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The Originality and Influence of Joachim of Fiore

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2016

Marjorie Reeves*
Affiliation:
St. Anne's College, Oxford

Extract

Originality and influence are obverse and reverse of one coin. When extensive influence is claimed for any thinker the question at once arises: Were there no other sources from which these putative disciples might have drawn their inspiration? Since no thinker springs entirely unheralded out of the head of Zeus, he must have drawn on an already existing cluster of ideas and therefore, in turn, his possible influence may merge into a wider intellectual ambience. The problem of influence thus becomes one of establishing marks of originality which can be applied as a kind of ‘litmus test’ to distinguish direct dependence from general affinity. The ideas of the Abbot Joachim have lately attracted wide-ranging claims in respect of their influence in later generations. To cite only one example: Professor Roger Garaudy is quoted as saying that the ‘first great revolutionary movements in Europe’ were ‘all more or less imbued with the ideas of Joachim of Fiore.’ In the last decade or so many medievalists, including myself, have spun the Joachimist coin in order to turn up ‘tails,’ and we have perhaps found Joachimist ‘tails’ in too many quarters. By the law of probabilities it was more than time to turn up heads, and Robert Lerner in an article of 1976 slapped down a challenging ‘head study’ for which I personally am grateful since it set me off spinning the same old coin again. The purpose of this study, therefore, is to examine the background of ideas out of which Joachim's theology of history was generated, to pinpoint the original aspects of his thought, if any, and thence to define and apply criteria for claiming later individuals, groups, or writings as ‘Joachite’ or ‘Joachimist.’

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Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

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28 Three examples may be cited. (a) In his commentary on the Song of Songs Honorius uses the Pauline figure of the body and its members, equating the eyes to apostles, ears to monks, nose to ‘magistri,’ mouth to priests (presbyteri), hands to knights, and feet to ‘rustici’; compare Joachim's figure of the Dispositio novi ordinis (Lib. fig. plate 12), where the same pattern is used with a different equation of members to orders. (b) In Book III of Honorius’ Gemma animae the liturgical year of the Church is interpreted as symbolising the pilgrimage of the individual soul and also of the Church from this life to the next. Joachim's figure of the Mysterium ecclesiae (Lib. fig. plate 19) is more complex, relating the liturgical year to the ages of history and the three status, but there is a similarity of concept; compare in particular Honorius’ comment ‘Per tempus a Septuagesima usque ad Pascha alleluia intermittitur; nos exprimit, qui hic in labore et tristitia relinquimur’ with Joachim's ‘a prima hebdomada qui intitulatur LXX omittimus cantare canticum Domini quod est Alleluia, et pro eo utimur tractu qui est carmen doloris. Quia quando in primo parente ejecti scimus de paradiso et pervenimus ad vallem lacrimarum tunc omisimus cantare canticum Domini eo quod esse cepimus in terra aliena.’ (c) In his exposition of the Psalms Honorius interprets the forma of the psaltery as follows: its form represents the novus homo in Christ; its triangularity stands for the Trinity; its ten strings are the decalogue. In his early exposition of this figure Joachim makes precisely the same points (Psalterium decem chordarum, ed. Venice 1527 [hereafter Psalt.] fols. 230rff.), although later he develops the symbolism of the strings in an original way (see Figurae 55–59, 201–206). All these derive from a common stock of symbolic interpretation, and so the influence of Honorius cannot be proved but taken together they suggest its likelihood.Google Scholar

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64 Ibid. 722, 1022, 1036.Google Scholar

65 Ibid. 715. Bede had seen the ‘silence’ at the opening of the seventh seal in the Apocalypse as a period of repose for the Church after Antichrist, but apparently did not identify this with the great Seventh Day; cf. Explanatio Apocalipsis, PL 93.154 with Liber de temporibus maior sive de temporum ratione, ed. Jones, C. W. (Cambridge, Mass. 1943) 202.Google Scholar

66 Grundmann, Herbert Professor had planned a critical edition of the Liber concordie, a task which Professor Randolph Daniel, E. has now taken up. The Expositio in Apocalypsim and Psalterium decem chordarum are equally in need of modern editions.Google Scholar

