Cistercian Studies

Come abbiamo visto citando Marx, ciò che è dato per un paese è dato per il mondo intero, è solo una questione di tempi. Va da sé che bisogna tener conto del grado di sviluppo di una società per spiegare analogie e differenze. Essendo l'Italia il più antico paese capitalistico, la sua borghesia era già decrepita quando riuscì finalmente a contrastare le forze internazionali che impedivano l'unificazione nazionale. Quest'ultima non era ancora completata che già si manifestavano in pieno le peculiarità di questa classe dominante trafficona, corrotta, politicantesca e completamente succuba del capitale. Tenendo conto del ripetersi storico da tragedia in farsa, questo retaggio storico è ben rappresentato dal quindicennio del partito berlusconiano con i suoi presunti nemici, in realtà simbiotici rappresentanti di un governo unico del capitale. Specie fuori d'Italia, sembra che sia difficile capire la genesi di questo fenomeno sociale. I commenti sono per lo più improntati a stupore che possa accadere. Eppure non solo accade, ma si generalizza, dato che non si contano i casi di governi che, in modo più o meno sbracato o clownesco, si dimostrano stupidi strumenti del capitale. Devono essere stupidi per svolgere la loro funzione.

„Tu deinen Mund auf und iss, was ich dir geben werde.“ Der Adressat dieser Anweisung ist der alttestamentliche Prophet Ezechiel, der von Gott angehalten wird, eine Schriftrolle zu essen, ihren Inhalt sich einzuverleiben und die sich auf diese Weise angeeigneten Worte Gottes zu verkünden (vgl. Ez 2,8ff.). In jenen Texten des Mittelalters, die unter der literaturhistoriographischen Ordnungskategorie ‚mystische Literatur‘ subsumiert werden, steht das Geschriebene meistens nicht am Beginn des Offenbarungsprozesses, sondern ist sein Produkt. Bemerkenswerterweise stellt die Schriftwerdung des Offenbarten in den Texten ein Thema für sich dar. Anders gesagt: Die Texte reflektieren die Bedingungen ihrer Entstehung; sie legen Wert darauf, den Leser in die Umstände ihrer Genese einzuweihen.
Dies gilt auch für die Helftaer Offenbarungsliteratur, deren textintern präsentierte Buchentstehungsgeschichten die deutliche Signatur von Schwester N, einer namentlich nicht bekannten Konventualin, tragen, von deren schriftstellerisch-kompilierender Hand auch die vor Kurzem entdeckte Sonderedition des Legatus divinae pietatis in der Leipziger Handschrift Ms 827 zeugt. Für gewöhnlich werden die im Helftaer Schrifttum gemachten Aussagen über die Entstehungsumstände der einzelnen Werke als kulturgeschichtlich verwertbare Fakten referiert, die über tatsächliche Schreibprozesse informieren. Doch zeigt der Prolog der Sonderausgabe des Legatus, wie Autorschaft modelliert und Schreibszenarien kreiert werden können, was die Frage nach dem Referenzwert vieler faktisch anmutender Details rund um die Buchgenesen, aber auch in Bezug auf die Figurationen von Autorschaft aufwirft.
Ohne diese Implikationen des Themas aus den Augen zu verlieren, widme ich mich in meinem Vortrag den Produkten der um 1300 tätigen Literaturwerkstatt von Helfta. Einleitend werde ich Spuren literarischer Interessenbildung bei jenen Grafenhäusern nachgehen, aus deren Reihen sich die Gründer des Vorgängerkonvents von Helfta rekrutieren. Der Blick auf die Anfänge von Helfta ist insofern aufschlussreich, als die Akteure, mit deren Namen der Literaturbetrieb um 1300 verbunden ist, Nachfahren der Förderer von Helfta bzw. der Stifter des Vorgängerkonvents waren. Diese Akteure haben in verschiedenen Funktionen zur Entstehung eines Textcorpus beigetragen, das nach einhelliger Meinung der Forschung nicht nur Werke mit Offenbarungscharakter, sondern auch solche umfasst, die aus seelsorgerischem Anliegen heraus verfasst wurden. Welche Werke mit Helfta tatsächlich in Verbindung stehen und welche wohl nicht, möchte ich im Einzelnen erläutern. Dabei gilt es, sowohl den Inhalt der neu aufgefundenen Leipziger Handschrift Ms 827 zu berücksichtigen, als auch die Argumente auf den Prüfstand zu stellen, die die Forschung veranlasst haben, das Fließende Licht und die Exercitia spiritualia dem Helftaer Literaturbetrieb um 1300 zuzuschlagen.

