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On the Liber Nicholay see, D'Ancona, A., “La leggenda di Maometto in occidente,” Giornale storico della letteratura Italiana 13 (1889): 199–281Google Scholar. An edition with analysis of the Pisa Anonymous is in Mancini, A., “Per lo studio della leggenda di Maometto in Occidente,” Rendiconti della R. Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei 10, ser. 6 (1934): 325–49Google Scholar. This study is reproduced in, Studi di Critica e Storia Letteraria di Alessandro D'Ancona. 2nd ed. (Bologna: Nicola Zanichelli, 1912), 1:165–306.Google Scholar

5. The most thorough treatment of Embrico of Mainz's Vita Mahumeti is by Guy, Cambier, Embricon de Mayence La Vie de Mahomet. Collection Latomus, 52 (Bruxelles: Latomus, Revue d'études Latines, 1961)Google Scholar. See also his, “Embricon de Mayence (1010?–1077) est-il l'auteur de la Vita Mahumeti”? Latomus 16 (1957): 468–79Google Scholar and “L'épisode des taureaux dans La légende de Mahomet (ms. 50, Bibl. du Sém. de Pise),” in Collection Latomus, Hommages à Léon Hermann (Bruxelles: Latomus, Revue d'études Latines, 1960), 44:228–36Google Scholar. The only study to begin an exploration between Embrico's Vita Mahumeti and the apocryphal legends about Simon Peter is in Tolan, John V., “Anti-hagiography,” 25–41.Google Scholar

6. Irenaeus, , Adversus haereses in Contre les hérésies. Livre 1.2., ed. Rousseau, A.. Sources Chrétiennes, 264. (Paris: Les Editions du Cerf, 1979), 312–13.Google Scholar

7. Ferreiro, , “Jerome's polemic against Priscillian in his Letter to Ctesiphon (133, 4)” Revue des Études Augustiniennes 39.2 (1993): 309–32CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Ferreiro, , “Simon Magus and Priscillian in the Commonitorium of Vincent of Lérins,” Vigiliae Christianae 49 (1995): 180–88.Google Scholar

8. The Nicolaitans have received more extensive commentary in modern scholarship. For the patristic era and scholarly issues see, Fox, Kenneth A., “The Nicolaitans, Nicolaus, and the early Church,” Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 23.4 (1994): 485–96CrossRefGoogle Scholar. A discussion of Nicolaitans, Jerome, and Priscillian is in Ferreiro, A., “Jerome's polemic against Priscillian,” 309–32Google Scholar. Michael Topham engages briefly the possible association of the Nicolaitans with the enigmatic beast bearing the 666 name in the Apocalypse of John, , “Hanniqolaītēs,” The Expository Times 98.2 (1986): 44–45Google Scholar. The following studies focus principally on questions related to the early Church Fathers: Prigent, P., “L'hérésie Asiate et l'église confessante de l'apocalypse à Ignace,” Vigiliae Christianae 31 (1977): 1–22Google Scholar; Brox, N., “Nikolaos und Nikolaiten,” Vigiliae Christianae 19 (1965): 23–30CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Maurice, Goguel, “Les Nicolaïtes,” Revue de l'histoire des religions 58 (1937): 5–36Google Scholar; Adolf von, Harnack, “The sect of the Nicolaitans and Nicolaus, the deacon in Jerusalem,” Journal of Religion 3 (1923): 413–22Google Scholar; van den Bergh van Eysinga, G. A., “Die in der Apocalypse bekämpfte Gnosis,” Zeitschrift für die Neue Testamentliche Wissenschaft 13 (1912): 293–305Google Scholar; Wohlenberg, G., “Nikolaus von Antiochien und die Nikolaiten.” Neue Kirchliche Zeitschrift 6 (1895): 923–61Google Scholar; and Leonhard, Seesemann, “Die Nikolaiten. Ein beitrag zur ältesten häresiologie,” Theologische Studien und Kritiken 66 (1893): 47–82.Google Scholar