67 See n. 28. Another quite common example is the use of Peter and John as types of the orders of clergy and monks. See, for instance, the Scutum canonicorum of Arno of Reichersberg (PL 194.521–523), who thus interprets the episode, so beloved of Joachim, of the two disciples running to the Sepulchre; but significantly he does not come anywhere near Joachim's striking but dangerous deduction from the time sequence that the work of Peter is consummated before that of John, who arrives first but enters the Sepulchre last. I owe this reference to Robey, Dr. D. Google Scholar

68 For Joachim's interpretation of Satan bound for a thousand years as the Sabbath of history, see Expos. fols. 210v–212r.Google Scholar

69 Joachim's exposition of the Sybil in 1184 before Pope Lucius III and the text, Expositio de prophetia ignota Romae reperta, presumed to belong to this occasion, have been studied by McGinn, B., ‘Joachim and the Sybil, Cǐteaux Commentarii Cistercienses 24 (1973) 97138, who confirms the case for the authenticity of this text.Google Scholar

70 Mottu's, Henry important book La manifestation de l'Esprit selon Joachim de Fiore (Neuchǎtel and Paris 1977) reached me too late for adequate comment within the limits of this article. He suggests that I have underestimated Joachim's novelty, but his argument here turns on the question of how revolutionary, rather than how original, Joachim was and, though these two questions are interrelated, they are not quite the same. Joachim's originality can be clearly assessed only when he is studied in relation to his contemporaries. How far that originality carried him into revolutionary conclusions is a question involving a delicate balance between two over-statements, see below, pp. 293–97. The question of Joachim's originality was discussed briefly at the International Colloquium at Lyons in 1974; see 1274: Année charnière — Mutations et continuités. Colloques Internationaux du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (Paris 1977) 892–894.Google Scholar

71 On Joachim's theology of history, see Reeves, M., The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages (Oxford 1969) 1721; Figurae 5–19. See also RTAM 21 (1954) 211–247. On the last point, see Mottu, Manifestation 89: ‘Il n'est point exagéré de dire qu'avec Joachim, et peut-ětre pour la première fois dans l'histoire de l'herméneutique chrétienne, une claire prise de conscience du temps de l’Église et de son histoire se fait jour dans sa différence d'avec une conception uniforme et répétitive du temps post-christique.’Google Scholar

72 The five relationes are Father; Father and Son; Father, Son, and Spirit; Son and Spirit; Spirit. The seven modi are Father; Son; Spirit; Father and Son; Father and Spirit; Son and Spirit; Father and Son and Spirit (Psalt. fols. 257v–262v).Google Scholar

73 For a fuller exposition, see Figurae 31–38, 45–51; Reeves, M., ‘The Abbot Joachim's Sense of History,’ in 1274: Année Charnière 783–787.Google Scholar

74 From this viewpoint I think Manselli, R., ‘La Terza Età, Babylon e l'Anti-christo Mistico,’ Bulletino dell’ Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medio Evo e Archivio Muratoriano 82 (1970) 49, 58–59, presses too far the concept of ‘appropriation’ of the Three Persons to three separate status as the core of Joachim's doctrine, even though at times Joachim's language may seem to justify this view.Google Scholar

75 Expos. fol. 39r-v; Lib. conc., Prefatio and fol. 135v.Google Scholar

76 Lib. conc. fols. 113rff.Google Scholar

77 Psalt. fols. 260v–263v. Note especially: ‘Quia simul in seipsis tote tres persone habent posse dare septem spiritus qui sunt septem dona ipsius spiritus: mittunt illos in omnem terrain… . Habent itaque aliquid simile iste quinque virtutes cum quinque relationibus istis: sicut et septem dona spiritus sancti cum septem illis modis quibus dicuntur ad se persone deitatis: sive unaqueque sigillatim: sive communiter due vel tres. Que videlicet septem donis quamvis sint verissime totius trinitatis propterea tamen specialius eidem spiritui ascribuntur …’ (fols. 161v–162r).Google Scholar

78 See Figurae 6–12.Google Scholar

79 Expos. fol. 9r.Google Scholar

80 Ibid. fol. 137v.Google Scholar

81 Ibid. fol. 12r.Google Scholar

82 Lib. conc. fols. 26v–38r. Zindars-Swartz, Miss S. first drew my attention to the significance of the pavimentum. Google Scholar

