Egeria (pilgrim)
Egeria,[1] Etheria, or Aetheria was a Hispano-Roman Christian woman, widely regarded to be the author of a detailed account of a pilgrimage to the Holy Land about 381/2–384. The long letter, dubbed Peregrinatio or Itinerarium Egeriae, is addressed to a circle of women at home. Historical details it contains set the journey in the early 380s, making it the earliest of its kind. It survives in fragmentary form in a later copy—lacking a title, date and attribution.
Discovery and identity
The middle part of Egeria's writing survived and was copied in the Codex Aretinus, which was written at Monte Cassino in the 11th century, while the beginning and end are lost. This Codex Aretinus was discovered in 1884 by the Italian scholar Gian Francesco Gamurrini, in a monastic library in Arezzo.[2] In 2005, Jesús Alturo identified two new fragments from one manuscript circa 900 in Carolingian minuscule.[3]
Gamurrini published the Latin text and theorised the author was Sylvia of Aquitaine.[4] In 1903, Marius Férotin claimed the author is one Aetheria or Egeria, known from a letter written by the seventh century Galician monk Valerio of Bierzo. He dated her pilgrimage to about 381–384, during the reign of Theodosius I.[5]: vii f. Férotin believed she was from Gallaecia, but in 1909 Karl Meister disputed Férotin's theory about the date of Egeria's pilgrimage and her identity. Meister argues that her language shows no evidence of Iberian Romance but rather suggests that she may have been from one of the well-known religious houses of sixth century Gallia Narbonensis; according to this theory, her pilgrimage took place in the first half of the reign of Justinian I (r. 527–565).[5]: viii f. John Bernard noted that certain details of Egeria's account that support the earlier dating — two churches mentioned in the Breviarium and Peregrinatio Theodosii (both circa 530)—are absent from Egeria's otherwise detailed description of Jerusalem and thus confirm the 4th century dating.[5]: xiv Most scholars favor the 4th century date.[6]
It is through Valerio's letter that we first see the name Aetheria or Egeria, and have much of the biographical information. He praises Egeria and identifies her as a nun, perhaps because she addresses her account to her "sorores" (Latin for "sisters") at home. However, others (including Hagith Sivan, 1988) have pointed out that during Egeria's time it was common to address fellow lay Christians as "sisters" and "brothers". It is possible that Egeria used the term to address her Christian acquaintances.
Travels of Egeria
Egeria set down her observations in a letter now called Itinerarium Egeriae ("Travels of Egeria"). It is sometimes also called Peregrinatio Aetheriae ("Pilgrimage of Aetheria") or Peregrinatio ad Loca Sancta ("Pilgrimage to the Holy Lands") or some other combination. It is the earliest extant graphic account of a Christian pilgrimage.[7] The text has numerous lacunae.[6]
The text is a narrative apparently written at the end of Egeria's journey from notes she took en route, and addressed to her 'dear ladies': the women of her spiritual community back home.[8] In the first extant part of the text, she describes the journey from her approach to Mount Sinai until her stop in Constantinople. Staying for three years in Jerusalem, she made excursions to Mount Nebo and to the tomb of Job in ancient Carneas or Karnaia[9] (modern Al-Shaykh Saad, Syria). She wrote extensively on her observations of Holy Week proceedings and an Easter vigil, both at Jerusalem in immediate succession of each other.[10]
Additionally, she visited the burial places of
The second portion of the text is a detailed account of the liturgical services and observances of the church calendar in Jerusalem (most likely, under Cyril),[11][13] The liturgical year was in its incipient stages at the time of her visit. This is invaluable because the development of liturgical worship (e. g. Lent, Palm or Passion Sunday) reached universal practice in the 4th century. Egeria provides a first-hand account of practices and implementation of liturgical seasons as they existed at the time of her visit.[14] This snapshot is before universal acceptance of a December 25 celebration of the nativity of Jesus; this is very early and very helpful in cataloguing the development of annual liturgical worship.[15]
See also
Chronological list of early Christian geographers and pilgrims to the Holy Land who wrote about their travels, and other related works
- Late Roman and Byzantine period
- Eusebius of Caesarea (260/65–339/40), Church historian and geographer of the Holy Land
- Anonymous "Pilgrim of Bordeaux", pilgrim to the Holy Land (333-4) who left travel descriptions
- St Jerome (Hieronymus; fl. 386–420), translator of the Bible, brought an important contribution to the topography of the Holy Land
- Madaba Map, mosaic map of the Holy Land from the second half of the 6th century
- Anonymous Pilgrim from Piacenza, pilgrim to the Holy Land (570s) who left travel descriptions
- Early Muslim period
- Paschal Chronicle, 7th-century Greek Christian chronicle of the world
- Arculf, pilgrim to the Holy Land (c. 680) who left a detailed narrative of his travels
- Medieval period
- John of Würzburg, pilgrim to the Holy Land (1160s) who left travel descriptions
References
- OCLC 187417880.
