presump­tu-­ ous friars, who do not learn how to do inferior works with pleasure from these two noble royal offsprings!”80. Moreover, Elizabeth is applauded for the donations she asked for and received from her father, King Stephen, and for the confirmation of various estates for the convent. A perplexing new bit of information added to the legend is that while King Stephen was buried next to the high altar of the church at the Dominican convent on the Island of the Hares in a red marble sarcophagus, Elizabeth was buried in the chapterhouse, in front of a crucifix, “as it was also written there”81. It is unlikely that her body was transferred from Naples to the Island near Buda at any point82, and archaeological excavations have not found the supposed burial place of Elizabeth in the chapterhouse83. Nevertheless, the complete physical destruction of the S. Pietro  convent may have contributed to this later belief84. In any case, this legend shows that, after two centuries, Elizabeth was remembered as a very positive figure, first a humble servant and then an eminent leader of the convent, who contributed greatly to its prosperity and was a good guardian 63 The account on Elizabeth is reported in Archivio Generale dell’Ordine di S. Domenico (Rome, Convento di Santa Sabina), xiv. 55, fols 193v–194r. Gábor Klaniczay, “Borselli és Taeggio Margit-legendája Bánfi Florio apparátusával” [Borselli’s and Taeggio’s Legends of Margaret of Hungary with the Apparatus of Florio Bánfi], in Miscellanea fontium historiae Europae. Emlékkönyv H. Balázs Éva történész professzor 80. születésnapjára, János Kalmár ed., Budapest 1997, pp. 11–56. 64 Giovanni Michele Pio, Delle vite degli huomini illustri di s. Domenico. Parte prima, Bologna 1607. The account on the two Elizabeths is on p. 499. 65 “ambe vergine di mente, e di corpo, ambe di molta oratione, spirito, e santità di vita” in Pio, Delle vite (n. 64), p. 499. 66 “Credesi che la figlia di Stefano fosse nipote della beata Margherita predetta” in ibidem. 67 The calculations were presumably originally made by Taegio, in whose legend on Margaret of Hungary, her brother, King Stephen, is mentioned. Supposedly, also her daughter Elizabeth lived around that time. Since Margaret died in 1270, as it can be read also in her legend, the author stipulated that Elizabeth lived around 1270 or a bit later. 68 Conradus Zittardus, Kurtze Chronika. Das ist Historische beschreibung [neben andern merklichen Puncten] der General Maister Prediger Ordens und was zu eines jeden zeit für Fürnehme

Hochgelehrte auch Heylige Brüder und Schwestern im Prediger Orden gelebt haben. Allen klösterlichen Junckfrawen Prediger Ordens zu gutem zusammen getrangen, Dillingen 1596. The account of Elizabeth is on pp. 135–136. 69 Huijbers, Zealots (n. 56), 147. 70 Teodoro Valle da Piperno, Breve compendio de gli più illustri padri nella santità della vita, dignità, uffici e lettere ch’ ha prodotto la Prov. del Regno di Nap. dell’Ord. de Predic., Naples 1651. The account of Elizabeth is on pp. 92– 95. 71 Gábor Klaniczay, “Sacred Sites in Medieval Buda”,  in Medieval Buda in Context (n. 7), pp. 229 –254, sp. pp. 236 –247. 72 Lovas Elemér, “Boldog Margit életének részletes forráskritikája” [The Detailed Philology of the Life of Blessed Margaret], in Pannonhalmi Főapátsági Főiskola évkönyve az 1915–1916-iki tanévre, Pannonhalma 1916, pp. 203–346, sp. p. 221. Kanyó listed the major differences between this legend and the earlier ones; cf. idem, “Az apáca” (n. 2), p. 31. 73 The codex is preserved in the National Széchényi Library under the shelfmark mny 3. Its text is edited as Szent Margit élete, 1510. A nyelvemlék hasonmása és betűhű átirata bevezetéssel és jegyzetekkel [The Life of St Margaret, 1510. The Facsimile and the Annotated Literal Transcription of the Linguistic Record], János P. Balázs, Adrienne Dömötör, Katalin Pólya eds, Introduction by János P. Balázs, Budapest 1990. The text is also reported in a modernized version in Árpádkori legendák és intelmek [Legends and Admonitions from the Arpad Age], Géza Érszegi ed., Budapest 1983, pp. 110 –179. On the various legends of Margaret, see Ilona M. Nagy, “Árpád-házi Szent Margit legendájának középkori és neolatin változatai” [The Medieval and Neo-Latin Versions of the Legends of St  Margaret of Hungary], in Classica-Mediaevalia-Neolatina ii, László Havas, Imre Tegyey eds, Debrecen 2007, pp. 86 – 94. 74 Legenda vetus (n. 6), p. 29. 75 Árpád-kori (n. 73), p. 130. 76 Ibidem, p. 171. 77 For the dating of the miracle, see Legenda vetus (n. 6), p. 31; ac­cording to Géza Érszegi, it took place in 1273, see Árpád­ kori (n. 73), p. 227, note 64. The unreliability of Elizabeth’s acting in the miracles, who was about 20 years old and not yet the prioress of the convent in 1275, has already been pointed out by Kanyó, “Az apáca” (n. 2), p. 23, note 69. 78 Árpád-kori (n. 73), pp. 164–165. 79 Legenda vetus (n. 6), pp. 119 –121. On the other hand, Elizabeth’s healing from a serious illness with Margaret’s veil and scapular is omitted. 80 “Ó, ki nagy szemérem a kevély szerzeteseknek, kik nem tanulnak alázatos dolgot örömest tenni e két nemes királyi magzatoktól”. Árpád-kori (n. 73), p. 171. 81 “Miképpenott is megírták”. Árpád-kori (n. 73), p. 171. On the tomb of King Stephen v, see Rózsa Feuerné Tóth, “V. István sírja a margitszigeti domonkos apácakolostor templomában” [The Grave of King Stephen v in the Church of the Dominican Nunnery on the Margaret Island], Budapest Régiségei, xxi (1964), pp. 115–131; Pál Lővei, “Epigraphy and Tomb Sculpture”,  The Art of Medieval Hungary (n. 4), pp. 253–267, sp. p. 258. 82 In the opinion of Fraknói, it is unlikely that King Louis i of Hungary (r. 1342–1382) left the earthly remains of his grandmother, Mary of Hungary as well as those of his brother Andrew, he would have transported Elizabeth back to Hungary, see Fraknói, Mária, V. István leánya (n. 35), pp. 42–43, note 16. 83 Rózsa Feuerné Tóth, “A margitszigeti domonkos kolostor” [The Dominican Convent on Margitsziget], Budapest Régiségei, xxii (1971), pp. 245–268, sp. p. 260. 84 I am grateful to the anonymous reader of my paper for this observation.