9. Clement of Alexandria disagreed with Irenaeus on the question about whether the Nicolas of the New Testament was himself immoral and encouraged his followers to be likewise. Kenneth Fox has argued that Irenaeus and Clement did not disagree that the New Testament Nicolas founded the sect then existing in the second century. Clement, moreover, did depart from Irenaeus when he condemned the Nicolaitans for justifying their sexual behavior in part by claiming to imitate the moral dictates of their founder. Clement of Alexandria, , Stromata III, Cap IV, Die griechischen christlichen Schriftsteller. 2 band, ed. Stählin, O., (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs'sche Buchhandlung, 1906), 1:207–8Google Scholar. Fox, , “The Nicolaitans,” 490 and 495.Google Scholar

10. For patristic sources see, Amann, É., “Nicolaites,” Dictionnaire de Théologie Catholique 11.1 (1931) cols. 499–506Google Scholar. The text of Isidore is in, Reta, J. Oroz and others, San Isidoro de Sevilla. Etimologías I (Libros 1–X). Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 433, (Madrid: Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 1982), 698–701Google Scholar. Also, Ferreiro, , “Jerome's polemic,” 316–19Google Scholar. Priscillian, , Tractates, 1, 6, 23–26 and 1, 27, 4–7Google Scholar, in Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, 18, (Vindobonae: Hoelder-Pinchler-Tempsky, 1889), 7 and 23Google Scholar. Priscillian not only deemed it necessary to disassociate himself from Nicolaitism (the topos), but even Jerome, in the early fifth century, used it to discredit Priscillian and the sect. See Ferreiro, , “Priscillian and Nicolaitism,” Vigiliae Christianae 52.4 (1998): 382–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11. Consult the edition, Actus Petri cum Simone= (Acta Petri) and Passio Sanctorum Apostolorum Petri et Pauli=(Passio) Acta Aposotolorum Apocrypha., ed. Lipsius, R. A. and Bonnet, M.. (Heldesheim-New York: Georg Olms, 1972)Google Scholar. For a late artistic example see, Ferreiro, A., “Simon Magus and Simon Peter in a Baroque altar relief in the Cathedral of Oviedo, Spain,” Hagiographica 5 (1998): 141–58, ill.Google Scholar

12. Tolan, , “Anti-hagiography,” 25–41Google Scholar. An example is the earliest biography of Muhammad by Ibn Ishaq's Sirah. A thorough study is in Newby, G. D., The Making of the Last Prophet. A reconstruction of the earliest biography of Muhammad. (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1989) See especially the discussion at pages 1–32Google Scholar. Consult also Southern, , Western Views of Islam, 29–33.Google Scholar

13. Hinc populis seditiosam murmurationem agentibus Simon excitatus est in zelum, et coepit de Petro multa mala dicere, dicens eum magnum esse et seductorem. credebant autem illi hi qui mirabantur signa eius, Passio, cap. 11, 129–31.

14. Acta Petri, cap. 25–26, 72–73.

15. Ada Petri, cap. 31–32, 81–85. Simon autem male tractatus inuenit qui eum tollerent in grauato extra Roman Aricia. et ibi paucos dies fecit et inde tultus est quasi exiliaticum ab urbe nomine Castorem Terracina et ibi duo medici concidebant eum, extremum autem die angelum satanae fecerunt ut expiraret, Acta Petri, cap. 32, 85.

16. Et continuo dismissus cecidit in locum qui Sacra Via dicitur, et in quattuor parties fractus quattuor silices adunauit, qui sunt ad testimonium uictoriae apostolicae useque in hodiernum diem, Passio, cap. 56, 167.

17. The flight of Simon Magus is at Acta Petri, cap. 32, 83 and Passio, cap. 50–56, 163–67. A brief discussion is in Ferreiro, , “Simon Magus: Patristic-Medieval Traditions,” 164–65.Google Scholar

18. “A marvelous incident at Rheims,” in Heresies of the High Middle Ages, trans. Wakefield, W. L. and Evans, A. P., (New York: Columbia University Press, 1969), 251–54 and 727.Google Scholar

19. White, L. Jr., “Eilmer of Malmesbury, an eleventh century aviator,” Technology and Culture 2 (1961): 97–111.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

20. On the flight of Muhammad see, Comfort, W. W., “The literary role of the Saracens in the French Epic,” Publications of the Modern Language Association of America 55 (1940): 628–59, at 634–35CrossRefGoogle Scholar. By far the most thorough treatment to date is by Eckhard, A., “Le cercueil Flottant de Mahomet,” Mélanges de philologie romane el de littérature médiévale offerts a Ernest Hoepffner, (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1949), 77–88Google Scholar. Also Sendino, J. Muñoz, La Escala de Mahoma. (Madrid: Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores, 1949), 151–55.Google Scholar

