Type
Text
Type
Dissertation
Advisor
Lipton, Sara | Rosenthal, Joel | Cooper, Alix | Zarker Morgan, Leslie.
Date
2015-12-01
Keywords
Medieval history
Department
Department of History.
Language
en_US
Source
This work is sponsored by the Stony Brook University Graduate School in compliance with the requirements for completion of degree.
Identifier
http://hdl.handle.net/11401/77720
Publisher
The Graduate School, Stony Brook University: Stony Brook, NY.
Format
application/pdf
Abstract
Very broadly, friendship can be defined as a particular relationship between individuals that is reciprocal in nature. On the one hand, it is a relationship that is universal, but on the other hand friendship is a concept that is socially constructed and historicized through the meanings and functions a particular society gives to it and the ways in which the relationship is realized and performed. Furthermore, friendship is as much an idea as it is a lived experience. This dissertation examines friendship among women in medieval Italian cities of the thirteenth– and fourteenth– centuries. The primary focus of this study is an analysis of the hagiographies of a particular set of female saints from that period: women who leaned towards independence in their pious endeavors, or sought out new types of religious communities. In this period of spiritual experimentation when the authors of these texts were not sure quite how to present their subjects, these hagiographies provide unique insight into the female networks of companions and acquaintances in which the saints circulated. These holy women depended on other women for material, emotional, and spiritual support, yet at the same time the texts reveal a deep anxiety about these worldly connections. As representations of urban living, these narratives demonstrate the importance of friendship in the lives of medieval Italian women. Furthermore, the centrality of relationships beyond those of blood or kin was a key feature of Italian urban society. Within this context, a new model for friendship was developing, one that took elements from the traditional philosophical ideals of perfect friendship but applied them towards a society whose stability depended on a variety of overlapping connections of blood, kin, guild, parish, and neighborhood. Although women were not citizens or civic participants in the legal sense that there husbands, fathers, and brothers were, friendship was still a means through which women constructed their civil identity. | Very broadly, friendship can be defined as a particular relationship between individuals that is reciprocal in nature. On the one hand, it is a relationship that is universal, but on the other hand friendship is a concept that is socially constructed and historicized through the meanings and functions a particular society gives to it and the ways in which the relationship is realized and performed. Furthermore, friendship is as much an idea as it is a lived experience. This dissertation examines friendship among women in medieval Italian cities of the thirteenth– and fourteenth– centuries. The primary focus of this study is an analysis of the hagiographies of a particular set of female saints from that period: women who leaned towards independence in their pious endeavors, or sought out new types of religious communities. In this period of spiritual experimentation when the authors of these texts were not sure quite how to present their subjects, these hagiographies provide unique insight into the female networks of companions and acquaintances in which the saints circulated. These holy women depended on other women for material, emotional, and spiritual support, yet at the same time the texts reveal a deep anxiety about these worldly connections. As representations of urban living, these narratives demonstrate the importance of friendship in the lives of medieval Italian women. Furthermore, the centrality of relationships beyond those of blood or kin was a key feature of Italian urban society. Within this context, a new model for friendship was developing, one that took elements from the traditional philosophical ideals of perfect friendship but applied them towards a society whose stability depended on a variety of overlapping connections of blood, kin, guild, parish, and neighborhood. Although women were not citizens or civic participants in the legal sense that there husbands, fathers, and brothers were, friendship was still a means through which women constructed their civil identity. | 173 pages
Recommended Citation
Boffa, Andrea Rebecca, "Amicitia among Women: Fellowship & Pious Practice in the Vitae of Italian Saints" (2015). Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions). 3507.
https://commons.library.stonybrook.edu/stony-brook-theses-and-dissertations-collection/3507