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of Margaret’s relics. Regardless of the veracity of the information on her burial place, the author of the legend was careful to highlight that, in addition to Margaret, two other members of the Arpad dynasty found their final resting place in the convent, further enhancing its prestige. Some of the information about Elizabeth in the vernacular legend of Margaret was used by the Italian Sigismondo Ferrari (Sigismundus Ferrarius), a Dominican theologian at the University of Vienna, who published his De rebus Ungaricae provinciae Ordinis Praedicatorum… in 1637. It was the first scholarly overview of the history of the Hungarian Province. Hungary was under Ottoman rule from the occupation of Buda in 1541 until its liberation in 168685. By the mid-sixteenth century, the Hungarian Dominican Province had been thrown into complete disorder, caused partly by the introduction of Protestantism to the country. Ferrari, appointed with the reorganization of the Province that had virtually not existed since ca 1580 due to Ottoman expansion, came to Hungary in 1634 to choose the best location for a new Dominican convent86. He worked for three years to record the significance of the Province, starting with its early history, examples of its martyrs, saints, blessed, and other illustrious members of the order, as well as listing the male and female convents, a history of the General Chapters, missionary activities, and the Observant reform87. Ferrari was familiar with the works of Epp, Taegio, and Pio, but was not aware of Elizabeth’s life in Naples. He reported Elizabeth’s benefices to the convent, as well as the information that she was buried in the chapterhouse88. He calculated that she must have died after 1278. The information about Elizabeth from the vernacular legend of Margaret became accessible to a broader, non-Hungarian speaking audience, thanks to Ferrari’s work. His undertaking in Hungary was successful, and the first new Dominican convent was founded in Szombathely, followed by the (re-)establishment of several others through the  early eighteenth century. The Austro-­Hungarian Province of the order was created in 1702. The list of Dominican works from the seventeenth century that feature an account of Elizabeth’s life ends with the German Dominican

and Professor of Theology Friedrich Steill’s Ephemerides, published in 1691 in Bologna. The work is organized according to the calendar, and Elizabeth’s life can be found on March 6, together with the other Hungarian princess of the Arpad dynasty, Elizabeth of Töss89. Steill includes her years spent both in the convent on the Island of the Hares and at S. Pietro, which he reports she spent with all virtues given by God, especially humility. He used Johannes Thuróczy’s Chronica Hungarorum90 for Elizabeth’s lineage and relied on the Kurtze Chronika for the rest of her life. A new piece of information given is a short reference to her great miracles. Despite the works listed above, Elizabeth was not considered a saint by everyone: she was not included in compilations by several significant Dominican chroniclers from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, such as Girolamo Albertucci de Borselli, Serafino Razzi, Lorenz Sauer, and Hernando del Castillo91. Elizabeth cannot be found in the Bollandists’ Acta Sanctorum, the most extensive historical work of the Jesuits, named after its first editor Jean Bolland, either. Its first volumes were published in Antwerp in 1643, and by 1794, 53 total folio volumes had appeared, listing holy persons from January 1 to October 14. The greatest novelty, besides the amount of biographical material, was that the editors looked at sources with historical criticism92. I would like to conclude this hagiographic overview with a work by an author from Hungary who was not a Dominican, but whose work was published shortly after the kingdom was liberated from the Ottomans. The Jesuit Gabriel Hevenesi, regarded as a founder of Hungarian scientific historiography, was supported by Cardinal Leopold Kollonich in his initiative to collect a wide range 85 For a short but informative overview of the period from the religious point of view, see Antal Molnár,“Relations between the Holy See and Hungary during the Ottoman Domination of the Country”,  Fight Against the Turk in Central-Europe in the First Half of the 16th Century, István Zombori ed., Budapest 2004, pp. 191–225. 86 Ireneusz Wysokinski, O.P., “Ferrari Zsigmond és a Domonkos Rend újjászervezése a xvii. századi Magyarországon” [Sigismundus Ferrarius and the Reorganization of the Dominican Order in Seventeenth-Century Hungary], Tanítvány, vii (2001), pp. 54– 66. 87 See the “Prefatio” of Ferrari, De rebus Hungaricae Provinciae Ordinis Praedicatorum, Vienna 1637, pp. 1–12, sp. pp. 1, 11.

2 / Elizabeth in the codex preserving the legend of Margaret written in the Hungarian vernacular, copied by the Dominican nun Lea Ráskai in the convent on the Island of the Hares in 1510, National Széchényi Library Budapest, mny 3, fol. 101r

88 The codex containing the vernacular legend of Margaret was discovered by the Jesuit Jakab Némethy in the Clarissan convent in Bratislava/Pozsony (today’s Slovakia) in the seventeenth century, where the Dominican nuns from the Island of the Hares, fleeing from the Ottoman invaders, had brought it with them. Némethy had the legend copied and translated into Latin for Ferrari by Ferenc Lénárt Szegedy. Ferrari used this legend for his accounts on Margaret and Elizabeth; cf. Ferrari, De rebus (n. 87), p. 220. 89 Friedrich Steill, Ephemerides Domenicano-sacrae. Das its Heiligkeit und tugendvoller Geruch, der aus allen Enden der Welt zusammen getragenen Ehren-Blumen dess himmlisch-fruchtbahren Lust-Gartens Prediger Ordens, 2 vols, Dillingen 1691, vol. i, pp. 391–393. 90 Editio princeps: Johannes de Thurocz, Chronica Hungarorum, Buda 1473.

91 Girolamo Albertucci de Borselli, Cronica magistrorum generalium Ordinis Fratrum Praedicatorum, Biblioteca Universitaria di Bologna, Cod. lat. 1999; Laurentius Surius, Vitae sanctorum patrum ordinis praedicatorum iussu reverendissimi…, Leuven 1575; Serafino Razzi, Vite dei santi e beati così huomini, come donne del sacro ordine de’ Frati Predicatori, Florence 1577; Hernando del Castillo, Historia General de Sancto Domingo y de su orden de Predicadores, 2 vols, Madrid 1584–1592. 92 Elizabeth’s vita, based on Ferrari’s account, was added to the “Appendix. Acta sanctorum Ungariae, qui hactenus praetermissi fuerunt, complectens” of the Acta sanctorum Ungarie reporting the lives of those who were not reported in the Bollandists’ volumes; cf. Acta sanctorum Ungariae, ex Joannis Bollandi S. J. theo­ logi, ejusque continuatorum operibus excerpta… Trnava, 1743–1744, vol. 1–2; the legend of Elizabeth is in vol. ii, on pp. 31–33.

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3 / Elizabeth in the Hungarian Jesuit Gabriel Hevenesi’s Ungaricae Sanctitatis Indicia Tyrnaviae [Trnava] 1692, p. 66

of sources from family archives, since a large number of ecclesiastical and other historical records in Hungary were lost during the Ottoman occupation and then the Habsburg “liberation”93. His circular Modus materiae conqiurendae pro annalibus ecclesiasticis regni Hungariae issued in 1693 can be considered the foundation document of historical writing in Hungary, and the result of his invitation was the accumulation of 140 manuscript volumes of sources. One year earlier, in 1692, Hevenesi published one of his most significant works, the Ungaricae Sanctitatis Indicia, in Trnava/Nagyszombat (in present-day Slovakia), including an account of Elizabeth94. It was meant for private reading, as both its small size (15 × 9 cm) and the fact that it was also published in Hungarian vernacular would suggest95. The Latin version was enriched with 50 copperplate engravings with the signature Hoffmann and Schott [Fig. 3]. The collection (re-)established a link between Hungary and sanctity that had been thrust into oblivion for centuries. In this booklet, Elizabeth is placed in the most illustrious company of saints (officially recognized by the Church or not) that originated from or were related to Hungary in some way, ranging from St Stephen of Hungary to the Observant Franciscan James of the Marches. In the Prologue, Hevenesi writes about his motivations: to save these figures from oblivion, to follow the urging of his friends to use the examples of saints to return Hungarians to their “ancient” (i.e. Catholic) religion, and to spur his readers to gather records on other saints, too. Hungary had as many saints as other countries – claims Hevenesi – yet perhaps there was no other country where citizens had forgotten about their saints as much as here, which can be ascribed to fire, destruction, and looting96. Although Hevenesi mentions both Ferrari and Steill as authors of the life of Elizabeth, he follows the latter more closely. Elizabeth’s move to Italy, with the consent of the pope, was motivated, in Hevenesi’s opinion, by the fact that the further she was from her relatives, the more she could be engaged in spiritual matters. This aspect is emphasized by a new element: she dedicated her life on the Island of the Hares to the contemplation of the divine. Her image in the book is quite schematic, very similar to the other Dominican nuns in the volume,

