HENRY C. LEA STUDIES IN CHURCH HISTORY

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1 HENRY C. LEA STUDIES IN CHURCH HISTORY

2 BACHMANN REPRINTS Herausgegeben von Wolfgang Beutin, Luc Deitz und Peter Dinzelbacher Band 1

3 Henry C. Lea Studies in Church History Reprint of the second, enlarged edition with an Afterword by Peter Dinzelbacher Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Bachmann Badenweiler

4 Bibliografische Information Der Deutschen Bibliothek Die Deutsche Bibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet über abrufbar. Unveränderter Nachdruck der 2., erw. Auflage Henry C. Lea s Son & Co., Philadelphia 1883 Alle Rechte vorbehalten. Dieses Werk, in erster Linie das Nachwort, ist urheberrechtlich geschützt. Jede Verwertung außerhalb der engen Grenzen des Urheberrechtsgesetzes ist ohne Zustimmung des Verlages unzulässig. Dies gilt insbesondere für Vervielfältigungen, Übersetzungen, Mikroverfilmungen und Einspeicherung bzw. Verarbeitungen in elektronischen Systemen. Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Dr. Michael P. Bachmann Badenweiler 2009 Gedruckt auf säurefreiem und alterungsbeständigem Papier Druck und Einband: fgb Freiburg i. Br. ISBN Besuchen Sie auch unseren Internetauftritt unter

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26 Afterword by Peter Dinzelbacher 1 Peter Dinzelbacher, Dr. phil. habil., Honorarprofessor für Sozial- und Mentalitätsgeschichte an der Universität Wien.

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28 3* Introduction My initial acquaintance with Henry Charles Lea s book on the history of the Church in the Middle Ages took place in that labyrinthine structure which is known as the Princeton University Library. There, for the first time, I could read some paragraphs of these fascinating analyses of the temporal power the late antique and medieval clergy so successfully strove to gain in the feudal world. I had been already familiar with this title since two or three older Anglophone works on similar subjects had quoted it, but subsequently it had always turned out impossible to find a copy of this publication, as there seem to exist only a very few public libraries on the European continent which are in possession of the second edition of Lea s studies, and none of them (the British ones included) would lend it via interlibrary loan. Back to Europe I literally searched for many years for a second-hand copy until I could order one at a reasonable price and with the help of a colleague teaching in the United States 2. It must be underlined that only the second edition of these Studies should be used today, as Lea had reprinted them including several new additions illustrating his statements. Also, and even more importantly, he added a chapter on a further subject less studied, viz. the Early Church and slavery. The very rarity of this scholarly publication by the famous historian of the Inquisition would have been reason enough to pave the way for a reprint which, according to my opinion, certainly will not be chiefly to the advance of historians of historiography; instead, Lea s concise and thoroughly source-based expositions are of such a high quality that they 2 Professor Albrecht Classen, University of Arizona, Tucson, who also was kind enough to go over the English of this article.

29 4* still should be consulted by the present-day medievalists who have for too long ignored this excellent book mostly due to its absence in the libraries of historical institutes and seminars until now. H. C. Lea Some information on the man and his work might be appropriate. Henry Charles Lea (September 19, October 24, 1909) was not an academic historian and never taught at a university. Originally, his main interest had rested in the natural sciences, specializing in photographic chemistry. He originated from a very well-to-do Philadelphia family, his parents being the owners of one of the more important publishing houses in the United States, founded in Having received an excellent private education, Lea seemed at first to be bound to follow in the footsteps of his father, writing, for example, several papers on descriptive conchology. In 1847, however, during a long illness, he began to read French memoirs of the late Middle Ages, and from that time onwards the study of the religious history of that epoch had become a never ceasing passion for him. He could, however, not dedicate too much time to this most serious hobby, as his main occupation was the work for the family s publishing house, which, from 1865, he had to manage as the firm s boss, a job he fulfilled with much success. At the same time, Lea was actively involved in the political scene of his native community and beyond, promoting especially educational and humanitarian enterprises a tradition to remain, as his family endowed teaching chairs to commemorate Lea s name at three elite universities. The economic boom of the firm Henry C. Lea s (later H. C. L. Son & Co. ) led to the accumulation of a financial

