Professional paper
The Glagolitic Codex (Madrikula) of St. Jacob in Soline (Dugi otok) from 1750 to 1826
Grozdana Franov-Živković
; Zavod za povijesne znanosti HAZU, Zadar, Hrvatska
Abstract
Confraternities were the center of the social, economic and cultural life of a particular place. The basic tasks of the confraternities were the gathering of its members around the place patron saints (church altars) and the cultivation of devotion, humaneness, the extirpation of vice, the mutual helping out of members and of the poor, the training in social mores and community labor (learning how to run the schools), the building and the putting in order of churches, altars, church graves, the acquisition of church supplies (chalices, candlesticks, mass vestments). There were many other tasks to be performed. The material evidence of confraternities of the Zadar area (codices /madrikule/, records of bills, records of income and expenses (gain and loss), various regulations…) was, excepting the city of Zadar itself, for the most part written in Croatian and italicized Glagolithic script. The activities of the confraternity begins with the meeting of founders at the inaugural meeting (in this case of priests, friars and nuns) who determine the rules (kapitula). After this the recording secretary (in most cases the guardian, the vice-guardianor, the parish chaplain) writes out the rules at the beginning of the codex. The rules are afterwards approved by civil and church authorities. The names of the members of the “school” are written out on the pages that follow. In some cases (for example, the “school” of the village Preko), the membership dues which were either paid in money or in kind (oil, wheat, wax…) were listed next to the name and surname. Codices kept the records of annual assemblies with various recordings of larger investments made by the “school” in question (building, adding to a building, the fitting out of the altar, the purchase of bells, of tabernacles and of other church necessities). All of the larger fraternities also kept special records, that is various other kinds of books such as the book of accounts, the book of income and expenditure, various other evidence, for example, of burials in church graves, of borrowing wax, of auctions … while other schools maintained all their records in the codices themselves. In the article the author describes how the priests of the village Soline kept the records of the confraternity of St. Jacob and how their rules were implemented in practice. What is of particular interest is the manner the confraternities functioned in everyday life and how the rules accommodated to real practice. It is a fact that the confraternities played a significant role in the economic, cultural, social and religious life of a particular place on the lives of the individuals themselves and their families. This is why many inhabitants (both men and women) readily joined the “schools”, at times becoming simultaneous members of a number of them and their active members. It is important to note that data concerning two other “schools” of the Holy Sacrament and of the Holy Cross in Soline have been discovered in this codex. The files of these two (alongside many other codices written in the italicized Glagolithic script in the Zadar area) have not been preserved.
Keywords
italicized Glagolithic script; confraternities; codex (madrikula); capitals (rules); Dugi Otok; 1750-1826
Hrčak ID:
48324
URI
Publication date:
23.11.2009.
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