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22. Cambier, , Embricon de Mayence, 58–59Google Scholar. Tolan, , “Anti-hagiography,” 35–36.Google Scholar

23. Eckhard, , “Le cercueil Flottant,” 82Google Scholar. See the detailed recent study by, Tolan, J. V., “Un cadavre mutilé: le déchirement polémique de Mahomet (1),” Le Moyen Age 104 (1998): 53–72Google Scholar. Southern, , Western Views of Islam, 31.Google Scholar

24. Pliny, in Historia Naturale 34Google Scholar, 14 mentions a temple built by Plotemius for Queen Arimis that used magnets to suspend a statue in her honor. In the Middle Ages even Rufinus, Bede, and Cassiodorus mediated and kept alive the belief in the magical properties of magnets to defy gravity, as it were. Augustine expressed a more rational position in that he attributed the use of magnets to suspend objects to natural forces used by human ingenuity and less so to supernatural powers. Isidore of Seville, (Orig. Etym. XVI, 1) in his entry on magnetism cited Pliny and Augustine as his source. Eckhard, , “Le cercueil Flottant,” 80–82.Google Scholar

25. Ibid., 82.

26. Ibid., 83. Tolan, , “Un cadavre mutilé,” 63.Google Scholar

27. Eckhard, , “Le cercueil Flottant,” 86.Google Scholar

28. Ibid., 85. See D'Ancona, , “La leggenda di Maometto,” 199–281Google Scholar. See also Tolan, , “Un cadavre mutilé,” 65.Google Scholar

29. Cambier, , Embricon de Mayence, 12Google Scholar. Tolan, , “Anti-hagiography,” 31–35.Google Scholar

30. Acta Petri, cap. 13–14, 60–61.

31. Cambier, , Embricon de Mayence, 12Google Scholar. Tolan, , “Anti-hagiography” 35–36.Google Scholar

32. Tolan, , “Anti-hagiography,” 27 and 41Google Scholar. Tolan, , “Un cadavre mutilé,” 57 and 62Google Scholar; Tolan, , “The Diabolical Heresy,” 359–62Google Scholar. Nero and Simon Magus are presented as close associates in the Passio, cap. 57–58, 167–70, where Nero ordered the arrest of Peter and Paul after Simon Magus's death. John of Damascus called Islam the “forerunner of the Antichrist,” in Sahas, John of Damascus, 68 and 133.Google Scholar

33. Cambier, , “L'épisode des taureaux,” 231–34Google Scholar. Cambier, , Embricon de Mayence, 63Google Scholar. Tolan, , “Anti-hagiography,” 36–37.Google Scholar

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35. Acta Petri, cap. 8–14, 54–61. For a treatment of the dog legends and Simon Magus see, Ferreiro, , “Simon Magus, Dogs, and Simon Peter,” in The Devil, Heresy, and Witchcraft, 45–89 ill.Google Scholar

36. Acta Petri, cap. 9–14, 56–61. “Et respiciens Petus canem magnum catena grande ligatum, accedens soluit eum, cards autem solutus uocem humanam accipiens dixit ad Petrum,” cap. 9, 56–57.

37. Passio, cap. 25–27, 140–43. Petrus uero extendens manus in orationem, ostendit canibus eum quern benedixerant panem: quern ut uiderunt canes subito nusquam conparuerunt, cap. 27, 143. Ferreiro, , “Simon Magus, Dogs, and Simon Peter,” 74–80 and 86–88.Google Scholar

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39. For the Pisa text see, Mancini, , “Per lo studio,” 325–49.Google Scholar

40. In the eleventh century the Gregorian Reform papacy confronted the pervasive practice of clerical marriage. The issue had been long disputed in the western Church, but it was not until the eleventh century that the papacy prohibited clerical marriage altogether. To do so, the papacy issued a series of papal bulls spanning from the Lateran Council of 1059, convened by Nicolas II, to the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 under Innocent III. Earlier in 1022, however, the German Emperor Henry II called a Synod at Pavia that condemned clerical marriage and at which he threatened to punish these clerics by personally deposing them. There were those in the Church who went further than condemning clerical marriage as a mortal sin; they also categorized it as a heresy. To do so, moreover, these polemicists harkened back to the patristic era to revive the Nicolaitan heresy to condemn medieval clerical marriage.