The article presents the results of the architectural and archaeological research which was conducted in 2015 in the basement with a fragment of the
enclosure cellarium of the former Cistercian Abbey in Trzebnica. After presenting a general history of the object and the state of the research, the
scope of architectural and archaeological works was described separately. The final part of the article constitutes an attempt to reconstruct and date
transformations of the cellarium of the Trzebnica enclosure. The researched fragment is a remnant of the first enclosure building. Its western wall
was at the same time a part of the facade of the western wing and its preserved fragment of the room is the only existing relic of the interior of the
oldest convent in Trzebnica.
The cellarium was a two-aisle room covered with a cross vault supported by brick arches and a stone pillar. It performed the function of an everyday
storage of the Cistercian convent. It was probably erected in the years 1203–1214. The first reconstruction of the cellarium took place in around 1706
and it was connected with the construction of the great Baroque building of the Cistercian enclosure. At that time a small cellar was created in the
northern part of the cellarium. A change in the function of the cellar took place in about 1894 after the secularization of the Cistercian convent and
was connected with the beginning of the functioning of the Congregation of the Sisters of Charles Borromeo. Then, on the ground floor of the northern
cloister a monastic chapel was arranged and under it in the cellar a boiler room was probably placed. Another modernization of the cellar took place
probably in about 1909 when a large boiler room was built in the east and concrete floor, a small pool with drainage tubes to collect ground water
were built as well as a stove was put there to dry the interior.
In the post-war times of the 20th century the basement with a cellarium fragment served as a handy storage of the convent. This function was totally
changed in 2015 following the described architectural research. At present its interiors house an exhibition of the revealed cellarium fragments.

This article presents a manuscript that significantly enriches the textual corpus of ›Helfta Mysticism‹ with a series of hitherto unknown writings. Aside from this, it contains what is by some distance the oldest copy of the ›Legatus divinae pietatis‹, in the form of a ›special edition‹ that consists of excerpts from the known text as well as new material. This is preceded by a prologue and a florilegium which is marked in an epilogue as Gertrude’s own work. We argue that the epilogue of the florilegium, the prologue and the ›special edition‹ itself were probably composed by ›Sister N‹ of Helfta herself. The article provides a full description of the manuscript (Ms 827), a breakdown of the new ›special edition‹ of the ›Legatus‹-text, and an edition, translation, and close reading of the prologue.

Im Folgenden soll eine Handschrift vorgestellt werden, die die Textbasis der Helftaer Mystik mit einer Reihe von bislang unbekannten Schriften bereichert. Außerdem enthält sie die mit Abstand älteste Abschrift des ›Legatus divinae pietatis‹ in Form einer ›Sonderausgabe‹, die aus Exzerpten aus dem bekannten Textcorpus und aus weiterem bislang nicht bekanntem Material besteht. Dieser geht eine Vorrede und ein im Epilog als Gertruds Werk ausgewiesenes Florilegium voraus, Texte, die wie die ›Sonderausgabe‹ selbst von Schwester N von Helfta stammen dürften. Die vorliegende Studie bietet eine Beschreibung von Ms 827, die Aufschlüsselung der ›Sonderausgabe‹ des ›Legatus‹ sowie Abdruck, Übersetzung und inhaltliche Analyse der Vorrede.

