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00.04.07, Shepard, Courting Power

00.04.07, Shepard, Courting Power


Those weary of theoretical posturings may find this monograph refreshing. The only thing fashionable about Courting Power: Persuasion and Politics in the Early Thirteenth Century is the title, which is misleading. This book is not concerned with the ceremonial expression of power; it is a study of letters produced in the papal and imperial chanceries. "Courting" turns out to be a euphemism for the rhetorical strategies employed by Frederick II and his rivals in Rome, who "sought power by courting the minds and hearts of prominent men" (xiv), while "persuasion" is the process whereby the letter-writers attempted to sway an unspecified audience, successfully or unsuccessfully (invariably the latter, one finds). Where "power" and "politics" enter the picture is less clear. Laurie Shepard's thesis is that the thirteenth century introduced a "new paradigm of persuasion" that could aid in the articulation of "competing visions of Christendom". (xiii) She contends that the aggrandizement of papal power under Innocent III and the matching claims of the Emperor coincided with the "sudden appearance" of an epistolary stance "that admitted conflict". (211) This change is discernible in letters: once brief and generalized, they became longer and more specific in their articulation of grievances and were, Shepard insists, intended for a "responsive public"--a public not explicitly identified until the concluding pages of this study as the denizens of "ecclesiastical and secular courts". (212-213). A secondary argument is developed in a single chapter, to the effect that the influence of Aristotle was felt in the imperial chancery (but not in that of the pope) and that, as a result, the secular ruler developed logical arguments based on reason and expediency, while the papacy continued to rely on the reiteration of immutable law. This latter argument is not convincing, and the former can only be made if one is prepared to situate letter-writing within a larger historical context, analyzing the relationship between real power and powerful rhetoric.

The first chapter, "Framing the Facts in Medieval Epistolary Theory" traces changes in the teaching of the ars dictandi, which in the early part of the twelfth century focused on flattering the reader into a state of compliance; by end of the century, manuals were advising the writer to offer the most powerful interpretation of specific events. But if, as Shepard argues, the "French" manuals (i.e. manuals in Latin copied or composed by churchmen living in what is now France) signal a shift toward a new type of rhetoric, one that "authorizes the writer to control the events that prompted the act of writing" (23-24), we need to ask if there has been a corresponding change in the function of these letters and the circumstances under which they were written and read. The reality is that letters of the early period, so vague and comforting, are more likely to have been supplemented by some sort of oral exchange, and were therefore only one element in a set of political maneuvers. In the thirteenth century, by contrast, letters were doing more of the work on their own. Indeed, Shepard mentions the fact that these manuals signal a "'technological' innovation" (9), yet her use of quotation marks indicates that she is not used to thinking about her sources in this way. The specific conditions in which letters were composed, transmitted, received, saved, and used are not considered. Shepard nods in the direction of aurality in her frequent references to the sonority of the stilus supremus (pp. 5, 35, 95) and she insists throughout on the letters' "public" character (pp. 4, 151-153, 166, and passim). But the nature of that public, and the mechanisms by which the letters would have reached it, are topics never directly addressed. Only the lengthy quotations from the letters, which take the place of detailed analysis, can be relied upon to identify the recipients as "listeners".

The limitations of Shepard's approach are highlighted in Chapter Two, "Persuasion and Reception," which cites the number of letters written at the two courts as "[e]vidence of the preoccupation with rhetorical persuasion and the chancellors' belief in the effectiveness of rhetoric in swaying public opinion". (34) This statement begs several questions: what factors account for the survival of letters, how do we measure their effect, and what constitutes "public opinion"? Sheer numbers, however large, cannot be construed as the result of heightened tensions. As many recent studies have shown, the thirteenth century was marked by a drive toward the creation, preservation, and consultation of written documents; there are more letters in the archives because more letters were being produced and retained, and they are longer and more subtle because they are bearing a larger share of the diplomatic burden. But were these letters the most important agents of persuasion and, if so, how did they work? The best example "of the reaction of the public to papal and imperial missives" that can be offered in this chapter turns out to be Matthew Paris (of all people) and the long passage quoted from the Chronica majora of St. Albans says nothing whatsoever about letters. (35-36) Instead, Matthew mentions the dissemination of information via reportage, sayings, utterances, whisperings, and rumor. What, then, is the link between the letters and Matthew's sources, which are acknowledged to be oral? (40) Although Shepard's own sources keep pointing toward the role of performance in the reception of epistolary rhetoric, that component is consistently ignored. Even the sirventes of the troubadours are treated as documents. (39) In short, the context in which letters were read--aloud--must be considered in any discussion of reception, and some recourse to reader-response theory (e.g. Hans Robert Jauss) would also seem to be necessary here.

