Projects
From Penitent Umbrian Laywoman to the 'Teacher of Theologians': How was Angela of Foligno made Magistra Theologorum? University of Antwerp
Augustine of Hippo's De civitate Dei in the Central Middle Ages (10th-12th c.): Transmission History and Reception in Theological Debates KU Leuven
My project centers on the reception and manuscript transmission of Augustine of Hippo’s De civitate Dei from the 10th century to the first two decades of the 12th. Augustine’s masterpiece has been one of the most influential works in shaping not only Christian identity, but also Western culture as such. Nonetheless, its medieval Fortleben has received less attention than it deserves. By providing the first encompassing study of its reception ...
From Truth to Ecology Reassessing the History of the Senses, 1250-1750 KU Leuven
This project investigates the paradigm shift from truth to ecology that occurred in perception theories from 1250 to 1750 – in the period, namely, from the adoption of an Aristotelian curriculum by European universities to the Encyclopédie. In the course of the Early Modern age, I argue, the time-honoured Aristotelian claim that the senses provide insight into the real properties of bodies was replaced by a quite different understanding of ...
Literatures Without Borders. A Historical-Comparative Study of Premodern Literary Transnationalism University of Antwerp
Sabbatical Anthony Dupont: Early witnesses to the reception of the Pelagian controversy KU Leuven
In the sabbatical period I want to start a new line of research (cfr. infra) with the study of the treatise Hypomnesticon contra Pelagianos et Caelestianos. This late antique treatise consists of six books, which systematically expound and refute the teachings of so-called Pelagianism (Books 1-5) and Semi-Pelagianism (Book 6). Although the anonymous author relied heavily on the works written by Augustine of Hippo in the Pelagian Controversy ...
In search of a true vita canonica. Normative texts and their manuscripts as alternative witnesses for the emergence of the canonical reform movement (9th-11th century) KU Leuven
Traditionally the history of the religious orders is narrated along the
lines of a pattern of rise, decline, and reform. The historiography of
the canonical order is no exception. Decades of steady decline are
said to have been followed around the middle of the 11th century by
a period of reform, culminating in the emergence of a new type of
religious – the ‘regular’ canon –, as opposed to the non-reformed ...
Language perception and language use in the county of Flanders: the sociolinguistic impact of 1302. KU Leuven
Humanist Condolences. Funerary Collections in Quattrocento Italy. KU Leuven
How people express grief and sympathy in situations of death and loss is conditioned by culture. When, in fourteenth- and fifteenthcentury Italy, Renaissance humanism gradually replaced medieval ways of thinking, a new literary phenomenon emerged, as humanists began to compile funerary collections. These collections, preserved in both manuscripts and incunables, consist of treatises, letters, orations, poems, and dialogues that were composed ...