Anniversary: 20 years of the Research Center for Comparative History of Religious Orders

On 27 and 28 November, FOVOG will celebrate its 20th anniversary. Since its founding in 2005 by Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Gert Melville, the Research Center for Comparative History of Religious Orders (FOVOG) has been dedicated to the history of monasteries and religious orders. 
For 15 years, FOVOG has been based at Dresden University of Technology, where it provides the organisational framework for a large number of comparative projects.

 

New Projects

Resilienzvor­stellungen in der Klosterge­schichtsschrei­bung des Hochmittelal­ters (11.-13. Jahrhundert) [Notions of Resilience in Monastic Historiography of the High Middle Ages (11th–13th Centuries)]

by Cornelius Caspar

In the humanities and social sciences, resilience is generally understood as the ability of individuals and groups to adapt to and withstand crises. So far, the concept has received little attention in research on monasteries and religious orders. This PhD project therefore explores notions of resilience in monastic historiography from the 11th to 13th centuries. Using a broad heuristic definition, resilience is considered present when authors highlight monks’ or canons’ capacity to develop political, social, economic, or cultural strategies that, in the eyes of contemporaries, enabled them to respond to threats and crises. Sixteen hagiographical and historiographical texts from Benedictine, Cistercian, and Premonstratensian contexts form the corpus. These works describe past emergencies in detail and often present responses to them, raising the question of whether such narratives served as guides for resilient behaviour. The disruptions depicted fall into three categories: (A) physical violence, (B) disease, fire, and natural disasters, and (C) legal conflicts with secular or ecclesiastical parties. Using an analytical tool developed by the Trier-based Collaborative Research Centre 2539, the study closely examines the actions outlined by the authors. Resilience strategies represent measures aimed at protecting and maintaining the monastic or canonical order during or after a disruption, and material or immaterial resources were required to implement them. Finally, the project investigates how different forms of religious life influenced medieval notions of resilience. Owing to their stronger institutionalisation, Cistercian and Premonstratensian houses may have relied more on organisational structures such as general chapters or visitations. By contrast, Benedictine authors might reflect more independent approaches to coping with disruption.

© Casuum Sancti Galli continuatio secunda, St. Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, 615, p. 314; Ab exordio enim huius nascentis loci usque ad senissimam antiquitatem nostram monachis nostris nunquam persecutiones, tribulationes, detractiones, invidię defuerunt. “From the founding of this place to our venerable age, our monks have never been spared persecutions, hardships, slanders, or envy.”

 

Associated Scientists

In 2024, three internationally renowned researchers in the field of vita religiosa were appointed as associated scientists of FOVOG.
At this point, we would like to present the current project of Dr. Marko Jerković.

Disciplinary Authority in Religious Communities

The project deals with the forms, functioning, and stability of disciplinary authority in medieval religious communities. It focuses on techniques of regulation, regularization, and rectification of behaviour, and on the conceptual strategies devised for the efficient mindset adaptions to the cloistered life. The main goal is to comprehend better how a “disciplined individual” and “disciplined community” functioned. The project builds upon the social control theories and the extensive research of the institutionalization of religious orders at the FOVOG-Dresden. The research is based on the example of Mendicant Orders. It takes into account the normative sources and its commentaries, the papal reforming bulls, the parenetic instructions, and excerpts from hagiographic writings. The approach is based not only on the close-reading content analysis but also on analysing how was the written word functionalised to mobilise the corporate sense of validity and viability of disciplinary technologies. The research investigates the holders of disciplinary authority and decision-making processes; mechanisms of application of discipline; targets of discipline; transgressions and punishments. These objectives are followed by analysing: the changeable and fixed elements of discipline; its ability to provide the state of perpetual liminality for the brethren; the ability of discipline to rationalize the spiritual motivation and to divinize the rational organization; and the acquiring of consensus on the question what constitutes the acceptable discipline.

 

Courses Winter Term 2025/26

Research Colloquium: New Research on the Comparative History of Religious Orders

Location: Research Center for Comparative History of Religious Orders (FOVOG), Budapester Str. 34b, 01069 Dresden
Time: Wednesday, 6 DS (16:40–18:10)
Participation via Zoom is possible after registration at fovog@tu-dresden.de.

           

Advanced seminar: Liebe(n) im Mittelalter (Blockveranst.) [Love in the Middle Ages (block event)] (Jörg Sonntag)

Love and sex have not only been “occupying” people since they came into existence. Humankind has even made both phenomena a fundamental part of its culture. Thus, in addition to individual feelings, love and sex soon began to derive their meaning increasingly from social, political, religious or, more generally, ethical and moral contexts. In this advanced seminar, we will therefore discuss the ideas and practices of “love” (marriage, homosexuality, polygamy or prostitution) as well as the forms of courtly love and divine love, or techniques of love magic.

 

Reports

Workshop: "The Influence of Societies on Religious Orders - A Comparison between the Croatian Historical Lands and the Holy Roman Empire" (Zagreb, November 6-7 2025)

In contrast to today, religious orders and their members were apparent and influential in the societies of premodern Europe. The German-Croatian DAAD project “Religious Orders and Societies Entangled. The Examples of the Croatian Historical Lands and the Holy Roman Empire” intends to research the interplay between various religious orders and the respective societies in the Croatian Historical Lands and the Holy Roman Empire. It wants to study in a comparative and interdisciplinary way how different religious orders identified themselves as communities on their own, which were distinct from the societies around them, how the societies around them nonetheless affected the religious orders and how, on the other hand, religious orders reshaped the societies around them.