Chapter Three, which "provides a cursory account of the historical relationship between pope and emperor" (xvi) is disturbingly reliant on potted histories of "church and state," some published well before the Second World War. Ernst Kantorowicz and Walter Ullmann are presented as the main authorities on the institutions of the Empire, and the Oxford Dictionary of Popes provides background on the Church. To be sure, recent works by James Brundage and Kenneth Pennington are consulted for basic information on the development of canon law, while the scholarship of Giles Constable, Martin Camargo, and Ronald G. Witt is cited in technical discussions of the ars dictandi. But it is odd to see six entries for Charles Homer Haskins in the bibliography, unsettling to find so many references to high school and college-level anthologies (unfortunately, Brian Tierney's The Crisis of Church and State, 1050-1300 is listed as Crisis in Church and State. 1150-1300), and downright frustrating to be referred to one's old medieval history textbook (Tierney and Painter!) for further insight. (70, n. 2) Of course, this is not supposed to be a work of history. But if the goal is to show that letter-writing techniques respond to changing political circumstances, or are the catalyst for change, those political circumstances must be described in a responsible and nuanced manner.

Part Two devotes a chapter each to the papal chanceries under Innocent III (1198-1216), Honorius III (1216-1227), and Gregory IX (1227-1241). Shepard makes the point that Innocent's epistolary innovations (or those of his chancery) were designed to reflect and advance his ambitions for the papacy, and that his "mastery of a discourse of power" was as challenging to secular and ecclesiastical officialdom as other aspects of his program. However, the letters that receive consideration in Chapter Four are not those addressed to the young Frederick or his guardians, so their relevance to the relationship between empire and papacy is unclear. Moreover, the evidence on which Shepard rests her conclusions in these chapters is slight: three or four famous examples of epistolography are allowed to stand for the entire output of the chancery during each pontificate, and these are quoted at length while the reader's attention is drawn to figures of speech, biblical allusions, and other stylistic niceties. Translations are serviceable, but they do not help to illuminate the material. Gregory IX's condemnation of the unacceptable behavior that led to Frederick II's excommunication in 1227 contains the evocative phrase "ruptis vinculis quibus tenebatur astrictus," rendered as "breaking the vows by which he was strictly held" (120), a translation that obscures an ironic reference to St. Peter's chains miraculously broken in the service of the Church (Acts 12: 6-7). And in a study devoted to the use and reception of words, it makes little sense to translate important stock phrases differently in two adjoining passages: res gestae is "the facts" on one page and "what has happened" on the next. (13-14)

Chapter Five, "Harmony and Conflict at the Chancery of Honorius III," would seem to promise a fascinating glimpse of scribal dysfunction, but it is really about the concepts of "harmony" and "conflict" and their articulation in the letters drafted during Honorius' reign. Still, the metaphorical title raises important questions: how complete was the turnover in personnel from pontificate to pontificate? Who actually controlled the letter-writing campaigns? Did the popes dictate some or all of the letters themselves? According to Gerald of Wales, Innocent III had all his correspondence read aloud to him. How would that dynamic affect the way he received information or formulated his letters? How did Honorius III achieve the "verbal, phonic, and rhythmic repetition" characteristic of his correspondence? (95) An imperial letter cited in a later chapter provides a wonderful description of Gregory IX at work: "in his room, with something of the merchant's manner, he weighs with scales fit for wares... acting as his own sealer and scribe and maybe even as his own accountant" ("camera sua more mercatoris cuiuslibet, in libra mercationis appendit...existens sibi bullator et scriptor et forsitan numerator," quoted n. 6 on p. 209; my translation). Instead of occupying the apostolic throne, judging the sins of mankind, the pope is cast as a parsimonious businessmen surrounded by the tools of his trade. This vivid caricature deserves to have an impact on the discussion of Gregory's documentary activity in Chapter Six.

