Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.31745/s.67.3
MEDIEVAL ITINERARY AROUND THE HOLY LAND IN THE VINODOL MISCELLANY
Josip VUČKOVIĆ
; Staroslavenski institut, Zagreb, Hrvatska
Abstract
This article presents a literary and historical analysis of the text ot er(u)s(o)l(i)ma i groba b(o)žiê čt(enie) [The reading on Jerusalem and God’s Sepulchre] which is preserved in a late medieval Glagolitic codex known as the Vinodol miscellany (Zagreb: Archives of the Croatian
Academy of Sciences and Arts, sign. III a 15). In addition it contains the first edition of the source. The text is identified as a member of the itineraria genre and it is the only known medieval itinerary in the Holy Land written in the Croatian language. While the direct source of the
Croatian texts has not been found, a few idiosyncratic toponyms point to the conclusion that the Croatian writer was using a Latin or a Romance source. The itinerary describes the pilgrimage from the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem to Hebron, where the creation of Adam was to be commemorated. In this article, I argue that the pilgrims’ progression through the sites could have been envisaged as the commemoration of the history of salvation in a reverse order. Given that the text refers to the contemporary Muslim presence in the Holy Land only once, it was unlikely to be intended as a practical guide for a real pilgrimage. The avoidance of the references to the Muslim presence allow for an interpretation of the itinerary as an instructive text which was promoting the western construct of the Holy Land as a sacred area to which the Christians have the exclusive right. A further support for the conclusion that the text was not a practical guide comes from the codicological placement of the itinerary between texts which were written for the purpose of religious instruction. Apart from serving the purpose of Christian memory building, the itinerary could have also been used as a script for a meditative religious devotion in the form of a virtual pilgrimage.
Keywords
Vinodol miscellany; medieval itinerary; Croatian Glagolitic literature; pilgrimage; virtual pilgrimage; medieval Jerusalem; Holy Land; collective memory; iterology
Hrčak ID:
193356
URI
Publication date:
30.12.2017.
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