Tuomas M.S. Lehtonen and Elisabeth Mornet, eds. Les Elites nordiques et l'Europe occidentale (xiie--xve siecle). Actes de la rencontre franco--nordique organisEe a Paris, 9-10 juin 2005. Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 2007. Pp. 316.

It is no longer unusual for scholars from the Nordic

countries to publish some of their works in English rather than in their native language. Uncommon, however, are ventures into French and even more unusual is the preoccupation of French scholars with medieval Nordic subjects. The appearance of the book under consideration is therefore as welcome as a Christmas present in July.

Jukka Havu, former director of the Finnish Institute in Paris, took the initiative for the conference involving French and Nordic scholars that forms the basis of this collection. Among the Nordic participants the Finns dominate with five scholars; Denmark and Sweden each sent two, Norway one, and France six. As subject for the conference, the two organizers, Tuomas Lehtonen and Elisabeth Mornet, chose the elite. Because of the emphasis in recent times on the emergence of public power and the birth of the modern state in western Europe, the study of the elite and its importance in the process has undergone extensive renewal. The editors rightfully deemed it of interest to ascertain the response of the Nordic elites to this challenge. The participants were given the choice of presenting papers and submitting articles in French (12) or English (6). Summaries in the two languages accompany each article. The collection has a good spread of mature and younger scholars. In fact, at least five authors make reference to their dissertation as being in progress or recently published. The older scholars tend to provide overviews of a problem or a synthesis of their own works, whereas the younger group concentrates on new research, a good sign of life and progress in the field.

The two editors each provide a preface, Mornet on the background of the conference and Lehtonen on the Finnish delay in accepting Christianity and literacy. The book in divided into three sections of which the first, dealing with the Nordic elites and the construction of the state, contains six articles, the second treats the elites and the Roman church in four, and the last deals with the elite and Western culture in five papers.

Introducing the first part, Sverre Bagge provides a historio-graphic survey of the interplay between the king, the nobles, and the peasants in the development of the state in Norway in which he outlines the liberal and the Marxist points of view of the past century and places his own interpretation in the middle. He admits that more work needs to be done on the subjective and cultural perspectives of power. Taking a new look at the difficult problem of the origin of the Nordic people who settled in Ireland, Olivier Viron claims that they did not come directly from Scandinavia, but from the islands previously settled by Vikings. In Ireland, they did not merge with the local population but continued to stay apart maintaining instead connections with their place of origin. The following two papers deal with Sweden: Olle Ferm examines the emergence of a small feudal elite consisting of members of the nobility, the highest clergy, and some burghers. Appointed by the monarch, the elite class was pluralistic in origin and had access to resources not available to others. In contrast to this general picture, Thomas Lindkvist focuses on the regional elite, most specifically on the law speaker, who was responsible for the legal and social order. The office is best known from Vastergotland where it can be traced back to pagan times. In an interesting article, Raphaelle Schott analyzes the composition of a group of ambassadors that Queen Margaret of Denmark sent to England in 1404 to negotiate a marriage alliance between Erik VII of Pomerania and Princess Philippa. She demonstrates that the Queen used her great political skill in the composition of the embassy thereby reflecting her plans for the union. Queen Margaret also plays a role in the following essay by Anu Lahtinen in which she connects the Queen's appointment of a certain Klaus Fleming as law speaker of Finland with the emergence of ah important branch of the Finnish nobility. Klaus probably originated in Flanders but became the progenitor of an important family in Finland whose members acquired positions and wealth, not the least through marriage alliances aided by the fact that daughters as well as sons inherited land.

Heading off the section on the elite and the church, Brian McGuire offers an analysis of the Cistercians in Denmark and in Sweden from the mid--twelfth to the early sixteenth century. He argues that the self--perception of the order in the two countries changed around 1250. Although these monks had started out as "the poor of Christ" whose existence depended on the generosity of the wealthy elite, their success in managing their properties eventually allowed them to join the elite. This thesis concerning the order is generally accepted in the rest of Europe. Ane L. Bysted examines the crusading ideology and the imitation of Christ in Anders Sunesen, Bernard of Clairvaux, and Innocent III. Its inspiration was found in the writings of Bernard concerning the Second Crusade and was used by Innocent III in his sermons and bulls for the Fourth and Fifth Crusades. Although Anders Suneson did not leave any sermons, Bysted argues that it may be possible to reconstruct them from his poem Hexaemeron. Sylvain Gouguenheim focuses on William of Modena, an Italian who is known especially for his role as a papal legate in Norway and Sweden in 1247-48 toward the end of his life. Although concentrating on this subject, the author also deals with William's work as a missionary, particularly in Prussia, and his role as a reformer of the church. The article whets the reader's appetite for a full modern biography of this important person. Jussi Hanska deals with the difficult problem of the identity of the clerics who were ordained to the priesthood in Rome. Using the example of Jakob Ulvsson, ordained in Rome in 1466 and later canon and archbishop of Uppsala, the author takes issue with Denys Hay's thesis that persons ordained in Rome were mainly swindlers and fortune seekers. Although based on a slim foundation--the 114 men who were ordained together with Jakob Ulvsson--he argues instead that they were in most cases well--educated men coming from the highest levels of European society.

The first two papers in the last section on culture treat the Christianization of Finland in the 1160s by two saints, King Eric of Sweden and Henry, Bishop of Uppsala. Tuomas Lehtonen analyses the entire Latin as well as the vernacular tradition concerning the two men from the standpoint not of history but as sources for the ideology of the time in which they were created. Sini Kangas concentrates on the vernacular tradition concerning the Bishop, in which he sees the influence not only of hagiography but also of the chanson de gestes. Elisabeth Mornet provides a sophisticated analysis as well as a French translation of a single text, the testament of Benechinus Henrici of Ahus, signed in 1358 in Lund where he was cantor. By focusing on its rhetorical style as well as on its empirical content, she is able to prove her main point that Benechinus belonged to the highest rank of the clerical hierarchy and that he possessed a cultural sophistication and an education on a par with his European colleagues. Of special interest are the titles of the books he planned to distribute. Corinne Peneau gives a fascinating historiographic analysis of the entire corpus of Swedish rhymed chronicles, the Swedish favorite way of handling their history during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The oldest and most important is the Erikskronika, recently translated to French by Peneau, but it was later modified and continued by the Karlskronika and the Sturekronika. These verse chronicles portray Swedish history as a chivalric romance. In the last paper, Elina Rasanen examines the life of Lucia Olafsdotter, a highborn Finnish woman of the late fifteenth century, and her devotion to St. Anne. Lucia was known as an important patron, and she showed special devotion to St. Anne, perhaps because of her own lack of children. Based on little-known artworks, the essay is a study in the emerging field of reception and patronage of religious images.

Following French custom the book is provided with a conclusion. It is a pleasure to acknowledge that this piece, written by Elisabeth Mornet and Jean-Marie Maillefer, is perhaps the best in the collection. The two authors admit readily that certain subjects have been excluded knowingly or because of lack of readily available sources including the Icelandic elite and elites within other social groups than wealthy landowners and clergymen. Furthermore, the two Frenchmen are better able to see the common features in the Scandinavian development and to identify the European foundation from which the Scandinavians often drew their inspiration than Nordic scholars who for a long rime have been imprisoned within their respective national framework. Not surprisingly, they invite a renewed debate on the concept of "center" versus "periphery" currently fashionable in Nordic circles. The strength of the conclusion is evident in an extensive bibliography that goes beyond those provided by the individual authors. It is to be hoped that this important collection will bear fruit both in the North and in France.

Jenny Jochens

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