Wood, Ian (2024) Bruno of Querfurt and the Practice of Mission. In: Mass Conversions to Christianity and Islam, 800–1100. Palgrave Macmillan Cham, pp. 77-99.
Full text not available from this repository.Abstract
The history of Latin missions to Eastern Europe in the late tenth and early eleventh centuries is dominated by two figures, Adalbert of Prague and Bruno of Querfurt. Anyone who has looked at the careers of these two saints is confronted with numerous insoluble problems. To begin, there are debates about the source material, most notably over the authorship of the Vita Prima sancti Adalberti. Then there is the chronology: how exactly is one to fit in Adalbert’s work among the Hungarians, and what did it entail? And for Bruno, the narrative of his failure to reach the community established by Benedict and John in the territory of Bolesław Chrobry before the murder of his friends and missionary colleagues is simply bizarre. The community is usually identified with Meserizi, following Reinhard Kade’s identification in his edition of Bruno’s Vita quinque fratrum Poloniae with the monastery mentioned by Thietmar’s Chronicon. There is no reason to accept this identification. It is not entirely certain that he ever visited the site of the Polish hermitage established by his friends Benedict and John, whose martyrdom he recorded with extraordinary vividness. In fact, the chronology of his life, after his departure from Italy, is difficult to establish. Nor can we be sure of his movements between his departure from Kiev and his arrival in the realm of Nethimir (or Bosla), wherever that was. As for his martyrdom, the contemporary sources (of which there are several) are in conflict over several significant points of detail. ‘Bruno’ of Querfurt’s views about how mission should be practised are expressed in his hagiographical writings and in his Letter to Henry II. These constitute a rare insight into missionary theory in the early Middle Ages, and they can be compared with what we can establish of his own missionary activity, as well as the missionary strategies of his contemporaries.
| Item Type: | Book Section |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | martyrdom, saints, |
| Subjects: | A Church/mission history G Christian traditions/Denominations > Eastern Orthodox |
| Divisions: | Central Europe |
| Depositing User: | Katharina Penner |
| Date Deposited: | 26 Apr 2026 16:47 |
| Last Modified: | 26 Apr 2026 16:47 |
| URI: | https://ceamol.osims.org/id/eprint/3253 |
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