The Diocesan library in Pelplin contains several manuscripts which originate from its mother monastery in Doberan. They probably came here with the first monks from Doberan to the newly founded monastery in Pogódki (1258) which moved to Pelplin a few years later (1276). The stock consists of six manuscripts with a definite possession note of Doberan Monastery and seven further handwritings which are classified by research work as originating from Doberan. The article presents the manuscripts and the current state of research.

SEBASTIAN, Luís - A faiança portuguesa no Mosteiro de S. João de Tarouca (séculos XVI-XVIII). In Actas do Congresso Internacional "Mosteiros Cistercienses: História, Arte, Espiritualidade e Património". Alcobaça: Jorlis, Edições e Publicações, Lda.. Vol. I. Separata. 2013, pp. 357-373.

Resumen El estudio del fondo bibliográfico de manuscritos que hubo en la biblioteca del Monasterio de Piedra es un asunto complejo. Tradicionalmente se ha afirmado que todo se perdió en la desamortización, pero esta afirmación es un tópico. Sería más exacto afirmar que hoy están en paradero desconocido o no es posible su identificación, reconociendo que una buena parte del fondo se perdió irremediablemente. El presente artículo ha permitido identificar, en el arco cronológico que va de 1195 a 1531, con seguridad total, nueve libros, de los cuales, ocho eran manuscritos y uno era impreso. Pese a que es un espectro de información limitado, se abre con él un nuevo campo de análisis y se pone en conocimiento de la comunidad científica la existencia de un centro productor y consumidor de libros durante la Baja Edad Media.

Klöster wirkten in die Welt. Der Band nimmt Phänomene in den Blick, in denen die Wirkmacht des klösterlichen Handelns zum Ausdruck kommt. Die Beiträge gehen der Frage nach, welche Möglichkeiten Nonnen und Mönche hatten, innovativ zu sein, und welche Grenzen ihnen hierbei gesetzt waren. Durch ihre Regeln und Verfahrensabläufe, durch spirituelle wie ökonomische Effizienz, aber auch durch die gestalterische Kraft des Einzelnen konnten sie nicht nur eine Potenz entwickeln, mit der sie die eigene Lebensform auf Dauer stellten, sondern sie waren ebenso in der Lage, innovatorisch über den eigenen Bereich hinaus zu wirken. Auf diese Weise waren Klöster und religiöse Orden über Jahrhunderte hinweg Wegbereiter gesellschaftlichen Wandels und vermochten es, das Leben in Europa und weit darüber hinaus nachhaltig zu prägen. Die vielfältigen klösterlichen Lebensformen erweisen sich ebenso als entscheidende Faktoren menschlicher Kultur wie als innovative Triebkräfte gesellschaftlicher Veränderungen.

- Klöster als Grundmodule menschlicher Kultur und innovative Triebkräfte gesellschaftlicher Veränderungen
- Welche Möglichkeiten hatten Mönche und Nonnen, innovativ zu wirken, und welche Grenzen waren Ihnen hierbei gesetzt?

Mit Beiträgen von Henryk Anzulewicz, Mirko Breitenstein, Julia Burkhardt, Michael Hänchen, Anette Kehnel, Martin Kintzinger, Volker Leppin, Gert Melville, Jens Röhrkasten, Regina Schiewer, Eva Schlotheuber, Jean-Claude Schmitt, Jörg Sonntag, Matthias M. Tischler, Stefan Weinfurter (+)

Aelred of Rievaulx's treatise "A Certain Wonderful Miracle" ends with 2 statements originally addressed to Saint Peter, crediting God with two kinds of action to an imprisoned young nun. Scholars have largely overlooked the first of the two, about God's cleansing the young woman. This article explores the way the treatise shows that cleansing taking place, and the presence of the same theme in his other hagiographical works.