Margaret and Helen: her attributes are the Dominican habit, a crown, and a crucifix indicating her commitment to spiritual matters. Through Hevenesi’s work, the account of Elizabeth originating with Johannes Meyer, via Zittardus and Steill, eventually reached readers in Hungary, and the Arpadian princess took her seat in the pantheon of Hungarian saints. Conclusions We will never know how widely it was known among Elizabeth’s contemporaries that she had not been a Dominican nun her entire life. Nevertheless, western and Byzantine sources alike attest that the worldlier aspects of Elizabeth’s life were known during her lifetime, even though supposedly only by a very limited circle of people. Still, this did not seem to hinder the Neapolitan royal couple from sustaining (or recreating) the image of a devout sister, to which later Giovanni Regina, a Dominican friar closely linked to the Neapolitan court, made a great contribution with his sermon. These details of Elizabeth’s life, namely that she had been both a wife and a mother, remained hidden from the Dominican historiographers-hagiographers who included otherwise uninformative accounts of her life in their works. Clearly, her origin in the holy Arpad dynasty was a factor that nothing could outdo, not even the events after which one would not imagine her having a place among the Dominican saints and being blessed. A Hungarian princess who chose to live in poverty instead of royal splendor was of utmost importance in the history of the two communities she had been a member of, from both a spiritual and a material point of view. Elizabeth was a precious person because she had been a fellow nun of Margaret, a likely candidate for canonization, whose case was promoted by the Angevins who wanted to transfer the hereditary saint tradition of the Arpads to their own dynasty. In the collective memory of Dominican female communities, Elizabeth remained a person whose presence secured the revenues that were indispensable for their existence. The safeguarding of Elizabeth’s body in their proximity was part of the preservation of her memory: while there is

no trace of Elizabeth’s memory being kept alive from the 1330s onwards in S. Pietro, in the community of the Dominican convent on the Island of the Hares, she was remembered in the early sixteenth century as the niece of Margaret, who supported her local cult and used her royal origin to secure the convent’s material wealth. The 1472 destruction of S. Pietro, where she was originally buried, may have contributed to the belief that her final resting place was on the Island of the Hares near Buda. Her stay in Naples was not known by a number of authors, but those who mentioned the S. Pietro convent always acknowledged its founder, Mary of Hungary. Some authors felt 93 Kollonich’s aim was to make a legal claim on the territories liberated from the Ottomans, but Hevenesi, perhaps inspired by the history writing (and at the same time counter reformational) activities of the Bollandists in Antwerp, used this opportunity to organize the collection of data and research of the sources to make up for the lacuna in the history of the Catholicism in Hungary, and of the country itself. On the Jesuit historians in Hungary, see György Hölvényi, “A ma­gyar jezsuita történetírók és a jezsuita rend” [Hungarian Jesuit Historiographers and the Jesuit Order], Magyar Könyvszemle, xc (1974), pp. 232–249, sp. pp. 235–237. 94 Gabriel Hevenesi, Ungaricae Sanctitatis Indicia, Trnava, 1692; the account of Elizabeth is on pp. 43–44. Trnava/Nagyszombat was the center of historical scholarship; at the time, the only university in the Kingdom of Hungary was here, where the Jesuits created a school of history. On the Jesuits’ activity here, see Paul Shore, Jesuits on the Eastern Peripheries of the Habsburg Realms (1640 –1773), Budapest / New York 2012, pp. 251–280; on their role in the emergence of history as a discipline in Central Europe, see Jakub Zouhar, “Early Modern Jesuit Writing of History as an Inspiration for Central European Historians before 1773”,  in Engaging Sources: The Tradition and the Future of Collecting History in the Society of Jesus (Proceedings of the Symposium held at Boston College, June 11 – 13, 2019), Cristiano Casalini, Emanuele Colombo, Seth Meehan eds, Boston 2021, available at: https://jesuitportal.bc.edu/publications/symposia/2019symposium/symposia-zouhar/ [last accessed on December 9, 2021]. 95 Gábor Hevenesi, Régi Magyar Szentség, Avagy: Magyar-Ország Bóldog emlékezetű ötven Szentnek, és Bóldoginak le-képezett élete, kik Szt. István idejében Magyar-Országban vóltan, Avagy A’ Római Széken, avagy élő embertől nem említhető régiek egyenlő értelméből, avagy szava hitt Históricusoknak írásaiból Szentek közé számláltattak. Most pedig az idvözült Szentekhez illendó tiszteletnek buzgóbb gerjesztésére a’ világ eleiben tétetnek. Nagyszombat 1695. On the work, see the preface to the digitalized version by Ferenc Sinkó [http://www.ppek. hu/konyvek/Hevenesi_Gabor_Regi_Magyar_Szentseg_ Ungaricae_Sanctitatis_Indicia_1.pdf], pp. 9 –12. In the Hungarian version, it can be read that the S. Pietro founded by Mary was in Milan. It must be a translation error resulting from the works of Konrad of Sittard or Friedrich Steill, who wrote about Sanct Peter von Mainland, referring to St Peter of Verona, who suffered martyrdom in Como in 1252, and was buried in the Basilica of Sant’Eustorgio in Milan. 96 Hevenesi, Ungaricae Sanctitatis Indicia (n. 95), pp. 1–3.

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the need to come up with explanations for Elizabeth’s move to Naples, and we can also observe attempts to gather additional material about her and to determine the exact time she lived in. Nevertheless, these authors did not reflect on the pieces of information that seem to be contradictory, namely, her move to Naples and her more than two decades in S. Pietro. The authors mention more works that featured accounts of Elizabeth than they actually included in their works, and it is not clear what motivated their preferences. Since very little was known about why Elizabeth was regarded a saintly woman, we can see a tendency of enriching her image with some – rather conventional – details, such as the contemplation of divine matters and miracles, from the late sixteenth century onwards. The establishment of the day of her death (March 6) was necessary for cataloguing her in works arranged according to the calendar, as was the case with Friedrich Steill. Although these accounts were written at the time of, or after, the Observant reform in the fifteenth century, when the time of the blessed princesses living in mendicant convents was long gone, we have seen that Elizabeth remained a figure to be remembered for several reasons. Apart from the struggle of most authors to include as many saints of both sexes in their works as possible, so as to underline the excellence of the Order of Preachers, she could have been of interest because of her attitude towards doing menial jobs in the convent without complaint, despite her royal origin. For authors with the aim of gathering material on a specific Dominican Province or country, she was important because of her links to the royal house(s) and specific communities in Hungary and Italy. For the Jesuit Hevenesi, Elizabeth was someone to include in the assembly of the saints of Hungary, in order to contribute to the country’s recovery of the Catholic faith and the strengthening of its self-awareness by digging up saintly characters from the past.