The second workshop of the project, which took place in Zagreb on 6 and 7 November 2025, discussed the influence of the societies of the Croatian Historical Lands and the Holy Roman Empire on different religious orders. Monasteries were usually dependent on their benefactors as well as the secular and ecclesiastical hierarchy. Often the outside world tried to influence the religious orders and monasteries, and sometimes to a degree that endangered their religious concepts. The workshop examined such influences from outside, focusing on the ones that were typical and the ones that contrasted with the order’s concept and transformed them in the long run. The influence of the founders was evident as a common feature between the Croatian Historical Lands and the Holy Roman Empire. This meant that even orders with a very seclusive concept adapted to the expectations of the founders to a certain extent. Among the examples discussed were princes who wanted to build a palace within charterhouses or tried to secure their symbolic presence by sumptuous works of art in the cloister, although the order prescribed simplicity and forbade luxury. On the other hand, the workshop also showed many contrasts between the two regions. For example, language and ethnic conflicts played a greater role in the Croatian Historical Lands, which had been ruled by the Hungarian king since the 12th century, than in the Holy Roman Empire. It was shown that the tensions between Hungarians and Croatians also had an impact on the Pauline Order and the Franciscans in the time of Reformation.

 

Workshop: "Religious Orders as Communities in Themselves" (Dresden, June 16–17 2025)

Unlike today, religious orders and their members were not only present in the societies of pre-modern Europe, but also extremely influential. The German-Croatian DAAD project "Religious Orders and Societies Entangled. The Examples of the Croatian Historical Lands and the Holy Roman Empire" aims to explore the interplay between various religious orders and the respective societies in the historical Croatian territories and the Holy Roman Empire. It aims to conduct a comparative and interdisciplinary study of how various religious orders identified themselves as communities that differed from the societies surrounding them. At the same time, however, the mutual influence of orders and society will be examined.

The first workshop of this project focused on religious orders as communities and aimed to gain a better understanding of how orders distinguished themselves from the surrounding society, both conceptually and through specific practices. It drew on Michel Foucault's concept of heterotopia, which refers to a place that actually exists but has a utopian character, and applied it to monasteries. This workshop analysed various aspects through which religious orders distinguished themselves from their environment, such as architecture, clothing, specific symbols and rituals, liturgy, and their reflection in writing and polemical literature. In addition, the question of regional differences and regional identities was addressed, e.g. different architectures of monasteries of the same or similar orders in the historical territories of Croatia and the Holy Roman Empire.

Workshop: “Statuten von Hospitalorden und Statuten von Hospitälern im europäischen Vergleich (12. bis 18. Jahrhundert)” [Statutes of Hospitaller Orders and Statutes of Hospitals in European Comparison (12th to 18th Century)] (Dresden, March 24–26 2025)

From 24 to 26 March 2025, the workshop “Statuten von Hospitalorden und Statuten von Hospitälern im europäischen Vergleich (12.–18. Jahrhundert)” was held at FOVOG in Dresden. The event formed part of the research project “Normative Order and Symbolic Presence of the Antonites. Edition of their statutes and analysis of their signs” (2022–2025), directed by Mirko Breitenstein, who organised the workshop together with Nathalie Schmidt.
In addition to an introductory lecture by Mirko Breitenstein, nine presentations examined the statutes and regulations of various hospital orders and institutions, including the Order of Saint Anthony, brotherhood hospitals, and leprosy houses. Scholars from Germany, France, and Italy discussed similarities and regional variations in the legal and normative frameworks of medieval and early modern hospitals.
The workshop emphasised the comparative study of hospital statutes as sources for understanding charitable organization, governance, and religious practice across Europe. The contributions will be published in an edited volume planned for 2026.

The detailed conference report by Rebecca Hoppe can be found on H-Soz-Kult.

Conference report of the Workshop "Körper und Geistlichkeit im Mittelalter: Zwischen Konvention und Unkonventionalität?" [Body and Clerical Order in the Middle Ages: Between Convention and Unconventionality?] (Cologne, 25 to 27 September 2024)

An international and interdisciplinary workshop entitled „Körper und Geistlichkeit im Mittelalter: Zwischen Konvention und Unkonventionalität?“ (“Body and Clerical Order in the Middle Ages: Between Convention and Unconventionality?”) took place at the University of Cologne from 25 to 27 September 2024. It was organized in cooperation between the DFG Research Training Group 2212 “Dynamics of Conventionality (400-1550)”, which is based at the University of Cologne, and the  working group “Body and Clerical Order in the Middle Ages. Virtue, Power and Representation”. This working group was founded in December 2023 by Daniela Bianca Hoffmann (FOVOG-Dresden), Jan Lemmer (University of Cologne) and Matthias Weber (Ruhr-Universität-Bochum); it was the first workshop of the working group, which will be followed by others.

The detailed conference report can be found on H-Soz-Kult.

 

Publications

 

Miscellaneous

 

Upcoming Events

Working group "Body and Clerical Order in the Middle Ages. Virtue, Power and Representation"

The working group "Body and Clerical Order in the Middle Ages. Virtue, Power and Representation" prepares a second workshop which will take place in Dresden in autumn 2026. Further information will follow in the next newsletter.