"Mt. Doom" isn't lazy!

I have discovered a blog after mine own heart.  Though I must disagree with the author in the humor behind the MEME that faults Tolkien for choosing a "lame" "plain" name for the volcano in Mordor (otherwise known as Orodruin), the short essay's thesis is pleasing to my inner Tolkien nerd: "‘Mount Doom’ was not chosen to be vaguely menacing, like some comic book villain calling himself ‘Dr. Doom!' Tolkien uses the word ‘doom’ in a very particular (and very old) sense, which has huge symbolic significance for the story as a whole."

http://observationdeck.io9.com/what-does-tolkien-mean-by-the-word-doom-1166561920

Merry Christmas!

Jesus Christ, "being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross!  Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."  ~Philippians 2:6-11

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Letdown

[I originally intended to write this review the day after I first saw The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.  At the time, I was still in a huff over the (as I saw and see them) unreasonable deviations from the original book, but after a few initial notes I put off what I hoped to make a masterpiece of cinema criticism until such a time as I could devote proper attention to the effort.  Then the first ad for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug arrived and I decided that now was the time to inform the public of my views, but before I could get started again the blue-ray edition of the first movie was released, which seemed a more appropriate date, etc.  Now, a year later and only one week from the premier of the anticipated sequel, I have finally taken time to finish what I started.  My original discontent over Jackson’s adaptation has since dissipated and I confess myself a terrific fan of the new trilogy.  So while I remain disappointed by what The Hobbit could have been, I prefer to think that Jackson’s Lord of the Rings was so breathtakingly masterful that any subsequent efforts will naturally pale in comparison.  Mr. Jackson, it is easy to criticize from an armchair, my hat is off for realizing my childhood dreams ten years ago, and I look forward to your new interpretation this Christmas!] 

I read a review of the Lord of the Rings trilogy in PS3 Magazine a few years ago that started with the line, “Peter Jackson is going to heaven.”  Regarding the first trilogy, I am in complete agreement, and if God allowed me a place on His tribunal, Jackson would definitely have my vote.  Yet if that is true on account of his work of ten years gone, then this new endeavor looks to be a one-way ticket to Purgatorio.  Whereas The Lord of the Rings trilogy is almost completely true to the books, including most of the added material that Tolkien only hinted at, Jackson’s An Unexpected Journey better fits with the “based on” attribution appropriately applied to works by Disney.  That is not to say that An Unexpected Journey is not any good, it is just not The Hobbit.

What it got right

First, let me pause to point out that which is simply amazing about the movie.  In keeping with his style from LOTR, Jackson’s realization of Middle Earth is absolutely stunning.  The dwarvish dominion of Erebor evokes the almost Babylonian culture only hinted at in Gimli’s character of ten years ago, as do the elves of Mirkwood for Legolas; the human trade city of Dale is cast in a Tibetan-steppe realization of Venice, given its location to the northeast of Middle Earth; and the previously established locales are faithfully reproduced from Bag-End to Rivendell.  New Zealand returns in all its taunting glory through Jackson’s beloved wide shots, in which characters both new and returning go traipsing past monuments and backdrops that will bring tears to the eyes of Middle-Earth fans. 

The filming, too, is first class, combining both the previously seen camera work with the latest CGI, easily on par with the very best that Avatar had to offer.  While I have not watched An Unexpected Journey in the new digital style that garnered much attention in pre-release reviews, the quality of the filming itself was certainly marvelous.  The Shire’s green possesses an intensity verging on neon, while the mounds of gold in Erebor are all but blinding in the torchlight as Jackson utilizes extreme contrasts of lighted areas set against darkly shadowed recesses.  This is put to best use in a breathtaking battle sequence that explains Thorin’s background after the loss of his home to the dragon, wherein uncountable dwarves and orcs engage in a swirling slow-motion melee that picks out each and every sword swing and war face in metallic detail.  

Battle of Azanulbizar

As for the casting and character design, somebody has a knack for perfection.  In addition to the returning cast, the dwarves broke every Hildebrandt brothers and Alan Lee stereotype out there, and within the first several moments each dwarf is a unique man.  The one sad thing about this plethora of newcomers is that many of them remain unremarkable past their truly remarkable appearances and one-liners.  I read an interview wherein Jackson said that he was afraid of attempting to film The Hobbit on account of the sheer number of main characters, and this fear appears to have unfortunately played out onscreen, with most of the dwarves remaining more or less one-dimensional until the hugely entertaining escape from Goblin Town.  Though I must observe that The Avengers managed to make something out of each of their heroes, if just briefly, perhaps it is too much to ask for regarding a cast that, even in the original, was really restricted to two or three lead dwarves.  

