"Gothic" Women and Merovingian Desert Mothers
Judith Oliver
A previously unstudied Brabantine psalter-hours of the late thirteenth century has textual and liturgical contents pointing to ownership by a devout religious woman, most probably beguine. The extraordinary length its litany, especially list virgin saints, sets this manuscript apart from other extant devotional books period made in region. It includes local female saints Merovingian origin whose cults reemerged twelfth centuries. Reliquaries created same provide us with tangible evidence for their veneration. Thus exploring provided vitae thirteenth-century mulieres sanctae diocese Liege as well contemporary art, liturgy, popular French literature, we may be able regain greater understanding devotion beguines women these saints.
Gesta