30 fortune which allowed Lea to buy in Europe manuscripts, incunabula, and other books in such large numbers that his library was soon considered the foremost one on medieval history in nineteenth-century America (most of these treasures survive in the University of Pennsylvania Library 3 ). Also, he employed a group of copyists, indispensable before the time of the copy-machine. Of greatest importance were his very numerous contacts with European scholars who helped him by providing sources for his historical studies, i. e. unpublished documents in Latin and in the various vernaculars, stored in archives and libraries. Remarkably, he did not utilize ghost-writes, whom some would have considered to be an absolute necessity in light of such numerous and huge volumes produced by a very agile businessman. Lea s method was to reconstruct history by allowing the documentary evidence to speak for itself. As he explains in his address to the readers in one of his first books in which he deals with superstition and force: The aim of the following essays is simply to group together facts so that, with a slender thread of commentary, they may present certain phases of human society and progress which are not without interest for the student of history and of man. The authorities for all statements have been scrupulously cited, and it will be seen that, for the most part, they are drawn from the original sources. The conclusions the reader can verify for himself. 4 5* Each topic discussed is embedded in general information on the relevant periods showing that Lea disposed of a good general background in European history (shaped especially, as it seems, by William Lecky s works, whose verbose style, however, Lea, luckily, did not imitate). Superfluous to note that Lea s books, as all other scholarly writings on history, also contain a number of errors, misinterpretations, and misprints, but these are by no means worse than those found in Lea, Superstion and Force, Philadelphia 1870, iii.

31 12* Major Works by Henry Charles Lea Superstition and Force (Philadelphia, 1866, new ed. 1870, 1892) Historical Sketch of Sacerdotal Celibacy (Philadelphia, 1867, new ed. 1907) History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages (New York, 1888, translations into the major European languages; the German one, edited by Joseph Hansen, Geschichte der Inquisition im Mittelalter, 3 vols., Bonn, 1905/1909/1913, and several later printings, is to be recommended because of the many additions by this specialist in the field) Chapters from the religious history of Spain connected with the Inquisition (Philadelphia, 1890) History of Auricular Confession and Indulgences in the Latin Church (3 vols., London, 1896) The Moriscos of Spain (Philadelphia, 1901) History of the Inquisition of Spain (4 vols., New York and London, ) The Inquisition in the Spanish Dependencies: Sicily--Naples--Sardinia--Milan--the Canaries--Mexico--Peru--New Granada (New York, 1908) Materials Toward a History of Witchcraft (3 vols., Philadelphia, 1939 [posthumous]) [Most of these titles have already been reprinted in the United States; there exist also some unreliable shortened versions. Full texts of some of Lea s books can be found in the web, see the links in: Henry_Charles_Lea. Useless to say that some longer quotations taken out of Lea s works and circulating on unexpected sites in the web are of no help for the specialist (as, e. g., lea_stud.html].

32 13* Studies on Henry Charles Lea Baumgarten, Paul Maria, Die Werke von Henry Charles Lea und verwandte Bücher (Münster 1908 [an extensive Catholic critique of Lea and Hansen, 190 pp., containing, however, some minor corrections and supplements to Lea s main works. Baumgarten did not deal with the Studies in Church History]) Bradley, Edward Sculley, Henry Charles Lea. A Biography. Philadelphia 1931 O Brien, John M., Henry Charles Lea: The Historian as Reformer. American Quarterly 19, 1967, Peters, Edward, Henry Charles Lea ( ). In: Medieval Scholarship, Biographical Studies on the Formation of a Discipline I, edited by Helen Damico and Joseph B. Zavadil, New York 1995, Tollebeek, Jo, Writing the Inquisition in Europe and America. The correspondence between Henry Charles Lea and Paul Fredericq (Bruxelles 2004 [contains an extensive and magisterial introduction based on unpublished material]) [Cf. also: Penn Special Collections-Lea Biography: upenn.edu/collections/rbm/mss/lea/leabio.html]