83 Ibid. fol. 38r. In a figure of the generations one caption emphasizes this point: ‘Hic ostenditur quod Filii et Spiritus Sancti una est divinitas, equalis gloria, coeterna maiestas.’ See Figurae 37.Google Scholar

84 Expos. fols. 5r–6r.Google Scholar

85 Ibid. fol. 5v.Google Scholar

86 Ibid. Google Scholar

87 Psalt. fol. 269r.Google Scholar

88 Expos. fol. 5v.Google Scholar

89 In a recent, profoundly thoughtful essay, ‘Il problema del doppio Anticristo in Gioacchino da Fiore’ in Geschichtsschreibung und geistiges Leben im Mittelalter: Festschrift für Heinz Löwe zum 65. Geburtstag, edd. Hauck, K. and Mordek, H. (Cologne and Vienna 1978) 427449, Professor Manselli makes the point that ‘il vero e proprio Anticristo’ comes at the end of the third status under the name of Gog. From this he draws the conclusion that the third status is not ‘un terzo momento della storia’ so much as ‘il momento iniziale dell’ età escatologica,’ preparing for the final Antichrist and Last Judgement. This needs further consideration, but — leaving aside the question of whether the ‘greatest Antichrist’ comes before or at the end of the third status — the positive promise of the Sabbath Age as a stage of history which will mark fresh achievement after triumph over the greatest Antichrist to appear so far seems to me to come through in innumerable passages, although, of course, it is always a transitus to the Eighth Day of eternity.Google Scholar

90 See Figurae 125–126, 165–168; Reeves, Influence, 132, 303, 305; Lib. conc. fols. 52r, 56r-v; Expos. fols. 9r–11r, 24v, 207r, 212r–214r. See also Lerner, ‘Refreshment of the Saints’ 119.Google Scholar

91 McGinn, B., ‘The Abbot and the Doctors: Scholastic Reactions to the Radical Eschatology of Joachim of Fiore, Church History 40 (1971) 34. A similar point is made by Flood, D., o.f.m., ‘A Study in Joachimism,’ Collectanea Franciscana 41 (1971) 135–136.Google Scholar

92 McGinn, , ‘The Abbot and the Doctors’ 34.Google Scholar

93 Mottu, , Manifestation, passim. Google Scholar

94 See the references given in Reeves, Influence 395–396.Google Scholar

95 Mottu, , Manifestation 89.Google Scholar

96 The problem is complicated by the fact that Joachim, of course, held that in the first transitus the Synagogue was literally superseded by the Church. Thus when he makes the concord with the second transitus it is natural to assume that he intended a similar supersession. Yet all the passages dealing with the transitus from the Church of the second status to that of the third are couched in terms of people on the move rather than a substitution of one institution for another. Thus Lib. con. fol. 58r-v: ‘Et ut populus fidelis qui egressus est de synagoga transiens per doctrinam et verbum Christi … receptus est in sinu matris ecclesie … ita nunc quoque amatores Christi transeant per doctrinam spiritualem recipiendi quandoque et ipsi in sinu spiritualis ecclesie.’ In two passages in which Joachim uses a shifting typology (Lib. Con. fol. 61r and Psalt. fol. 265r-v) he has a series of ecclesiae all designated in terms of people or orders and their characteristic activities, e.g., ecclesia secularium, clericorum, monachorum. Again, in Expos. f. 83r, where the ecclesiae are specifically linked to the three status, similar broad terms are used: ecclesia clericorum, ecclesia or populus spiritualis or contemplativa. Ecclesia laborantium / contemplantium (Lib. conc. fols. 85v, 96v), societas contemplantis ecclesie (ibid. fol. 83v), populus tertii status (ibid. fol. 96r), populus sanctorum (ibid. fol. 69v) — these and similar expressions occur many times. In none of the passages just cited is the ecclesia romana or ecclesia Petri associated with this concept of successive churches: the context in which Joachim uses these terms is, in general, quite different; the ecclesia romana or New Jerusalem remains immoveable. Yet sometimes immutability and transition are brought together: ‘Non igitur … deficiet ecclesia Petri que est thronus Christi … sed commutata in maiorem gloriam manebit stabilis in eternum’ (Lib. con. fol. 95v). David, first reigning in Hebron, then in Jersalem, typifies the Papacy: ‘Quia occurrit pontificibus romanis preesse ecclesie laborantium; postea ecclesie quiescentium, prius desudantium in vita activa: postea exultantium in vita contemplativa’ (ibid. fol. 92v). In one of the ‘special histories’ treated as typifying the transition to the third status, at the end of the Lib. con., a convincing link between the new life to come and the Church of Peter is made: Queen Esther typifies both the vita contemplativa and the Roman Church which Christ ‘prefers’ above all others, whilst her parent, Mordecai, represents Peter. Thus, in the final apotheosis after the storm of Antichrist, Mordecai's exaltation is that of Peter's successor ‘qui erit in tempore illo quasi fidelissimus vicarius Christi iesu elevabitur in sublime’ (Lib. conc. fol. 122v).Google Scholar

