In parallel with a certain popular celebration centered in the city of Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, the second day of February, in most Christian traditions, also marks the commemoration of the presentation of Christ in the Temple and the ritual purification of Mary. Due to the prominent role played by candles in the liturgical celebrations in the Latin tradition, the feast is commonly referred to as “Candlemas”.
The Presentation in the Temple (along with the text of the Nunc Dimitis). Taken from the Les Trรจs Riches Heures du duc de Berry. Musรฉe Condรฉ, Ms 65, 63r. Via Wikipedia Commons. Public Domain.
For Ivo of Chartres, whose homilies on Advent and Christmas have short commentaries and translations elsewhere on this blog, his work In Purificatione takes the opportunity to reflect on the details of the liturgical celebration itself as a symbol of the moral imperatives of the Christian life. For him, the wax from which the candles are made represents the flesh of this life, but which also bears a light that illumines the shadows, echoing the Prologue of the Gospel of John. Carrying the candles in procession echoes, in a physical sense, the spiritual carrying of God accomplished through the imitation of Christ.
Interestingly, Ivo cites two short passages from liturgical texts. The first is taken from a version of the Exultet of Good Saturday, in which the celebrant, standing in front of lit candles, commemorates the bee as a symbol of the virginity of Mary. This verse, while it does not exist in the modern Roman rite, can still occasionally be found in use (for example, in this video of the Exultet intoned by a member of the Discalced Carmelites) [1]. The second passage is from a text of the feast of the Purification itself, in which Sion (i.e., the church) is commanded to adorn the bridal chamber in order to receive Christ. This text is well-attested as both a responsory and an antiphon in the manuscript tradition [2]. For Ivo, again, the spiritual meaning is clear: we are to adorn our hearts with virtues that we may have God dwelling within us.
The recourse to liturgical texts, at least for me, lightens the content by focusing more on the act of celebration, rather than emphasizing the grander themes of the economy of salvation and the final judgment found in some of his other homilies. The ultimate effect is almost to encourage a more active personal participation in the ritual on the part of his listeners, a suggestion to meditate on the texts and the actions of the liturgy and to apply the deeper, spiritual meaning in day-to-day life.
The translation and Latin text (Patrologia Latina) of the homily are available here.
Nick Kamas PhD in Medieval Studies University of Notre Dame
[1] For the full text of the Preface, categorized as the “Franco-Roman Version”, see Thomas Forrest Kelly, The Exultet in Southern Italy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), 38.
A few months ago, Ben and Will sat down with poet, essayist, and translator, Dana Delibovi, to discuss her life and work. After dropping out of the doctoral program in Philosophy at Columbia Universityโsubsequently earning a terminal masterโs at New York UniversityโDelibovi spent 45 years as an advertising copywriter while also working as an adjunct instructor of philosophy at Lindenwood University. In 2019, following the decision to retire, she began translating the poems of St. Teresa of รvilaโa longtime inspiration of hersโand didn’t look back. This culminated in the publication of Sweet Hunter: The Complete Poems of St. Teresa of รvila (2024).
For St. Teresa, the sharp disciplinary boundaries we draw today between philosophy, theology, spirituality, and poetry were far less rigid. Her work weaves together theological reflection, spiritual practice, and personal experience, so that the search for truth cannot be separated from interior transformation. True knowledge is knowledge of self and of God, which is arrived at not through detached inquiry but through an inward journeyโone must venture the soulโs many โmansions.”
It is quite fitting, then, that her poems have found a translator whose encounter with Teresaโs work has itself been inseparable from her own life journey. Delibovi here conveys not only the riches of Teresaโs thought, but does so with the spirit in which Teresa surely wouldโve wanted to be read, in a deeply serious and personal way.
In addition to St. Teresa’s work and Delibovi’s own life story, Ben and Will chat with Delibovi about a range of topics, including the art of translation, how we relate to the same texts differently throughout our lives, and more.
Thanks for listening, and be sure to stay tuned for more!
There are few things I like to do more than pouring over an old map. For those working on the Maeander River Valley (modern Bรผyรผk Menderes in western Tรผrkiye), we are spoiled by old maps from archaeological surveys and excavations from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Unlike earlier maps, these maps surveyed and composed for archaeological purposes were more detailed and often more accurate in their spatial representation. In this blog, I want to introduce two fascinating maps.
First, is the Lyncker map, named for the military officer Karl Lyncker who carried out the bulk of the investigations around 1908 and 1909. The map was produced for the archaeological exploration and excavations conducted in the valley by Theodor Wiegand. This map is best understood as a composite map, including the map of Lake Bafa by the military officer Walther von Marรฉes in 1906 (Fig. 1) and the map of the Milesian peninsula by the mine surveyor Paul Wilski in 1900 (Fig. 2). Alfred Philippson, a geologist, would conduct his own surveys and produce his own map in 1910 (Fig. 3). Later, Philippson would compile all the earlier maps and publish them as a composite map in 1936 in the series of volumes of the Miletus excavation.[1]
Figure 1: A Map of Mount Latmos and Lake Bafa produced by Walther von Marรฉes in 1906.Figure 2: A Map of the Milesian Peninsula produced by Paul Wilski in 1900.ย Figure 3: A Map of Western Asia Minor produced by Alfred Philippson in 1910.
The second map accompanied the archeological work of Olivier Rayet and Albert Thomas and was composed in 1874 (Figs. 4, 5, and 6).[2] While Wiegand outsourced his cartography to professional geodesists, Rayet drew the map himself.
