Saracens, Demons, & Jews: Making Monsters in Medieval Art

171 Pages·88.225 MB·English

by  Debra Higgs Strickland

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Making
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Monsters
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Debra Higgs Strickland
Princeton University Press
Princeton and Oxford
IN i\IEl\\ORIAi\t
N 5950 .S685 2003
Strickland, Debra Higgs
NATHAN H ASSIG Contents
Saracens, Demons, and
Jews - Making Monsters i
32355003484086
Front cover: Giant, Sciopod, Pygmy, Bragmanni, c. 1270-90 (fig. 57)
Back cover: Devils pouring molten lead down the throats of the damned, c. 1450-70 (fig. 19)
Frontispiece: derail of fig. 20; Preface: fig. 55/plare 1; Chapter 1: derail of fig. 5; Chapter 2: derail
of fig. 21; Chapter 3: detail of fig. 42; Chapter 4: derail of fig. 94; Chapter 5: derail of fig. 122;
Chapter 6: derail of fig. 133
7 Preface
Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08540. In the
United Kingdom: Princeton University Press, 3 Marker Place, Woodstock, Oxfordshire OX20 1SY 21 Pla res
www.pupress.princeton.edu
Making Men Known by Sight: Classical Theories,
Copyright© 2003 Princeton University Press. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be
reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage Mon.5trous Races, &:. Sin
or retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publishers, except by a reviewer who
may quote brief passages in a review. 61 2 Demons, Darkness, &:. Ethiopians
Publication of this book has been made possible in part by a grant from Furthermore, a program
of the]. M. Kaplan Fund. 95 3 Chri.5tians Imagine Jews
Designed by Sarah Henry 157 4 Saracens, Tartars,&:. Other Crusader Fantasies
Composed by Tina Thompson
Printed by South China Printing
2Il 5 Escharnlogical Conspiracies
Manufactured in China
IO 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 241 6 Conclusions: What ls a Mon,5ter?
ISBN-13: 978-0-691-05719-4 (clorh)
Notes
1sg '-I 0: 0-691-05719-2 (clorh)
Library ofC ongress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Strickland, Debra Higgs, 1958- 3°3 Acknowledgments
Saracens, demons, and Jews : making monsters in Medieval arr I Debra Higgs Strickland.
Bibliography
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-691-05719-2 (alk. paper) Index
1. Art, Medieval-Themes, motives. 2. Minorities in art. 3. Christianity and other religions.
I. Title. 336 Photography Credits
N5950 .S685 2003
700'.45229 '0902- dc21
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lon~dtnt IN 111s 1290 VERSE TREATISE on "monstrous men," Clerk of Enghien succinctly artic
~glona mtft nfalttran1UO:ffentattt tt ~ ulated what had been a fundamental object of Western fascination for a very long rime:
,.,.. . .. um people in the East are utterly different from those in the West. The present book explores
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Others as marvels to Others as enemies.
·-·~_.. Probably writing for an aristocratic readership, Clerk goes on to describe sys
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range in type from the warmongering Amazons to the backward-walking Antipodes;
from the one-legged Sciopods to the Men with Six Hands.' ln the footsteps of the
ancient Greeks, Clerk consistently forges a relationship between external, physical form
and moral character. Thus, men with heads on their chests are greedy, bearded women
are prideful (and thus have begun to resemble men), and other men have the heads of
dogs owing to their proclivity for adultery and sexual crimes.' Clerk's comments on the
Onocentaur-half man, half ass-reveal his more general perception of these marvelous
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8 9
True it is ... enemies who were pictured and described on equally imaginary terms.
What others witness and say Medieval pictorial and literary data relevant to pejorative representations of non
that in the eastern parts are men Christians are vast, forcing me to impose serious limits on this study. I hope to have done
horrible, vile, villanous, and bad, so in such a way as to provide a representative sample of negative imagery produced over
who do not dwell in towns quite a broad chronological period. My temporal focus is the era of the crusades because
but in deserts and mountains. this is the period that saw the greatest acceleration in the production of negative imagery
They have very strange faces owing to escalating conAicts between Christians and non-Christians both at home and
and are men above the waist abroad. In addition, some discussion of imagery produced on either side of this period
bur animals in many strange ways below. has been necessary in order to show the roots and aftermath of the negative pictorial tra
Cruel, bad, stinking, and fierce, dition that was so well developed during the crusading period proper. I therefore discuss
they come from adultery.i works of art and literature produced from the early eleventh through the early sixteenth
century, with the heaviest concentration on the twelfth through fourteenth centuries.