General Storyline Abuse

So in many ways, the Hobbit feels remarkably different from its predecessors, much like the new Star Wars trilogy when compared to the classics.  Such positive changes are indicative of an artist at work, Jackson’s style, techniques, and tastes fluctuating with the progression of his career.  But it is in the content of the movie, in the actions of the cast and the dialogue, where An Unexpected Journey takes a drastic turn from before.  In some ways, this takes the form of what might pass for writer’s block, or as though the screenwriters spent the weekend rewatching LOTR to get in the proper frame of mind, and thus sadly letting too much of the old trilogy infuse their new work.  This is first noticeable in the little odes to The Fellowship, which are certainly welcome, such as Gandalf’s repeated entanglements with Bag End’s chandeliers.  But the wizard does not stop there, instead looking to Moria’s Balrog scene as he again pulls a Moses and breaks a stone with his staff, and later gathers up a convenient moth to reenact the calling of the eagles.  Through Gandalf’s antics alone, one begins to suspect that one has seen this movie before.  But Jackson does not stop there.  As did Frodo in the Prancing Pony, Bilbo discovers the power of the Ring through an unfortunate tumble and superhuman dexterity and presence of mind that lands the Ring on his finger, recreating that iconic shot in every detail except Elijah Wood’s horrified intensity.  The wargs on the trail invoke a clunky Dark Riders/uruk-hai hybrid (more on that below), and the final boss fight even sees Thorin beaten down a la Sean Bean’s Boromir, complete with a menacing orc preparing the final blow before Aragorn (or in this case, Bilbo), executes a flying tackle from stage left at the last moment.

But besides Gandalf’s unfortunate special awareness in Bag-End, all is well until Thorin and Company leave the Shire.  Then comes the meeting with the trolls, wherein Bilbo is fussily pushed forward to try his hand at robbery.  But here the content drastically breaks from that of the book: Tolken has the adventurers caught up in a rain storm when they catch sight of the fire, which promise of warmth and shelter entices them into a trap, a tense yet humorous event as Gandalf reappears to pull some mimicry shenanigans to save the captured dwarves.  In the movie adaptation, however, Fili and Kili notice that some of their ponies have been stolen, which prompts them to send “the burglar” to investigate and/or free the poor animals.  Before long, Bilbo’s cover is blown as he attempts to spring Myrtle and Mindy, and the trap is replaced with a riotous melee that showcases the mad fighting skills of the dwarves, complete with somersaults and similar acrobatics, whereafter Bilbo takes on the role of distracting the trolls til daybreak.  Is such admittedly tame adaptation really that objectionable?  Sadly (with the exception of the brilliant fight scene), very much so.

Now I realize that there were some changes made to the books’ plot in the original trilogy, many much more drastic than that just detailed above.  Faramir became a Ring-grabber, Treebeard was such a gentle giant that it took Hobbit ingenuity and a lecture to convince him to dismantle Isengard, and the ghosts of Dunharrow made themselves known on the Pelennor Fields.  These were jarring moments, to be sure, and even now I cringe a little inside when Faramir goes dragging Frodo, Sam, and Gollum into war torn Osgiliath, but each of these changes did not derail the book’s plot or ruin major character development (Faramir lets Frodo leave, Treebeard still calls the Ents to battle), and in the case of the ghosts, it helped maintain movie integrity.  In the Return of the King, Aragorn drums up the ghosts for battle, not outside the gates of the White City, but at the Stone of Erech some three hundred miles distant, and then they proceed to whup swarthy pirate tush in a swashbuckling ghostly hunt that sees off the raiders and frees up vital militia forces, who set sail on the captured vessels (after Aragorn releases the ghosts) and land at the docks at Harlond in time to save the beleaguered Rohirrim.  Almost all of this occurs “offscreen” and involves several sub-plots and narratives, to say nothing of numerous extra support characters, all lovingly detailed by Tolkien in such a way as to demand space for a fourth entry in Jackson’s trilogy.  So much as I would have loved to see an extra two hours tucked into the middle of an already stuffed blockbuster epic, the decision to promote the ghosts to the front lines of the War of the Ring makes perfect movie sense. 

Not so, The Hobbit.

The Orc

As a much shorter work, The Hobbit is perfect for fleshing out to trilogy dimensions.  Its characters are diverse and many are fully developed, it draws upon a rich history that Tolkien had already been crafting since his tenure in the trenches of WWI, and hints at whole episodes that occur, again, “offscreen,” such as Gandalf’s sleuthing expedition to Dol Guldor, which is indeed a major plot point of the upcoming Desolation of Smaug.  But far from remaining faithful to the book’s program, Jackson decided to throw a wrench into Tolkien’s finely tuned gears: Azog, the Pale Orc. 

