Daily Life Depicted in the Cantigas de Santa Maria

Islands of Castile: Artistic, Literary, and Legal Perception of the Sea in Castile-Leon, 1248-1450

In the Cantigas de Santa Maria, King Alfonso X unveils an intricate cultural, political, and economic system that defines the relationship between Christian society and religious minorities. This article illustrates that the Cantigas must be understood as an ideological instrument of cultural codification that reaffirms the established Christian social order in relation to three principal groups: heretics, Jews, and Muslims.

Heretics and Infidels: The Cantigas de Santa María as Ideological Instrument of Cultural Codification

Objective: To discuss the neuropsychiatric phenomena described in Cantigas de Santa Maria ( Canticles of St. Mary [ CSM ]). Background: CSM is a collection of 427 canticles composed in Galician-Portuguese between 1252 and 1284 at the Court of King Alfonso X the Wise of Spain (1221–1284). The canticles (of which 9 are repeated) include devotional and liturgical poems and 353 narrative stories consisting mainly of depictions of Marian miracles. Most are set to music and many are illustrated. Methods: We reviewed the canticles for description of miracles and other neuropsychiatric phenomena. Two neurologists reached a consensus about the descriptions. Results: Of the 353 miracles, 279 medically relevant facts (from 187 canticles) and 25 instances of resurrection were reported. Possible neuropsychiatric conditions were described in 98 canticles. Physicians were mentioned in 16 narratives. The most common neurologic conditions detailed were blindness (n = 17), dystonia, weakness, and deformities (n = 20). Other common conditions included psychosis (n = 15), speech disorder/deaf-mutism (n = 12), infections (n = 15), sexual dysfunction/infertility/obstetrical-gynecologic issues (n = 18), head trauma (n = 5), ergotism/St. Anthony9s fire (n = 7), and others. There were 9 instances of prodromic mystical experiences/hallucinations heralding death. Conclusions: While limited by retrospection and interpretation of neuropsychiatric phenomena in the medieval context, these short accounts are among the first descriptions of neuropsychiatric conditions in early Portuguese/Galician. They reflect how medieval societies used rational and irrational approaches to understand occurrences in their lives.

Neuropsychiatric phenomena in the medieval text Cantigas de Santa Maria.

"Juro al Deu aí somos nós": Some Notes on Gil Vicente's Jews and the Spanish and Portuguese Cancione[i]ros

Though studies on the Cantigas have emphasized them as a personal and collective plea for salvation, investigated the role of the troubadour, or highlighted depictions of daily life, very few have focused on the space and function of the sea in relation to the broader Alfonsine cultural and imperial project. In response to this lacuna, I argue that certain cantigas can and should be read as textual and visual manifestations (maps) of Alfonso's struggle for, and power over, the Mediterranean Sea. Moreover, and contrary to critical notions of the shipwreck text as a counterhistoriographical narrative of empire, as articulated by Josiah Blackmore, I suggest that scenes of shipwreck, piracy, and tempestuous seas in the Cantigas are, in fact, carefully constructed narratives used to demonstrate—by way of divine intercession—the authority and influence of Alfonso's empire beyond the limits of the Peninsula, into and throughout the Mediterranean space.

Daily Life Depicted in the Cantigas de Santa Maria

Citations

Islands of Castile: Artistic, Literary, and Legal Perception of the Sea in Castile-Leon, 1248-1450

Heretics and Infidels: The Cantigas de Santa María as Ideological Instrument of Cultural Codification

Neuropsychiatric phenomena in the medieval text Cantigas de Santa Maria.

"Juro al Deu aí somos nós": Some Notes on Gil Vicente's Jews and the Spanish and Portuguese Cancione[i]ros

Alfonso X's Imagined Mediterranean Empire: Shipwrecks, Storms, and Pirates in the Cantigas de Santa María

References

Las Siete Partidas

English Life In The Middle Ages

The art of the illuminated manuscript

Everyday Life in Medieval Times

Parents and Children in the Quarta Partida of Alfonso X