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Look at the Lovely Pictures of Medieval Lesbians!

Monday, March 27, 2017 - 07:00
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There's one part of me that just wants to squee on the theme of the title of this blog. But what I love about Mills' work here is that he puts the brakes on the emotional reaction that's inspired by wanting to "own" this piece of history, and he walks the reader step by step through what these images do and don't mean. The biggest part of that is that they mean a lot more than simply "here is a picture of two women or two men making love." Because sex never exists in a social vacuum. One of the conundrums of medieval evidence for sex between women is that the actual simple act of genital contact was generally not considered of significance. But a great many associated behaviors and conditions could make that act either more or less transgressive than we might expect. So, for example, a woman who makes sexual advances to another woman might be viewed as acting "against nature" not necessarily because of the object of her desire, but due to having taken an assertive role in sex at all. That is, she might be seen as no less but no more transgressive than a woman who takes the sexual initiative with a man.

From the point of view of an author trying to create motivations and reactions for a historic character, it's vitally important to understand those differences. If a woman's confessor asks her "have you had sex in an unusual way" rather than "have you had sex with another woman", the difference in how she perceives her behavior will be significant. Among the few testimonies we have from pre-modern women accused of sodomy, several of them claimed that they didn't think what they were doing was a sin. That it couldn't be unnatural because they'd heard of other women doing it. Studies like this current book help flesh out that sort of difference of approach.

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Full citation: 

Mills, Robert. 2015. Seeing Sodomy in the Middle Ages. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago. ISBN 978-0-226-16912-5

Publication summary: 

This is an in-depth study of the visual cues and visual representations of the concept of “sodomy” in medieval manuscripts and art, using the definition of that concept at the time, not the more specific modern sense. Mills looks at how gender and sexuality interact and challenges the perception that there was no coherent framework for understanding gender and sexual dissidence in the middle ages. The topics covered include images associated with the label “sodomite”, gender transformations and sex changes (especially in Ovid), and sexual relations in closed communities (such as religious houses). The analysis includes a consideration of the relevance of modern categories to the study of medieval culture.

Chapter 1 Translating Sodom

In Paris, ca. 1200, there was an increased focus on anti-sodomy literature. One writer considered it equivalent to murder because both “interfere with the multiplication of men.” Sodomy also relates to gender categories because non-procreative sex blurs distinctions and suggest androgyny. Androgynous people, according to this position, must pick a binary identity based on the nature of who they find arousing within an imposed heterosexual framework. The focus in this anti-sodomy literature is not generally on gender ambiguity, but specifically on preserving “active” male sexuality. Not only are “passive” partners despised, but the “active” partner who uses them becomes corrupted thereby. Sodomy is generally linked to luxury and effeminacy.

Anti-sodomy authors are generally associated with the cathedral schools (and naturally are churchmen) and are obsessed with the idea that “unnatural crimes” are being treated too leniently by the authorities. To address this, penitential manuals included detailed interrogation scripts that focused on details of the status and nature of the partners of the person confessing. Notably, these interrogation scripts not only omit details of the sex acts that are under scrutiny, but the confessor is instructed not to discuss them, to avoid giving people ideas. They are directed to speak only of acts “against nature” or of sex performed “in an unusual way.”

“Against nature” could include masturbation, incest, or other “seed wasting” activities. The details were often obscured as being “too terrible to name.” Sodomy was also othered and exoticised with references to unspeakable sins being practiced openly in other parts of the world. [Note: this comes back later in the chapter as a connection between sodomy and heresy or non-Christian practices.] Although “unspeakable” in text, the medieval understanding of the specific nature of these activities can be seen in how they are depicted in art, and specifically in the Bibles Moralisées. This chapter focuses on those works and images.

This genre of manuscript first appears in Paris in the 1220s-1230s. These were not “popular” books but were a restricted genre produced for royal and noble patrons. [Note: I’ll include a catalog summarizing the full manuscript references and descriptions of the relevant images at the end of this entry. For now, I’ll be using the shorthand manuscript references that Mills uses.]

