1852
Reviews of Books
say, dynastic and territorial goals. Larger international determined all the more conclusively as the paradigm
issues, such as the papal schism, did not draw English is put to the test elsewhere.
JOHN D. FUDGE
and German kings into political alliances or war and
University of British Columbia
produced no lasting Anglo-German coalitions against
France or the papacy. Rather than constituting a series
of failures, though, this is "an exemplary history of the THOMAS S. ASBRIDGE. The Creation of the Principality of
nature of European polities" at the time, to which Antioch 1098-1130. Rochester, N.Y.: Boydell &
Brewer. 2000. Pp. xi, 233. $75.00.
modern notions of state building are not applicable.
If political life is indeed a record of social dynamics,
Studies of Frankish activities in the Levant in the wake
from familial to religious and economie in this study, it
of the First Crusade have traditionally concentrated on
is seldom encountered outside the social strata of
the Kingdom of Jerusalem, with the northern states of
royalty, aristoeracy, and prince-bishops. Notwithstand- Edessa, Antioch, and Tripoli receiving far less attening the Cologne burghers, Anglo-Normans, Lotharing- tion. The boom of crusade studies during the past
ians, and Flemings whose collaborative participation in twenty years or so has not basically affected this
the Second Crusade allegedly illustrates the forging of disparity in interest, although the three northern
new channels of cooperation and integration by small states, too, are now more intensively dealt with. This is
landowners and townsmen, there is scant attention
especially true of the Principality of Antioch. Hans
here to diplomacy among major towns (for instance, Eberhard Mayer, Rudolf Hiestand, Bernard Hamilton
Cologne and London). The same holds true for rela- and others have recently thrown light on various
tionships between sovereign and territorial jurisdie- aspects of its political, ecclesiastical and intellectual
tions and other political entities, such as the fledgling history, while Charles Burnett has shown that signifiGerman Hanse, in which Cologne would acquire a cant intercultural contacts had taken place there, with
Stephen of Antioch playing the leading role in the
leading political voice. For a more complete spectrum
of Anglo-Cologne relations, including cultural ties, the 1120s.
Whereas these studies concentrate on specific isreader is directed to Huffman's earlier published work.
sues, Thomas S. Asbridge presents a comprehensive
All the same, when this current study ventures into the
realm of heightened economie and cultural interde- history of Antioch during the first three decades of the
pendenee across Europe and maintains that the defin- principality's existence. It is the first attempt to do so
ing forees responsible for bringing regions together since René Grousset in 1934 and Claude Cahen in
and encouraging economie and cultural growth were 1940 covered much of the same ground in works of far
broader scope. Asbridge examines in detail the milipolitical, some elaboration of the political-economic- tary moves of Franks and Muslims, points out the
cultural matrix might strengthen the case. What spe- importance of strategie areas like the low hills halfway
cific aspeets of culture were transmitted from one between Frankish Antioch and Moslim Aleppo, draws
location to another during this era of increasingly attention to the affinity between the tributes that
complex interregional relations and how, aside from Syrian Moslim towns paid to Antioch and the parias
the granting of trading rights to Cologne merchants, payments that Spanish Moslim cities rendered to the
did those relations facilitate growth of the European kings of Castile, and highlights instances of Frankisheconomy?
Muslim alliance. Five maps make clear the ups and
This book is a very worthwhile addition to the
downs in the extent of Frankish-controlled territory
relatively modest corpus of works on medieval Ger- between 1099 and 1119.
These maps might have included more details. For
many currently available in English, bringing together
a wide selection of printed sources and offering an instance, the elevated Jabal as-Summaq region southexcellent synthesis of scholarship to date. By virtue of east of Antioch, mentioned in Asbridge's account
the interregional approach, it succeeds in its stated aim more than thirty times, is not shown on any of these
of grafting Germany more firmly into the historiogra- maps; indeed, no elevations are indicated on them. To
phy of the medieval West. Some familiarity with locate Jabal as-Summaq, or to learn about elevations
fundamental political events in England and the em- in general, one must return to Cahen's map of 1940.
pire is assumed from the outset. The reader not so Neither does Asbridge spell out the differences beacquainted may be somewhat overwhelmed by the tween his reconstruction and the quite detailed ones by
Grousset and Cahen. Also, Asbridge's account tends
remarkably large cast of characters and the innumerto stick to the essential military and political steps,
able details of their sociopolitical intrigues. The theooccasionally leaving out valuable information. For
retical thrust of this study provides ample food for instance, he presents the conflicting reports about the
thought, an alternative paradigm to a historiographical fate of the Frankish defenders following the conquest
tradition far too prone, in Huffman's view, to judge of Kafartab in 1115 but omits mentioning that the
success or failure in terms of modern institutional Franks killed their children and women before the
expectations. Whether or not Anglo-German relations Muslims forced their way into the town. Again, he
are therefore exemplary of medieval polities may be points out that, after the Muslim victory in 1119,
AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW
DECEMBER 2001
Europe: Ancient and Medieval
Patriarch Bernard organized the defense of Antioch,
but he does not disclose that the patriarch had the
city's towers garrisoned by monks and clerics as well as
by laymen—a boldly unorthodox measure that William
of Tyre was to leave unmentioned.