Referência: 2. SANTOS, Selene Candian dos. O Apologia ad Guillelmum abbatem de Bernardo de Claraval e a Espiritualidade no Século XII. In: JORNADA DE ESTUDOS ANTIGOS E MEDIEVAIS E CICLO DE ESTUDOS ANTIGOS E MEDIEVAIS DO PARANÁ E SANTA CATARINA, 11. e  9., 2012, Maringá. Anais da Jornada de Estudos Antigos e Medievais. Maringá: [s.n.], 2012. Disponível em: CD-ROM.

Na década de 1120, Bernardo de Claraval escreveu o Apologia ad Guillelmum abbatem, no qual se posiciona contra monges da Ordem Cisterciense que alegadamente eram detratores da Ordem de Cluny e admoesta os cluniacenses no que diz respeito à sua superfluidade e imoderação. A análise dos argumentos agenciados por Bernardo de Claraval nesse documento, levando em consideração seu gênero discursivo, possibilita a identificação de como seu posicionamento se articula com as transformações no campo da espiritualidade na época. Assim, pretende-se com este artigo analisar de que forma Bernardo de Claraval não só é informado pela valorização de novos aspectos da vida cristã, mas também contribui para essa valorização.
Após a análise do documento, verifica-se que existem ao menos três práticas cristãs que Bernardo destaca em sua importância e que parecem ser características da espiritualidade no século XII: a preeminência da humildade como virtude, das atitudes interiores em comparação às exteriores e da personalização da vida religiosa; a identificação da Igreja primitiva, da vida dos apóstolos e, em específico, dos primeiros monges, como a perfeição de vida cristã e de obediência à Regra; e a valorização crescente da pobreza material ascética em contraposição ao luxo e à riqueza.

The correspondence between King Roger II and Bernard of Clairvaux reveals that in 1140 ca. Cistercians moved to the Norman Kingdom with Elisabeth of Champagne, when she married the Duke Roger. Here, they established their first settlement, whose location is still not widely agreed on by scholars.
Saint George’s Abbey, now a ruin, was erected in Sicily by the Duke at about the same time, and it has been traditionally considered as a Norbertine building.
A new research, conducted through both stylistic analysis of the building and critical reading of the documents, reveals Cistercian features of the abbey and proposes a hypothesis that St. George’s Abbey would actually be the first Cistercian settlement in the Kingdom of Sicily. This sheds new light on the Cistercians in Sicily, and merits further analysis on the subject within the entire Kingdom.

This paper is concerned with identifying signs of a cultural and institutional crisis in early Cistercian collections of visions and miracle stories (ca. 1170 – ca. 1225). I analyze some of the  themes of these literary productions in relation to the political and cultural contingency. I am particularly interested in the way through which a fear of the dissolutio ordinis might have penetrated and shaped the use of symbolic language in the literature. For example, the automatic salvation of the Cistercians and their superiority in the afterlife is a theme that is elaborated upon widely in the miracle literature, and the way in which this theme is expressed differs significantly from the teachings of Bernard of Clairvaux. Visions and miracle tales show us how Cistercian authors sought to recount their history and shape their community. They can also offer us an invaluable insight into the general structure of the Order and perhaps reflect the political climate within the institution.