The Bibles Moralisées follow a conventional layout (and there is a clear continuity of content and visual imagery across multiple examples, which makes some of the shifts and re-interpretations more obvious). A series of eight images is presented in roundels of similar artistic frames, two columns of four each, and are bracketed by two narrow columns of text at the right and left margins. The text is broken up into a total of eight boxes, aligned with and corresponding to the roundels. It is clear from the text layout that the images are primary and the text has been added, often badly fitting into the available space. This stands in sharp contrast to the usual text-centered approach to Biblical commentary. In general, within a set of four roundels, the upper left image will directly represent a biblical scene, with the images to its right and below extrapolating and commenting on it in some way, and the lower right image providing commentary and interpretation for the contemporary context. This layout allows for--in fact encourages--multiple viewing paths and ways of constructing context for the images. [I'll include a brief description of each manuscript image when it becomes relevant to the discussion, as in the following.]


Vienna MS 2554, the earliest example of the genre, created in the 1220s in Paris - Context is Adam and Eve in the garden, with subsequent images of the temptation of Eve and the marriage of Christ and the Church. The roundel of interest shows two embracing couples, one male and one female, being tormented by devils. Both couples are lying on bedding and are oriented diagonally on the page. The women are kissing and one woman is holding the other’s face in a conventionalized “chin chuck” gesture [see note]. One member of the male couple has a tonsure indicating a monk and the other wears a style of round cap that elsewhere is associated with Jews or heretics.

Note: The "chin-chuck gesture" is a conventional artistic trope that is always associated with erotic love. It involves one person holding the other's chin, with their thumb on one side and the other fingers (sometimes curled into a loose fist, sometimes straight) on the other. Due to its symbolic significance, I'll be noting for each image whether it is or is not present.


If sodomy is not to be named, why is it being depicted in detail for a royal audience? And for people who are closely associated with the authors of the anti-sodomy polemics? Mills compares this to the myth of Victorian repression, i.e., that a surge of interest in sodomy spawned both the textual response and the interest in depicting the acts. Stepping back for a moment from the focus on homosexuality in particular, Mills views the set of images in Vienna 2554 as a “translation” of acceptable sexuality, i.e., as portraying various types of “imitation” of the central approved/moral behavior, which is considered “moral” because it is “natural.”

In the set of Eden images, the primary image is of an upright Adam and Eve invited into Eden by God (interpreted in the text as a marriage). This theme is reflected to the right by the temptation, with a female-torsoed serpent taking the central position from God, and Eve taking over the active role, in offering the apple to Adam. Below the primary image, the “marriage” of Adam and Eve is reflected in a scene of Christ marrying Ecclesia (the church). And then in the fourth position, we have the above described pairs of female and male lovers. Mills discusses how these illustrate a variety of parallels, contrasts, and reversals of meaning. The “sodomites” represent chaos, contrast, and corruption in the same way that the temptation is contrasted to the “marriage” of Adam and Eve by God in the first panel. The images do not “speak” directly of specific sexual acts (the image only shows embracing, kissing, and caressing) but rather of this symbolic violation of order and hierarchy. In the same way, Eve “unnaturally” takes the lead in the scene of the temptation, overturning “natural” gender hierarchies.

These reflections and contrasts continue in the lower four roundels. In the primary position, we see God confronting Adam and Eve, with Adam blaming Eve for his temptation. Then to the right, the expulsion from Eden, below the primary image a scene of sinners excusing themselves to God at judgment day, and in the fourth position, Christ leading sinners to hell.

Although this layout of images carries over across multiple examples of the genre, the depiction of transgressive sexual desire is not always illustrated by female and male pairs. Other representations include a tonsured man embracing a woman. But there is an entire sequence of images (some clearly related by direct transmission or imitation) that involve a female and a male couple.


Vienna 1179 (produced in Paris, the Vienna label has to do with its current ownership) 1220s - Image occurs in the context of Adam and Eve and the Fall. In the “sodomites” image, there is a female and a male couple, oriented diagonally. Pillows are visible behind them, but not necessarily full bed-clothes. The women are embracing and one women holds the other’s face in a chin-chuck gesture. Their faces are close to each other, but not actively kissing. Mills interprets the scene as showing the chin-holder’s legs inserted between the other woman’s and the other woman’s skirt as being somewhat hiked up. [I’m not sure I see that clearly.]  The male couple are embracing and kissing. The man reclining on his back has his tunic open in front with his underclothes showing.


