Proving Woman (23 page)

⁹
Balthasar Kaltner,
Konrad von Marburg und die Inquisition in Deutschland
(Prague: F. Tempsky, 1882), pp. 98–99.

¹⁰
Caesarius of Heisterbach,
Vita
, in “Des Cäsarius von Heisterbach Schriften,” pp. 24–25. The reference to Conrad’s correction of morals refers to his efforts
at church reform that were, again, encouraged by Gregory IX. See, for example, Gregory’s letter regarding clerical concubinage
in Germany, in Auvray, 20 June 1227, no. 113. Also see Lea,
Inquisition
, 2:330–34; Kaltner,
Konrad
, pp. 106–7.

¹¹
The name Conrad is mentioned at the end of
Dialogus miraculorum
3.16, but the trials are described in 3.17 (ed. Joseph Strange [Cologne, Bonn, Brussels: J. M. Heberle, 1851], 1:32; trans.
H. Von E. Scott and C. C. Swinton Bland,
The Dialogue on Miracles
[London: Routledge, 1929], 1:149–50). John Trithemius, though admittedly late (ca. 1500), claims that this was, in fact, Conrad
of Marburg. He also dates the persecution of Strasbourg as 1215, further arguing that Conrad used the ordeal in defiance of
Lateran IV (
Annales Hirsaugienses complectens historiam Franciae et
Germaniae
ann. 1215 [Saint Gall: Monastery of Saint Gall, 1690], 2:525). Kaltner notes, however, that the persecution in Strasbourg
would have occurred around 1212, so that even if the cleric in question was Conrad, he was not contravening Lateran IV’s ban
on ordeals (
Konrad
, pp. 82–84).

¹²
Caesarius of Heisterbach,
Vita
, in “Des Cäsarius von Heisterbach Schriften,” p. 23, also n. 14, below. Cf. Dietrich of Apolda,
Vita
3.8, p. 59. Conrad is consistently referred to as “Magister” by Gregory IX in the correspondence discussed below.

¹³
Kaltner,
Konrad
, pp. 74–75.

¹⁴
Ibid., pp. 76–78. Caesarius of Heisterbach,
Vita
, in “Des Cäsarius von Heisterbach Schriften,” p. 24. Richer’s
Gesta Senoniensis ecclesiae
(between 1254 and 1264) refers to Conrad as a Franciscan, perhaps because of Elisabeth’s own patronage of the order (ed. G.
Waitz,
MGH SS
, 25:319). But the Dominican claim seems to have won out. See Trithemius’s assertion in
Annales
Hirsaugienses
ann. 1215, 2:525. Thus Thomas of Cantimpréreports in his alleged history of the order that Master Conrad, “preaching in Germany
against the heretics, perish[ed] in a happy death through them,” although he never explicitly says that Conrad was a Dominican
(
De apibus
2.57.23, p. 553). But Colvener, the sixteenth-century editor of Thomas of Cantimpré’s
De apibus
, notes that subsequent chroniclers do make this claim (see the notes to 2.57.23, pp. 155–56). Moreover, Conrad is listed
in Colvener’s index as the first martyr of the Dominicans. Also see Karl Hermann May’s argument for a possible Premonstratensian
connection, in “Zur Geschicte Konrads von Marburg,”
Hessisches Jahrbuch fu
ï
r Landesgeschichte
1 (1951): 89–101.

¹⁵
Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, p. 135. This is according to Irmingard’s testimony.

¹⁶
Cf. Kaltner,
Konrad
, pp. 116–17.

¹⁷
Ibid., p. 112. For the various persecutions on behalf of her in-laws, see Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, pp. 121–22; idem,
Der sog. Libellus
, pp. 145–46; Caesarius of Heisterbach,
Vita
, in “Des Cäsarius von Heisterbach Schriften,” p. 34.

¹⁸
Only one letter remains, which was copied at the back of a psalter and discovered in 1904.

This has been edited by Karl Wenck, with an introduction and German translation as, “Die heilige Elisabeth und Papst Gregor
IX,”
Hochland
2 (1907): 128–48. In this letter, Gregory alludes to earlier communications (p. 145).

¹⁹
See the expanded version of the original account of the four handmaidens (Huyskens,
Die
sog. Libellus
, pp. 45–46). Also see Kaltner,
Konrad
, p. 113.