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summary Helisabet filia Stephani regis Ungarorum illustris Obraz svaté jeptišky z dynastie Arpádovců v hagiografických pramenech

Princezna Alžběta (1255?–1321?), dcera uherského krále Štěpána v., strávila mládí v dominikánském klášteře na Zaječím ostrově na Dunaji v blízkosti Budína. Než se stala převorkou, žila zde asi deset let společně se svou tetou Markétou, jejíž pověst světice se začala šířit brzy po její smrti v roce 1270. V roce 1301 se Alžběta přestěhovala do dominikánského kláštera S. Pietro a Castello v Neapoli, který nedávno předtím založila její sestra Marie Uherská, manželka sicilského krále Karla ii. Zde žila až do konce svého života. Nebyla však celý život jeptiškou: než se přestěhovala do Neapole, vdala se a stala se dokonce matkou. V roce 1466 se díky dominikánovi Johannesi Meyerovi její jméno objevilo mezi význačnými členy řádu a až do konce sedmnáctého století byly krátké zprávy o ní začleněny do řady hagiografických či historiografických děl, ovšem bez jediné narážky na světštější stránky jejího života. Tento příspěvek se zabývá vznikem a proměnou obrazu pricezny Alžběty v blahoslavenou. Z toho důvodu je nezbytné i podrobné představení jejího života. Díla obsahující zmínky o Alžbětě psaná jak latinsky, tak v lidovém jazyce, byla určena různým čtenářům a odrážela také vznik historie jako vědní disciplíny v šestnáctém a sedmnáctém století. Bližší pohled na středověké prameny nám také umožňuje jasněji vidět, že Alžběta byla svými komunitami připomínána jako klíčová

postava z duchovního i materiálního hlediska a že ochrana jejího těla v blízkosti těchto komunit byla nezbytnou součástí uchování její památky. Významný rozdíl mezi jednotlivými díly spočívá v tom, zda vypovídají pouze o Alžbětině životě na Zaječím ostrově, nebo také o jejích letech strávených v Neapoli. Její původ ze svaté dynastie Arpádovců byl zásadním faktorem pro vykreslení její postavy jako skromné jeptišky, která si místo královské pompy zvolila život v chudobě. Přestože tato vyprávění vznikala v době, kdy doba blahoslavených princezen žijících v žebravých klášterech byla dávno pryč, Alžběta zůstávala postavou, na kterou se nesmělo zapomenout. Na jedné straně, pomineme-li snahy většiny autorů zahrnout do svých děl co nejvíce světců obou pohlaví, aby podtrhli výjimečnost Řádu kazatelů, mohla být Alžběta zajímavá také svým postojem k vykonávání podřadných prací v klášteře, a to navzdory svému královskému původu. Naopak pro autory, jejichž cílem bylo shromáždit materiál o konkrétní dominikánské provincii nebo zemi, byla důležitá kvůli svým vazbám na královský rod (rody) a na jednotlivé komunity v Uhrách a Itálii. Koncem osmnáctého století, po osvobození Uher od osmanské nadvlády, se díky jezuitskému autorovi, který se hluboce zajímal o (církevní) dějiny a usiloval o obnovu katolicismu v království, stala členkou nově vzniklého panteonu uherských světců.

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afterword

Royal Nunneries in Czech Lands: Their Specificity and Research Perspectives Klára Benešovská

The introduction to this volume has outlined the general framework of medieval female monasticism. To conclude, it is crucial to add several specific examples from Czech lands that are not discussed in the articles of this volume but are linked to those included here by familial and institutional ties. Seven chosen nunneries, closely related to Přemyslid sovereign politics, exchanged, shared, and maintained the tradition and memory of the former Přemyslid foundations. The princesses and queens who were born to the Přemyslid family or married into it were involved in the foundation of many new female monasteries in the Bohemian Kingdom. They received their education there and in many cases entered the monasteries as nuns, became abbesses, or simply found shelter in these 1 / The east end of the basilica with a main apse, two towers and the Chapel of St Ludmila added by Abbess Agnes in the early 13th century, and restored in 14th century. St George Basilica, Prague Castle

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institutions for a certain period of time, often being buried there. Experience and tradition were thus naturally passed on and maintained. From the tenth to the middle of the fourteenth century – from Mlada-Marie, the first known foundress, to Elisabeth Richenza, the last Přemyslid Queen of the Piast dynasty – we can trace the changing politics of the ruling family as well as the ways in which royal women subtly, but persistently, intervened in the political affairs beyond the walls of the monasteries. The first and key example is the Stift of St George, founded within the fortified Prague Castle, which was the centre of the Přemyslid state since the tenth century1. The circumstances of the foundation of this convent determined its unique position among Bohemian royal nunneries, which endured until the Hussite wars. In ca 920, Duke Vratislav i founded St George’s Basilica at Prague Castle and introduced a permanent group of priests here. It is symptomatic that the stone throne on which the new dukes of Bohemia were enthroned, was situated in front of the basilica’s west façade. Vratislav intended for the church itself to be a dynastic necropolis and the centre of church administration – an archpresbyteriate – at a time when Prague belonged to the diocese of Regensburg. The basilica was consecrated in 925 during the reign of Vratislav’s son, Wenceslaus, who translated the remains of his murdered grandmother Ludmila, the first female saint and martyr of the Přemyslid dynasty, to this church [Fig. 1]2. Before his martyrdom (in 929 or 935), Wenceslas built the rotunda of St Vitus “ad similitudinem Romanae ecclesiae rotundam” to the west of the Basilica of St George3. About 950 his dead body was transferred here from Stará Boleslav and buried in the southern apse. The chapel erected above his grave has since become the centre of the St Wenceslas cult. Between the years 965 and 967, Duke Boleslav ii (a nephew of St Wenceslas) sent his “sacris litteris erudite, christianae religioni dedita” sister4, Princess Mlada to Rome, to negotiate the establishment of a new diocese with its seat at Prague with Pope John xiii. She stayed in the Benedictine monastery of St Agnes of Rome on the Aventine for several years5, receiving the habit of the Benedictine order and a new name, Marie.

After the death of the opposing Regensburg bishop, Michael, she received the consent of Emperor Otto i and the Pope, not only to establish the bishopric of Prague, but also the first nunnery in Bohemia. Upon her return to Prague (972–973?), the rotunda of St Vitus with the grave of St Wenceslaus became the bishop’s church, and St George’s Basilica was handed over by Boleslav  ii to the new “Damenstift”6, where Princess Mlada-Marie became the first abbess-superior of the “canonesses”.This Přemyslid princess must therefore be placed into the context of other educated tenth century women from the highest strata of society, who have fundamentally contributed to the consolidation of new religious institutions and thus to the cultural rise of their lands. The close connection with the princely, later royal court was further strengthened in Prague by the close proximity of the seat of the monarch and bishop inside the fortified area of Prague Castle. The church took over St George as a patron, the congregation of priests, and the function of the ducal necropolis with the tombs of the church founder, Vratislav, and the founder of the nunnery, Boleslav ii, and also cared for and fostered the cult of St Ludmila. Although more Přemyslid burials took place here, it was these two founders who were worshiped in the monastery as “beati” and their tombs, in front of the stairs to the elevated eastern choir, were located in the honorary position “in medio ecclesie” [Fig. 2]. The first monastery from the tenth and eleventh centuries was damaged in 1142 by a devastating fire. After this event, under the rule of Abbess Berta’s, the monastery was rebuilt in stone. The basilica was radically adapted, although it mostly kept the dimensions of the original church: a new larger choir was built above the crypt, two towers were erected flanking the eastern end of the side aisles (outside the church), the main nave was extended to the west, the side aisles were vaulted and galleries were built above them. The northern gallery was connected by a staircase directly to the choir. In the west, during the following construction phase, an arcaded porch was built, with the entrance to the “longa via” – a covered corridor that could be used for processions between the metropolitan church of St Vitus and St George’s Basilica7.

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2 / The east choir with the mural paintings of the 12th century and the position "in medio ecclesiae" with the Přemyslid tombs, the state after the reconstruction between 1888–1915 and the restorations in 1959–1963, St George Basilica, Prague Castle * 1

2 3 4 5

6 7

The author would like to thank Daniela Rywiková and Jana Gajdošová for the translation and Alexandra Gajewski for proofreading the English text of this Afterword. The Story of Prague Castle, Prague 2003, pp. 48 –140; Kateřina Kubínová, Klára Benešovská, “Art and Architecture in the Period 800 –1500”,  in Art in the Czech Lands 800 –2000, Taťána Petrasová, Rostislav Švácha eds, Prague 2017, pp. 39 – 74; Josef Žemlička, “Transformation of the Dukedom of ‘the Bohemians’ into the Kingdom of Bohemia”,  in Political Culture in Central Europe (10th–20th Century): Part i, Middle Ages and Early Modern Era, Halina Manikowska, Jaroslav Pánek, Martin Holý eds, Prague 2005, pp. 47– 64; Alfred Wieczorek, Hans-Martin Hinz, Europas Mitte um 1000. Beiträge zur Geschichte, Kunst und Archäologie. Katalog., Stuttgart 2000, pp.  244–304; Jan Frolík, “Die Prager Burg im 10. und 11. Jahrhundert (Zu Fragen der Auswertung der älteren archäologischen Dokumentation und deren Interpretation)”,  in Boleslav ii. Der Tschechische Staat um das Jahr 1000, Internationales Symposium, Praha (9.–10.2.1999), Petr Sommer ed., Prague 2001, pp. 153–187. Svatá Ludmila. Žena na rozhraní věků, Jan Mařík, Martin Musílek, Petr Sommer eds, Prague 2021. Cosmae chronicon Boemorum cum continuatoribus, Fontes rerum bohemicarum, ii, Josef Emler ed., Prague 1874, p. 92. Ibidem, p. 35. After the mention in the annals of Heinrich of Heimburg (Annales Heinrici Heimburgensis-Chronica Bohemorum, Fontes rerum bohemicarum, iii, Josef Emler ed., Prague 1882, p. 307); Rudolf Turek, “Ctihodná Mlada-Marie”,  in Bohemia sancta. Životopisy českých světců a přátel Božích, Jaroslav Kadlec ed., Prague 1989, pp. 78 – 84; Petr Kubín, Sedm přemyslovských kultů, Prague 2011, pp. 151–160. See Robert Suckale, Die mittelalterlichen Damenstifte als Bastionen der Frauenmacht, (Vortrag, gehalten vor der Kölner Juristischen Gesellschaft am 27. Mai 2000), Köln 2001. For the archeology, building story and historiography of the monastery St George see Katarina Mašterová, Bazilika a kláštor sv. Jiří na Pražskom hrade vo svetle archeologického výskumu, PhD thesis, (Charles University, Prague, super­visor: Petr Sommer), Prague 2015.

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3 / The area under the gallery for the nuns, Basilica of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary, Doksany, ca 1143–1197 4 / The relief from St George’s monastery, commissioned by Abbess Agnes (1220–1228), and the fragment of the archivolt with the inscription In gremio matris residet Sapientia patris 5 / The nave of the church of St Francis, consecrated in 1231–1234, Convent of St Agnes of Bohemia, Prague

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The reconstruction period coincided with the building boom promoted by King Vladislav i and his wives Gertrude of Babenberg and Judith of Thuringia. Gertrude and Vladislav founded the Premonstratensian nunnery in Doksany [Fig. 3]. Here, in this new, “modern” monastic institution, two other important Přemyslid princesses were brought up: Agnes, the daughter of Vladislav and Judith, later the abbess of St George, as well as St Agnes of Bohemia, the founder of the Poor Clares convent in Prague. Judith and Vladislav also founded a Benedictine nunnery in Teplice, settled with nuns from the St George Damenstift and inspired by its new building from the period after the year 11428. Its basilica was chosen by Judith as her final resting place. The (incomplete) three-part relief from St George’s monastery, commissioned by Abbess Agnes (1220–1228), demonstrates the importance of the convent’s traditions as well as the self-confidence of the female patron [Fig. 4]. The central scene, showing a Sedes sapientiae, is evidence of the strong Marian cult in St George’s monastery. The relief was probably a part of the tympanum above the entrance to the Virgin Chapel or it could have stood inside the chapel on the altar mensa. A fragment of the archivolt with the inscription In gremio matris residet Sapientia patris also survives from the same period and it is interesting to ask whether this may have been related to the relief found walled up near the southern portal of the basilica9. The relief visually summarizes the role of the most important abbesses – the founders of the monastery (Marie, Bertha, Agnes) and their direct connection to the Czech throne (here in the person of Agnes’s brother, King Přemysl Otakar i). After a long effort, Agnes, the daughter of Přemysl Otakar i and his wife Constance of Hungary (the aunt of St Elisabeth of Thuringia), managed to break free from the dictate of the “marriage policy” and turned her attention to a new phenomenon: the town. Guided by Franciscan piety and with the help of her brother, King Wenceslas i, and her mother, Agnes founded a new type of convent in 1231 near the walls of the developing Greater Town of Prague on the bank of the Vltava River. This convent of Poor Clares was endowed with a hospital, which was replaced in 1238 by

the monastery of Friars Minor10. In 1234 Agnes wore the order’s habit in the presence of the royal family and seven bishops. In the same year, the nave of the church of St Francis, between the nun’s convent and the Friars’ cloister,

