The Oxford Handbook of Medieval Christianity

The Oxford Handbook of Medieval Christianity takes as its subject the beliefs, practices, and institutions of the Christian Church between 400 and 1500AD. It addresses topics ranging from early medieval monasticism to late medieval mysticism, from the material wealth of the Church to the spiritual exercises through which certain believers might attempt to improve their souls. Each chapter tells a story, but seeks also to ask how and why "Christianity" took particular forms at particular moments in history, paying attention to both the spiritual and otherwordly aspects of religion, and the material and political contexts in which they were often embedded.

This Handbook is a landmark academic collection that presents cutting-edge interpretive perspectives on medieval religion for a wide academic audience, drawing together thirty key scholars in the field from the United States, the UK, and Europe. Notably, the Handbook is arranged thematically, and focusses on an analytical, rather than narrative, approach, seeking to demonstrate the variety, change, and complexity of religion throughout this long period, and the numerous different ways in which modern scholarship can approach it. While providing a very wide-ranging view of the subject, it also offers an important agenda for further study in the field.

John H. Arnold, Professor of Medieval History, Birkbeck, University of London

John H. Arnold studied at the Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York, and worked first at UEA and then at Birkbeck, University of London. He became Professor of Medieval History at Birkbeck in 2007. He is author of various books and articles on medieval history, and has published also on modern historiography and the history of gender.

Abbreviations and conventions
List of Contributors
Introduction
1. Introduction: A History of Medieval Christianity, John H. Arnold
Methods
2. Histories and Historiographies of Medieval Christianity, John H. Arnold
3. Religion, Belief, and Society: Anthropological Approaches, Simon Yarrow
4. Material Culture and Medieval Christianity, Beth Williamson
5. Medieval Christianity in a World Historical Perspective, R. I. Moore
Spaces
6. The Boundaries of Christendom and Islam: Iberia and the Latin Levant, Amy Remensnyder
7. Christianizing Kingdoms, Sverre Bagge
8. Monastic Landscapes and Society, Wendy Davies
9. Civic Religion, Nicholas Terpstra
10. Localized Faith: parochial and domestic spaces, Katherine L. French
Practices
11. Continuity and Change in the Institutional Church, Ian Forrest
12. Pilgrimage, Marcus Bull
13. Using Saints: Intercession, Healing, Sanctity, Gabor Klaniczay
14. Missarum sollemnia: Eucharistic Rituals in the Middle Ages, Eric Palazzo
15. Penitential Varieties, Rob Meens
16. Spiritual Exercises: The Making of Interior Faith, Robert L. A. Clark
Ideas
17. Fear, Hope, Death, and Salvation, Arnold Angenendt
18. Reform, Clerical Culture, and Politics, Maureen C. Miller
19. Intellectuals and the Masses: Oxen and she-asses in the medieval Church, Peter Biller
20. 'Popular' religious culture(s), Laura A. Smoller
21. Doubts and the absence of faith, Dorothea Weltecke
Identities
22. Medieval Monasticisms, Constance H. Berman
23. Mysticism and the Body, Rosalynn Voaden
24. Christianity and Its Others: Jews, Muslims, and Pagans, Sara Lipton
25. Christian experiences of religious non-conformism, Grado Giovanni Merlo
Power
26. The Church as Lord, George Dameron
27. Christianizing Political Discourses, Geoffrey Koziol
28. Religion in the age of Charlemagne, Janet L. Nelson
29. Papal Authority and Its Limitations, Kathleen G. Cushing
30. Bishops, Education and Discipline, Sarah Hamilton
Conclusion
31. Looking back from the Reformation, R. Po-chia Hsia
Index