²⁰
Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, pp. 114, 125. This is according to Isentrud’s testimony. For Elisabeth’s prayers for assistance in giving up her property
and feeling no greater love for her children than for other people, see ibid., p. 126. Irmingard also recounts that she ordered
her child of a year and a half to be removed from her, lest she be turned from God’s service (ibid., p. 137). In an anonymous
letter describing Elisabeth’s death, one of the earliest contemporary sources advancing her sanctity, Elisabeth herself is
described as reminding Conrad that with the vow of obedience she renounced not only her will but her children, her corporeal
and worldly desire, and worldly possessions—with the exception of those necessary for paying debts and distributing alms.
These latter resources, moreover, were retained only at Conrad’s behest, and she would gladly have given them up as well in
order to enter a cell as an anchoress (p. 148). Cf. Conrad’s letter to Gregory IX, ibid., p. 157. Although Elisabeth’s gray
tunic has subsequently been associated with the Franciscan order, there is no evidence for this claim. She was probably not
officially affiliated with any order (see Edith Pa è sztor’s “Elisabetta di Turingia,” in
BS
, col. 1121).

²¹
See her maid Isentrud’s account in Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, pp. 115–16.

²²
For the bull
Gloriam virginalem
, see Auvray, 30 May 1233, no. 1361.

²³
Conrad’s letter to Gregory IX makes reference to Raymond’s repeated urgings (Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, pp. 155–56). The delays seem to have been due to Conrad’s desire to ensure the presence of the archbishop of Mainz, who
was expected to visit on the feast of Saint Lawrence in order to consecrate two altars to Elisabeth in her basilica at Marburg.
Probably without first consulting the archbishop, Conrad preached a sermon on Elisabeth’s virtues in which he called on the
witnesses to her miracles to testify the next day. Not only were many of the witnesses unable to get through the press of
people, but the archbishop was in a hurry. Moreover, neither he nor the other ecclesiastics in attendance had brought their
seals, and they were hence unable to signify their presence and support legally (See Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, introd., pp. 79–80; Kaltner,
Konrad
, pp. 122 ff.). On other forces promoting Elisabeth’s cult, see Michael Goodich’s “The Politics of Canonization in the Thirteenth
Century: Lay and Mendicant Saints,” in
Saints and
Their Cults
, ed. Stephen Wilson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), pp. 171–72.

²⁴
Auvray, 13 October 1232, no. 913. Also see Kaltner,
Konrad
, pp. 123–24 and nn. 2–3; and AndréVauchez,
Sainthood in the Later Middle Ages
, trans. Jean Birrell (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. 59 nn. 69–70.

²⁵
See Gregory’s letter to Beatrice, queen of Castile, that discusses the conversion of Elisabeth’s brother-in-law, Conrad of
Thuringia (Auvray, 7 June 1235, no. 2648). He allegedly went to Elisabeth’s tomb seeking an end to the horrible fleshly lusts
in which he was ensnared, and he was miraculously freed of all such temptations. This precipitated his conversion (see Huyskens,
Der
sog. Libellus
, pp. 84–85; Caesarius of Heisterbach,
Vita
, in “Des Cäsarius von Heisterbach Schriften,” p. 39; cf. Dietrich of Apolda,
Vita
8.9, pp. 116–17). In his sermon on Saint Elisabeth, Caesarius recounts how Conrad of Thuringia personally approached the pope
regarding her canonization (
Sermo de translacione
, in “Des Cäsarius von Heisterbach Schriften,” p. 54). Conrad of Thuringia also gave the celebratory dinner for the various
religious in the wake of Elisabeth’s canonization (see
Processus et ordo canonizationis
, in Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, p. 146).

²⁶
See Auvray, 11 October 1234, no. 2114, for his directions to the bishop of Hildesheim, and various other religious authorities,
to undertake an inquisition regarding Elisabeth’s miracles. The canonization was effected by the bull
Gloriosus in maiestate sua
. See Auvray, 1 June 1235, no. 2600. Cf. the account that was probably written by Raymond of Peñafort,
Processus et ordo canonizationis
, in Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, pp. 142–45.

²⁷
On this ceremony, see chap. 4, pp. 140–41, below. On his Constitutions of Melfi of 1231, see Lea,
Inquisition
, 1:221, 227, 320, 2:148, 198, 199, and David Abulafia,
Frederick II: A Medieval
Emperor
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 211–13.

²⁸
See Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, pp. 142–46. On Raymond’s probable authorship, see ibid., introd., pp. 29–30.

²⁹
Gregory granted only forty days indulgence for pilgrimages to the tomb of Virgil of Salzburg (d. 784), who was canonized
two years later (Vauchez,
Sainthood
, p. 74 n. 37).

³⁰
Huyskens,
Der sog. Libellus
, pp. 45–46.

³¹
Nicholas Aragonius,
Vita Gregorii Papae IX
,
RIS
, 3,1:580.