was consecrated [Fig. 5]. The chancel was added between 1238–1245 and in its longitudinal axis, the body of the King Weceslaus i, the co-founder of the convent, was buried. Several construction phases, changes in layout and re-construction phases reflect the specifications of the Rule as well as the position of Agnes within the monastery and in the politics of the kingdom. The new functions of some parts of the building correspond to this11. This is clear from the adaptation of the two-storey palace into Our Lady chapel [Fig. 6] and in the location of Agnes’s private oratory on the ground floor of her new dwelling – it is from the oratory and through the hagioscope that she could watch the Holy Mass at the altar in the Marian chapel and receive the Eucharist12. Her regard for family memoria and for royal representation is testified by burials of members of the royal family in the chancel of the church of St Francis (King Wenceslaus i), in the chapel of Our Lady (queens and princesses) and in the new royal mausoleum in the church of the Holy Saviour. The ground plan and architecture of the double monastery are evidence of an effort to enforce strict enclosure of the Poor Clare sisters during Holy Mass and to prevent any communication with the Friar Brothers. It is also interesting to study the relationship between the architecture of the monastery and the function of its spaces: The simple style of the brick convent buildings and its areas for everyday life, in combination with the architectural vocabulary used in the cloister and St Francis’s church make visible the participation of Cistercian workshops. Despite this, the style of the presbytery of the Holy Savior church [Fig. 7] confirms knowledge of the courtly style of contemporary France, which probably arrived here from Klosterneuburg (Capella speciosa)13. St Agnes’s monastery is a unique witness to the process of forming and stabilizing perhaps 8 Antonín Hejna, “Basilika v Teplicích”,  Umění, viii (1960), pp. 217–238. As a result of the Hussite wars, the monastery was dissolved in the 15th, at which time it passed into secular hands. It was rediscovered by archaeologists in the 1950s. 9 Klára Benešovská, “The Wisdom of the Father Enthroned in the Lap of the Mother”,  in The Story of Prague Castle (n. 1), pp. 128 –131.

afterword

6 / Chapel of Our Lady, 1238–1245, with the funeral niche of Agnes, and the view to the Church of Holy Savior, Convent of St Agnes of Bohemia, Prague

10 The pope Gregory ix promoted the hospital confraternity to an independent canonical order, called the Crosiers of the Red Star (the only one of Bohemian origin). In 1237 the hospital moved to the Church of St Peter on Poříčí and from there to the foot of Judith Bridge, in 1252. Zdeňka Hledíková, “Listiny k nejstarším dějinám kláštera a špitálu sv. Františka v Praze”,  in Svatá Anežka Česká – princezna a řeholnice, catalogue of the exhibition, Prague 2011, pp. 126 –135. 11 The convent of St Agnes of Bohemia has been the subject of a detailed study by the Czech researcher Helena Soukupová for the last 50 years. She is the author of monographs and many articles, of which we present: Helena Soukupová, Anežský klášter v Praze, Prague 1989 [extended 2nd edition 2011]; eadem, Svatá Anežka česká. Život a legenda, Prague 2015; eadem, “Program Anežčina kláštera a jeho vliv na architekturu mendikantů”,  in Sztuka w kręgu krakowskich franciszkanów i klarysek, Marcin Szyma, Marek Walczak eds, Cracow 2020, pp. 45– 66. In English: eadem, “The Founder, her Life and her Legend”,  in Convent of St. Agnes of Bohemia. Monastery guide, Helena Dáňová, Štěpánka Chlumská eds, Prague 2016, pp. 27–39; eadem, “A Building History of the Na Františku Monastery, from the Middle Ages to Modern Times”,  in ibidem, pp. 59 – 75, eadem, “Monastery Guide”,  in ibidem, pp. 76 –173; eadem, “The Lapidarium of the Convent of St. Agnes of Bohemia”,  in ibidem, pp. 175–177, eadem, “Catalogue of the Lapidarium”,  in ibidem, pp. 179 –219. About Agnes’s foundations see also: Christian Frederick Felskau, Agnes von Böhmen und die Klosteranlage der Klarissen und Franziskaner in Prag, Leben und Institution, Legende und Verehrung, 2 Vol., Nordhausen 2008. 12 See Jan Kapistrán Vyskočil, Legenda blahoslavené Anežky a čtyři listy sv. Kláry, Prague 1934. 13 Agnes lived here when she was about 9 to 14 years old, as a future wife of Henry, the son of Emperor Frederick ii.

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7 / Church of the Holy Savior, after 1261, Convent of St Agnes of Bohemia, Prague 8 / Heads of the queens and kings on the entrance gate, detail, Church of Holy Savior, around 1265, Convent of St Agnes of Bohemia, Prague

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the most important female convent of Poor Clares in Central Europe in the early stages of the institutionalization of this order. It also reveals the crucial role of St. Agnes, who was already regarded a saint during her lifetime, in this process14. Czech research still owes Agnes a more substantial comparison with her revered contempo­raries [Fig. 8]15. Following the example of Agnes’s Foundation, the Přemyslids later founded more double monasteries mainly in the strategic positions in selected towns on the border of Moravia and Bohemia – Znojmo, Opava, Olomouc, Cheb, and later in the fourteenth century Český Krumlov. Other double convents originated in the countries under the rule of the Polish Piast or Arpád dynasties16. Almost simultaneously with Agnes’s convent of Poor Clares in Prague, her mother, Queen Constance, founded between 1212–1234 with the help of her sons – King Wenceslas i and the Moravian Margrave Přemysl – a Cistercian monastery in Moravia nearby Tišnov – called Porta coeli [Fig. 9]. The character of its architecture is close to Austrian monasteries, such as Heiligenkreuz, Zwettl, Lilienfeld, Klosterneuburg and St Michael’s church in Vienna. Its western cathedral portal with figures of apostles represents a unique element within Cistercian architecture and underlines the importance and prestige of the royal foundation: its exquisitely carved Romanesque vegetative ornament in the archivolt and in the jamb closely resembles contemporary Italian work in Parma and Monza, and it has analogies, for example, in Lilienfeld with the tombstone of Frederik ii, Duke of Austria († 1246). The lion sculptures fit into the tradition of northern Italian Romanesque portals, while the bodies of apostles enveloped in pleated drapery (the heads and legs were added in the nineteenth century) demonstrate an intermediary inspiration from French Cathedral production at the beginning of the thirteenth century (in particular, Chartres Cathedral, northern portal)17. In 1277, the first-born daughter of Přemysl Otakar ii, Kunigunde, entered the convent of the Poor Clares, led by her aunt Agnes, to avoid marriage with Rudolf of Habsburg’s son. When she was 26, her brother Wenceslas ii married her to Boleslav, Duke of Mazovia. Ten years later,

