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Regendering Radegund? Fortunatus, Baudonivia and the Problem of Female Sanctity in Merovingian Gaul1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

Simon Coates
Simon Coates*
Affiliation:
King’s College, University of London
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Extract

In the prologue of her De vita sancti Radegundis, Baudonivia, an inhabitant of Radegund’s community of the Holy Cross at Poitiers, adopted a phrase from Venantius Fortunatus’ Vita Hilarii to express her unworthiness for the task: ‘I can as easily touch heaven with my fingers as perform the task you have imposed on me.’ Baudonivia, the first female hagiographer in Merovingian Gaul, was here drawing from the Life of a male saint to introduce her work. She was thus, like all hagiographers, not alone in her task. This was doubly the case, since immediately prior to the composition of her own work Venantius Fortunatus had himself composed a Vita of the saint. Radegund was thus a focus of both male and female interest. This paper will examine the two Lives from a gendered perspective, exploring the manner in which gender, a constructed rather than a physiological form of sexual differentiation, may illumine Radegund’s sanctity.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 34: Gender and Christian Religion , 1998 , pp. 37 - 50
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1998

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Footnotes

1

An early version of this paper was presented to the Denys Hay Seminar at Edinburgh University in May 1996. Its final version was completed during a period of research funded by the British Academy. I wish to thank Marilyn Dunn, Judith George, Julia Smith, Janet Nelson, and Conrad Leyser for comments on previous drafts. I am grateful to the President and Members of the Ecclesiastical History Society for a bursary to attend the Canterbury conference.

References

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29 VR.2, c. 1, pp. 379–80; trans. Sainted Women of the Dark Ages, p. 87.

30 VR.2, cc.8-10, 17, 19, pp. 382–5, 389–90, 391–2.

31 Ibid., cc.10-12, pp. 384–6.

32 Ibid., cc.13-14, 16–17, pp. 386–90.

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53 VR2, cc.8, 17, pp. 382–3, 389–90.

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55 Ibid., c.24, p. 372.

56 Ibid., c.6, p. 367; trans. Sainted Women of the Dark Ages, p. 73.

57 VR1, c.22, pp. 371–2; trans. Sainted Women of the Dark Ages, p. 79.

58 VR2, c.8, pp. 382–3.

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60 VR2, c.20, pp. 391–2; trans. Sainted Women of the Dark Ages, p. 101.

61 VR2, c.23, p. 392, citing Gregory of Tours, Liber in gloria confessorum, 104.

62 Gal. 3.28.