97 Tractatus super quatuor evangelia, ed. Buonaiuti, E. (Rome 1930) 86: ‘itaque senex iste iustus et timoratus Romane presules designat Ecclesie … et cum dabitur ei videre quod optat, ut videlicet ita videat confirmatum donum Spiritus sancti in populo christiano, sicut futurum credimus in adventu Helie, qui venturus est omnia consumare, videns sanctum ilium ordinem quem Ecclesia peperit spiritalis… . accipiet eum in ulnas fidei et dilectionis sue et pronuntiabit in eo esse ilium vivificantem Spiritum… .’Google Scholar

98 Mottu, , Manifestation 137.Google Scholar

99 Tractatus 87: ‘quasi ergo in ulnas suas suscipiet puerum senex Symeon, cum successores Petri quibus data est prerogativa fidei et discernere inter sanctum et prophanum, videntes ilium ordinem qui imitatur vestigia Christi, in virtute spiritali, sustentabit eum munimine auctoritatis sue et confirmabit verbis testimonii sui, annuncians complenda esse in ipso ticinia prophetarum… . neque enim super dissolutionem suam poterit dolere, cum se in meliori successione permanere cognoscet. scimus enim quod ut alius ordo designetur in precessore, alius in successore, non facit diversitas fidei, set proprietas religionis.’Google Scholar

100 E.g., Lib. con. fols. 18r, 58r; Expos. fols. 17r–18v, 22r–23v, 49v–50v, 137v, 141vff.; Psalt. fol. 265v. Even when, in Expos. fol. 204v, he speaks of the two ecclesiae of Peter, and John, , these still represent types of order (predicantium and contemplantium), not the Roman Church and a successor.Google Scholar

101 Tractatus 86: ‘set quare vel a Domino dicitur evangelium Regni, vel a Iohanne evangelium eternum, nisi quia illud quod mandatum est nobis a Christo vel apostolis, secundum fidem sacramentorum, quantum ad ipsa sacramenta transitorium est et temporale, quod autem per ea sacrificatur, eternum?’Google Scholar

102 Lib. fig. plate 12. See Figurae 232–248.Google Scholar

103 Tractatus 191–202; Mottu, Manifestation 180–186.Google Scholar

104 Mottu, , Manifestation 184.Google Scholar

105 Ibid. But notice that the passage which Mottu here quotes (Tractatus 193) couches the transformation in terms of a ‘nova religiosorum Ecclesia’ which hardly justifies his interpretation as an institutional, structural conversion of the Church.Google Scholar

106 This and similar phrases are used by Joachim a number of times. See Lib. conc. fol. 112r; Expos. fols. 5v, 45r, 78r, 86r; Tractatus 21, 74.Google Scholar

107 ‘Joachite,’ ‘Joachimist,’ ‘Joachist,’ and other varieties have been freely used according to taste. McGinn, ‘The Abbot and the Doctors’ 35, gives his own definition of the terms ‘Joachite,’ ‘Joachimist.’ I have preferred to stick to Salimbene's use of ‘Joachita’ (Eng. ‘Joachite’) as a name for one who is a disciple or committed to Joachim's Trinitarian doctrine of history. ‘Joachimist’ then becomes the broader adjective describing varying degrees of influence on ideas or writings. Paul, J., ‘Le Joachimisme et les Joachimites au milieu de xiiie siècle, d'après le témoignage de Fra Salimbene,’ 1274: Année charnière 799, points out that Salimbene's use is peculiar and that he turns an adjective into a noun. See also Father Brady's discussion of what constitutes a ‘Joachite’ in his review of my book in Catholic Historical Review 58 (1972–1973) 612.Google Scholar