Men of the East, then, are both products and perpetrators of sin. Like many authors Another necessary limitation is the selection of the particular enemy groups to be
before him, Clerk is redrawing still more boldly the conceptual line between Us and discussed: this book is by no means a full explication of the "Other" in the Middle Ages
Them. We are attractive, They are ugly. We are civilized, They are wild. We are moral, in all of its manifold constituencies. Indeed, I have deliberately used this term sparingly
They are sinful. Later medieval theologians added still another distinction, which was to because the groups with which I deal form only a subset of those normally sheltered
become key: We are blessed, They are damned. Consequently, medieval Christians broad under this vast conceptual umbrella. In particular, the Others described in this book are
ened the spectrum ofT hem to include not just the monstrous men of the East, but any first and foremost non-Christians, and were all at some stage considered enernies of the
living non-Christian, local or distant. The East, for the time being, remained a symbolic Faith. By contrast, medieval lepers, prostitutes, and homosexuals were Others in the
locus of trouble, but later on-especially in the Holy Land-it became an actual one. sense of social outsiders or minorities, but they were not by primary definition oppo
This brings us to a question especially important co this study: What is a mon nents of the Church. Still another reason to exclude certain groups is owing to the prob
ster? During the Middle Ages, is there really any conceptual distinction to be drawn lematic nature of the imagery. For example, images of both lepers and prostitutes are
between, say, an Onocentaur and a Muslim, given that both were perceived by the quite rare during the period under discussion unless one overlays these identifications
Christian majority as "cruel, bad, stinking, and fierce?" Even a cursory view of medieval onto other subjects, such as the Aagellated Christ with multiple wounds (as leprous) or
Christian literature and exegesis on the "problem" of non-Christians reveals that "mon the Magdalene (as a prostitute). Similarly, it is normally impossible to identify an image
strosity" was the primary conceptual catch-all for any rival religious sect or ethnic group, of a heretic without an inscription or accompanying text; there does not seem to be a dis
whether from within (heretics) or without (Jews, Muslims). For medieval Christians, tinct pictorial code for heretics. Unequivocal images of homosexuals are even more diffi
then, monstrosity was a metaphor for unacceptability, both cultural and religious. cult to verify, if indeed any actually exist outside the parameters of marginal parody or
My art historical concern with the relationship between monstrous external form scenes of hell. I therefore leave the art historical analysis of these and still other Others
and moral character, as articulated by Clerk and many others, stems from the recognition to others.'1
that ugliness is a necessarily visual phenomenon. It follows, therefore, that the most effec Because negative theological characterizations and artistic representations of
tive means by which ideas about ugliness can be transmitted is through pictorial works of Jews are so crucial to any study of pejorative imagery in the medieval West, I have also
art. During the Middle Ages, rendering ugliness posed formidable challenges for artists, imposed a geographical limitation of northern Europe, primarily because this is where
who had to find visual ways to express largely abstract ideas about moral degeneracy, per there were the greatest Jewish-Christian tensions, especially during the heart of the
versity, godlessness, demonic allegiance, and a whole host of other characteristics regu period under consideration. In Spain and Italy, the situation was rather different, as Jews
larly attributed to the various enemies of Christendom. From a modern perspective, serried there much earlier and subsequently fared somewhat better. This is probably why
these enemies were both real and imaginary, although it is my contention that these two fewer negative images have survived from i:hese areas compared to the plethora from the
realms were actually merged in Christian portrayals of non-Christians. Thus, I argue that north. Within northern Europe, I concentrate primarily on English and French artistic
representations of Monstrous Races and demons were crucial to the development, both and literary works executed in conjunction with expulsion activities that took place dur
literary and artistic, of portraits of Ethiopians, Jews, Muslims, and Mongols, the living ing the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and I also attempt to analyze the extent to
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12 13
uCJ which changing crusader interests were promoted by pictorial works of art. I discuss attitudes that shifted over time according to changing contemporary, even local, interests
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.C..J. selected German works ro a much lesser extent, but I have included a few emblematic and circumstances.
