Men and morality

Stone, Rachel

doi:10.1017/cbo9781139017473.014

Cited by 2 publications

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“…116 I have previously argued that Carolingian masculinity was notably inclusive, potentially allowing all Christian men, both secular and clerical (as well as some Christian women), to be considered manly. 117 However, I would now see class-based limits to such inclusiveness, if less extreme than with Roman masculinity. Carolingian norms of masculinity may still have (implicitly) excluded unfree men; although such men were sometimes praised for their good behaviour, they were not among the men and women whom Frankish authors described as acting 'manfully'.…”

Section: Carolingian Theoriesmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…These unions potentially raised difficult questions about a husband's headship, an issue which interested Carolingian authors. 71 Therefore, churchmen's silence on unfree marriage was not solely because of the low social status of unfree women, but also due to the uncertain gender status of unfree men, in a period when marriage had become a key marker of lay masculinity. This, in turn, was affected by the views Carolingian authors had inherited on marriage and gender from patristic authors and ultimately from the Roman world.…”

Section: Carolingian Intellectuals and Unfree Marriagementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Carolingian norms of masculinity may still have (implicitly) excluded unfree men; although such men were sometimes praised for their good behaviour, they were not among the men and women whom Frankish authors described as acting 'manfully'. 118 Unfree men were certainly marginal in the key activities marking out free adult men in Frankish society. They played no role in community decision-making or dispute settlement, although they could go to court to claim that they were not in fact unfree.…”

Section: Carolingian Theoriesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Overlooked Husbands: The Paradox of Unfree Marriage in the Carolingian World

Stone¹

2021

Gender & History

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Unfree people in the Roman world could not legally marry, while they could in the Middle Ages. This paper explores the marriage of the unfree in the Carolingian empire (750–900 CE), a society with an intense moral concern about marriage. Carolingian churchmen wrote extensively about marriage, using a strongly gendered discourse focusing on how men should approach marriage and behave as husbands. However, these moral and legal texts rarely discussed unfree marriage, even though the practice was common. It is argued that this silence reflects the persistence of late antique class‐based gender models, in which masculinity was reserved for married property holders. Although legal prohibitions on unfree marriages had ended, Carolingian moralists continued to be influenced by patristic assumptions that these were not valid relationships. These assumptions, combined with Frankish social practices that largely excluded unfree men from other key male roles, such as arms‐bearing, meant that unfree husbands were not conceptualised as sufficiently ‘manly’ to have their marriages discussed. It is only from the tenth century onwards, when images of masculinity began to fragment more along lines of social status, that authors began explicitly to state that the Christian ideas of marriage applied to all, free and unfree.

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Section: Carolingian Theoriesmentioning

confidence: 95%

Section: Carolingian Intellectuals and Unfree Marriagementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Carolingian Theoriesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Overlooked Husbands: The Paradox of Unfree Marriage in the Carolingian World

Stone¹

2021

Gender & History

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“…14 This continued into the Carolingian period but for the royal family rather than the rest of the nobility. 15 The Carolingians used relics, particularly Roman relics, to distinguish themselves from the Merovingians, strengthen their connection with churches, and direct veneration away from saints who had lived recently in case they would become the focus of opposition to their rule. 16 Most of the saints venerated during the Carolingian period lived centuries before the Carolingians.…”

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confidence: 99%

The Carolingian World through Hagiography

Gibson

2015

History Compass

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Hagiographic texts – including the lives of saints, accounts of relic translations, miracle collections, and deeds of abbots and bishops – are plentiful and rich sources for investigating the Carolingian world. The recognition that hagiography offers a great deal of information about the author's time has led scholars to use these texts to shed light on a variety of topics. Hagiography's similarity to history as well as literature means that scholarship on history and literature can contribute to our understanding of hagiography and the world that produced it. Works comparing earlier versions of saints' lives with their Carolingian‐era revisions and investigating hagiography alongside works of other genres have contributed to some of the biggest debates in Carolingian history: the reform of the church, monasticism, and society; the renaissance of learning, the impact of doctrinal controversies, and views of kingship and reactions to political change.

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Men and morality

Cited by 2 publications

References 0 publications

Overlooked Husbands: The Paradox of Unfree Marriage in the Carolingian World

Overlooked Husbands: The Paradox of Unfree Marriage in the Carolingian World

The Carolingian World through Hagiography

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