2025/02/27 by Blair Apgar · 1 voice
Arts and Humanities · #Byzantine Studies and History #Historical and Religious Studies of Rome #Medieval Literature and History
paper · pdf · doi:10.3390/rel16030301
openalex publication_date 2025/02/27 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
The popular perception of Matilda of Canossa (1046–1115) is one which is typically filtered through the events of the Investiture Controversy and the famed 1077 meeting at Canossa and is thus prismatically reflected through the legacy of two men, Emperor Henry IV (1050–1106) and Pope Gregory VII (1020–1085). Though not an atypical journey through time for any female figure of history, it is a historiographical transformation which has altogether subverted studies of Matilda’s agency and authority. This has obfuscated studies of Matilda’s own agency and authority, where her oft contentious attitude toward and relationship to the regnum has typically been classified as a side effect of her extreme devotion to the papacy, rather than its own effort. This paper will begin to unwind the evidence of Matilda’s personal rebellion from the king by examining the biography produced at the end of her lifetime, the Vita Mathildis (Vatican City, Bibliotheca Apostolica Vaticana, MS. Vat. Lat. 4922). The examination of both the text and illuminations of the manuscript makes clear that Matilda’s rejection of the regnum was not merely a side effect of lifelong loyalty to the papacy but was also part of a conscious rejection of imperial authority, evidence of which can be found through vigorous textual and visual analyses.