Of all the human endeavors of the more than one thousand years of Western medieval culture, no single aspect looms so large in the mind of modern man as that of medieval art.  Yet despite the vast number of studies that have been undertaken to explain one aspect or another of medieval art, very few have attempted to explain in a non-aesthetic or non-theological way that issue which is so fundamental to a complete understanding of the artistic complexities of the Middle Ages--the medieval attitude toward art.
In this book, I attempt to lay the foundation for just such an understanding, refracted through the greatest artistic controversy to occur in the West prior to the Reformation, and through the most important document of that controversy--indeed, the most important source we have for the medieval attitude toward art--Bernard of Clairvaux's Apologia ad Guillelmum (1125).
Bernard of Clairvaux was the most articulate spokesman of the historical constant of the medieval opposition to the use of religious art (virtually all of the greatest art before the Late Middle Ages was religious).  In this study, I address a number of the more pressing artistic issues affecting frontline art of the early twelfth century as articulated in Bernard's Apologia.  As presented in this study--which is securely anchored in both the monastic literary tradition and contemporary political, social, and economic concerns--the discussion of Bernard's "things of greater importance" follows a sequence from the economic base of monastic art production (the investment in art to attract donations) to the artistic means by which this was carried out (the sensory saturation of the holy place), to the reception of excessive art on the part of the general public (the equation between excessive art and holiness), to external social objections (art as being in opposition to the care of the poor), and finally to the internal spiritual objections of monasticism (art as a spiritual distraction to the monk).  Central to this social theory of medieval art is the concept of the justification of art, the limits of acceptable art, and the question of just what actually constituted excessive art.  This study shows that art, the absence of art, or the degree of art in the Middle Ages should no longer be seen simply as the result of the ability to acquire or the desire to avoid art.  This book comprises the most thorough social-theoretical study of medieval art as it actually functioned in society, and its implications for the art of both the Romanesque and Gothic periods, whose transition Bernard's life spans, are significant.
This study is accompanied by an English translation and an extensive commentary on the Apologia.
      This formerly out-of-print book is now available again in print at: https://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/book/1655.html

A Companion to Medieval Art: Romanesque and Gothic in Northern Europe, Blackwell Companions in Art History, 2nd ed. (Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, 2019) (a collection of thirty-nine original essays from leading and upcoming scholars in the field, each historiographically analyzing one of a systematic and editorially determined range of subjects in the development of Romanesque and Gothic art history; eleven new essays were added to the revised original thirty essays of the first edition; this includes my introductory essay, "A Sense of Loss: An Overview of the Historiography of Romanesque and Gothic Art").

1. Introduction
A Sense of Loss: An Overview of the Historiography of Romanesque and Gothic Art
Conrad Rudolph

2. Artifex and Opifex – The Medieval Artist
Beate Fricke

3. Vision
Cynthia Hahn

4. Materials, Materia, "Materiality"
Aden Kumler

5. Reception of Images by Medieval Viewers
Madeline H. Caviness

6. Narrative, Narratology, and Meaning
Suzanne Lewis

7. Formalism
Linda Seidel

8. Gender and Medieval Art
Brigitte Kurmann-Schwarz

9. Gregory the Great and Image Theory in Northern Europe During the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries
Herbert L. Kessler

10. Iconography
Shirin Fozi

11. Art and Exegesis
Christopher G. Hughes

12. Whodunit? Patronage, the Canon, and the Problematics of Agency in Romanesque and Gothic Art
Jill Caskey

13. Collecting (and Display)
Pierre Alain Mariaux

14. The Concept of Spolia
Dale Kinney

15. The Monstrous
Thomas E. A. Dale

16. Making Sense of Marginalized Images in Manuscripts and Religious Architecture
Laura Kendrick

17. Definitions and Explanations of the Romanesque Style in Architecture from the 1960s to the Present Day
Eric Fernie

18. Romanesque Sculpture in Northern Europe
Colum Hourihane

19. Modern Origins of Romanesque Sculpture
Robert A. Maxwell

20. The Historiography of Romanesque Manuscript Illumination
Adam Cohen

21. The Study of Gothic Architecture
Stephen Murray

22. France, Germany, and the Historiography of Gothic Sculpture
Jacqueline Jung

23. Gothic Manuscript Illustration: The Case of France
Anne D. Hedeman

24. “Specially English”: Gothic Illumination c.1190 to the Early Fourteenth Century
Kathryn A. Smith

25. From Institutional to Private and from Latin to the Vernacular: German Manuscript Illumination in the Thirteenth Century
Michael Curschmann