Paris Bibliotheque nationale de France MS français 9561, mid 14th cntury - This book contains a similar image of a female couple and a male couple, embracing and kissing, lying diagonally across the page and being tormented by devils. The layout is strongly connected to the previous examples, though somewhat simpler in execution. But rather than being presented in the context of the expulsion from Eden, it is located in the story of Lot and Sodom.


In Paris 9561, the accompanying text focuses on the disruption of “natural” order due to bodily desire, and not on the specifically same-sex aspect. Although the image is homoerotic, the textual message is broader and more diffuse. The presence of devils ties in with the textual claims that unnatural lust (or simply lust in general) is due to demonic possession. Demons are often depicted as violent sodomists (in the sense of anal intercourse). While texts can conceal the presence and specificity of same-sex acts, art must over-particularize them, converting a general focus on “unnatural lust” into a narrow indictment of homosexuality.

Mills next looks at images that accompany text that specifically identifies “sodomites” (regardless of the nature of the images). How is the concept of “sodomite” translated into the specificity of visual representation? The Bibles Moralisées had the purpose of moralizing about contemporary times, using Biblical motifs, often modified from their original context. One example is how the serpent in Eden is embodied as female (thus tempting Eve in a same-sex context) where the Biblical text doesn’t specify gender. Other textual interpretations of this scene suggest the sexual implication is not homoerotic but narcissistic, though these are often conflated.

The “translation” of one scene to another context is seen in the Vienna 2554 illustration for Judges 20:47. This is an episode that thematically parallels the Lot/Sodom story but rather than the demanding neighbors being residents of Sodom, they are members of the Benjaminite tribe. The image used to illustrate the episode focuses on the host’s unfortunate concubine who is handed over for sexual abuse and murder (in substitution for the guests that had been demanded). There is no reference to same-sex erotics in the art except for an isolated image within a crowd scene of two men embracing with a chin-chuck gesture. But the text accompanying the scene specifically identifies the attackers as “sodomites”, rather than Benjaminites. Some scholars have viewed this “bad translation” between the image and text as simply due to ignorance and error. Mills sees it instead as a sophisticated manipulation of the imagery in service of a teleological moral truth in which Biblical textuality is subservient to that lesson.

There are other examples of parallel imagery that comes, not from the original Biblical text, but from visual connections. For example, in a depiction of the story of Cain and Abel, Cain is shown kissing Abel before taking him off to kill him, and this is paired with an image of Judas kissing Christ.

Later editions of the Bible Moralisée genre sometimes attempted to restore a more accurate text, but this could result in visual incoherence, which point out the hazards in interpreting the visual parallels in these later texts, as in the following.


Bibliotheque Nationale de France MS Fr 166, early 15th century - A depiction of the story of Ruth and Naomi has shifted the depiction from earlier versions. The earlier examples set up a parallel between how Ruth stayed with Naomi (representing those who are faithful to the church) while Orpha separates from her (representing those who leave the church). But in this 15th century text, a depiction of Ruth and Orpha embracing before parting from each other is juxtaposed with an image of a lustful couple embracing (as an example of turning away from chastity to embrace sensual temptation), creating a false visual equation of Ruth with sin.


Another example of the drift and change of visual symbolism is how the earlier images of female same-sex couples used as a negative symbol in parallel with the male couples, are replaced within the same visual composition by a heterosexual couple. There is a parallel erasure of the feminine characteristics of the serpent, removing the homoerotic potential from Eve’s temptation.  For example, Paris 166 does not include any lustful images of female couples.

Illustrations associated with the term “sodomites” and the story of Lot shifted by the 14th century from a relatively narrow range of behaviors in the Bibles Moralisées (specifically, violence and inhospitality) to a focus on non-procreative sexual acts, including but not exclusively between male couples. The earliest pictorial connection between this story and sexual transgressions is in Toledo MS 1 (1230s, created in Paris).