Figure 4: A Map of the Maeander River Valley produced by Olivier Rayet in 1874.Figure 5: Close Up of the Area Around Miletus (Balat ou Palatia) in the Rayet Map.Figure 6: Close Up of the Area Around the Turkish Town of Sรถke (Sokhia) in the Rayet Map.
These maps are an important source of ancient and medieval ruins that have since disappeared. However, I have always marveled at what these maps reveal unintentionally: the landscape of the late Ottoman Maeander Valley before a series of changes that would occur in the twentieth century.
Before the Population Exchange of 1923
In 1923, the Greek populations living the Maeander were exchanged with Turkish populations living in Greece. These maps include many Greek toponyms that are no longer used. Didyma is known by its Byzantine name of Hieron (Jeronda), while the town on the southern coast of Lake Bafa was known as Mersinet, a survival of the Byzantine Myrsinos (Fig. 1). The toponym of Patniolik (Figs. 2, 3, and 5), which became the modern Batmaz Tepe (the hill that cannot sink), makes clear that the origin is not Turkish, but Byzantine; this was a village owned by the monastery of Saint John the Theologian on the island of Patmos. On the southern face of Mount Mykale, the ancient site of Priene is still known by its Byzantine name of Samson (Samsoun) on the Rayet map (Fig. 5), while the village of Domatia (Figs. 3 and 5) is likely the survival of the Byzantine toponym Stomata, which references the mouth of the Maeander River.
The town of Baฤarasi (Gjaur โ Bagharassi on the Lyncker map) missed out having its old Greek name, Mandica, as it was renamed after the Greek War of Independence (1829). Still, not all Greek toponyms imply a direct Byzantine survival. The Greek communities of the late Ottoman period are idiomatic to their time and are not simply the fossils of another era; some immigrated from the islands after the plagues of the seventeenth century, while others moved to the area to work for local Turkish lords (like the Cihanoฤlu family in the Turkish town of Koรงarlฤฑ โ there is no reason to assume that the church in Koรงarlฤฑ in the Lyncker map required a Byzantine predecessor).
Before the Draining of the Bรผyรผk Menderes
Beginning in the late 1920โs, a series of drainage canals fundamentally transformed the hydrological realities of the Maeander Valley. Before the construction of this system of canals, the Maeander valley flooded every winter and remained inundated until spring. This could wreak havoc on transportation across the valley and rendered many places in the plain isolated throughout the winter. A rather frustrated Gertrude Bell โ a Byzantinist in her own right โ who visited the Maeander Valley around the same time as Lyncker, remarked:
โThis sort of travelling is far more difficult and less pleasant than my Syrian journeys. There one simply gets onto a horse and rides off, carrying oneโs house with one. Here there are so many arrangements to be made and one has to depend on other peopleโs hospitality which is always a bore. Itโs worth doing however and while I am about it, I will see as much of the country as I can so that I need not come back.โ[3]
The draining of the valley was not just the construction of individual canals, but the construction of a system of canals that included the entire valley, where the canals, parallel to the river, provided drainage for the entire valley. Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, and Ottomans all had drainage of some type in the Maeander, but I have seen no evidence of a valley-wide attempt to drain until the early years of the Turkish Republic.[4] One of the clearest representation of these canals as a system is found in a map from a British Naval Intelligence Division geographical handbook from 1943, when this process was well underway but far from finished.[5]
Despite the difficulties of living in the open plain in this period, the Lyncker map shows considerable number of settlements, from the series of houses along the river between Priene and Miletus, to the villages east of the town of Sรถke (Fig. 3). While the Rayet map is less detailed in showing the late Ottoman settlement pattern, it does often show where the major fields were located (Terres labourรฉes), such as the northeastern extreme of the Milesian peninsula, those directly south of Priene (Fig. 5), and the plain between Sรถke and Burunkรถy (Bouroun Keui, Fig. 6). Because marshes are dynamic and seasonal in the Maeander, that these two maps do not show the same regions as swamp makes sense. The Lyncker map is oriented more towards the summer and fall, mapping the lakes found at the center of a swamp, while Rayet shows the much wider area that likely saw itself underwater during the winter and spring. Near Miletus (Balat ou Palatia), Rayet designates โlands flooded during the winterโ (Landes inondรฉes pendant tout lโhiber). In fact, this is a consistent problem when examining maps, even into the second half of the twentieth century. What can appear as an invented lake โ a โpaper lake,โ if you will โ is instead a cartographer mistaking what is permanent for what is seasonal.
For western Tรผrkiye, the twentieth century introduced a series of fundamental changes to the landscape. Being able to see what the landscape looked like before that can provide important insights about the medieval landscape. But, if I am honest, pouring over these maps is simply just a great way to pass an afternoon!
Tyler Wolford, PhD Byzantine Studies Postdoctoral Fellowship Medieval Institute University of Notre Dame
[1] Alfred Philippson. Das sรผdliche Jonien. Milet III.5. Berlin and Leipzig, 1936.
[2] Olivier Rayet and Albert Thomas. Milet et le Golfe Latmique, Tralles, Magnรฉsie du Mรฉandre, Priรจne, Milet, Didymes, Hรฉraclรฉe du Latmos: Fouilles et explorations archรฉologiques. Paris, 1877. This map can be viewed online at http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/rayet1877a/0002.
