Northern European Reformations

Transnational Perspectives

James E. Kelly, Henning Laugerud, Salvador Ryan, James E. Kelly, Henning Laugerud, Salvador Ryan, James E. Kelly, Henning Laugerud, Salvador Ryan

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9783030544584
• Topic: Histoire
• Subtopic: Histoire de l'Europe

This book examines the experiences and interconnections of the Reformations, principally in Denmark-Norway and Britain and Ireland (but with an eye to the broader Scandinavian landscape as well), and also discusses instances of similarities between the Reformations in both realms. The volume features a comprehensive introduction, and provides a broad survey of the beginnings and progress of the Catholic and Protestant Reformations in Northern Europe, while also highlighting themes of comparison that are common to all of the bloc under consideration, which will be of interest to Reformation scholars across this geographical region.

© The Author(s) 2020

J. E. Kelly et al. (eds.)Northern European Reformationshttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54458-4_1

Begin Abstract

1. Introduction

James E. Kelly¹ , Henning Laugerud² and Salvador Ryan³

(1)

Durham University, Durham, UK

(2)

University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway

(3)

St Patrick’s College, Pontifical University, Maynooth, Ireland

James E. Kelly (Corresponding author)

Email: [email protected]

Henning Laugerud

Email: [email protected]

Salvador Ryan

Email: [email protected]

Lost Connections?

The Project

Structure

Slow Reformations

Migration, Exile and Interconnections

Zones of Circulation: Transfer of Ideas and People

Appropriations and Adaptations

Northern European Reformations Over the Longue Durée

End Abstract

Lost Connections?

A trip to the University Museum of Bergen offers ample evidence of religious exchange between Britain, Ireland and the countries of Scandinavia before the reformations of the sixteenth century.¹ For example, there is a model of the Cistercian abbey of Lyse, located some 25 kilometres south of Bergen, which was founded by Fountains Abbey in Yorkshire, in the north of England.²

Fig. 1.1

Norwegian altar frontal from Årdal, c. 1325, featuring St. Botolph. Courtesy of Bergen University Museum

(Photo Svein Skare, Universitetsmuseet i Bergen)

Nearby is a Norwegian altar frontal with, in its centre, a depiction of St Botolph, the seventh-century English abbot and saint, to whom many churches were dedicated in his homeland (Fig. 1.1).³

Fig. 1.2

Fifteenth-century Lurøy altarpiece featuring (from left to right) St. Thomas Becket, St. Olaf, St. Edmund the Martyr and St. Magnus. Courtesy of Bergen University Museum

(Photo Svein Skare, Universitetsmuseet i Bergen)

A fifteenth-century altarpiece from Lurøy includes a statue of St. Magnus, the twelfth-century Earl of Orkney who so embodied the contact between those islands, Norway and Scotland, in addition to two important English saints, St. Thomas Becket and St. Edmund the Martyr. Between the two English saints stands the martyred Norwegian king St. Olaf, a telling example of the close religious, cultural and politico-economic ties in the North-Sea area (Fig. 1.2).

Fig. 1.3

Austevoll triptych, c. 1520 with St. Sunniva in the middle. Courtesy of Bergen University Museum

(Photo Svein Skare, Universitetsmuseet i Bergen)

The Austevoll altarpiece of c.1520 depicts the tenth-century Irish St Sunniva, who fled to Norway to escape a pagan marriage (Fig. 1.3).⁴ Yet for all that contact, both physical and intellectual, limited consideration has been given to the religious experience in this specific geographical bloc during and after the reformations. There were links before the Reformation, so the natural question is to ask: what happened afterwards? Were the experiences of Christians in these countries similar or were the reformations parallel events, not just confessionally but also geographically? Were similar patterns of development at play or did the reformation create different experiences, fracturing any shared methods or paths of reform? It is with the intention of engaging with such questions that this book had been brought together, to explore the experience of these northern European countries during the period of reformations in one volume.

However, this is not about doing comparative history for the sake of it. As argued above, these nations had historic links that affected each other’s religious culture, belief and practice before the sixteenth century. Yet what happened to these shared religious heritages through the period of reformations has been generally neglected by scholars of the early modern period. As such, this collection represents an attempt to track what happened across these countries. It is not intended to offer a definitive account of the processes of reformation, but instead to highlight several thematic strands that the editors believe can be identified running through the various chapters. It is hoped that these connections may in turn offer a possible thematic template for scholars to look at the Northern European reformations in the future. Most importantly for the volume at hand, it is these themes, the editors venture, that offer the points of comparison and are common to all of the bloc under consideration, running through the differences and similarities between the reformation processes at play. As mentioned, in no way do we suggest that these themes are definitive; rather, we propose them as one possible way for scholars of the topic and the geographical area to approach the subject, a suggested attempt at commonality.