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examples in order to represent more completely the arristic range and high level of visual So exactly who would have seen these pejorative works of art? In fact, many of
virulence achieved during this long period. them were accessible nor only to private, educated patrons but also to a broad social
That so much medieval effort was put into the production of anti-Jewish texts spectrum, including in some cases the very objects of denigration, who would have had
and images is not really surprising given that anti-Judaism is part of the infrastructure of regular occasion to view monumental sculpture, stained glass, and other forms of public
Christianity. That is, the New Testament itself articulates basic anti-Jewish attitudes in arr. Jr is therefore safe to assume that the negative messages about enemies of Christen
conjunction with numerous statements expressing a fierce intolerance of those who do dom conveyed in medieval works of art were received by nearly everyone. Such negative
not follow Christ.1 In a way, the avalanche of Christian polemic produced subsequently, views of non-Christians were by no means confined to works of visual art but were dis
throughout the entire medieval period and well beyond- in the form of biblical exegesis, seminated in other forms, such as public sermons and plays, which did not require lit
theological tracts, drama, epic, sermons, exempfa, poetry, papal legislation, and pictorial eracy on the part of their listeners and viewers. This is why I have tried to emphasize
works of art-may be viewed as the perhaps inevitable extension of basic attitudes set parallels in various realms-visual, literary, dramatic, rheological, political, and legal
forth in the very handbook of Christianity. ro make apparent something of the scope and scale of what can only be characterized as
It is obvious by now rhar this is a book concerned with negative imagery, which an ongoing, Church-sponsored propaganda campaign designed to denigrate and dis
means rhar the reader seeking a balance of positive and pejorative images of the various credit both non-Christians and their respective religions.
enemies of the Church is nor going ro find it here. I only wish to indicate at the onset I therefore discuss selected examples from a variety of media in order to reveal rhe
that lam fully aware that not all medieval theologians, monarchs, and Christian citizens artistic variety of pejorative imagery; manuscript painting, misericords, stone sculpture,
at large hared and abused black Africans, Jews, Muslims, and Mongols; that there were glass-painting, tapestry, metalwork, enamel, and ivory are all represented. Although the
some rheological tracts written in defense of Jews and protective papal legislation man basic negative themes relevant to a particular non-Christian group were rendered across
dated on their behalf; that some works of medieval lirerawre characterize Muslims posi all media, l have nevertheless placed special emphasis on manuscript painting, for two
tively; and that there are many exran r pictorial works of art that portray members of reasons. First, the variety and richness of pejorative imagery contained in this particular
nearly all these groups in positive or at least neutral ways. But it is also true that the bal medium is immense, and ir has survived intact to a much greater extent than monu
ance of surviving contemporary theological, literary, legislative, and visual evidence mental works of art, such as stained glass and murals, that by now have been damaged
weighs in heavily on the negative side, and that fact alone, I believe, justifies a concen by the ravages of time and the environment or else have been deliberately destroyed. In
tration on the pejorative material. particular, manuscript painting provides the best guide to the use of color in the Middle
Although I have not systematically discussed the more positive imagery, I do Ages, color being a very important vehicle for the expression of negative ideas. Second,
draw attention to particular positive attitudes toward a given group when these have been the textual component of illuminated manuscripts often provides clues as to the contex
articulated on a reasonably large scale, in order to convey something of the overall com tual meaning(s) of accompanying imagery through the forging of relationships between
plexity of medieval Christian perceptions of non-Christians. Thar is, in addition ro the words and pictures. Text-image analysis is in fact a major method employed in this study,
numerous negative ideas discussed at length, the notion of the "blameless Ethiopian"; as l have tried to show how the range and rype of images that may be evaluated as pejora
the belief that Jews were vital witnesses to the True Faith and that their conversion was tive actually expand beyond the visually obvious once textual considerations are taken
necessary to bring about the Second Coming of Christ; crusader admiration for the mili into account. That is, I am interested throughout in the concept of superficially benign
tary skill of Muslim warriors and the clemency of at least one of their leaders; and the imagery that nevertheless carries negative meaning, not necessarily owing to the nature
short-lived Christian belief that the "Tartars" under the leadership of Prester John would of the image or accompanying text per se, but rather to the ideas that are generated
assist in the annihilation of rhe Muslims; were all important aspects of medieval attitudes through particular text-image combinations. ln this type of analysis, I consider texts and
toward non-Christian Others. Therefore, although the imagery I discuss conveys over images sign systems of equal importance in a semiotic method that has in some cases
whelmingly negative messages, l try to consider how more positive attiwdes may have facilitated new readings of already familiar imagery.