108 The complaints of several reviewers of Influence underline the need to use clear criteria in applying these terms; see, for example, Father Brady, ibid. Google Scholar

109 See, for example, Werner of Rochefort and Opicinus de Canistris. For these, see Figurae 297–299.Google Scholar

110 An example of a superficial Joachimist influence can be found in Solomon's, D. study ‘The Sentence Commentary of Richard Fishacre and the Apocalypse Commentary of Hugh of St. Cher,’ Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum 46 (1976) 367377, in which he shows that Hugh could use Joachim's Expositio in Apocalypsim without adopting his expectation of a coming Age of the Spirit.Google Scholar

111 For this episode, see references in Reeves, Influence 59–66; see also Dufeil, M.-M., 1274: Année charnière 816–819.Google Scholar

112 Salimbene, , Chronica , MGH SS 32.232.Google Scholar

113 Ibid. 466.Google Scholar

114 West, D., ‘Between Flesh and Spirit: Joachite Pattern and Meaning in the Cronica of Fra Salimbene,’ Journal of Medieval History 3 (1977) 339352. See also Paul, ‘Le Joachimisme et Les Joachimites’ 797–813, who sees Salimbene's Joachimism as something already dead before he wrote his Cronica. Google Scholar

115 Salimbene, , MGH SS 32.293.Google Scholar

116 Daniel, E. R., The Franciscan Concept of Mission in the High Middle Ages (Lexington, Ky. 1975) 27 and passim for the later part played by ‘Joachites’ in the Order.Google Scholar

117 For references, see Reeves, Influence 176, nn. 3, 4, 5.Google Scholar

118 Commentaria in quatuor libros sententiarum Mag. Lombardi, P., Opera omnia I (ed. Quaracchi, ) 121.Google Scholar

119 Ratzinger, J., Bonaventura (Munich and Zurich 1959) 1696, 106–120; tr. Hayes, Z., The Theology of History in St Bonaventure (Chicago 1972) 7–24, 30–49, 82–93, 105–117. See also Reeves, Influence 179–181; McGinn, ‘The Abbot and the Doctors’ 41–45. The Collationes in Hexaemeron are the notes of university sermons given in Paris in 1273.Google Scholar

120 See above, pp. 282–85Google Scholar

121 McGinn, , ‘The Abbot and the Doctors.’ My original statement that ‘St. Bonaventura was a Joachite malgré lui’ (Influence 181) does not go far enough for McGinn, but goes too far for Father Brady (see above n. 107).Google Scholar

122 See, for instance, Olivi, Postilla super Apocalypsim, MS Rome, Bibl. Angelica 383 fols. 7v–8r; Ubertino da Casale, Arbor vitae crucifixae (Venice 1485) fol. 205r.Google Scholar

123 This has been suggested to me by Davies, Mrs. C. who has been working on Olivi's scriptural commentaries. See also Burr, D., ‘The Persecution of Peter Olivi, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society n.S. 66 (1976) 35.Google Scholar

124 Manselli, , ‘La Terza Età’ 48–52. In the essay ‘Giovanni XXII e il Gioachimismo di Pietro di Giovanni Olivi,’ Bulletino dell’ Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medio Evo e Archivio Muratoriano 82 (1970), Pásztor, Dr. E. argues that Pope John XXII exaggerated Olivi's Joachimism in the four articles which he extracted from the Postilla. It is not possible here to do justice to her searching analysis. I can only make the points (a) that I do not believe Joachim's third status implied a static and final state of perfection (cf. p. 88); (b) that, in my view, Joachim, as well as Olivi, strove to preserve the perennial reality of the Church (cf. p. 88); (c) that I do not see the Trinitarian periodisation which Olivi seems to derive from Joachim as a contradiction of the centrality of Christ in history (cf. pp. 90, 105). In the end her conclusion does not seem far from mine: ‘sembra indubbio che Olivi avesse previsto una terza età prima della fine dei tempi. Sotto quest’ aspetto la sua visione eschatologica è senza dubbio gioachimitica’ (p. 109).Google Scholar

