We’ve Been Here Before: How Past and Place Were Retold in the Violent Eleventh Century

Around the turn of the millennium, few thought that there was anything new under the sun. Relying heavily on Augustine, current events were thought to be somehow “outside” of sacred history; that sacred history had stopped after the apostolic age and would only be restarted just before the End. Churchmen of the Year 1000 seem to have thought that time progressed in a series of essentially repeating cycles. Taking as a case study three contemporary authors working in early eleventh-century southwestern Francia, Ademar of Chabannes, Radulfus Glaber, and Bernard of Angers, this paper will show how each author constructed (similar) narratives of disorder and violence, but ones which would be quite familiar to their primarily monastic readers. They all read the past and present typologically, so that, in their common conceptions of the arc of sacred history, they retold the story of the Israelites in a new place – theirs. Details differed but the song remained the same. Therefore, understanding how these authors conceptualized the struggles of the new chosen people will allow us to rethink the reality of the “violent eleventh century.” The kingdom of Israel had splintered following David and Solomon, with decadent kings, a falling away from the true God, and ultimate loss of Jerusalem. In the eyes of our eleventh-century authors, recent history followed that same pattern – after Charlemagne (David) and Louis the Pious (Solomon), the kingdom had splintered, decadent kings warred among themselves, Jerusalem was lost, and the chosen people forgot true religion.