Sinister? No, the symmetrical scars are merely disturbing

The inclusion of Azog in An Unexpected Journey feels downright bizarre and comes off as depressingly corny: rather than the scruffy Ahab seeking vengeance upon the White Whale for the loss of his leg, we find a white orc (who bears compelling resemblance to both a shark and the alien villains from I Am Number Four) seeking vengeance upon the scruffy Thorin for the loss of his arm.  To be fair, the derivation is all Tolkien, who crafted a glorious dwarvish history that culminates in a battle on the front step of Moria, and featuring Azog, Thorin, and other worthies of the Tolkien universe.  But here is the crucial bit: Azog dies.  Yes he kills King Thror, yes Thorin snatches up an oak branch in lieu of a shield, but Azog is gutted by good dwarvish steel at day’s end (actually by Thorin’s younger cousin, Dain, but let’s not split hairs).  Why bring him back?

There are a couple different reasons that come to mind.  With the third movie fast approaching, one wonders if Jackson was perhaps seeking a more concrete rationale for the appearance of goblins and wargs at the Battle of Five Armies, and so decided to draw upon the perhaps-underplayed orcish/warg relationship hinted at in The Two Towers and Return of the King, while tying in the final events of An Unexpected Journey: the wargs, orcs, and burning trees.  This seems a bit unnecessary to me, since Tolkien already thought up a reason for the final battle: Azog had a son, Bolg, who apparently had some sort of vendetta against Dain for his father’s death (to say nothing of dragon treasure).  There it is, Mr. Jackson, problem solved!  A few scenes of plotting and scheming would have set Bolg up as the perfect “unexpected” villain, set to burst on the scene for movie #3. Interestingly, I believe Bolg is slated to appear in The Desolation of Smaug, though what role he plays in the film remains to be seen.

More likely, though, the episodic dangers facing Thorin and Company did not strike Jackson as threat enough compared to the Black Riders of The Fellowship, so he threw in a pack of angry wolf riders to give Thorin an archenemy worthy of a grudge match.  But here is the problem with this twist: Thorin does not need an archenemy, he has Smaug, the dragon that destroyed his childhood home!  “But isn’t Smaug far away and unassailable?  He’s a dragon!”  The former point is of little consequence; after all, many villains appear only at the end of the journey, and sometimes only a few seconds’ worth of appearances at key points in the narrative are all it takes to remind viewers of whom they are to hate.  As for the second point, since when did heroes need to actually chop on their enemies?  There are many examples of protagonists engaging far off or intangible foes: Scarlet O’Hara swore to defeat poverty at all costs in Gone with the Wind, William Wilberforce fought to end the trans-Atlantic slave trade in Amazing Grace.  Thorin Oakenshield does not need a special orc to make him a compelling and conflicted character.

Through Azog’s intrusion, the warg-riding orcs steal too much of the limelight and play havoc with the storyline, ultimately doing the tale more harm than good.  The addition of Radagast is an element that I was happily anticipating, as his whimsical personality makes a nice contrast with Gandalf’s gruff practicality and Saruman’s domineering authority.  But with the arrival of the orcs, the impact of Radagast’s message (“Sauron’s back!”) is lost in the rampage.  Better to have done away with the orcs and let the company have its danger in the trolls and goblins as Tolkien intended, and then Gandalf’s desire to visit Elrond would have gained added urgency following Radagast’s arrival (and let’s not even start on the unnecessary need to trick the dwarves into visiting Rivendell at all). 

The Hobbit

But the principal casualty of An Unexpected Journey is the book’s titular protagonist himself: Bilbo Baggins.  What Jackson did right in crafting this iconic character was his decision (and perseverance, if I have heard correctly) to cast Martin Freeman in the role of the furry-footed homebody-turned unforeseen hero.  Without a doubt, Freeman is Bilbo, and works innumerable quirks and mannerisms into his performance that capture perfectly the sort of person that has a certain amount of self-importance balanced with a unabashed desire to stay out of adventuresome people’s way, as well as a secret longing for adventure, provided there is an adequate supply of handkerchiefs on hand.  So in this way, Freeman’s portrayal of Mr. Baggins is spot-on.  But again, it is the content of his character, the actions and words that he performs, that woefully deviate from Tolkien’s careful construction.  On screen, Bilbo is the stereotypical Hollywood zero who must prove his worth in the face of verbal abuse heard in corny moments from behind closed doors. 

The beautiful thing about the Bilbo Baggins of The Hobbit is that he spends most of the book being miserable.  He misses his fire, his food, his smokes, and he greatly dislikes the uncomfortable amount of danger his adventures throw at him.  Added to his discomfort is the dismissive treatment received at the hands of the dwarves, who for the most part ignore him until his particular talents are most needed (i.e. the dirty work, which is itself a wonderful commentary on human nature).  He is never in the limelight, and only gains acceptance and respect as the level of his unexpected heroics rises.  Yet in An Unexpected Journey he is constantly on everyone’s minds, first snorted at by the adventuresome dwarves, then repeatedly told that he does not belong.  As if this was not Hollywood enough, there is even the obligatory “sneaking home” scene where Bilbo, offended by Thorin’s harsh criticisms, determines to sneak out and is stopped by the watchful and well-meaning Bofur in a stereotypical argument over the merits of the decision (complete with the groan-worthy unwitting-harsh-comment-about-your-flaws/apology/no-no-I’m-fine-you-go-ahead-and-leave exchange) as a wakeful Thorin listens in while pretending to be asleep. 

