Escaping Justice?: The Politics of Liberation Miracles in Late Medieval Portugal

Iona McCleery

Jump to Content

Chapter 12 Escaping Justice?

The Politics of Liberation Miracles in Late Medieval Portugal

In: A Companion to Medieval Miracle Collections

Author:

Iona McCleery

Iona McCleery
Search for other papers by Iona McCleery in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed

Type:: Chapter

Pages:: 249–273

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004468498_014

Purchase instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):

€42.00€35.00 excl. VAT

Add to Cart

Redeem Access Token

This chapter is an exploration of the many non-healing miracles found in medieval shrine collections and canonization processes, with a particular focus on a set of liberation miracles recorded for late medieval Portugal. The first part defines what is meant by “non-healing” miracles and discusses some methodological difficulties; the second part considers non-healing miracles in the context of the Portuguese cult of the saints. The last part of the chapter provides a case study of protection miracles from the cult of Our Lady of Virtues, focusing on liberation from prison or escape from execution. The argument of the chapter is that non-healing miracles are highly political in nature, but rather than being signs of disorder, they reinforced existing standards and norms. Such miracles are guides to ideal behaviour and performances of power that shed considerable light on medieval Portuguese criminal justice.

Citation Info

Save
Cite
Email this content

Share link with colleague or librarian

You can email a link to this page to a colleague or librarian:
Email this content
or copy the link directly:

https://brill.edhh.ma/abstract/book/9789004468498/BP000013.xml
The link was not copied. Your current browser may not support copying via this button.

Link copied successfully

Collapse
Expand

A Companion to Medieval Miracle Collections

Series: Reading Medieval Sources, Volume: 5

E-Book ISBN:: 9789004468498

Publisher:: Brill

Print Publication Date:: 27 Aug 2021

Subjects

Front Matter

Back Matter

Metrics

	All Time	Past 365 days	Past 30 Days
Abstract Views	964	432	29
Full Text Views	36	5	0
PDF Views & Downloads	61	8	0

African Studies	Education	Media Studies
American Studies	History	Middle East and Islamic Studies
Ancient Near East and Egypt	Human Rights and Humanitarian Law	Musicology
Art History	International Law	Philosophy
Asian Studies	International Relations	Religious Studies
Biblical Studies	Jewish Studies	Slavic and Eurasian Studies
Biology	Languages and Linguistics	Social Sciences
Book History and Cartography	Life Sciences	Theology and World Christianity
Classical Studies	Literature and Cultural Studies

Subjects

Authors

Open Access

Product Information

Company

Contact

Chapter 12 Escaping Justice?

The Politics of Liberation Miracles in Late Medieval Portugal

Citation Info

Share link with colleague or librarian

A Companion to Medieval Miracle Collections

Table of Contents

Metrics

Metrics