Research at the Chair for Medieval History (Jaspert) DFG project „Dynastesses and mendicant orders in the late medieval empire. Female piety between court, city and convent (1250-1400)"“

Project management: 

• Prof. Dr. Nikolas Jaspert
• Imke Just, M. Ed. 

Project description:

A considerable number of princesses in the 13th to 15th centuries were particularly close to the mendicant orders. These orders were not only active in the expanding cities, as most scholars emphasize, but also in the far-flung networks of the aristocracy. Due to the charisma of the high nobility and their considerable capacity for action, this connection between the court and the mendicants had consequences,
far beyond the narrower field of the history of piety.

The aim of the project, funded by the German Research Foundation over three years, is to determine for the first time systematically and comparatively the intensity, development and consequences of the philomendicant piety of women of the high nobility in the late medieval empire between the middle of the 13th and the end of the 14th century. The female members of the three most important dynasties in the German Empire - the Habsburgs, Luxembourgers and Wittelsbachs - will be examined in their relationships to the four great mendicant orders and to related forms of religious life.The project (project leader Prof. Nikolas Jaspert, project assistant Imke Just) will contribute to recognizing the intensive turn to the mendicant orders by influential women of the high nobility in the mid-13th century as an important, albeit hitherto underestimated, pan-European movement.
13th century, the intensive turn of influential women of the high nobility towards the mendicant orders as a significant, albeit hitherto underestimated, pan-European movement.

The work of the research project also includes the development of a comprehensive database on the religious practice of the women from the Habsburg, Luxembourg and Wittelsbach dynasties under investigation (with the assistance of student assistants Charlotte Carl and Arne Lammert). The data collection will be carried out without restriction to the mendicant piety of the women; instead, all donations, endowments and testamentary dispositions will be recorded, as well as entries into convents and burials. This procedure will allow further comparative research on the religiousness of the dynastesses after the planned project duration and make the results of the research work accessible to a broad scientific audience.