As a consequence of his inconsequential participation in the quest, it is the little things that make Bilbo such a compelling character in the novel, and I think this is what Tolkien envisioned all along.  Over and over again, Bilbo is faced with insurmountable obstacles, but when the most stout-hearted dwarf might throw up his hands in despair, or shut himself up in a sulk, Bilbo simply starts moving in the hopes of coming to some answer.  When lost in the darkness of Goblin Town, Bilbo decides that, rather than spend his time moping in one place, he would rather mope while on the move, and so sets out to discover what can be found at the end of the tunnel – he needs no outside prompting because the Took on the inside is driving him forward.  His seemingly random discovery of the Ring, his desperate riddles with Gollum, his escape out of the tunnels, all of these things are the product of a confused homebody wanting only to find a little daylight and something to eat – and once outside, he even comes to the agonizing decision to return to the tunnels in search of his friends on the basis of duty, a favor he soon learns the dwarves are unwilling to do for him. 

None of this is evident in the movie.  Upon waking in the goblin tunnels, Freeman’s Bilbo is not long alone, for Gollum suddenly appears, and though repugnant he clearly knows his way around the tunnels, so why not follow him?  Then he drops the Ring, in brilliant bright-on-dark-contrast slow motion, thus informing Bilbo from the start that this little circle of metal is precious to its former owner.  All agency has been removed from our furry-footed hero.  And that choice to return for his lost friends?  Never made, since Bilbo stumbles across them as they also exit the same cave.

What of the trolls and Bilbo’s cover blown, which was my first significant criticism?  Recall that in the book Bilbo’s Tookish side suddenly flares up for the first time and he sneaks forward to pickpocket one of the trolls, only to be discovered.  In the movie, Bilbo has to slip the troll’s knife to save the ponies, with the same result.  Again, loss of agency.  This before his assumption of Gandalf’s role as lead distraction as the trolls debate their culinary options.  Not only does the dialogue take on qualities perfectly asinine (honestly, “don’t eat the dwarves, they all have parasites”?) but Bilbo is again the zero with the golden wit, whom the jocks never anticipated.  True, Faramir’s character was changed just as drastically, but he was one support character in a Dickensian array of innumerable support, hardly to be compared with Frodo, Sam, or Bilbo. 

Then there is final fight scene, with Bilbo lunging in from the side and actually killing a full-grown orc – presumably one who has spent the entirety of his miserable existence fending off much bigger, nastier attackers striking at equal random.  This was so out of character that…well, that’s enough from me.

So with my main grievances aired at last, I can now rest easy in the knowledge that The Deolation of Smaug will not be The Hobbit 2.0, as the trailers have already clearly shown.  And it is this knowledge, I think, that allows me to appreciate Jackson’s new adaptation.  I went to the midnight release of An Unexpected Journey expecting to watch The Hobbit rather than a loose interpretation, and thus left with a bad taste in my mouth.  As such I hasten to add that none of this has stopped me from putting An Unexpected Journey Extended Edition on my Christmas list, and viewing with undisguised glee each trailer and TV spot that pops up in my Facebook feed.  So what if Azog’s forces his unwelcome snout into “Barrels Out of Bond”?  Lee Pace is Thranduil, the elves get their acrobatics on in the branches of Mirkwood, Evangeline Lilly’s Tauriel might not be as irritating as was Kate Austen of LOST, Stephen Fry turns on the sleaze as Laketown’s Master, and Smaug speaks through the tongue of Benedict “the Voice” Cumberbatch.  What is not to love?

For a more sympathetic reading of Jackson’s treatment of Azog, see MichaelMartinez

For a VERY good, if slightly profanity-laced review of the movie, see The Escapist

Did anyone read the book? - A short "review" of Disney's Frozen

"Frozen" is the new Disney Princess movie ostensibly based upon Hans Christian Andersen's The Snow Queen.

In The Snow Queen, young Kay gets a piece of cursed glass in his eye and another in his heart, turning him from gallant boyscout to snarky brat. On a seemingly unrelated note, the titular Snow Queen picks him up in her sleigh and to two make tracks for parts unknown, she erasing his memories and making him inured to the cold. Though everyone else thinks him dead, Kay's playmate, Gerda, vows to find her lost friend.

