Pilgrim Pastoral: Shrines, Nature, and the Landscape in France, c. 1450-1750

FAIN: FT-60993-13

Virginia Reinburg
Boston College (Chestnut Hill, MA 02467-3800)

This project on shrines and the pilgrims who visited them explores the relationship of religion to nature and the landscape in early modern France. Of central importance are works of literature and art representing shrines and landscapes. I address two major questions: how did people of that time and place create a landscape by means of religion, and how did they live their religion in the world of nature? These questions will open an inquiry that will be fully interdisciplinary, drawing on methods from history, anthropology, art history, literary criticism, religious studies, the history of science, and environmental studies. France's many shrines dedicated to the Virgin Mary and saints formed a sacred topography mapped, painted, and written, from the Reformation to the Enlightenment. My goal is to locate these shrines in the landscapes and natural environments in which they were embedded, thus exposing the long history of relationships linking religion, nature, and the arts.

Associated Products

History and Antiquity at French Pilgrim Shrines: Three Pyrenean Examples (Book Section)
Title: History and Antiquity at French Pilgrim Shrines: Three Pyrenean Examples
Author: Virginia Reinburg
Editor: Ann Blair
Editor: Anja-Silvia Goeing
Abstract: A study of books published about early modern pilgrim shrines.
Year: 2016
Primary URL: http://www.brill.com/products/reference-work/sake-learning-2-vols
Primary URL Description: Brill Publisher website
Secondary URL: http://bc.worldcat.org/oclc/946076105
Secondary URL Description: WorldCat
Access Model: print book and ebook, not open access
Publisher: Brill Publisher
Book Title: For the Sake of Learning: Essays in Honor of Anthony Grafton
ISBN: 9789004263307

Past and Present: Archives, Eyewitnesses and Rumours: Writing About Shrines in Early Modern France (Article)
Title: Past and Present: Archives, Eyewitnesses and Rumours: Writing About Shrines in Early Modern France
Author: Virginia Reinburg
Abstract: Seventeenth-century historians and antiquarians lavished attention on nearly every place in the French kingdom. So it is hardly surprising that pilgrim shrines numbered among the many cities, provinces and dioceses whose parts attracted such passionate interest and extensive research.
Year: 2016
Primary URL: http://past.oxfordjournals.org
Format: Journal
Publisher: Past Oxford Journals

Storied Place: Land and Legend at Notre-Dame de Garaison (Article)
Title: Storied Place: Land and Legend at Notre-Dame de Garaison
Author: Virginia Reinburg
Abstract: Pilgrim shrines and their fabled miracles became beacons of resurgent Catholicism after the religious wars ended. Since the seventeenth century, historians have highlighted the contributions of bishops, clerics, and aristocratic patrons to Catholic reform, including the building and expansion of shrines dedicated to the Virgin Mary. But a close look at Notre-Dame de Garaison in Bigorre shows that the local community—peasants, shepherds, and pilgrims—created the shrine and its meanings out of the landscape and stories of this particular place in the central Pyrenees.
Year: 2017
Primary URL: https://read.dukeupress.edu/french-historical-studies/article-abstract/40/3/391/129443/Storied-PlaceLand-and-Legend-at-Notre-Dame-de?redirectedFrom=fulltext
Primary URL Description: French Historircal Studies
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: French Historical Studies
Publisher: French Historical Studies

Storied Places: Pilgrim Shrines, Nature, and History in Early Modern France (Book)
Title: Storied Places: Pilgrim Shrines, Nature, and History in Early Modern France
Author: Virginia Reinburg
Abstract: Pilgrim shrines were places of healing, holiness, and truth in early modern France. The book explains how clerics, bishops, magistrates, townspeople and villagers, pilgrims, and visitors reckoned with religious conflict and doubt by creating pilgrim shrines as natural, legendary, and historic places whose authority might provide a new foundation for Catholic life. Part I includes detailed studies of the shrines of Sainte-Reine, Notre-Dame du Puy, Notre-Dame de Garaison, and Notre-Dame de Betharram, showing how nature, antiquity, and images inspired devotion and enthusiasm among pilgrims. Many pilgrims visited shrines in search of healing, a goal they also pursued at the shrine’s fountains and neighboring medicinal spas. These chapters also show that the category of “pilgrim” included a wide variety of motivations, beliefs, and acts. Part II recounts how shrine chaplains authored books employing history, myth, and archives to prove that the shrines were authentic and the truths they exemplified were beyond dispute. These chapters also show how often local rumors, knowledge, and stories about shrines and miracles surface in chaplain-authored books.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: http:////www.cambridge.org/core/books/storied-places/246092D43FD33E3692D359B8C080E94C
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Type: Single author monograph
ISBN: 9781108483117
Copy sent to NEH?: No

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