informed the broader pattern of pictorial representation, if not certain iconographical lt is true that some of the imagery analyzed in this study has been discussed
details. Most importantly, the collective force of the imagery examined in this study before. I have deliberately included some well-known monuments, such as the Luttrell
expresses an ambivalence unsupported by any single text and bears witness to Christian Psalter, rhe Cloisters Cross, and the Vezelay tympanum, because they are important to
,
A11m·1., TO I'. Plate ..J. Richard the l.ionhean versu:> Saladin. l.utrrcll P::;alter. Dioce:;e of I.in coin,
c. 1125-15. Briti::;h l.ibrary, l.ondon,Add. ~tS ..J21JO, fol. 82 (detail)
Plate 6. Battle of l.eignirz; decapitation of I lcnry II and hi:;:;oul carried w heaven. I lcdwig Codex.
Allll\'I. llOTTO~I. Plate 5. rrench ver::;u:; Saracen~• . \\'illfam of·l~Te, I li.~IOl\'Of011lre1111•1, Pari!>, '117·
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Biblimhcquc Nationalc de France, Pari5, ~IS fr . .1..1...J95. fol. 15..Jv (derail)
uu the themes that concern me and also because I believe I have contributed something new rages. One, ir allows me ro take a diachronic view char exposes variations on selected
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"" ro- or in some cases, rcfured-exisring analysis. Alongside the familiar, l have also negative themes as well as whether or nor changes in Christian attitudes and "targets"
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assembled imagery that ro my knowledge has nor yet been published or analyzed, or that evident in ocher realms of cultural production are paralleled pictorially ar different his
was not previously recognized or interpreted in light of medieval Christian views of torical moments. At rhe same rime, a thematic approach highlights arrisric, rheological,
enemy groups. On rhe whole, I have sought a balance between the famous and the rela and political preoccupations that remain consistent over the centuries, and which there
tively unknown, attempting to establish some meaningful relationships between monu fore must be considered of paramount importance in the assessment of rhe medieval
ments previously considered unique by connecting them thematically or iconographically Christian view of non-Christian enemies. From an organizational standpoint, a thematic
co lesser known artistic efforts. approach permits a systematic and concentrated focus on each of rhe different types of
The subject of monuments previously discussed leads me to acknowledge my enemies in turn, making ir easier to discuss rhe nature of their perceived and respective
considerable intellectual debts to ocher scholars, without whose work rhe present study "offenses" against Christendom and how these are given varying arriscic expression over
would have had considerably less solid foundations, if indeed it had ever gotten off the ti me.
ground. Ruch Mcllinkoff must be credited with literally exposing the scale and charac l have also tried ro arrange the material in a way rhac highlights rhe inAuencc char
teristics of pejorative medieval images, especially of Jews, in a body of published work descriptions and images of one group had upon another. ln chapter 1, I begin in rhe
impressive in both its quantity and quality, much of which is cited in the present study. realm of the utterly imaginary, with the earlier traditions of Monstrous Races, and in
Her 1993 book, Outcasts, is a masterful assembly and analysis of many of the pictorial chapter 2, demons, and then show how aspects of both traditions are combined in por
signs char figure into my own analysis, and it is not an exaggeration to say char traits of black Africans. From here, I move on to a discussion of medieval Jews in chap
Mellinkoff's is the book chat has provided and will continue tO provide the foundations ter 3, which is in many ways rhe heart of the study, as this was the group most despised
for all subsequent studies of pejorative medieval imagery, including chis one. l am also by Christians for the longest period and whose portraits therefore exhibit the full arsenal
heavily indebted to rhe work of Michael Camille, especially his analysis of Gothic idols, of expressive weaponry. The theme of rhe crusades forms the organizational scheme for
but also his work on the functions and meanings of marginal art. Ocher seminal studies chapter 4, where I begin with a discussion of Jews in this context and proceed to
produced by Robert Bartlett (on medieval ethnography), Jean Oevisse and Michel medieval Christian images of Muslims ("Saracens") and Mongols ("Tartars"). Chapter 5
Mollac (on images of black Africans), John Block Friedman (on Monstrous Races), is organized around the theme of "eschatological conspiracies," and under chis rubric,
Andrew Gow (on the Red Jews), Suzanne Lewis (on English Apocalypses and Matthew emphasizes what all these disparate groups had in common according to medieval
Paris), Sara Lipton (on anti-Jewish imagery in the Bibles moralisees), and Miri Rubin (on Christian expectations vis-a-vis the End of Days. My conclusions in chapter 6 fall into
hose desecration) have all proved invaluable by providing important historical and arc two categories. First, I summarize my main findings in relation to the pictorial code of
historical insights char have helped clarify my own chinking about pejorative attitudes rejection identified and discussed in the previous chapters. 1 then return co the problem
and pictorial imagery. Further acknowledgment of che specific contributions of these of medieval monstrosity by examining a small bur representative group of images that
scholars, along with many ochers, is made throughout the book in both the main text seemingly contradict the principles of this pictorial code, thereby necessitating a revised
and the notes. and expanded definition of the medieval monster.