After getting swept away by a mischievous river, Gerda is taken in by a kindly witch, who also erases her memories into the bargain. Yet after an interview with talking flowers, Gerda's memories are restored and she continues on her quest, whereupon she meets a talking crow, who thinks he knows of master Kay, who is now a prince. Of course, the young man in question is not Kay (and is apparently much older on account of his princess bride), but the royal couple are decent folk and get Gerda kitted out for the next leg of her journey, which ends unfortunately with her magnificent escorts slain on a road and herself in a robbers' den. But she apparently wins over the robber lady's daughter, who gifts her a talking reindeer to ride into Lapland and Finmark as she works her way towards the Snow Queen's lair ("summer palace").

Upon arrival she is greeted by a host of bestial snowflakes, but just as suddenly Gerda's frozen breath turns into a superior host of angels that clear to way for her to enter the snow palace. Sitting on the floor is young Kay, crouched over an array of ice chunks with which he hopes to spell "eternity," the magic word that earns his freedom (though Andersen makes it clear that he yet remembers none of his past life and takes interest in trivial things like mathematics - I mean, that's in the story!) Fortunately for him, Gerda's tears melt away the glass shard in his heart and cause him to cry out the shard in his eye, while the sympathetic Ice chunks helpfully spell out the desired word, allowing the children to escape the palace before the Queen returns from her Italian holiday.

The crisis thus concluded, the children return home via reindeer to find the robber girl having adventures on her own, the helpful crow inexplicably passed away, and themselves full-grown, yet still children at heart - as explained by a perfectly random quote from Matt. 18:3

By contrast, Disney's "Frozen" (which you may recall is BASED upon the events detailed above) has as the main character a princess named Anna, as well as several young men, none of whom are named "Kay." There is also a (mute) reindeer and a snow queen with matching palace - for that matter, there is plenty of snow. But Disney also introduces trolls, snowmen, 8 songs, several blizzards, and Archduke Franz Ferdinand. That said, it was still a great way to spend Thanksgiving evening!

This is Middle Welsh I

I just finished a Welsh class.

Which strikes me as curious enough a claim, besides the fact that it was actually Middle Welsh - that is, the Welsh that came before the Welsh spoken today.  I can barely read it, let alone speak it, yet the fact that I am now familiar with what amounts to a semi-dead language other than Greek or Latin, and is also distinct from other tongues commonly studied at university, seems like excuse enough to indulge in a unbecoming and wholly uncalled-for sense of pride.  Yet while I hope to suppress such urges beneath a veneer of self-deprecation, I would like to offer some sampling of my new-found knowledge to the general public as a means of introducing this fascinating language.

A joke that I frequently encountered during the semester is "Ah Welsh, the language with no vowels."  This impression is easily understood by referencing the following phrase taken from the website for St. David's Cathedral:

"Pwyswch yma i fynd i mewn yn Gymraeg"*

 While funny, I must observe that the joke is in fact false: Welsh does have a vowel, thank you very much!  And the Welsh get a great deal of mileage out of it!

That said, the discerning reader will have noticed several vowels in the quote, most notably the two i's, the e's, and the a.  More important to the Welsh, by far, are the y's, but what will perhaps surprise the reader of English most is the equally-frequent application of w.  W's have two sounds in Middle (and modern) Welsh: that which English speakers are familiar with when used before vowels (i.e. with) and when between consonants, an oo sound (shoot).  Thus pwyswch above is pronounced something like "poo-EES-ooch" (the ch pronounced like the composer Bach).  Indeed, Welsh makes use of every vowel used in English, with a few extras, depending upon where the Welsh speaker hails from, and as such becomes relatively easy to read with practice.  The grammar is also comparatively easy to master, again in a relative sort of way.  Students of foreign languages will likely rejoice at the simplicity of Middle Welsh - our professor tells us that as of the close of semester we were about 85% done with the grammar - especially when compared to paradigm-intense tongues like Latin.  But where Latin is ordered in its complexity, Middle Welsh makes it practitioners pay through its comparative...oddities.

*Being a bilingual site, stdavidscathedral.org.uk offers visitors two links depending on language of choice.  The above quote links to the Welsh-language option, while its English equivalent reads "Click here to enter in English"

Tolkien's Take on Arianism

Lovers of English and snark have yet another reason to rejoice.  I had heard once from a friend that Tolkien took it upon himself to set Hitler straight on the infamous notion of the Aryan race, and a quick google search pulled up this classy blog: Letters of Note.  The entry in question concerns a letter written by Tolkien in response to a German publisher's query as to his lineage, as a copy of The Hobbit would presumably be denied print if Tolkien failed to prove his Arianism.  Though famous for his Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, Tolkien was also a peerless linguist with a far superior understanding of linguistic/cultural history than der Fuehrer, and his response is a fitting put-down (it is unknown whether his publisher sent it).

De Jong’s Penitents

Mayke de Jong. The Penitential State: Authority and Atonement in the Age of Louis the Pious, 

814-840. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009.