In Part Three, Shepard turns to the epistolary output of the imperial chancery, where she attempts to locate the "Emergence of a New Paradigm of Persuasion" (Chapter Seven). She argues in Chapter Eight that this paradigm was partly based on the Aristotelian strain in medieval thought, and that the papal chancery was untouched by the new learning. This stance owes everything to a stereotypical view of the Church as irrational and old-fashioned, and the fact that no intellectual histories are cited at this juncture (not even that of David Knowles) makes it hard to take this argument at all seriously. At any rate, the only direct evidence of Aristotelian influence at Frederick's court is not derived from the letters but from his hunting treatise, De arte venandi cum avibus, and from the prologue to the Liber Augustalis. As far as the letters are concerned, the influence of Virgil is more palpable than that of Aristotle. Despite Shepard's claim that imperial epistolary rhetoric is "straightforward" (175) and burdened with "few rhetorical flourishes," there is no denying that it was capable of describing a battle outside Milan in epic terms ("tanquam de celo tonitruum ipsis intonuit," "autem noctis umbrosa caligine," etc.). Frederick is represented as Aeneas, not "an Old Testament hero". (177)

Although the ars dictandi is repeatedly described as "porous" (pp. xv, 157, 211), and while Shepard is clearly interested in the reciprocal influences of canon law, biblical exegesis, and scholasticism, she is not able to demonstrate how official letters functioned within the intellectual and political life of the thirteenth century. Nor does she even attempt to show how successful they were in swaying either their recipients or "the public." The very structure of the book is at odds with its thesis, since it treats the letters of the popes and those of the emperor in separate sections, thus fostering an impression that the two chanceries were controlled environments in which two teams played elaborate word-games without reference to each other or to the world outside. The premise of the book, that rhetoric matters, is untenable if there is no attempt to situate the study of rhetoric within a larger context, or even to make a case for the necessity of studying the "paradigm of persuasion" in this way.

For Courting Power is almost entirely uninfluenced by the scholarship of the past thirty years. Like the letters that provide its subject-matter, it appears to have been written in a vacuum. There has been no recourse whatsoever to the valuable studies of documentary practices, accountability, literacy and public reading, political ceremonial, and medieval rhetoric by Michael Clanchy, Alexander Murray, Paul Saenger, Geoffrey Koziol, and Mary Carruthers, among many others. Literary criticism seems to have ceased with Erich Auerbach and Ernst Curtius; Peter Dronke is represented only by a short article in a collection of essays. Needless to say, these pages are entirely uncontaminated by postmodernism, but to such an extent that even the conservative reader fairly longs for a deep draught of the New Philology, the New Historicism--or any other -ism, for that matter.

It is hard to see how Courting Power fits into "a series of interpretive and analytic studies" of medieval literature ("General Editors' Forward," ix). One must conclude that it has been ill-served by its editors. At the very least, they should have kept an eye on structure and apparatus, since the notes repeatedly cite the same secondary works in full, there is no division of primary and secondary material in the bibliography, and the index is rudimentary. An editor should also have helped to weed out unnecessary repetitions: we are invited to share Innocent III's vision of a "society animated by papal love and governed by papal vigilance" twice in the space of seven pages (pp. 78 and 84). But it is ultimately the fault of the author when repetition takes the place of proof. "The persuasive approach of imperial letters always depended on the public it was addressing, and secondarily on the subject matter of the document" (151), "the persuasive approach of a letter ultimately depends on its content and intended public" (152), "[f]inally, it is clear that the public had changed," and "[r]hetorical persuasion evolved because an awareness that new ideas and a new intellectual elite were transforming the culture of the ruling class". (153) This string of contradictory assertions only underscores the fact that the letters' "public," changing or unchanging, remains elusive. The scholarly public of Courting Power is similarly undefined.