Landscapes of conversion in eighth century Hessia : an interdisciplinary approach to the Anglo-Saxon mission of St Boniface.

This thesis is the first large-scale study of the mission of the Anglo-Saxon Saint
Boniface to Hessia, a region in the centre of modern Gennany, between 721 and 754.
The aim of the study is to explore in more detail than has so far been achieved three
aspects of the Bonifatian mission in Hessia: first, his fonnative years in Wessex and
the political context of Hessia before his arrival; second, the ways in which the
Anglo-Saxon missionaries represented certain aspects of mission in their literary
discourse with Insular and Roman contacts; third, the specific challenges of the
mission and the methods used by the missionaries to overcome them.
The thesis takes an interdisciplinary approach that has not yet been attempted
in Bonifatian studies. The historical sources chiefly include the surviving letters of
Boniface and his associates as well as the later vitae of Boniface and several other
figures connected to his mission. The archaeological sources include furnished
burials, fortifications, settlements and ceramics. These sources are brought together
with the aid of a considerable amount of original toponymical and topographical
research within Hessia itself.
The thesis is divided into three parts. In Part I, after an introduction and
historiography (chapter 1), the theoretical and methodological foundations of the
thesis are established (chapter 2).
In Part II, Boniface's early years in the West Saxon church (chapter 3) and the
development of Frankish rule in Hessia between the early sixth century and the
beginning of Boniface's mission (chapter 4) are contextualised more fully than
previous studies have attempted. In chapter 3 several features of the church and
kingdom of Wessex are identified that would fundamentally infonn Boniface's
approach in Hessia. In chapter 4 a new model for the development of Frankish
influence in Hessia up to 721 is outlined, and its significance for the Bonifatian
mission discussed.
Part III focuses attention on the Bonifatian mission in Hessia. Chapter 5 offers
a broad overview of the mission: important cronological matters are discussed and
clarified and the progress and development of the mission between 721 and 754 is
outlined. It is argued that Boniface made a concerted attempt to evangelise Saxony
from 739 onwards, but that his efforts were thwarted by growing political instability
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on the Hessian-Saxon borderlands and the opposition of elements of the Rhineland
Frankish church to his mission.
Chapters 6 and 7 explore two important aspects of the mission. First (chapter
6), the letters of Boniface and LuI are subjected to careful textual analysis. Second
(chapter 7), several specific features of the Hessian mission are explored in more
detail. In chapter 6 a distinction is identified in the nature of the literary discourse
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between the missionary community and papal Rome on the one hand, and the
missionary community and the Insular Anglo-Saxon church on the other. The
argument is made that the literary representation of the mission in letters between
Anglo-Saxons, in contrast to letters between Anglo-Saxons and Rome, reflected a
distinctive conceptualisation of continental mission that combined emotive themes of
peregrillatio, suffering and the concept of Germallia as an ancestral homeland that
had been ensnared by Satan.
In chapter 7 the Bonifatian mission In Hessia is examined from several
viewpoints. Using topographical and toponymical evidence, an original argument is
put forward for the existence of numerous pagan cult sites within Hessia that together
constituted part of a pre-Christian 'sacred landscape'. This is followed by an
examination of the earliest ecclesiatical foundations of Hessia. New observations and
arguments are proposed concerning the development of Hessia's early ecclesiastical
landscape during Boniface's mission, and this landscape is then discussed in relation
to the 'pagan' landscape which it was intended to supplant. This is followed by a
detailed discussion of Boniface's attempts to gain material support for his mission
through his dealings with the Frankish clerical and lay elites, with a special emphasis,
using original charter-based research, on his relationship with the local secular elites
of Hessia. Finally, the ways in which Boniface evangelised and instructed the
population of Hessia and attempted to maintain control of his mission territories are
examined.
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By taking a broad, contextualising, interdisciplinary approach, this study
illuminates the ways in which Boniface, strongly influenced by the structure of the
West Saxon church, made practical attempts to establish a coherent ecclesiastical
network in a politically volatile region where pagan customs and identity were deeply
inscribed in the landscape. Through the textual analysis of the letters, the dissertation
also presents the argument that the conceptualisation of mission as an inherently
painful peregrillatio encouraged Boniface and his fellow missionaries, despite
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circumstances of extreme adversity in Boniface's final years, not to abandon their
largely thwarted evangelisation of the Hessian-Saxon borderlands. In doing so, the
study offers invaluable new perspectives on and insights into the Bonifatian mission
in Hessia.
The second volume of the thesis contains: three appendices giving the results
of the textual analysis of the letters of Boniface and LuI discussed in chapter 6; two
appendices li~ing the grantors of property to Hersfeld and Fulda referred to in the
discussion of charter evidence in chapter 7; and all figures and plates referred to in the
first volume.