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This volume was conceived with the double aim of providing a background and a further context for the new Dumbarton Oaks English translation of the Life of St Neilos from Rossano, founder of the monastery of Grottaferrata near Rome in 1004. Reflecting this double aim, the volume is divided into two parts. Part I, entitled "Italo-Greek Monasticism," builds the background to the Life of Neilos by taking several multi-disciplinary approaches to the geographical area, history and literature of the region denoted as Southern Italy. Part II, entitled "The Life of St Neilos," offers close analyses of the text of Neilos's hagiography from socio-historical, textual, and contextual perspectives. Together, the two parts provide a solid introduction and offer in-depth studies with original outcomes and wide-ranging bibliographies. Using monasticism as a connecting thread between the various zones and St Neilos as the figure who walked over mountains and across many cultural divides, the essays in this volume span all regions and localities and try to trace thematic arcs between individual testimonies. They highlight the multicultural context in which Southern Italian Christians lived and their way of negotiating differences with Arab and Jewish neighbors through a variety of sources, and especially in saints' lives.
List of contents
Introduction Barbara Crostini Part I: Italo-Greek Monasticism 1. Monastic Spirituality of the Italo-Greek Monks David Hester 2. Italo-Greek Monastic Typika Cristina Torre 3. Greek Monasticism in Campania and Latium from the Tenth to the Fifteenth Century Vera von Falkenhausen 4. Art and Architecture for Byzantine Monks in Calabria: Sources, Monuments, Paintings and Objects (Ninth to Thirteenth Centuries) Lorenzo Riccardi 5. Family Hagiography and Christian Resistance in the Tenth Century: The Bioi of Sabas, Christopher and Makarios Adele Cilento 6. Historical Echoes in Italo-Greek Hagiographies of the Norman Age Gioacchino Strano 7. Monastic Interactions Between Calabria and Mount Athos in the Middle Ages Enrico Morini 8. Nicholas-Nektarios of Otranto: A Greek Monk Under Roman Obedience Claudio Schiano Part II: The Life of St. Neilos 9. Neighbors: Jews and Judaism in the Life of St. Neilos the Younger Giancarlo Lacerenza 10. Calabria and the Muslims During Saint Neilos's Lifetime Alessandro Vanoli 11. "Ceramiclast" in the Bios of St Neilos Raymond Capra 12. The Homosexual Background Attributed to a Textual Gap in the Life of St Neilos from Rossano: A Re-Evaluation Andrea Luzzi 13. East Meets West, West Meets East?: Constructing Difference in First Life of St Adalbert and in the Life of St Neilos David Kalhous 14. Neilos the Younger and Benedict: The Greek Hymns Composed by Neilos in Campania Annick Peters-Custot 15. Neilos's Long-Lasting Marks on Grottaferrata's Identity Ines Angeli Murzaku 16. St. Bartholomew of Grottaferrata Between Tradition and Innovation Angela Prinzi
About the author
Barbara Crostini is Assistant Professor in Byzantine Greek at the Department of Linguistics and Philology, University of Uppsala.
Ines Angeli Murzaku is Professor of Church History at Seton Hall University in New Jersey.
Summary
This book gives a context for a reading of the Life of Saint Neilos, a Southern Italian tenth-century monastic from Calabria, founder of the monastery of Grottaferrata near Rome. His background is delineated against a multi-ethnic and idiosyncratic region where Greek and Latin cultures meet, with a significant presence of Arabs and Jews.