In this light, we suggest six overarching themes that are evident throughout the contributions to this collection. The first of these is the notion that the reformations in Northern Europe were influenced by wider European philosophical and religious movements from outside their locality. Equally, the Northern European reformations in turn influenced developments outside of our geographical remit, underlining a two-way process. At this point, we have deliberately shied-away from discussing this in terms of centre and peripheries.⁵ The first issue with this terminology is that it is applied differently to Catholic and Protestant reformations. Perhaps even more pertinently, the question arises of what is a periphery within this area, particularly when considering Protestant reform movements. As an island, is Orkney a periphery? Are towns within central Norway—away from the trading points on its coasts, so more cut-off from potential cultural exchanges—peripheries?⁶ Rather than be sidetracked by such quandaries, the editors wish, at this stage, to limit this theme to the observations about influences from outside Northern Europe.

The second theme very much links to the first: this as a zone of circulation. This idea breaks down into several parts. Perhaps the most obvious is the movement of people, whether as traders or to locations of exile, though this should never be understood as a permanent movement but, once again, as potentially circular. Equally, the place of (temporary) exile also had a huge influence on the type of religio-political outlook imbibed by the individual. Of course, these movements of people could be to areas outside of the region, again stressing our first thematic point above, but they were also between the nations upon which this volume focuses. Perhaps even more commonplace was the transfer of ideas, whether through news, books or oral traditions.⁷ All the countries considered in this book witnessed these phenomena. The methods, intentions and results may have differed, but it is a key thematic thread that can be seen running through this volume.

Adaptation is another core theme that is evident across the Northern European Reformations. Although we have identified it as adaptation, we could just as easily have used the terms inculturation or accommodation. To some extent, these terms are more usually applied by scholars researching the Catholic Reformation and particularly those focussing on Jesuit Studies,⁸ yet this volume makes clear that the same thing was happening, to different degrees, in the attempts at Protestant reform across Northern Europe. Reformers of whatever religious hue were intent on finding the best way to bring about their vision of religious change and, from the evidence of the chapters in this collection, some form of adaptation to the specific national situation appears to have been the norm.

That links to our next identified theme: the importance of language. In terms of how this related to religious change, it is evident that, as highlighted above, different strategies were adopted in specific areas based on what was believed most appropriate for a particular country. In some places the issue of language was dictated by what was felt best for a specific audience, whether popular or learned, national or international, but in, for example, Wales, language was a central issue, requiring as it did native Welsh-speakers for the Catholic missionary enterprise there. Nor should it be neglected that these considerations affected the literary culture of the reformations across Northern Europe, the intended audience and the medium employed being explicitly entwined. In short, there was a relationship between religious change and language beyond—and more complicated than—just the shifts from Latin to the vernacular.

From language it is easy to link to our penultimate thematic lens through which to analyse the Northern European reformations: namely, the question of identity. It is abundantly clear from the essays in this volume that the people of Northern Europe were dealing with fluctuating national, religious and supranational identities. This balancing act, one could argue, is something not quite so common in the modern world, but it is evident that in the early modern period those experiencing the reformations had to face these challenges and, indeed, expected to do so and frequently proved adept at doing just that. Of course, one could also add regional identity to the mix, which itself links to issues of memory, or continuities and discontinuities, such as the ongoing draw of holy wells or sacred spaces after their official rubbishing by reformers. The situation becomes further complicated by details of ethnicity, such as in Ireland between the Old English Catholics and Gaelic Irish Catholics, or even the differences within an ethnic culture, such as urban and rural Gaelic-speaking Catholics. Equally evident is that religious identity was not fixed, both in terms of how people defined themselves in relation to a belief structure, but also by what was actually understood to be a vital component of a particular faith group. There were clearly different ways of understanding, for example, what it meant to be Lutheran or Catholic in different geographical areas.⁹

Our final suggested theme encompasses a broad area around the tied issues of religion and politics. Immediately evident throughout this volume is how reform was intrinsically linked with state...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Front Matter
• 1. Introduction
• Part I. Slow Reformations
• Part II. Migration, Exile and Interconnections
• Part III. Zones of Circulation: Transfer of Ideas and People
• Part IV. Appropriations and Adaptations
• Part V. Northern European Reformations over the Longue Durée
• Back Matter