In his discussion of Antioch's relations with Byzantium, Asbridge convincingly argues that the Treaty of
Devol of 1108 was far less important than recent
historians have assumed. He also contends that the
office of the duke of Antioch, the chief Frankish city
functionary, was probably modeled on a Byzantine
precedent. In his survey of Antioch's relations with
Jerusalem, Edessa, and Tripoli, Asbridge proffers the
plausible hypothesis that the rulers of these Frankish
states forged a formai "confraternity" that guaranteed
mutual military assistance.
The last four chapters deal with the development of
lay and ecclesiastical institutions in the Principality of
Antioch. Especially valuable is the prosopographical
study of the principality's lay landholders, which suggests that many of them were Normans from Normandy and southern Italy. The study might have been
enhanced by the inclusion of Hamdan al-Atharibi, a
Muslim poet, chronicler, and administrator who received a village from the Frankish lord of al-Atharib.
This Muslim retainer of the Franks was first brought to
attention by Cahen; more recently Anne-Marie Eddé
devoted a few dense lines to him; a full-length study, by
Muhammad al-Hajjuj, is under preparation.
Discussing the relations of Patriarch Bernard of
Antioch with the papacy, Asbridge marshals several
pieces of evidence suggesting that Bernard challenged
Rome's claim to supremacy. He could have clinched
his case by utilizing the letter, re-edited by Hiestand in
1985, that the papa! legate Giles of Tusculum sent
Bernard in 1128. In this letter, Bernard is explicitly
branded for his disobedience to Rome and for the
boast that he is the pope's collega et frater.
These omissions notwithstanding, Asbridge's
book—based on his Ph.D. dissertation—amounts to a
significant contribution to the understanding of early
Frankish Antioch.
BENJAMIN Z. KEDAR
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
FRANCES ANDREWS. The Early Humiliati. (Cambridge
Studies in Medieval Life and Thought, Fourth Series,
number 43.) New York: Cambridge University Press.
1999. Pp. xi, 353. $69.95.
In 1184, Pope Lucius III condemned a group called the
Humiliati or "humble ones" as heretics. Unlike the
Cathars, whom he also condemned, the Humiliati
posed no challenge to Christian dogma. What was at
issue was the Humiliati's method of living out the
tenets of the Christian faith. In 1201, Pope Innocent
III revisited the question of the Humiliati, approving a
framework that allowed for three separate Humiliati
orders: canons, regulars, and laity. It is the latter event
rather than the former that Frances Andrews empha-
AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW
1853
sizes in her excellent new study of the Humiliati, which
maintains that the group has been too long tarred with
the brush of scandal, when instead they should be
regarded as primary actors on the stage of the evangelical reawakening of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Herbert Grundmann first made this argument
in 1935 in his ground-breaking Religious Movements of
the Middle Ages (English translation, 1995), which
argued that both heterodox and orthodox religious
groups of the twelfth century shared a common impulse toward the vita apostolica, a life centered on
preaching and evangelical poverty. In Grundmann's
analysis, the Humiliati played an important but rather
limited role in the religious revival. By contrast, Andrews has thrown the spotlight on the Humiliati, a
welcome accomplishment, as there has been no fulllength treatment of the subject since 1911, when Luigi
Zanoni published his account that focused on the
group's involvement with the wool manufacturing industry.
This is not to say, however, that studies of the
Humiliati have been lacking, as Andrews's dexterous
historiographical discussion in chapter one demonstrates. English-speaking audiences were first introduced to the Humiliati in the 1970s by Brenda Bolton,
whose interest in Innocent III led her to investigate the
pope's relationship with the movement from an ecclesiastical standpoint. Alternatively, Italian scholars
have long been mining the rich holdings of Italy's
archives in an attempt to reconstruct Humiliati communities. Andrews is extremely well versed in this
literature; indeed, she has incorporated the findings of
many of these locaPstudies into her own work, which
itself is grounded in scrupulous archival research based
mainly, but not exclusively, in Verona. What she has
given us, then, is a three-fold contribution to the field:
first, she has performed an invaluable service for
English-language audiences by presenting and synthesizing the results of an enormous amount of recent
Italian scholarship; second, her work adds new and
exciting original research to the field, much of it
challenging our standard view of the Humiliati; and
third, it is the first study to trace out the general
contours and development of the Humiliati from the
early movement of the 1170s to its apogee as an
established religious order in the mid-thirteenth century. Any one of these elements would have been an
achievement; the combination of all three results in
major contributions to the fields of both medieval
Italian history and ecclesiastical history of the Middle
Ages.
Andrews's monograph is also a salutary lesson in
historical method as her approach brings together
documents of both theory and practice. That is, she
sensibly tests prescriptive documents produced by the
papal chancery against notarial documents of practice,
a method that frequently reveals a world of difference
between the well-ordered communities suggested by
the papal records and the actual "reality on the
ground." Wills, land transactions, and professions of
DECEMBER 2001