Acts of public humiliation may not often be seen as a strength, but that is what Mayke de Jong argues in her 2009 book, The Penitential State.  Calling for a reevaluation of Louis the Pious’ infamous humiliation in the presence of God and country in 833, de Jong takes on the claims that this was a simple coup and argues instead for a complex system of admonition and penance in nine-century Frankia.  By mining primary sources in an attempt to establish an understanding of Carolinian opinion of the day, de Jong builds up a world where politics and awareness of sin were inextricably entwined. 

The Penitential State functions very well as a narrative, thanks to De Jong’s great interest in the tales themselves, allowing her to present a story rather than relying on mundane critical analysis.  Largely a text-based work, the book uses histories and the written results of synods and capitularies to discover their authors’ views, preserving the living narrative and keeping the book moving.  The depth of de Jong’s analysis and the name-dropping, both ancient and modern, should appeal to experts in the field, and the flowing readability makes the book palatable to interested newcomers.  However, despite her best efforts to the contrary, de Jong’s use of categories does occasionally wander off into confusing date-hopping and her sources, while excellent on the literary plane, remain lacking in other respects, with little-to-no reference to archeology or paleography (that is, the study of writing and the treatment of documents as objects for study), which would probably have worked well in conjunction with her study of piety. 

The sources de Jong does choose to utilize are many and varied.  Telling her story of sin and penance through contemporary eyes, these so-called “ninth-century narratives” were chosen based upon their authors’ political clout, as all were involved (or claimed to be) with Louis’ court and many placed themselves into the story as players in the great affairs of the state.   Admirably, de Jong remains careful to place arguments in the mouths of those who made them, but occasionally she seems to let her pro-Louis bias take the lead, as when she turns to the Astronomer for justification of an aging Louis as hardy peacemaker.   Besides this otherwise nameless cleric (author of the Vita Hludowici imperatoris), de Jong draws upon the Royal Frankish Annals, Einhard’s Vita Karoli, the bishop Thegan’s Deeds of Louis, Ermold the Black’s attempt to “literally … write himself back into Aquitaine,” from his exile in Strasbourg, Nithard’s dour Historiae, angry Radbert (author of the Vita Adalhardi and Epitaphium Arsenii) and the omnipresent Walahfrid Strabo, often used as a cross-reference to join together the primary sources.   Far from being merely windows into the past (albeit occasionally close) these sources are mined to determine what was said in the ninth century and to ascertain the tone of political life.   On the modern end of the spectrum, de Jong takes care to not isolate herself from the historical narratives of today, citing the opinions of Christina Pössel, Julia Smith, Janet Nelson, Matthew Innes, and Rosamond McKitterick, among others. 

In keeping with its subtitle, The Penitential State focuses a great deal of attention upon authority and atonement and how they influenced one another throughout the reign of Louis.  Upon succeeding his father, Charlemagne, Louis demonstrates his kingly authority through “assemblies and councils [which] were ideal platforms for the representation of royal authority.  Here, Louis publicly became the Christian emperor, responsible for the salvation of his people.”   De Jong delves into the Latin, beginning with the notion of constructive criticism, or “constructive admonitio” which introduces the Carolingian notions of authority and correction.   Having been granted ministerium (divinely bestowed office) kings often engaged in admonitio, as when Louis called upon the bishops gathered at Aachen in 816 “to look into the lack of hospitality in religious communities, and into the insufficient learning of canons.”   But with ministerium came the weighty responsibility of promoting the public good, as well as the sin of neglect, or negligentia.   To combat neglect and faulty ruling, good Carolingians were willing to suffer naysayers at court, provided their admonitions remained within reasonable bounds – consequently, admonitio was most often carefully crafted to avoid the appearance of “brazen presumption.”   From admonitio the criticisms grew harsher in the forms of correptio (akin to reproach or blame), increpatio (“morally charged rebukes or wrath”), and the furious invectio.   Corresponding to this hierarchy of admonition went the “vocabulary of sin,” featuring such niceties as iniquitas, scandalum, and negligentia, this latter used frequently, says de Jong, in the Carolingian context.   Indeed, these Carolingians took their admonitio very seriously, especially when it occurred in a religious context, as de Jong speculates is the case in the instance of Charlemagne’s purgatorial torment, as recounted in the Visio Wettini – just criticism was not to be lightly brushed aside. 