she returned to Prague and became an abbess of  St George’s nunnery at Prague Castle. The monastery was then an important cultural centre with its own scriptorium and a permanent congregation of canons (since 1294). Women and girls entering the monastery also brought with them manuscripts; they were required to know Latin and to know how to write, as evidenced from the books belonging to the Benedictine nuns which carried the dedication image of the Passional of Abbess Kunigunde [Fig. 10]18. In the monastic library there was also the oldest hymn Welcome the Almighty King [Vítaj král’u všemohúcí], written in vernacular, from the turn of the thirteenth and fourteenth century, also called “Kunigunde’s Song”. St George’s Convent (Damenstift), operated under the special regime from the very beginning. 14 It is reflected also in the four letters of St Clara to Agnes. Vyskočil, Legenda blahoslavené Anežky (n. 12), pp. 43–53 and Soukupová, “The Founder” (n. 11). 15 The debt has been partially corrected by Franz Machilek, “Die Přemysliden, Piasten und Arpaden und der Klarissenorden im 13. und frühen 14. Jahrhundert”,  in Westmitteleuropa, Ostmitteleuropa, Vergleiche und Beziehungen: Festschrift für Ferdinand Seibt zum 65. Geburtstag, Winfried Eberhard ed., Munich 1992, pp. 293–306; Gábor Klaniczay, “Agnes of Bohemia and Margaret of Hungary: A Comparison”,  in Queens, Princesses and Mendicants. Close Relations in a European Perspective, Nikolas Jaspert, Imke Just eds, Zürich  2019, pp. 263–281; idem, Holy Rulers and Blessed Princesses, Cambridge 2002; Kirsty Day, “Royal Women, the Franciscan Order, and Ecclesiastical Authority in Late Medieval Bohemia and the Polish Duchies”,  in Authority and Power in the Medieval Church, c. 1000 – c.1500, Thomas W. Smith (ed.), Turnhout 2020, pp. 269 –286. 16 Dušan Foltýn, “The Phenomenon of the Na Františku Double Convent: Associated an Neighbouring Monasteries”,  in Convent of St. Agnes (n. 11), pp. 53–57; 17 Klára Benešovská, “Porta coeli”,  in Art in the Czech Lands (n. 1), pp. 112–113; Aleš Flídr, “Stavební omyly, záměrné návraty či snahy po modernitě? Osudy nejen západního portálu baziliky Porta coeli v Předklášteří u Tišnova”,  Opuscula historiae artium, lix (2011), pp. 4–29; Helena Soukupová, “Zu Datierung und Interpretation des Westportals des Zisterzienserinnenklosters Porta coeli in Tišnov (Tischnowitz)”,  Umění, lii (2004), pp. 298 –307. 18 The manuscript is compilation of mystical tracts. The Dominican and Inquisitor of Prague. Kolda of Koldice, is author of some of the texts in the codex, written specially for Kunigunde. Dana Martínková, Frater Colda Ordinis Predicatorum, Tractatus mystici: De strenuo milite – De mansionibus celestibus, Prague 1997; Gia Tousaint, Das Passional der Kunigunde von Böhmen: Bildrhetorik und Spiritualität, Paderborn/München/Wien/Zürich 2003; A Royal Marriage. Elisabeth Premyslid and John of Luxembourg – 1310, Klára Benešovská ed., Prague 2011, pp. 480 –485 (Abess Cunegonde and St George’s Convent).

9 a/ West façade of the Porta coeli, Cistercian nunnery nearby Tišnov, Moravia, around 1240 9b / Queen Constance and King Přemysl or Wenceslas i, detail of the tympanum, Porta coeli, Cistercian nunnery nearby Tišnov, Moravia, around 1240 10/ Kunigunde accepting the Kodex from Kolda of Koldice, the dedication image of the Passional of Abbess Kunigunde, 1312 and prior to 1320, Prague, National Library, ms. xiv a 17, f. 1v. 161

afterword

162

It was brought to perfection in the fourteenth century under Abbess Kunigunde and her successors. The nuns were called dominae; they had servants in the monastery and their own special daily portions of food. There were nine canons in the convent: five priests, two deacons and two subdeacons. They oversaw the liturgy and the Hours of the Virgin, which were served in the Virgin chapel. In addition to praying and administering the sacraments, they were in charge of funerary ceremonies, as well as playing the male roles in paraliturgical plays. It is the play Visitatio sepulchri, performed here during the thirteenth century, and modified by Kunigunde herself, that proves increasing flexibility of enclosure in this prominent nunnery. The sisters were allowed to leave the galleries and, together with the canons, participated in the drama performance in female roles. Some of the Passion scenes, depicted in the Passional of Abbess Kunigunde, (fol. 14r Three Mary at the sepulchre) would have resonated with the performative production that took place in front of the Holy Cross altar, situated in medio ecclesiae. The stone tomb at the main altar in the high choir

represented a crib during the Christmas procession, where the sisters placed a statue of the Virgin and Child, and during the Visitatio sepulchri, it represented the tomb that the Three Mary found empty19. Kunigunde also commissioned splendid reliquaries for her convent [Fig. 11]20. Přemyslid Royal Nunneries are complemented by one Cistercian monastery, Aula Sanctae Mariae, founded in 1323 at the gates of Brno by Elisabeth Richenza, widow of King Wenceslas ii and daughter of the last Piast King, Přemysl. It had a generous plan, which was brought to a successful completion thanks to the widow’s dowry. In 1333, a hospital for sisters and women from the area was established here. It also served the members of the queen’s court, who had the right to dwell in the monastery (which also applied to Elisabeth’s painters). The queen stayed here until her death in 1335; she was buried in the centre of the church by the Holy Cross altar21. The floor plan of the church and its spatial arrangement were subordinated to this funeral function: the two lower side choirs functioning as the funeral chapels are oriented to face the location of the queen’s burial. This trifoliate east end of the church and the brick material connects the architecture with Silesia. The trifoliate plan also refers to St Elisabeth’s church in Marburg and to Romanesque shrines in Cologne, which Elisabeth visited, bringing back a quantity of holy relics. The convent obtained a set of richly illuminated manuscripts from Elisabeth, which were created before the abbey’s foundation. These constitute a rich sampling of images, which include the images of the queen as donor [Figs 12, 13]. In this brief resume on the interconnected networks of royal nunneries in Bohemia and Moravia, it was only possible to outline, not analyse in detail, the cultural contributions of the individual foundations and their influence on the aesthetics of contemporary artistic production, including architecture, writing and music. This leaves a space for a more intensive interdisciplinary collaboration, which has already resulted in breaking down some established clichés22. Each of the protagonists of female monasticism in Czech Lands brought to the Czech environment her own experiences of foreign royal courts as well as the local nunneries where she had stayed

before marriage or was brought up. The specific links to the courts of the Arpads, Piasts, Babenbergs, Wettins and through these to other places in the Central European network, need to be studied in more detail and reinterpreted. This essay is therefore merely an “invitation to embark on a journey”23. 19 Klára Benešovská, “Altare est et dicitur praesepe et sepulchrum Domini”,  Listy filologické, cxviii (1995), n. 3–4, pp. 227–245. 20 A Royal Marriage (n. 18), pp. 458, 460 –470. 21 Klára Benešovská,“Aula Sanctae Mariae, abbaye cistercienne féminine de fondation royale: Brno, République Tchèque”,  in Citeaux et les femmes, Bernadette Barrière, Marie-Elisabeth Henneau eds, Paris 2001, pp. 55– 71; Die Illuminierte Handschriften der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek, Mitteleuropäische Schulen, i, (ca.1225–1335), Andreas Fingernagel, Martin Roland eds, Wien 1997, pp. 225–236. 22 In Czech contemporary medieval studies I remind to the activities of the Centre for Early Medieval Studies, Brno Masaryk University, Faculty of Arts or Centre of Medieval Studies, Prague, Institut of Philosophy of the Academy of Sciences and Charles University. See also the project Old Myths, New Facts: Czech Lands in Center of 15-century Music Developments (gačr expro 19-28306X). Masaryk Institute and Academy of Sciences Archives and the Charles University Faculty of Arts, project leader: Hana Vlhová. 23 This study was written within the framework of the funded project Obraz/y v době Přemyslovců: kontexty a formy (gačr 19-21654S). The study has been produced with the assistance of the database Czech Medieval Sources online, provided by the lindat/clariah-cz Research Infrastructure (https:// lindat.cz), supported by the Ministry of Education, Youth, and Sports of the Czech Republic (Project No. lm2018101).