26. Glazing Medieval Buildings
Elizabeth Pastan

27. Toward a Historiography of the Sumptuous Arts
Brigitte Buettner

28. Reliquaries
Cynthia Hahn

29. East Meets West: The Art and Architecture of the Crusader States
Jaroslav Folda

30. Gothic in the Latin East
Michalis Olympios

31. Art and Liturgy in the Middle Ages
Eric Palazzo

32. Architectural Layout: Design, Structure, and Construction in Northern Europe
Marie-Thérèse Zenner

33. Sculptural Programs
Bruno Boerner

34. The Art and Architecture of Female Monasticism
Jeffrey F. Hamburger

35. Cistercian Architecture
Peter Fergusson

36. Art and Pilgrimage: Mapping the Way
Paula Gerson

37. "The Scattered Limbs of the Giant": Recollecting Medieval Architectural Revivals
Tina Waldeier Bizzarro

38. Medieval Art Collections
Janet Marquardt

39. The Modern Medieval Museum
Michelle P. Brown

O antigo mosteiro cisterciense de N.ª Senhora do Desterro, apesar das vicissitudes que sofreu e da obscuridade em que permaneceu a história da sua construção permanece, ainda hoje, como um marco arquitectónico fundamental na imagem da cidade de Lisboa. Em boa parte poupado pelo Terramoto, os estragos a que foi sujeito desde o final do séc. XIX ao início do XX, devem-se sobretudo à acção humana. Décadas de incúria e delapidações sucessivas, conduziram a uma descaracterização progressiva a que não foi também alheia a própria transformação em hospital, traduzida em alterações profundas de adaptação pouco adequadas ao edifício.
Contudo, bem longe da imagem que vulgarmente dele se transmite, o antigo Mosteiro do Desterro constitui, apesar do estado fragmentário a que chegou aos nossos dias, um raro testemunho da nossa mais qualificada arquitectura tardo-clássica, fazendo parte dos grandes complexos monástico-conventuais construídos no período filipino (1580-1640).
O presente artigo pretende, além de comprovar a autoria do arquitecto Baltazar Álvares, dar a conhecer, a partir das fontes documentais, o processo construtivo do mosteiro e alguns aspectos desconhecidos do seu projecto. Nomeadamente, as influências da traça erudita da fachada (derivada de um desenho de Rafael para a Villa Madama incluído no tratado de Serlio) e as características peculiares dos espaços monásticos, como os claustros, impostas pela topografia acidentada do terreno.

Dieser Führer durch das UNESCO-Weltkulturerbe Maulbronn mit seiner wunderschönen Klosteranlage behandelt ausführlich die Geschichte und die Beschreibung der Klausurbauten des ehemaligen Zisterzienserklosters, die hier in einzigartiger Weise erhalten sind.

This article aims to study two illuminated liturgical manuscripts from the monastic library of Alcobaça, a Collectary – ritual (Alc. 166) and a Psalter-hymnal (Alc. 11), both from the late twelh century. e analysis of its liturgical contents and illuminated decorations, along with its comparison with other illuminated manuscripts from the same monastery, intends to accurate their context and dates of production and their origin in this Cistercian house.

The essential problem for the study of Bernard’s Apologia ad Guillelmum (1125), the most important document pertaining to the medieval attitude toward art, has been that scholars have felt it does not specifically name one monastery or monastic order as a subject of the criticisms contained in it. Although Bernard–one of the most influential men of his time–quite clearly and repeatedly addressed his admonitions to William of Saint-Thierry’s “order,” scholars have known that William was a friend of Bernard and therefore have believed that this address must have been a front for an indirect attack upon someone else. At the same time they have assumed that the Apologia was aimed at Cluny in particular. Undoubtedly from the earliest times a major factor in this conception has been the similarity of Bernard’s Letter 1 and the Apologia. Yet crucial distinctions between the two have not been noticed. These are that Bernard never hesitated to repeatedly mention Cluny by name in Letter 1, and that there is no criticism of the art of Cluny in the same letter. The problem of clarity of address was solved by prefixing to the Apologia, on inconclusive evidence, a certain letter of Bernard’s. This letter, in recounting an earlier one of William’s, did mention the Cluniacs. However, when the text proper was quoted either extensively or without the aid of the spurious preface, later scholars felt that it was necessary to interpolate the word “Cluniac,” as Bernard did not sufficiently use that word to accommodate their conception of the treatise. As a result, attention focused on Cluny as the major, or even sole, recipient of the Apologia.

