Original scientific paper
The Translatio Beati Grisogoni Martyris as a Historical Source
Mladen Ančić
; Zavod za povijesne znanosti HAZU u Zadru HR -22000 Zadar,
Abstract
An analysis of the text of the legend known as the Translatio beati Grisogoni Martyris has shown that in its composition and inner characteristics it entirely corresponds to the comprehension and spirit of the period from the 9th to the 11th centuries. More detailed analysis has brought to light a series of elements indicating that the text in its present form was created as a classic legend about the discovery and transportation ofthe bones (inventio ossis and translatio) of an early Christian saint-martyr, or rather the miracles (miracula) that were usually attributed to such relics, somewhere at the end of the 9th century or in the first half of the 1ath. The text was intended mainly for verbal communication, for being read aloud within a certain social circle, the leading stratum of the city and its immediate vicinity. Further research has indicated the possibility of recognizing elements that depict the conditions in Zadar and its hinterland in the period when the work was created, despite the fact that this text corresponds exactly to similar texts widely distributed in the same period. Although the intention of the writer apparently was not the faithful display and deSCription ofthe events spoken ofin the legend, he has nonetheless left us valuable data about the political organization ofthe city in the 9th century and the beginning of the lOth, the connections that existed in the deep spatial extent of the hinterland, all the way to Moravia, and finally has shown the way in which what some historians in the recent period have called "the conjuncture ofthe 9th century" was practically manifested in the reRion of the Croatian princedom.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
93242
URI
Publication date:
5.11.1998.
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