Klára Benešovská Institute of Art History, Prague, Czech Academy of Sciences [email protected]

11/ St George Reliquary Panel no. 1., ca 1260–1300, additions after 1782, Prague, Royal Canonry of Premonstratensians in Strahov, inv. No. 1310 12/ Psalter of Queen Elisabeth Richenza, prior to 1321, Rajhrad Abbey, R 355, fol. 8v 13/ Psalter of Queen Elisabeth Richenza, prior to 1321, Rajhrad Abbey, R 355, fol. 188r

photographic credits

Copyright rules K autorským právům In the matter of copyright, every author is responsible for the illustrations published. In general, Convivium follows § 31 of the law no. 121/2000 Coll. (Copyright Act), where paragraph 1 c explicitly states: “Copyright is not infringed by anybody who uses the work while teaching for illustration purposes or during scientific research, without seeking to achieve direct or indirect economic or commercial advantage and without exceeding the extent adequate to the given purpose; however, if possible, the name of the author, unless the work is an anonymous work, or the name of the person under whose name the work is being introduced in public and the title of the work and source, shall always be indicated.” Ve věci autorských práv ilustrací je každý autor odpovědný za publikované ilustrace. Obecně se ale Convivium řídí ust. § 31 zákona č. 121/2000 Sb. (autorský zákon), kde je v odst. 1, písm. c) výslovně řečeno: „Do práva autorského nezasahuje ten, kdo užije dílo při vyučování pro ilustrační účel nebo při vědeckém výzkumu, jejichž účelem není dosažení přímého nebo nepřímého hospodářského nebo obchodního prospěchu, a nepřesáhne rozsah odpovídající sledovanému účelu; vždy je však nutno uvést, je-li to možné, jméno autora, nejde-li o dílo anonymní, nebo jméno osoby, pod jejímž jménem se dílo uvádí na veřejnost, a dále název díla a pramen.“

T. MICHALSKY / D. RYWIKOVÁ / E. SCIROCCO – Figs 1–2,

Nikolaus Opitz / MUHBA Monestir de Pedralbes; Figs 13, 14,

© Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History /

©  2022 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana. G. ROSSI VAIRO –

Archivio dell’Arte – Pedicini Fotografi, Naples; Fig. 3, © Národní

Figs 1, 6–9, 12, photo author; Fig. 2, © Arquivo Nacional Torre

knihovna České republiky. J. ADAMSKI / P. PAJOR – Fig. 1,

do Tombo; Fig. 3, © SIPA 00512897; Fig. 4, © SIPA 00507232;

drawing by J. Adamski after: Architektura gotycka w Polsce, Teresa

Fig. 5, © SIPA DES 00017824; Fig. 10, © SIPA 00507391; Fig. 11,

Mroczko, Marian Arszyński eds, vol. 2: Katalog zabytków,

© SIPA 00507390. A. FEDERICI – Fig. 1, © Archivio Buonarrotti

Andrzej Włodarek ed., Warsaw 1995, fig. 386; Fig. 2, Władysław

Scaglia (1994); Fig. 2, © ASFM; Figs 3a–b, Massimo De Angelis,

Łuszczkiewicz, “Architektura najdawniejszych kościołów

“Il monastero di Borgo San Pietro di Filippa Mareri ricostruzione

franciszkańskich w Polsce”, Sprawozdania Komisyi do Badania

storico-architettonica”, in Santa Filippa Mareri e il monastero di

Historii Sztuki w Polsce, iv (1891), p. 175, Pl. 27; Fig. 3, photo

Borgo S. Pietro nella storia del Cicolano. Atti del Convegno di

Michał Kurzej; Figs 4–7, 10–12, 14–15, photo Jakub Adamski;

studi di Borgo S. Pietro (Borgo San Pietro, 24–26 October 1986),

Figs 8, 13, 17 © Archive of the Poor Clares Convent in Stary

Borgo S. Pietro di Petrello Salto 1989, p. 128, tav. 14; p. 119, tav. 4;

Sącz; Fig. 9, drawing after Caroline A. Bruzelius, The Stones of

Figs 4, 6–13, photo author; Fig. 5, Giovanni M. Forni, Antichi

Naples. Church building in Angevin Italy, 1266–1343, New Haven

monumenti di Roma nei disegni di Alberto Alberti, Rome 1991,

/ London 2004, Fig. 142; Fig. 16, photo Piotr Pajor. S. MARTI –

pp. 45–46, tav. lx . A. PATAŁA – Figs 1, 3, 4, 7, © Biblioteka

Figs 1, 5, © Staatsarchiv Aargau; Fig. 2, © Creative commons:

Uniwersytecka we Wrocławiu; Fig. 2, © Herder Institut, Marburg,

URN: urn:nbn:de:bvb:12-bsb00103105-6; Figs 3, 8, 9, © Bern,

photo P. Poklekowski; Fig. 5, © Herder Institut, Marburg; Fig. 6,

Bernisches Historisches Museum, photo Stefan Rebsamen; Figs 4,

© Małgorzata Kujda; Fig. 8, © Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie;

6, 7, 11, 12 © Kantonale Denkmalpflege Aargau; Fig. 10, © Bern,

Fig. 9, © Muzeum Narodowe we Wrocławiu; Figs 10, 11, 12,

Bernisches Historisches Museum, photo Christine Moor; Fig. 13,

14, 15 © Instytut Sztuki PAN w Warszawie; Fig. 13, © Romuald

© Bern, Bernisches Historisches Museum, photo Yvonne Hurni;

Kaczmarek. E. KONRÁD – Fig. 1, photo author; Figs 2, 3,

Fig. 14, © Bern, Bernisches Historisches Museum, photo Nadja

© National Széchényi Library (Budapest). K. BENEŠOVSKÁ –

Frey; M. ZÖSCHG – Figs 1, 2, 8, 9, © Archivio dell’arte, Pedicini

Fig. 1, Photo © Josef Sudek-heirs, Photolibrary iah cas Prague;

fotografi; Fig. 3, © Matilde Grimaldi; Figs 4, © Christian Nikolaus

Fig. 2, Photo © Alexandr Paul, Photolibrary iah cas Prague; Fig. 3,

Opitz; Fig. 5, ©  Kantonale Denkmalpflege Aargau; Fig. 6,

Photo © Jitka Walterová, Photolibrary iah cas Prague; Fig. 4,

© Schweizerische Nationalbibliothek (nb), Bern, Eidgenössisches

© Prague Castle Administration, photo Jan Gloc; Figs 5–9, Photo

Archiv für Denkmalpflege: Dokumentationen von Restaurierungen

© Vlado Bohdan, Photolibrary iah cas Prague; Figs 10, 12, 13,

und Grabungen; Fig. 7, © Österreichische Nationalbibliothek,

Photo © Prokop Paul, Photolibrary iah cas Prague; Fig. 11, Photo

Vienna; Fig. 10, © Joana Ramôa Melo; Figs 11, 12, © Christian

© Zdeněk Matyasko, Photolibrary iah cas Prague.

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