Atonement enters the narrative three years after Louis restored his authority following an ugly family squabble in 830 that resulted from his sons’ irritation over Louis’ redrawing of the royal inheritance to make way for the newest son by way of a new queen, Judith.  Once more at violent odds with his boys in 833, Louis’ actions (again redrawing the succession map to punish his wayward sons and reward those previously faithful) were used against him under claims of forcing perjury upon his subjects by way of multiple, conflicting oaths.   In addition, the political situation was primed for such a coup: in the years previous, Frankia had been struck by a series of unsettling events and reports of unnatural phenomena bespeaking of divine wrath, culminating in the disturbing admonitio from none other than a demonically possessed child.   The author of this account was undoubtedly as distraught as the exorcist on site and de Jong interprets his tale as one incriminating not only the Frankish people but also their king as chief minister of the flock.   When Judith was accused of adultery during the row of 830, priests had been described as armed with “penitential literature, which presented the [holy men] as the ‘good doctor’ ready to cure his patient of the illness caused by sin.”   And as events fell out on the Field of Lies, wherein the followers of Louis went over to the rebellious Lothar, the clergymen prepared themselves with the strong-arm of church doctrine.   In the official Relatio produced by the bishops to defend their position (and provided by de Jong in an appendix) the authors invoke the authority granted to the church by Christ through Matthew 18:18 and the warning related in Ezekiel 3:18 that a man would suffer for keeping quiet in the face of another’s sin.   In light of this, the bishops claimed the authority to condemn Louis’ sin of negligentia and to speak admonitio to him, upon which the monarch – in their words – “willingly took their redeeming admonition and their fitting and apt rebuke to heart.” 

Louis was no stranger to penance, as he had already committed an act of public humility with regards to fraternal strife in 822, an action that had only enhanced his Christian standing and placed him on par with his spiritually imperial predecessor, Theodosius I, famous for his own penitentiary demonstration some four hundred years prior.   In the case of this latter display, de Jong argues that context is everything, that the penance undergone by Louis “makes sense only if one accepts that there was an emperor who, together with his bishops and magnates, feared divine retribution as the inevitable consequence of sin, and directed his policies accordingly.”   In any event, the outcome of the public humiliation remained unclear, as evidenced by the bishops’ attempts to finalize the episode with oaths.   However, Louis still had room to wiggle and consequently refused to take up a permanent monastic retirement, and in time his rebellious sons had so fallen out that he was able to return to power and put Lothar in his place: ironically, it was the son who finally came to his father as a supplicant.   Predictably, Louis then went on the offensive, claiming that it was all coercion and abuse, and up to the very end, Louis continued to punish his sons by re-dividing the empire. 

The Penitential State is a remarkably readable and authoritative work.  Through extensive use of her primary sources, de Jong builds a case for a Carolingian polity that was genuinely religious, even at their most extreme.  “Rather than a police state, we are dealing with a political elite that was markedly preoccupied with sin and salvation – their own and those of the ‘Christian people’ that made up the Frankish polity.”

Garver’s Carolingian Women

Valerie L. Garver. Women and Aristocratic Culture in the Carolingian World. Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 2009.

For those who are tired about reading the history of “dead white men,” Valerie L. Garver has provided an alternative look at the equally dead alternative.  Women and Aristocratic Culture in the Carolingian World is 381 pages of analysis that takes into consideration both the clerical ideal of women and the actual circumstances of their lives and argues that “women, especially elite women, were active participants in shaping and perpetuating the behaviors, beliefs, and practices that marked the culture of the Carolingian lands between c. 700 and c. 925.”   Garver’s women essentially act behind the scenes, building and holding together the world in which their men act, but while her evidence is used well and her arguments reasonable, Garver at times allows her numerous assumptions to take control of the narrative.

The structure of Women and Aristocratic Culture is based upon the “four reasons why men desire women” outlined by Jonas of Orléans in the 820s: “family prudence, wealth, and beauty.”   Each of the chapters is devoted to one of these themes, with the all-important work of textile production added as a bonus fifth.  Throughout the work, one of the most prominent themes – and one in keeping with Jonas’ ideals – is the notion that Carolingian women complimented and enhanced their men  and families.  The ideal woman was the most desirable enhancement, and according to the poem Karolus Magnus et Leo papa, almost literally a physical treasure, shining in beatific glory that originated not only from herself, but also the rich ornaments festooning her person.   Thus, in her first chapter Garver determines that beautiful women, decked out in their Sunday best, were physical manifestations of their men’s status and wealth.   But more than mere centerpieces to familial standing, women had active roles as the glue that bound families together and as the means for perpetuating family memories and heritage.  Whether through marriage or convent, women were instrumental in shaping their families fortunes, for while Garver characterizes men as the “social face” of clan politics, women acted behind the scenes, praying for the dead as nuns, offering hospitality as wives, and in both capacities honoring those with whom they wished alliance by gifting hand-crafted textiles.   In addition to prayer, Garver repeatedly drives home the thesis that women “kept alive the memory of their family members and others by writing about them”  (but the strange emphasis almost takes on the assumption that, somehow, men were not doing that very thing).  In this she fleshes out the passing statement made by Marios Costambeys, Matthew Innes, and Simon MacLean in The Carolingian World.

