Full Description
The wealthy Katerina Lemmel entered the Maria Mai monastery in 1516—and rebuilt it. In Katerina's Windows, readers can observe how stained glass was donated and commissioned and witness spectators' reaction to it, ranging from critical aesthetic assessments to iconoclastic acts.
The book presents historical texts and interpretive analysis. Katerina Lemmel and those around her are given voice through translations of seventy-three sources, including personal and business letters, chronicle accounts, and legal documents, most of which have never been transcribed or published before. Necessary explanations as well as theoretical considerations and critical insights are provided through the voices of the authors.
Katerina Lemmel's letters allow glimpses into the materiality of monastic life; views of the interconnected workings of art, music, liturgy, and literature; evidence of the persuasive powers of a nun who functioned as negotiator; accounts of one woman's struggles on behalf of other women; and data on women's networks. The sources provide insiders' insights into the spiritual economies later scorned by Protestant reformers. They also offer an eyewitness account of the social challenges to this system that erupted in violent clashes during the Revolution of 1525.
The material offers a fresh look at art and music made by and for nuns. Much previous literature has focused on nuns as mystics and visionaries, and on their art as primitive or mundane. This book demonstrates the roles of nuns as active agents for sophisticated art and innovative liturgical music.
Contents
Contents
List of Illustrations
Preface
Acknowledgments
Maps
Introduction
1 Looking Through Words, Numbers, Images, Buildings, and Melodies: Glimpses of Childhood and Marriage, Investment and Donation, in the Nuremberg of Katerina Imhoff Lemmel, 1466-1516
2 Disappearing Behind Veils and Walls with Windows: Katerina's Rituals and Rhetoric of Passage in June 1516
3 Opening Windows of Communication: Building and Business: Letters from 1516
4 Sitting at the Window: News of Shattered Promises and Bad Returns: Letters from February Through July 1517
5 Windows of Opportunity: Bad Times, Singing for Saffron; Sights and Sounds, Scents and Tastes, of Commemoration: Letters from August Through December 1517
6 Writing by Window Light, Singing by Candlelight: Benefactions Through Windows to the World Outside: Letters from 1518
7 Windows Under Scrutiny: Letters from 1519
8 Some Good Eyeglasses: Letters from 1520-1522
9 Breaking Windows: Violent Clashes in the Peasants' War of 1525
10 Now Through a Glass Darkly, but Then Face to Face: Katerina's Last Letter, Last Words, and Last Will
Conclusion: Moving Forward with a Glance in the Rearview Mirror
Genealogical Tables
Bibliography
Index
