William J. Courtenay – författare

In his fascinating new book, based on the Conway Lectures he delivered at Notre Dame in 2016, William Courtenay examines aspects of the religious life of one medieval institution, the University of Paris, in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. In place of the traditional account of teaching programs and curriculum, however, the focus here is on religious observances and the important role that prayers for the dead played in the daily life of masters and students.Courtenay examines the university as a consortium of sub-units in which the academic and religious life of its members took place, and in which prayers for the dead were a major element. Throughout the book, Courtenay highlights reverence for the dead, which preserved their memory and was believed to reduce the time in purgatory for deceased colleagues and for founders of and donors to colleges. The book also explores the advantages for poor scholars of belonging to a confraternal institution that provided benefits to all members regardless of social background, the areas in which women contributed to the university community, including the founding of colleges, and the growth of Marian piety, seeking her blessing as patron of scholarship and as protector of scholars. Courtenay looks at attempts to offset the inequality between the status of masters and students, rich and poor, and college founders and fellows, in observances concerned with death as well as rewards and punishments in the afterlife.Rituals for the Dead is the first book-length study of religious life and remembrances for the dead at the medieval University of Paris. Scholars of medieval history will be an eager audience for this title.

In his fascinating new book, based on the Conway Lectures he delivered at Notre Dame in 2016, William Courtenay examines aspects of the religious life of one medieval institution, the University of Paris, in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. In place of the traditional account of teaching programs and curriculum, however, the focus here is on religious observances and the important role that prayers for the dead played in the daily life of masters and students.Courtenay examines the university as a consortium of sub-units in which the academic and religious life of its members took place, and in which prayers for the dead were a major element. Throughout the book, Courtenay highlights reverence for the dead, which preserved their memory and was believed to reduce the time in purgatory for deceased colleagues and for founders of and donors to colleges. The book also explores the advantages for poor scholars of belonging to a confraternal institution that provided benefits to all members regardless of social background, the areas in which women contributed to the university community, including the founding of colleges, and the growth of Marian piety, seeking her blessing as patron of scholarship and as protector of scholars. Courtenay looks at attempts to offset the inequality between the status of masters and students, rich and poor, and college founders and fellows, in observances concerned with death as well as rewards and punishments in the afterlife.Rituals for the Dead is the first book-length study of religious life and remembrances for the dead at the medieval University of Paris. Scholars of medieval history will be an eager audience for this title.

This study of the social, geographical and disciplinary composition of the scholarly community at the University of Paris in the early fourteenth century is based on the reconstruction of a remarkable document: the financial record of tax levied on university members in the academic year 1329-1330. Containing the names, financial level and often addresses of the majority of the masters and most prominent students, it is the single richest source for the social history of a medieval university before the late fourteenth century. After a thorough examination of the financial account, the history of such collections, and the case (a rape by a student) that precipitated legal expenses and the need for a collection, the book explores residential patterns, the relationship of students, masters and tutors, social class and levels of wealth, interaction with the royal court and the geographical background of university scholars.

This study of the social, geographical and disciplinary composition of the scholarly community at the University of Paris in the early fourteenth century is based on the reconstruction of a remarkable document: the financial record of tax levied on university members in the academic year 1329-1330. Containing the names, financial level and often addresses of the majority of the masters and most prominent students, it is the single richest source for the social history of a medieval university before the late fourteenth century. After a thorough examination of the financial account, the history of such collections, and the case (a rape by a student) that precipitated legal expenses and the need for a collection, the book explores residential patterns, the relationship of students, masters and tutors, social class and levels of wealth, interaction with the royal court and the geographical background of university scholars.

William J. Courtenay charts how the Faculty of Theology at the University of Paris took shape in the latter half of the twelfth century and developed into a leading intellectual authority in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Beginning with an examination of the origins and scope of the privileges that defined the Parisian scholarly community, this work traces how theology masters came to adjudicate questions of orthodoxy arising from the lectures and writings of arts masters, Bachelors of Theology, and works submitted to them for judgment, including those of Hildegard of Bingen and the Talmud. As the faculty's authority grew, its reputation became a resource in the political struggles of Philip the Fair in conflicts with Pope Boniface VIII and in the suppression of the Templars. The papal countermeasures to these royal interventions gave rise to benefice-supplication rolls - an institutional development that reshaped university finance in the fourteenth century.

William J. Courtenay charts how the Faculty of Theology at the University of Paris took shape in the latter half of the twelfth century and developed into a leading intellectual authority in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Beginning with an examination of the origins and scope of the privileges that defined the Parisian scholarly community, this work traces how theology masters came to adjudicate questions of orthodoxy arising from the lectures and writings of arts masters, Bachelors of Theology, and works submitted to them for judgment, including those of Hildegard of Bingen and the Talmud. As the faculty's authority grew, its reputation became a resource in the political struggles of Philip the Fair in conflicts with Pope Boniface VIII and in the suppression of the Templars. The papal countermeasures to these royal interventions gave rise to benefice-supplication rolls - an institutional development that reshaped university finance in the fourteenth century.

Long thought to be the most important medieval philosopher and theologian after Scotus and the founder of late medieval Nominalism, the meaning and influence of William of Ockham’s thought have become matters of intense debate in recent years. After a survey of the changing assessment of Nominalism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and a new understanding of twelfth-century Nominalism with related elements in the thought of Augustine and Anselm, this book examines the reception of Ockham’s thought at Oxford and Paris, the crisis over Ockhamism at Paris in the 1335 to 1345 period, and concludes with an examination of the legacy of Ockhamist thought in the late medieval period.

One of the richest sources for biographical information on graduates of the universities of Paris, Oxford, and Cambridge in the fourteenth century are papal letters of provision. While those from Paris are available in bound volumes, this book brings together for the first time comparable editions of supplications from university masters at Oxford and Cambridge. They show the topographical range of recruitment, the academic career, the importance of theological study at Oxford, and the predominant role of legal studies at Cambridge.