Many scholars have thought that if it were Cluny that Bernard had complained about in his treatise, it must also be Cluny that he had described in his chapters on art. Therefore theApologia was substituted for historical evidence in their reconstruction of the art program of that abbey. The use of Bernard’s denunciation of the worst aspects of excessive art as a catalogue of the artworks as they were believed to have existed at Cluny in 1125 has led to an image of Cluny as bent on a program of excessive art. This image was compounded by a somewhat misleading comparison with Cîteaux when Cîteaux was at its financially most impoverished level. Such a polarization of the two most visible representatives of contemporary monasticism has contributed to a rather limited understanding of the monastic controversy in the early twelfth century. The inflexibility of this view has also had as a consequence the impression that excessive ornamentation was somehow distinctively Cluniac, and to be consistently found throughout the Cluniac Congregation.

As to an analysis of what Bernard actually said about art, scholars have tended to concentrate their attention on two main aspects of Apologia 28-29: Bernard’s censure of art as a spiritual distraction and his recognition of the utility of a secular religious art. The first point has, in the most thorough work, received a certain amount of recognition. But although Bernard’s comments on secular religious art were only made in passing, they have been dealt with by some as a major tenet of the Apologia. In short, these authors have fixed on to what may be termed the artistically positive aspects of the Apologia, rather than on to the more prominent negative criticisms of art.

The same inclination is seen in efforts to explain the impetus behind Apologia 28-29. The premium set on medieval religious art by nineteenth-century Church enthusiasts compelled them to denounce Bernard’s criticism of art as personally motivated, rather than on monastic or social grounds. The approaches to Bernard’s personal attitude toward art have been varied and contradictory, with some authors suggesting that Bernard’s rejection of art indicated a revulsion, and to others a very strong attraction. In the end, this has detracted from seeing any more historically or politically based impetus to Bernard’s actions, which scholarship has only just begun to look at. Possibly because of the emphasis on personal stimulus, no direct connection has been made between the Apologia and the discontinuation of heavily ornamented manuscripts within the Cistercian Order. In any event, Bernard’s relation to Cistercian art and legislation on art has not been put into proper perspective. While a very few authors have noted similarities between his views and those of earlier Church fathers, Bernard’s position within a non-iconoclastic movement against religious art in his own time has been largely neglected.

Ultimately, there has been no thorough analysis of the Apologia with the exception of Vacandard’s ground breaking effort. The tendency has been to isolate various passages ofApologia 28-29, rather than to coherently analyze the whole, especially in relation to the rest of the Apologia, Bernard’s other writings, the artistic evidence of Cluny and Cîteaux, and the political conditions of both Cîteaux and monasticism in general. The literature has established a rather inflexible and restricted view of the Apologia. But at the same time, questions have at least been raised on most major issues which, when developed, will lead to a more significant understanding of the part played by Bernard’s treatise in the controversy over monastic art in the twelfth century.

Este artigo apresenta um projeto de investigação de Pós Doutoramento, agora
terminado, que estudou um conjunto de manuscritos iluminados produzidos no Mosteiro
de Alcobaça. Começa por abordar as características dos trabalhos de investigação
desenvolvidos em torno dos códices iluminados e das suas especificidades para em
seguida se concentrar no trabalho de equipa desenvolvido por um conjunto de
investigadores do Instituto de Estudos Medievais da FCSH UNL no aprofundamento do
estudo e divulgação deste património.
É nossa intenção abordar as iniciativas diversificadas de divulgação e disseminação,
pelos mais diversos públicos, do conhecimento científico produzido em contexto
universitário, pelos referidos investigadores, num processo que se desenvolveu em
estreita colaboração e parceria entre as instituições que têm os manuscritos à sua guarda,
como a Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal, entre outras e o Mosteiro de Alcobaça.