Memory is very important to Garver, and so is continuity, her book establishing connections throughout between the late-antique past and the Carolingian era, for “The originality of the Carolingian renaissance rested upon an ability to draw from older texts and traditions while applying them to contemporary exigencies.”   For example, prayer and remembrance was nothing new, as “Carolingian female preservation of familial memory had roots in late antiquity and in the Merovingian and Lombard kingdoms.”   But while many other Carolingian practices, such as keeping ornamental birds  – harking back to Paul Edward Dutton’s Charlemagne’s Mustache – and the production of textiles , were the continuation of ages-old practice, the most compelling argument for continuity comes from the written sources.  Many of those cited by Garver are clerical in nature, written in a pastoral context.  The Carolingians were interested in women acting as moral exemplars within their own spheres, a desire that “drew from late antique ideals” such as the writings of Jerome.   Churchmen’s denunciation of vanity similarly enjoyed a long tradition of exhortation, from the Hebrew Scriptures to the early church fathers in the second-to-fifth centuries.   Yet while biblical allusions and allegory dominate, other classical elements informed the authors’ styles; thus in writing “On the Court” and Karolus Magnus et Leo papa, the authors drew upon motifs from Virgil’s Aeneid.   Moreover, Garver laments the lack of reliable examples of Carolingian dress, as “illuminations and textual descriptions of dress are often drawn from antique sources and were meant to convey certain religious, political, and social messages more than describe dress through accurate observation.”   Yet for all her proof of continuity, such is not the thesis of Garver’s work, and thus other hot-button issues of history escape close scrutiny.

The issue of defining the Carolingian court is a thorny issue and in Charlemagne Rosamond McKitterick devoted a great deal of ink to the argument over whether or not the Carolingians had a court and the attendant administrative structure, or just a glorified posse that followed the king from manor to manor.  For her part, Garver seems to believe that a stable court existed, at least in the popular sense, for she makes broad, matter-of-fact statements, such as acknowledging the Carolingians’ emphasis upon women’s reforming roles as a source of agency for controlling their surroundings, the court included.   Here the court is the center of Politics, where young men go to finish their militant education  and young ladies meet future husbands with whom to establish more family bonds – or to pursue a lady’s education  – if their over-protective parents do not commit them to the comparative safety of convents.  Though not examined in any detail, one gets the impression that Garver’s court is an established culture, for not only was one young noble, William, taken away from his mother Dhuoda, she also warned him to avoid the temptations likely habitual to courtly life.   Yet it is apparent that court was nothing like a continuous community as what one might imagine of, say, a parliament; for Garver points out – in another elated aside about building bonds – that the great men of the realm came to court for assemblies , indicating that there were at least spurts of activity, or perhaps a continual flow of coming and going.  What appears concrete is the notion that this was a dangerous milieu that required practice and experience to navigate successfully, at least insofar as Garver can tell from the work On the Governance of the Palace by Hincmar of Rheims.   With this in mind, it is not surprising that Garver’s following observation is that aristocratic families “almost certainly did not want young, unmarried female kin to go to court as their young brothers did.”   In the final analysis, the court – whatever organizational features it bore – was the place to further one’s goals and those of the family – except for young girls, whose medium was the convent.

By her own admission, Garver relies upon educated guesswork to reach her conclusions, though some of her ideas are a bit of a stretch.  “In order to study some areas, particularly household management,” Garver says as she attempts to justify such leaps, “I suggest the activities for which women almost certainly had responsibility based on the existing evidence.  For example, according to prescriptive texts, gardening seems a probable activity of religious and lay aristocratic women, and the discovery of a watering can at an excavation of the convent of Herford helps to bolster the veracity of that impression.”   Many such leaps are similarly benign, yet a few such slips seem to undermine Garver’s key arguments, such as her fascination with women as bearers of identity.  In the case of Dhuoda, the laywoman often cited for her singular volume of advice for her teenaged son (this document’s unique nature does warrant remark from Garver ), her exhortations to pray for many listed relatives is used to back up Garver’s argument that women of all elite ranks, religious and otherwise, were actively transmitting memory.   Yet this same illustration also serves to undermine her argument for this “womanly duty,” as William’s own prayers are suddenly appropriated for memorial maintenance, thus placing this burden upon both sexes and alerting the reader to the broader implication of mutual participation.  That is not to say that all such educated guesses are poorly done.  There is an especially clever moment where Garver points out that the word for the officer given charge over the larder was the feminine  cellararia, thus implying positions open to, or possibly especially for, women.   But at the far opposite end of this endeavor is the seemingly absurd assumption that, because women did not often write about the colors of textiles and their meanings, as men did, the ladies somehow “were probably not aware of such meanings.”

Women and Aristocratic Culture is nonetheless a book well done.  Garver’s meticulous use of “textiles, exegesis, archaeological remains, poetry, liturgy, letters, inventories, lay mirrors, charters, polyptychs, capitularies, church councils, hagiography, and memorial books”  attempts to recreate an entire world of elite women and is a demonstration of what the eagle-eyed scholar can produce.  Suitable for the student with a general understanding of Carolingian culture, Garver’s work is certainly inspiration for future work on medieval gender.

Image taken from Tower.com