Love of God or Hatred of Your Enemy? The Emotional Voices of the Crusades
Sophia MENACHE
Original title: O amor de Deus ou o ódio ao seu inimigo? As vozes emocionais das Cruzadas
Published in The Middle Ages and the Crusades
Keywords: Crusades, Emotions, Moslems, Papacy.
The present paper attempts to investigate three cornerstones of the history of the early crusades from a wider range of emotions while focusing on [1] the call to the crusade and the conquest of Jerusalem, [2] the fall of Edessa and, subsequently, the Second Crusade and its outcomes, and [3] the Christian defeat at the Horns of Hattin. Less than a century before the crusades, different groups in Christian society had been the target of the same pejorative emotions that were later used to denounce and reproach the Moslems. These terms should therefore be seen and analyzed, not to produce a superficial moral reading of the vilification of the Moslems, but as an essential part of the thesaurus in which Christian society analyzed itself. In fact, the use of the same Augustinian emotional index transforms negative attitudes toward the Moslems into an act of inverted inclusion of the Moslems within the Christian sphere; in other words, using illusionary inclusion in order to exclude. This inverted inclusion means that within its inner discourse, Christian society defeated the Moslems symbolically, independently of the real outcome on the battlefield. The transformation of the crusaders from esterners into Easterners in Fulcher’s eschatology (note 45) is a conscious practice of erasing the “other” by expropriating its identity. This was not, however, an act of including the Easterner into the crusaders’ weltanschauung, but a symbolic denial that further served to exclude the Easterners altogether.
Some remarks on Plato on emotions
Robert ZABOROWSKI
Original title: Algunas observaciones de Platón a respecto de las emociones
Published in Emotions in the Ancient and Medieval Mediterranean World
Keywords: Desiring linkage, Emotions, Feeling, Plato, Stratification of affectivity, Thinking.
A paper is an attempt at reassessing the role of emotions in Plato’s dialogues cannot be assessed. A standard view identifying (or translating or interpreting) to logistikon with (as) reason, to thumoeides with (as) the irascible and to epithumetikon with (as) the concupiscent is challenged so far as each of the three parts possesses emotions (affectivity) of its own. The opinion that Plato is responsible for the negative view of emotion is rejected. Plato’s views on emotions are understood more accurately understood from a hierarchical perspective, i.e. when three parts of the soul are analyzed as three strata of the feeling–thinking–desiring linkages.
The Emotions on the Barcelona Streets of the Fifteenth Century
Cláudia Costa BROCHADO
Original title: As emoções nas ruas barcelonesas do século XV
Published in Emotions in the Ancient and Medieval Mediterranean World
Keywords: Barcelona, Emotions, Fifteenth century, Marriage.
The relationships between the citizens of fifteenth century Barcelona were often turbulent, especially between couples. The conflicts that occurred sometimes resulted in legal proceedings. The statements submitted for these cases were a visible expression of the emotions and conflicts involved. This article presents some of these legal proceedings through partial transcriptions, with the aim of getting as close as possible to the feelings and emotions of the people of Barcelona at the end f the Middle Ages.