Toledo tesoro de Catedral MS 1, 1230s, created in Paris - In the context of the story of Lot and Sodom, a scene of two same-sex couples embracing, one female, one male. The male couple consists of a cowled monk embracing a youth of indeterminate gender (beardless and wearing a long garment). The female couple both have long hair and long garments, and one holds the other’s head but without a chin-chuck gesture.


Bodley MS 270b (the first volume of the three-part Oxford/Paris/London Bible) ca. 1230, created in Paris - In the context of the Lot/Sodom story, depiction of two embracing couples. The couple on the left: a bearded man wearing a round cap sits in a chair and embraces a monk (with tonsure and cowl). The couple on the right: both figures wear long garments and are bare-headed and beardless. The one on the left has long hair (clearly signifying female gender). The hair length of the one on the right is not visible, however the overall artistic similarity and lack of unmistakably masculine signifiers suggests interpretation as a woman. They are embracing and the long-haired figure is holding the other’s head in her hands, though there is no chin-chuck gesture.


British Library Additional MS 18719, ca. 1260, probably London or Westminster origin - The art in this book is much more simple that the earlier works, line drawings rather than fully colored paintings, and more primitive in style. The nature and positioning of the figures indicates that it’s clearly copied from Bodley MS 270b or from a common source. On the left two men embrace, standing beside a chair. One is bearded and wears a round cap, the other is a monk with tonsure and cowl. On the right, reclining toward a slope formed by a hell-mouth, are two embracing figures. Both wear long garments, and are bare-headed and beardless, though the length of the hair is not visible for either. The left-hand figure is holding the other’s head in her(?) hands but there is no chin-chuck gesture.


Paris Bibliotheque Nationale de France, MS français 166, ca. 1402, produced in Paris - The physical arrangement of the characters is the same as for the preceding works, but the artistic style is elaborate and sophisticated.  On the left is an embracing pair consisting of a monk and a youth. On the right a heterosexual couple embraces and kisses. They are wearing high-fashion garments that are clearly differentiated by gender.


In the preceding sequence, we see how the ambiguity of feminine representation, and a reanalysis of an androgynous ideal of beauty allows for the reframing of a female same-sex couple as heterosexual, thus erasing the representation of female homoerotic possibility.

I’ll skip over a section focused solely on male depictions that discusses the association of sodomy with Saracens and heretics.

The question remains, why did this particular genre of illustration arise in this particular time and place? The original center of production of Bibles Moralisées was Paris, which had a reputation for the prevalence of sodomy, though this was a reputation shared by urban centers in general. And the imagery in these bibles is urban rather than rural. Whether or not urban centers were hotbeds of male homoerotic activity, they did provide a fertile intellectual and moral context for anti-sodomy rhetoric. The temporal context was also one where the fuzzy idea of sodomy as anything “against nature” was being particularized as a specific set of gender and sexual transgressions. The depictions in these bibles often focus on aspects of the social context, e.g., same-sex pairings, age differences, active/passive contrasts, clerical with secular figures, Christian with non-Christian, rather than focusing on the physical act of genital sex. The physical interactions that are depicted are embraces, kisses, chin-chuck gestures, and the displacement of clothing.

From another angle, why are these moralizing illustrations confined only to the Bibles Moralisées? Several factors may be relevant. These works were typically commissioned by or for royalty and their readership was tightly restricted, moreover it was restricted to a set of people who had close clerical oversight in their lives. So perhaps there was less “danger” in allowing this set of readers a more explicit understanding of what activities were forbidden (rather than worrying about “giving them ideas”). Female patronage for several of the earliest examples may have influenced the prominence of female same-sex couples in the depictions of sodomy. In turn, this very restricted readership may explain why these images were not generalized as part of the artistic vocabulary of medieval art.

In reference to this last observation, Mills notes several isolated examples of male same-sex embraces or sexualized interactions in other manuscripts, but in those cases they are not tied to specific passages in the text.

Another correlation with the era when these works evolved was the rise of capital punishment for homosexuality in the laws of Castile and France (in the 13th century) as well as increased legal concern with heresy.