Leading the way in the eleventh century to identify married clergy as Nicolaitans was Peter Damian. In the twelfth century Gerhoh of Reichensberg wrote a lengthy theological excursus wherein he argued, among other things, why both Simoniacs and Nicolaitans were deserving of the name “heretics.” Ulrich D'Insola, on the other side of the debate, rejected the epitaph of Nicolaitan to argue that secular clergy should be allowed to marry. These defenders of “Nicolaitism,” as applied to married clergy, remained a minority that did not prevail against the plenary papal ban in the Western Church. Russell, J. B., Dissent and Reform in the Early Middle Ages. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1965), 136–43, at 138. See note 3 for the sources.Google Scholar

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50. Transeo antiquos ipsa antiquitate minus famosos haereticos, Basilidem, Apellem, Marcionem, Hermogenem, Cataphrigas, Eucratitas, Montanum cum Prisca et Maximilla feminis insanis, Novatianum, Eunomium, multaque alia Christiani nominis monstra, in Peter the Venerable, PL 189:665. Kritzeck, , Peter the Venerable, 221, 37, and 41.Google Scholar

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52. Ad praecipuas diabolicae pravitatis pestes, quibus maxime Satanas Ecclesiam Dei inficere et velut robustioribus machinis subvertere conatus est, venio: Dico autem, Manichaeos, Arianos, Macedonianos, Sabellianos, Donatistas, Pelagianos, omniumque ultimos Nestorianos, et Eutichianos, in Peter the Venerable, PL 189:665. Kritzeck, , Peter the Venerable, 221.Google Scholar

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54. Peter the Venerable, PL 189:665–67. Kritzeck, , Peter the Venerable, 37–41Google Scholar. John of Damascus identified an “Arian monk” named Bahira who foretold the coining of Muhammad, Sahas, , John of Damascus, 73–74.Google Scholar

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56. “Dedit Satan successum errori and monachum haereticum pseudoprophetae conjunxit,” Epistola, 17, PL 189:341. Constable, , Letters, II, 284Google Scholar. See also, Abel, A., “Bahīrá,” The Encyclopaedia of Islam. 2nd ed. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1960), 1:922–23Google Scholar. See Tolan, , “Diabolical Heresy,” 359.Google Scholar

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60. Legimus in hystoriis romanorum quad nycolaus, qui Machometus dicitur, unus fuit de septem dyaconibus cardinalibus ecclesie romane, in Mancini, , “Per lo studio,” 327–28, note 4.Google Scholar

61. Hic cum esset in gramatica, dyalectica et astronomia doctus ac in factis secularibus eruditus et omnes diversas linguas loqui sciret et necesse esset, in Ibid. See also D'Ancona, , “La leggenda di Maometto,” 278–79.Google Scholar

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63. Fuit in diebus apostolorum vir nomine Nicolaus per omnia reprobus et maledictus: de septem tamen dyaconibus unus erat, sicut et Iudas traditor ex Christi discipulis unus exstiterat, in Mancini, , “Per lo studio,” 330Google Scholar. For Bahira as an “Arian” in John of Damascus see, Sahas, , John of Damascus, 73–74 and 133.Google Scholar

64. Non solum enim hec red multas alias blasfemias et scandali verba de suo spurcissimo corde invenit. Et alios multos perditos quos habebat discipulos docuit, et sic adversus Catholicam ecclesiam diaboli malicia armavit. Siquidem inter ceteros sue malitie discipulos insignis existerat unus nomine et rationaliter Maurus, in Mancini, , “Per lo studio,” 331Google Scholar. See also, D'Alverny, , “Pierre le Vénérable,” 165–66Google Scholar. Cambier, , “L'épisode des taureaux,” 229.Google Scholar

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66. Ibid., 326–27.

67. Hic post obitum beati Clementis pape, qui tercius a Petro beato rexit monarchiam et cathedram digne sedit apostolicam, in Ibid., 330.