125 See above, pp. 289–92. It is significant that even Salimbene grasped something of the complexity of Joachim's thought, for in the statement on Joachim's doctrine of the three status cited above (see reference in n. 113), he says: ‘… doctrina Ioachim abbatis, qui dividit mundum in triplicem statum. Nam in primo statu seculi proprietate misterii operatus est pater in patriarchis et filiis prophetarum, quamquam indivisibilia sunt opera trinitatis …’ (emphasis added).Google Scholar

126 Burr, , ‘Persecution of Peter Olivi’ 17–22, 34–35, gives an impressive number of references to Olivi's unpublished works.Google Scholar

127 See Flood, , ‘Study in Joachimism’ 136–140. Professor Charles Davis’ forthcoming article on ‘Poverty and Eschatology in the Commedia’ explores the significance of poverty in the Last Age.Google Scholar

128 See Reeves, , Influence 203–207. van Limborch, P., Historia Inquisitionis, cui subjungitur Liber Sententiarum Inquisitionis Tholosanae 1307–1323 (Amsterdam 1692) gives many examples. See also Manselli, R., Spirituali e Beghini in Provenza (Studi Storici 31–34; Rome 1959) 179–254.Google Scholar

129 See references and quotations in Reeves, Influence 212–216.Google Scholar

130 References are given in ibid. 54–55, and (more up-to-date) by Henderson, J., ‘The Flagellant Movement and Flagellant Confraternities in Central Italy, 1260–1400, Studies in Church History XV, ed. Baker, D. (Oxford 1978) 147160.Google Scholar

131 Nor had I intended to describe it as such in my book; but see McGinn, B., ‘Apocalypticism in the Middle Ages. An Historiographical Sketch, Medieval Studies 37 (1975) 277, who thinks I was imputing ‘Joachite motives’ to the movement.Google Scholar

132 See the short prophecies and verses quoted in Reeves, Influence 49–51.Google Scholar

133 MGH SS Libelli de lite 3.509–510. See Töpfer, B., Das kommende Reich des Friedens (Berlin 1964) 3031; McGinn, B., ‘Angel Pope and Papal Antichrist,’ Church History 47 (1978) 157–158.Google Scholar

134 See, for example, Lib. conc. fol. 56r: ‘… ascendet quasi novus dux de Babylone universalis sc. pontifex nove Hierusalem’; fol. 89r: ‘… erit tunc successio romani pontificis a mari usque ad mare’; fol. 122v: ‘… quia successor Petri qui erit in tempore illo, quasi fidelissimus vicarius Christi Iesu elevabitur in sublime.’Google Scholar

135 See Reeves, , Influence 399.Google Scholar

136 In an unpublished essay Clarke, Professor D. argues that in the mid-thirteenth-century pseudo-Joachimist works Super Hieremiam and Super Esaiam the idea, though not the name, of the Angelic Pope was already emerging more clearly than I had suggested (cf. ibid. 397–398).Google Scholar

137 These are studied in Reeves, M., ‘Some Popular Prophecies from the Fourteenth to the Seventeenth Centuries’ in Popular Belief and Practice, edd. Cuming, G. J. and Baker, D. (Cambridge 1972) 107133.Google Scholar

138 See Grundmann, H., ‘Die Liber de Flore, Historisches Jahrbuch 49 (1929) 3391.Google Scholar

139 See Bignami-Odier, J., Études sur Jean de Roquetaillade (Paris 1952); Donckel, E., ‘Die Prophezeiung des Telesforus,’ Archivum Franciscanum Historicum 26 (1933) 29–104; Reeves, , Influence 225–228, 321–331.Google Scholar

140 See Weinstein, D., Savonarola and Florence: Prophecy and Patriotism in the Renaissance (Princeton 1970); Reeves, M., Joachim of Fiore and the Prophetic Future (London and New York 1976) 82–95.Google Scholar

141 Jeffrey, D., The Early English Lyric and Franciscan Spirituality (Lincoln, Nebr. 1975) 7072.Google Scholar

142 Ibid. 71 gives as his reference Bondatti, G., Gioacchinismo e Francescanesimo nel Dugento (Maria degli Angeli, S. 1924) 147. Bondatti refers to Oliger, Studi francescani 7 (1921) 143–183, and 8 (1922) 18–47, but I cannot find any positive evidence of Joachimism in the work edited by Father Oliger.Google Scholar

143 O'Sharkey, E., ‘The Influence of the Teachings of Joachim of Fiore on Some Thirteenth-Century French Grail Romances, Trivium 2 (1967) 4758.Google Scholar

