International Medieval Congress 2023

We invite you to browse the programme which includes the papers of our team members: Grzegorz Pac, Wojtek Jezierski, Jurek Pysiak, Steffen Hope, Anna Dryblak, Karolina Morawska, and Kacper Bylinka. Our participation in the Congress was a great success, we received a lot of valuable feedback, e. g. from Gabor Klaniczay.

Session 603: Connecting to the Holy: Legitimising Power through the Cult of Saints – Norway and Poland before 1300
Tuesday 4 July 2023: 11.15-12.45
Chair: Grzegorz Pac
Respondent: Gábor Klaniczay

1. Internal and External Mission in the Hagiographies of St Olaf and St Adalbert – Kacper Bylinka
2. Female Advocates of Conversion: Remembering the Role of (Holy) Women in the Christianisation of Poland and Norway – Anna Dryblak
3. A Connection with the Past through Re-Actualisation of Saints: The Liturgical Presentations of St Sunniva and St Stanislaus – Steffen Hope

In the High Middle Ages, the legitimisation of elite power was often pursued by connecting the elite with cults of saints. Used by both secular and ecclesiastical institutions, saints provided the justification of the elites’ superior place in the society. This session thematises the variable ways in which the connections between elite groups and saints were utilized on the peripheries of Latin Christendom. Presented papers compare cases from Poland and Norway, two peripheral realms unconnected to each other, focusing on how remembering and venerating saints, as well as their presentation in hagiography and liturgy, might be tools for legitimising purposes.

Session 503: Power and Religious Reality on the Periphery of the Medieval Latin and Orthodox World
Tuesday 4 July 2023: 09.00-10.30
Chair: Piotr Oliński

1. Female Sanctity and Virginity: St Kinga of Poland as Portrayed in Her Vitae – Karolina Morawska

Session 614: Social Elites in Central Europe: Intellectual and Literary Formation at the End of the Middle Ages
Tuesday 4 July 2023: 11.15-12.45
Chair: Piotr Oliński

1. Les rois polyglottes? Comment les rois européens du Moyen Âge ont-ils communiqué avec leurs sujets? Jurek Pysiak

Session 1504: Ambiguity of Hospitality, I: Approaching Intercultural Host-Guest Relations through Discourse and Rituals, 1000-1350
Thursday 6 July 2023: 09.00-10.30
Chair: Miriam Tveit

1. (S)Platter: What Do Metaphors of Battles as Feasts Tell Us about the Ambiguity of Hospitality in Intercultural Contacts? Wojtek Jezierski