Holy feast and holy fast : the religious significance of food to medieval women / Caroline Walker Bynum.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Bynum, Caroline Walker.

Series:

New historicism.

New historicism

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Food--Religious aspects--Christianity.

Food.

Women--History--Middle Ages, 500-1500.

Women.

Food habits--History--To 1500.

Food habits.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xvi, 444 pages, 30 pages of plates )

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Berkeley : University of California Press, c1987.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

In the period between 1200 and 1500 in western Europe, a number of religious women gained widespread veneration and even canonization as saints for their extraordinary devotion to the Christian eucharist, supernatural multiplications of food and drink, and miracles of bodily manipulation, including stigmata and inedia (living without eating). The occurrence of such phenomena sheds much light on the nature of medieval society and medieval religion. It also forms a chapter in the history of women. Previous scholars have occasionally noted the various phenomena in isolation from each other and have sometimes applied modern medical or psychological theories to them. Using materials based on saints' lives and the religious and mystical writings of medieval women and men, Caroline Walker Bynum uncovers the pattern lying behind these aspects of women's religiosity and behind the fascination men and women felt for such miracles and devotional practices. She argues that food lies at the heart of much of women's piety. Women renounced ordinary food through fasting in order to prepare for receiving extraordinary food in the eucharist. They also offered themselves as food in miracles of feeding and bodily manipulation. Providing both functionalist and phenomenological explanations, Bynum explores the ways in which food practices enabled women to exert control within the family and to define their religious vocations. She also describes what women meant by seeing their own bodies and God's body as food and what men meant when they too associated women with food and flesh. The author's interpretation of women's piety offers a new view of the nature of medieval asceticism and, drawing upon both anthropology and feminist theory, she illuminates the distinctive features of women's use of symbols. Rejecting presentist interpretations of women as exploited or masochistic, she shows the power and creativity of women's writing and women's lives.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

List of Plates

Preface

Introduction

Part I. The Background

Part II. The Evidence

Part III. The Explanation

Epilogue

Abbreviations

Notes

General Index

Index of Secondary Authors

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

Description based on print version record and CIP data provided by publisher; resource not viewed.

ISBN:

9786613520180

9780520057227

0520057228

9781280078910

128007891X

9780520908789

0520908783

9780585326481

0585326487

OCLC:

45843145