³²
See Elliott,
Spiritual Marriage
, pp. 156–57.

³³
Raymond of Peñafort,
Summa de poenitentia et matrimonio
3.33.4 (Rome: Joannes Tallini, 1603), p. 383; Aquinas,
ST
3a, q. 85, art. 2, resp., 60:56–59. See Elliott,
Spiritual Marriage
, pp. 187–88.

³⁴
This association is very ancient. On nuptial veiling and the consecration of virgins in the West, see Raymond D’Izarny, “Mariage
et consécration virginale au IVe sie`cle,”
La Vie spirituelle
supp. 6 (1953): 92–118. Cf. parallels with consecrated widows, in Mary Erler, “English Vowed Women at the End of the Middle
Ages,”
Mediaeval Studies
57 (1995): 155–204. On some of the symbolic ramifications, see Nancy Warren,
Spiritual Economies: Female Monasticism in Later
Medieval England
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001), pp. 4–9, 87, 25–29.

³⁵
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania 35 See chap. 2, p. 55, above, and chap. 5, n. 135, below.

³⁶
This stricture is already present in the so-called first rule, although the actual text that Francis presented to Innocent
III has not survived. See Cajetan Esser, ed.,
Opuscula sancti patris Francisci
(Grottaferrata, Rome: College of Saint Bonaventure, 1978), c. 12, p. 265. Also see Donato Soliman,
Il ministero della confessione nella legislazione dei Frati Minori
, Studi e Testi Francescani, no. 28 (Rome: Edizione Francescane, 1964), p. 145.

³⁷
See n. 20, above. The expanded version of the four handmaidens’ testimony also stresses Conrad’s control over Elisabeth’s
property (Huyskens,
Der sog. Libellus
, p. 50). On the church’s protection of the widow as
miserabilis persona
, see James Brundage, “Widows as Disadvantaged Persons in Medieval Canon Law,” in
Upon My Husband
’
s Death: Widows in the Literature and
Histories of Medieval Europe
, ed. Helen Mirren (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1992), pp. 193–206.

³⁸
Conrad writes to Gregory IX that Elisabeth followed him to Marburg, even though he alleges his own disapproval of her move.
Marburg was at the farthest reaches of her husband’s land (Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, p. 158).

³⁹
See Isentrud’s testimony in ibid., pp. 115–16. Though Elisabeth used her dowry to supplement Ludwig’s table with permitted
food for herself and her attendants, she often needed to feign eating in order to avert scandal. Her careful efforts to distinguish
between permissible and impermissible food correspond closely to the kind of advice given to the wives of usurers in confessors’
manuals. See, for example, Robert of Courson’s manual, written between 1204 and 1210, which urged the usurer’s wife to reject
the tainted food of her husband’s board in favor of sustenance purchased from her own dowry. Failing that, she should employ
a psychic “winnowing instrument” (
uentilabrum
) to distinguish licit from illicit goods, partaking only of the former. See V. L. Kennedy’s edition of the manual in “Robert
of Courson on Penance” c. 10,
Mediaeval Studies
7 (1945): 319–20. Also see Caroline Walker Bynum,
Holy Feast and Holy Fast: The Religious
Signi
fi
cance of Food to Medieval Women
(Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1987), pp. 135–36. Note that Christina Mirabilis allegedly experienced
excruciating pain if she inadvertently partook of food of suspect origins (
VCM
, p. 654; trans. King, p. 15).

⁴⁰
For Conrad’s interference, see Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, p. 137. Also see the section in his letter to Gregory cited below. Cf. Dietrich of Apolda,
Vita
7.4, pp. 100–101. On the husband’s interference with the wife’s alms, and the wife’s special permission to circumvent this
interference, see Elliott,
Spiritual Marriage
, pp. 189–90; eadem, “Dress as Mediator between Inner and Outer Self: The Pious Matron of the High and Later Middle Ages,”
Mediaeval Studies
53 (1991): 279–308, esp. 297–99 for Ludwig’s alleged interference.

⁴¹
Dietrich of Apolda,
Vita
2.7, pp. 40–41.

⁴²
Huyskens,
Quellenstudien
, pp. 158–59. The leper was instantly supplanted by a poor scabby child who had hardly any hair on his head.

⁴³
Caesarius of Heisterbach,
Vita
, in “Des Cäsarius von Heisterbach Schriften,” p. 24. On traditional burial practices which presuppose that spouses will be
buried together, see Gratian, C. 13 q. 2 c. 2–3. Note, however, that this is not obligatory (C. 13 q. 2 c. 3 dpc).