Raiding Saint Peter: Empty Sees, Violence, and the Initiation of the Great Western Schism (1378)

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The Astrolabe

An ancient instrument for solving problems of location and distance, as well as time

Astrolábon órganon is the word used in Ptolemaeus Syntaxis 5.1 to describe a form of armillary sphere consisting of both fixed and rotating rings for determining the ecliptic co-ordinates of stars. Also called astrolabe were two-dimensional representations of the celestial sphere: over fixed disks with a representation of the horizon of the earth (in each case for a specific geographic latitude) and its parallels up to the zenith lies a rotating representation of the heavens (called ‘spider’ or ‘net’) with zodiac and indicators for some of the brightest stars. On the back is an indicator (‘alidade’) with visor plates for calculating the height of the stars. The astrolabe allows its user to determine the hours of day and night, the positions of stars, and the height and depth of objects on earth (mountains, buildings, wells). The oldest extant descriptions of the flat, planispheric astrolabe come from Iohannes Philoponus, 6th century AD, and (in Syrian) from Severus Sebokht, c. 660 AD. Indirect references may date back as early as Theon (4th cent.). Between the 8th and the 9th centuries the Arabs appropriated the knowledge of the astrolabe. At the end of the 10th century and again in the 12th century, they passed it on to Western Europe, where astrolabes were constructed up until the 17th cent. Today, one Byzantine astrolabe (from 1062) is extant, as are some 750 Arabic-Islamic astrolabes and approximately the same number of European astrolabes.

This information is abstracted from Brill's New Pauly, the English edition of the authoritative Der Neue Pauly, Encyclopaedia of the Ancient World. The encyclopaedic coverage and high academic standard of the work, the interdisciplinary and contemporary approach and clear and accessible presentation have made the New Pauly the unrivalled modern reference work for the ancient world. For more information see www.brillsnewpauly.com or visit our website catalog: www.brill.nl/bnp
Brill’s New Pauly and the complete original Der Neue Pauly, the recognized standard reference works for students and scholars of the ancient world are also available online. This dual-language edition offers basic and advanced search facilities and is fully browsable. New English translations are added as they become available. See www.paulyonline.brill.nl for more information and a demo version.

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Publications & Services> News> Now Available> Raiding Saint Peter: Empty Sees, Violence, and the Initiation of the Great Western Schism (1378)

Raiding Saint Peter: Empty Sees, Violence, and the Initiation of the Great Western Schism (1378)

Joëlle Rollo-Koster

Books

Available
Publication year: 2008


Series:	Brill's Series in Church History, 32
ISBN-13 (i)The ISBN (International Standard Book Number) has been changed from 10 to 13 digits on 1 January 2007:	978 90 04 16560 1
ISBN-10:	90 04 16560 6

Cover:	Hardback
Number of pages:	288 pp.

List price:	€ 99.00 / US$ 148.00

Table of contents

Preface
Acknowledgements

Introduction

1. The Empty See
a. Empty See Governance and the Papal Electoral System
b. The Liturgy of the Empty See
c. Looting, Charity, and Liturgy

2. The Empty See as Liminal Phenomenon

3. Looting the Empty See: The Early Chronology
a. Introducing Spolia: The Connection with the Ancient
b. Early Spoils: Historiography
c. Evidence
d. Right of Spoil

4. Looting the Empty See: The Great Western Schism (1378)
a. Rome 1378: Quick Historiography
b. Rome 1378: Background
c. Rome 1378: “Romanum Volumus Papam Vel Omnes Moriemini!”

Conclusion: More Loot

Works Cited and Bibliography
Index

Readership

All those interested in the history of the Church, papal, social and cultural history, the history of religious institutions, historico-cultural issues, and historical anthropology.

About the author(s)

Joëlle Rollo-Koster, Ph.D. (1992) in History, State University of New York at Binghamton, is Professor of Medieval History at the University of Rhode Island. She has published extensively on papal Avignon.

Throughout the European Middle Ages, the death of high-ranking prelates was usually interwoven with violent practices. During Empty Sees, mobs ransacked bishops’ and popes’ properties to loot their movable goods. Eventually, in the later Middle Ages, they also plundered the goods of newly-elected popes, and the cells of the Conclave. This book follows and analyzes the history of this violence, using a methodology akin to cultural anthropology, with concepts such as liminal periodization. It contends that pillaging was attached to ecclesiastical interregna, and the nature of ecclesiastical elections contributed to a pillaging ‘problem.’ This approach allows for a fresh reading and re-contextualization of one of the greatest political crises of the later Middle Ages, the Great Western Schism.