This new German translation of "De Spirituali Amicitia" is comfortably to read, edited by Cistercian monks of the Abbey Heiligenkreuz (Austria) - published at EOS, St. Ottilien (Germany) 2018.
Aelred's conversations about spiritual friendship are more than general religious considerations or conditioned by the time. This is due to the fact that the philosophically educated monk absorbs the ancient basic understandings in a positive manner, especially from Plato, Aristotle, Cicero and Seneca. True friendship goes far beyond interests and common pleasures. It is a mutual life support based on a higher ethic of humanity. Aelred succeeds in broadening this deeper understanding of friendship in the sense of a Christian humanism. This means that the power of divine love can create true humanity and thus cleanse egoisms and deficiencies in friendships. Thus, friendship, as a sustaining power of human relationship, leads to God, just as Jesus lived with his friends, the disciples. Aelred – standing in the medieval mystical tradition of spiritual friendship – has shown especially clearly how friends can become "friends of God". Such a friendship in the horizon of God is a gift for life. These thoughts are especially important in a time of growing self-interest and hunts for success. Therefore, this medieval text "de spirituali amicitia" can certainly serve as a useful vademecum for today's practice for compassion in true humanity.

O Mosteiro de Santa Maria de Alcobaça, Património Mundial da UNESCO desde 1989, constitui um caso de estudo no âmbito do vandalismo do Património em Portugal. Apesar de existirem vários estudos sobre os acontecimentos que ocorreram no Mosteiro nos séculos XIX e XX, falta um estudo dedicado unicamente e especialmente ao vandalismo na Abadia de Santa Maria de Alcobaça ao longo do tempo. Assim, recorrendo a alguma documentação existente em arquivos e à vasta bibliografia publicada nos últimos anos, é possível percorrer os túneis do tempo e elaborar um percurso histórico das transformações que o Mosteiro sofreu durante os séculos XIX e XX. Apesar de se tratar de um monumento classificado e Património Mundial, assistimos, ainda, em pleno século XXI, a casos de vandalismo, como o ocorrido em 2010, quando duas adolescentes foram identificadas a grafitar o monumento. Devemos ter com conta que a palavra vandalismo é uma terminologia originalmente utilizada pelos romanos, para classificar a destruição ou deterioração de algo belo pelos povos bárbaros.
Desta forma, pretende-se com este pequeno trabalho, elaborar uma resenha histórica dos vários vandalismos e destruições que o Mosteiro sofreu ao longo do século XIX e século XX. Assim, iniciamos com uma breve abordagem histórica da Abadia de Alcobaça, seguindo-se um pequeno capítulo dedicado às destruições e profanações ocorridas durante as Invasões Francesas, outro sobre as ocupações que o Mosteiro teve com a extinção das ordens religiosas, transformando um edifício sagrado em profano e terminando com os restauros efetuados ao longo da segunda metade do século XIX e primeira metade do século XX, que, através das teorias de restauro que vigoravam na época, em especial as teorias do arquiteto francês Eugéne Viollet-le-Duc, espoliaram a majestosa ornamentação barroca, na tentativa de restaurar o monumento ao seu estado original. Se Portugal tivesse tomado parte na carta de Atenas, teríamos hoje uma Igreja ricamente ornamentada. Felizmente, salvou-se a fabulosa fachada barroca. Seria necessário aguardar pela década de 60 para Portugal aderir e participar na redação da carta de Veneza, abrindo Portugal às teorias de restauro contemporâneas.