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145 Ermini, F., Medio Evo Latino (Rome 1938) 319323, argued that the order of the hierarchy in the Paradiso was influenced by Joachim's mounting scale in the figure of the psaltery with ten strings.Google Scholar

146 Notably by Tondelli, L., Da Gioachino a Dante (Turin 1944) 6772; Il Libro delle figure dell’ abate Gioachino de Fiore (2nd ed. Turin 1953) I 221–336.Google Scholar

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148 Figurae 326–328.Google Scholar

149 Ibid. 320–325.Google Scholar

150 Lib. fig. plates 5, 6.Google Scholar

151 See Reeves, M., ‘Dante and the Prophetic View of History’ in The World of Dante, ed. Grayson, C. (Oxford 1980) 4460.Google Scholar

152 Another complex literary problem concerns the question of possible Joachimist influence in Piers Plowman; see Bloomfield, M., Piers Plowman as a Fourteenth-Century Apocalypse (New Brunswick 1961). This seemed too large a topic to include in this sketch.Google Scholar

153 See Weinstein, , Savonarola and Florence 336–338; Reeves, , Joachim of Fiore and the Prophetic Future 92–93.Google Scholar

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155 Lib. conc. fols. 112v–122v; Figurae 226–228.Google Scholar

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158 Signora Gavazzoli sums up thus: ‘Se non unico, il testoehiave tenuto presente, anche indirettamente, nella concezione dell'opera si potrebbe identificare con l'Adversos Iudeos di Gioacchino, poichè sia le immagini scelte, sia la loro organizzazione conducono in modo convergente verso il tema di un'apologia del Cristianesimo di fronte al credo ebraico, così come è delineatta dall’ abate di Fiore’ (ibid. 139).Google Scholar

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160 Ibid. 9: ‘Nel nostro caso ogni figura ed ogni simbolo sono dettati da una personale esperienza costruttiva di un nuovo concetto mistico; non si sente la partecipazione astratta di un teologo, che detta le forme e lo scopo della immagini, ma esse sono invece il frutto vivo di una persona, che ha vissuto l'idea del motivo rappresentato e che non segue gli schemi iconografici più o meno stabiliti.’Google Scholar

161 Lib. fig. plate 13.Google Scholar

162 Prosperi's interpretation of the figures is not, I think, invalidated by his imperfect knowledge of Joachim's works, but it should be noted that (a) the Perugia MS contains, not Joachim's Liber figurarum, but a pseudo-Joachimist figure collection (p. 12); (b) that the Commentary on Jeremiah is not Joachim's but a mid-thirteenth-century work.Google Scholar

163 ‘Zur Ikonographie der Franziskuslegende, besonders der Fresken Giottos in der Oberkirche der Basilika San Franceso in Assisi,’ Zeitschrift für Religions- u. Geistesgeschichte 28 (1976) 245255.Google Scholar

164 Ibid. 247–250.Google Scholar

165 Ibid. 51–52.Google Scholar

166 In a letter to me.Google Scholar

167 Freyhan, R., ‘Joachim and the English Apocalypse, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 18 (1955) 211244.Google Scholar

168 Fraenger, W., The Millennium of Hieronymus Bosch tr. Wilkins, E. & Kaiser, E. (London 1952).Google Scholar

169 Ibid. 39. Fraenger calls Joachim Giacomo instead of Gioacchino throughout. Although he is able to link the triptych with the Brethren of the Free Spirit, any clear connection between this sect and Joachimism has never been established.Google Scholar

170 Ibid. 40–41.Google Scholar

171 Ibid. 42. Fraenger himself notes that these boys scarcely fit in with ‘Giacomo's’ idea of them as remote from all sexuality (p. 110).Google Scholar

172 Ibid. 41.Google Scholar

173 See Reeves, M., ‘History and Eschatology: Medieval and Early Protestant Thought in some English and Scottish writings, Medievalia et Humanistica n.s. 4 (1973) 115116.Google Scholar

174 Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Weltgeschichte (Stuttgart 1961) 472473. I owe this reference to Fontaine, Dr. P. F. of Utrecht.Google Scholar

175 See Reeves, , Joachim of Fiore and the Prophetic Future 172–173.Google Scholar