In light of chis important earlier work, the principal contributions of the present An important theoretical concern that I treat most fully in chapter 1 but that
study, as I see them, are: (t) the demonstration that general pictorial principles formerly remains a leitmotif is the medieval debt to Classical Greek scientific and pseudoscienrific
and incompletely observed in medieval portraits of individual enemy groups arc applied theories char explain the "natural causes" for external physical form and its moral impli
very consistently to many different ones, both real and imaginary; (2) the elucidation of cations, as well as arci tudes toward barbarians, both of which I argue provided rhe ideo
the Classical origins and individual visual elements of the medieval pictorial code that logical foundations for the development of pejorative medieval imagery. Ar this point, l
was regularly employed in these pejorative portraits; and (3) the comparative analysis of will not go further except to say that the concept of ugliness as a visual phenomenon is
negative ideas expressed in pictorial works of art and in other areas of cultural produc what justifies a concentration on the implications of physiognomical form and its rela
tion, mainly rheology, literature, and drama. tionship to moral behavior. These were principles that were well-established long before
Throughout the book, I have taken a thematic rather than chronological the period under discussion, in Classical Greek writings char were further developed and,
approach. ln each chapter, source material drawn from several centuries is integrated most importantly, "Christianized" during the later Middle Ages. Allegiance to these
according to its relevance to that chapter's main theme. This approach has several advan- principles led Clerk of Enghien, as guoced above, literally co "read" physical deformities
18
Plme 7. Rlcmmyai and Ethiopfan,s en roule LO Anlichri:n; fahiopian, Saracen, and Jew adore Amichri,st.
Anlichrisl. Bavaria, c. 1-1-10-50. SLaa[:;bihliOLhek :z;u Berlin, Preu,s,sir.cher Kuhurbe:;it:z;, Berlin, II \S germ. Plate 8. Three tempta[ion:; of Chri:;L. l-lumingfield Pr.alter. St. Alhan:;(?), c. 1i.15. Picrpom 1'\organ
Library, New York, 11\S I\\. .J), fol. wv
f.733, fol. .j
20
u as so many signs of sin. In fact, to judge people by their looks was a regular practice
u
uro
.... beginning in the Classical period, if not earlier; it continued through the Middle Ages,
0...
and it continues to the present clay. One needs think only of the conventional tendency
Plates
to portray the "bad guys" in the movies as physically repellent, or of negative social atti
tudes toward the disabled or disfigured, in order to see that people continue to make
assumptions about inner character based on outward physical appearance.
In his groundbreaking study, Orienta/ism, Edward Said commented brieAy on
the medieval tradition that informed eighteenth- and nineteenth-century colonialist
perceptions of the East and of Arabs in particular.6 I would be gratified to chink that the
present book may be, in a general way, an art historical corroboration and extension of
one of Said's basic arguments, char non-Westerners-whom I redefine here as non
Chriscians-have been willfully and systematically misrepresented in the West for che
unquestionable benefit of che image-makers. That physical and cultural difference is to
be hated and feared is an attitude chat remains ingrained in modem societies, often with
devastating and tragic consequences, just as it had in the Middle Ages. In the present
study, I seek to explore and to analyze Western medieval artistic formulations of this atti
tude in the perhaps naive hope chat it may one day disappear, and that being "otherwise"
eventually might come to be more respected than despised.
Orro::.rri:. Plate 9. 1l calth /\Ian. Bartholomew the L:ngli:;hman, Uvrec/csl'rol'riae:;cbcho.,r~. \\le:;tern
France, :;ccond quarter of the 15th cent my. Bihliothcquc arionalc de France, Parir., /\IS fr. 115, p. 111
(detail)