Lindsay Rudge PhD Thesis - University of St Andrews

This way of approaching the textual basis of dedicated life necessitates a thorough
analysis of the patterns of manuscript circulation of any text under consideration.
Moreover, one of the most fruitful avenues of exploration is the circulation of
combinations of texts. In this study, such an approach has yielded the immensely
important information that a group of Caesarian texts circulated together, in a pattern that
was completely independent of the Regula virginum.
While previous studies, such as those of McNamara, have relied to a large extent
upon the evidence of hagiographic sources to reconstruct female dedicated life, the
findings of the present study reveal the inadequacies of such an approach. The picture
drawn from vitae does not tally with that projected by normative texts. The importance of
texts directed at religious women that were not rules – Vereor, for instance – is not
represented by such sources. Texts concerned with proving the holiness of their subjects
did not (with the possible exception of Baudonivia’s vita Radegundis) often need to
describe fully the written basis of their lifestyles as a basis for their sanctity. A wider
spectrum of source material offers essential and complementary perspectives. As with
normative texts, this study has signalled the importance of assessing the manuscript
contexts of such vitae, for their valuable insights into the ways in which they were
produced and used. Further, the present study makes a further contribution to current
investigations of the underlying normative nature of hagiography; the uses of both
Caesarius’ language and his message in Baudonivia’s vita Radegundis is but one example
of this.
In sum, this thesis has greatly enriched studies of early medieval dedicated life in
several areas. The extended consideration of the production of Caesarius’ texts for
dedicated women that opened the thesis firmly re-situated women in the process of
writing and reproducing normative texts. Building on this, examinations of the
subsequent circulation and use of the texts have demonstrated the parity between women
and men as the recipients of Caesarius’ writings. Taking a wider perspective, the use of
the transmission of Caesarius’ works as a framework has highlighted the continuities of
female religious experience across centuries of the forming and reforming of its
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