Catalog of images

It seems pointless to discuss an analysis of visual imagery without having those images available. I tried to see if I could find online sources to link to, but have only succeeded at this point in the case of Vienna 2554. Ethics (as well as legality) prevents me from taking images directly from the book, so instead I have provided simplified re-drawings of the human figures in the relevant illustrations. (One of the major elements I've omitted are the tormenting devils, but other background details have been left out as well.) I make no claims for artistic merit here, and some of the subtleties of gesture, clothing, and hairstyles are not well reproduced.

Vienna 2554 (Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, cod. 2554, fol. 2r), the earliest example of the genre, 1220s - Context is Adam and Eve in the garden, with subsequent images of the temptation of Eve and the marriage of Christ and the Church. The roundel of interest shows two embracing couples, one male and one female, being tormented by devils. Both couples are lying on bedding and are oriented diagonally on the page. The women are kissing and one woman is holding the other’s face in a conventionalized “chin chuck” gesture [see note]. One member of the male couple has a tonsure indicating a monk and the other wears a style of round cap that elsewhere is associated with Jews or heretics.

Vienna 2554

Vienna 1179 (Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, cod. 1179, fol. 4r) (produced in Paris, the Vienna label has to do with its current ownership) 1220s - Image occurs in the context of Adam and Eve and the Fall. In the “sodomites” image, there is a female and a male couple, oriented diagonally. Pillows are visible behind them, but not necessarily full bed-clothes. The women are embracing and one women holds the other’s face in a chin-chck gesture. Their faces are close to each other, but not actively kissing. Mills interprets the scene as showing the chin-holder’s legs inserted between the other woman’s and the other woman’s skirt as being somewhat hiked up. [I’m not sure I see that clearly.]  The male couple are embracing and kissing. The man reclining on his back has his tunic open in front with his underclothes showing.

Vienna 1179

Paris Bibliothèque nationale de France, MS français 9561, fol. 8v, mid 14th cntury - This book contains a similar image of a female couple and a male couple, embracing and kissing, lying diagonally across the page and being tormented by devils. But rather than being presented in the context of the expulsion from Eden, it is located in the story of Lot and Sodom.

Paris 9561

Toledo tesoro de Catedral MS 1, vol. 1, fol. 14r, 1230s, created in Paris - In the context of the story of Lot and Sodom, a scene of two same-sex couples embracing, one female, one male. The male couple consists of a cowled monk embracing a youth of indeterminate gender (beardless and wearing a long garment). The female couple both have long hair and long garments, and one holds the other’s head but without a chin-chuck gesture.

Toledo 1

Bodleian Library, MS Bodley 270b, fol. 14r (the first volume of the three-part Oxford/Paris/London Bible) ca. 1230, created in Paris - In the context of the Lot/Sodom story, depiction of two embracing couples. The couple on the left: a bearded man wearing a round cap sits in a chair and embraces a monk (with tonsure and cowl). The couple on the right: both figures wear long garments and are bare-headed and beardless. The one on the left has long hair (clearly signifying female gender). The hair length of the one on the right is not visible, however the overall artistic similarity and lack of unmistakably masculine signifiers suggests interpretation as a woman. They are embracing and the long-haired figure is holding the other’s head in her hands, though there is no chin-chuck gesture.

Bodley 270b

British Library Additional MS 18719, fol. 7v, ca. 1260, probably London or Westminster origin - The art in this book is much more simply that the earlier works, line drawings rather than fully colored paintings, and more primative in style. The nature and positioning of the figures indicates that it’s clearly copied from Bodley MS 270b or from a common source. On the left two men embrace, standing beside a chair. One is bearded and wears a round cap, the other is a monk with tonsure and cowl. On the right, reclining toward a slope formed by a hell-mouth, are two embracing figures. Both wear long garments, and are bare-headed and beardless, though the length of the hair is not visible for either. The left-hand figure is holding the other’s head in her(?) hands but there is no chin-chuck gesture.

 

Paris Bibliothèque nationale de France, MS français 166, fol. 7r, ca. 1402, produced in Paris - The physical arrangement of the characters is the same as for the preceding works, but the artistic style is elaborate and sophisticated.  On the left is an embracing pair consisting of a monk and a youth. On the right a heterosexual couple embraces and kisses. They are wearing high-fashion garments that are clearly differentiated by gender.

Paris 166

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