- ^ a b c "About Egeria", on the website The Egeria Project.
- ^ Alturo, Jesús. "Deux nouveaux fragments de l'Itinerarium Egeriae du IXe-Xe siècle". Revue Bénédictine, vol. 115, fasc. 2 (December 2005), pp. 241–250. doi:10.1484/J.RB.5.100596
- ^ Otto Bardenhewer (1908). Patrology; the lives and works of the fathers of the church. trans. Thomas Joseph Shahan. B. Herder. p. 424.
- ^ a b c d e M. L. McClure; C. L. Feltoe (1919). "Introduction". The Pilgrimage of Etheria. Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.
- ^ HighBeam.
- ISBN 978-0-19-504652-6.
- S2CID 238206020.
- ^ Brown, J.; E. Meyers; R. Talbert; T. Elliott; S. Gillies. "Places: 678227 (Karnaia/Astaroth?)". Pleiades. Retrieved August 20, 2015.
- OCLC 187417880.
- ^ Lewis, Agnes Smith (1893). How the codex was found. A narrative of two visits to Sinai, from Mrs. Lewis's journals 1892-1893. Cambridge [Mass.]: Macmillan and Bowes. pp. 108–121.
- ISBN 9781443861601.
- ^ Jeffery, George (1919). A brief description of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem, and other Christian churches in the Holy City, with some account of the mediæval copies of the Holy Sepulchre surviving in Europe. Cambridge [Eng.]: University Press. p. 5.
- S2CID 238206020.
- ISBN 978-0-8264-1871-5.
- ^ Löfstedt, Einar (1911). Philologischer Kommentar zur Peregrinatio Aetheriae: Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der lateinischen Sprache. Uppsala.
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Further reading
Latin text
- Gamurrini, C. P. (1888). "S. Silvae Aquitaine; Peregrinatio ad Loca Sancta". Studi e documenti di Storia e Diretto. 9: 97–147.
- Geyer, Paul (1898). Itinera hierosolymitana saeculi IIII-VIII. OCLC 797991022. Retrieved 2015-08-15.
- Heraeus, Wilhelm [in German] (1908). Silviae vel potius Aetheriae peregrinatio ad loca sancta (in Latin). Carl Winter's Universitätsbuchhandlung. (archive.org; html)
- Egeria: Itinerarium peregrinatio in The Latin Library
Translations
- John H. Bernard (1891). The Pilgrimage of S. Silvia of Aquitania to the Holy Places (circa 385 A.D.). With an appendix by Sir Charles William Wilson. London: Palestine Pilgrims' Text Society. (1891 edition;1896 edition; html)
- M. L. McClure; C. L. Feltoe (1919). The Pilgrimage of Etheria. Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. (archive.org; html)
- Gingras, George E. (1970). Egeria: Diary of a Pilgrimage. ISBN 978-0-8091-0029-3. (This is a slightly older English translation than Wilkinson.)
- Wilkinson, John (2006). Egeria's Travels. Oxford: Aris & Phillips. ISBN 0-85668-710-3. (This translation includes supporting documents and notes. Previous editions were published in 1971 and 1981; the third revised edition was published in 1999.)
- Juan Monteverde (2010) [1955]. Eteria Itinerario. prólogo, traducción y notas de Juan Monteverde, S.D.B. Valladolid, Spain: Maxtor. ISBN 978-84-9761-788-8.
- ISBN 978-3-11-051811-5.
- Anne McGowan, Paul F. Bradshaw (2018). The Pilgrimage of Egeria. Collegeville, Minnesota: Liturgical Press. ISBN 978-0-81-468421-4.
External links
- The Pilgrim Egeria: A Select Bibliography, by Michael Fraser, c. 1994
- Excerpts from the Peregrinatio Ætheriae (Latin)
- Works by Egeria at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
- "Itineraria", article from The Catholic Encyclopedia
- The Egeria Project, with maps and images