The liturgical manuscripts of the Library of the Parisian Abbey of Saint-Victor (about 1108-1790). Manuscripts, descriptions, differentiations

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Rainer Berndt
• Subject Area: Roman Catholic Theology ; Medieval History
• Term: since 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 455816468

To write the History of Christian worship in the Latin Middle Ages, constitutes a procedure which enrolls as well medieval culture as the entire society of that time. It is similar to the Bible, which should be considered as the book, which acted, in all parts of a given society, as a normgiving authority. The Christian forms of worshipping within medieval societies of Europe dominated their religious rites and were to be understood as well indicating where to develop to as building up liturgical forms. Liturgical manuscripts are comparable to biblical manuscripts, which used to be of an uncredible textual richness and which wanted to underline the divine word by creative dynamics. Similarly the carefully produced liturgical manuscripts from the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Times, which often leave strong traces of use, show until our days an unimaginable spread of spiritual care and religiousness on the hand of the liturgical ‘authors’. On the basis of all the available manuscripts, the liturgy of the Victorines at Paris should become reconstructable for about a period of nearly 400 years (until about 1500). These liturgical manuscripts contribute to show the cultural as well as the intellectual force of exactly this religious community within Paris: Liturgical texts use to be ordinary texts; the medieval manuscripts transmitting them are, at the same time, contemporary witnesses of christianity. Today, it seems to be elementary for the understanding of the 12th and 13th centuries, to grasp the inner connection between the liturgy which a religious community used to celebrate daily, for example St Victor, and its intellectual ambitions. Carrying out research about the Victorine liturgy of Paris signifies at the same time: One should try to seize the deeper layers of the Victorine engagement in favor of understanding and erudition from the Middle Ages until Modern Times. Because of the Parisian reformed clercs‘ preference for liturgical celebrations, in relationship with the cultivation of erudition and science, they have reached the best modernization of religious life, according to their own understanding, during the twelfth century. It is essential for this project‘s first part, to point out as an example the connection, mentioned here before, of religousness (liturgy, fidelity to the Rule) together with science (erudition, philosophy, literature) according to the liturgical manuscripts of Saint-Victor. This project carries out fundamental research inasmuch its results will enable, on one hand, new historical features about the Church and Reign in France during the Middle Ages and until the French Revolution. On the other hand, it should provide new patterns which are intended to explain the theological revival during the 12th and 13th centuries.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants