What is the difference between miracle and magic? Scholars today believe that one cannot meaningfully differentiate between the two. The difference is a matter of perspective. This project investigates how Christians in late antiquity made the distinction between the fluid concepts of miracle and magic, how they tried to make it convincing, and why they constructed the distinction in the first place. It investigates these questions through the study of the character type of the 'magos' (‘magician’) in Byzantine hagiography (i.e. Christian narratives about holy (wo)men). The project takes a literary approach, studying the depiction of confrontations between so-called ‘magoi’ and holy (wo)men in hagiography, to see what kind of image Christians portray of 'magoi' and how they distinguish such figures from the saints. The project aims to show that the portrayal of 'magoi' as impostors and frauds lends the saint religious authority and thereby builds up the identity of the Christian community.

Medieval romance is arguably the most influential secular literary genre of the European Middle Ages. Its history has not been written yet. In order to enhance our understanding of this history (both conceptually and cross-culturally), this project offers the first reconstruction and interpretation of the persistence of (ancient) novelistic and (late antique and medieval) hagiographical traditions in French, Anglo-Norman and English medieval romance. Whereas it is assumed that ancient novels influenced medieval romance only if there were Latin versions of them, this project aims to explore the importance of hagiography as a possible narrative bridge between ancient (Greek) novels and medieval vernacular romance. The research hypothesis is that medieval romances were impacted (directly or indirectly) by ancient novelistic and late antique and medieval hagiographical influences of different kinds, and that they adopted, rehearsed, re-used and adapted them to various degrees in order to construct their protagonists as heroes/heroines. Two interrelated sets of research questions will test this hypothesis, one tracing diachronic continuity and the other examining synchronic differentiation. Methodologically, this project complements two literary-theoretical models, one modern (narratology), one ancient (rhetoric). The project will contribute to our knowledge about both reception of ancient novels in the Middle Ages and the literary complexities of medieval romance.

This project offers the first comprehensive reconstruction and interpretation of receptions of ancient novels (1st-4th cent. AD) in (Greek, Arabic and western vernacular) secular narrative from Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages. Novel Echoes follows up from the ERC Starting Grant project Novel Saints (on hagiography). It does so by taking ancient novelistic receptions towards entirely new, unexplored horizons.

Our knowledge about the early history of the novel is incomplete. Receptions of ancient novels have been studied for periods from the 11th and 12th cent. onwards but not systematically examined for preceding eras – much to the detriment of the study of both narrative (then and later) and the history of fiction. This project pursues the hypothesis that different secular, narrative traditions in this period were impacted (directly or indirectly) by ancient novelistic influences of different kinds and adopted (and adapted) them to various degrees and purposes; and that, since the ancient novel is a genre defined by its own fictionality, its reception in later narrative impacts notions of truth and authentication in ways that other (often more authoritative) literary models (e.g. Homer and the Bible) do not.

Novel Echoes strikes a balance between breadth and depth by envisaging three objectives:

1. the creation of a reference tool charting all types of novelistic influence in secular narrative from the 4th to the 12th cent.;

2. the in-depth study of particular sets of texts and the analysis of their implicit conceptualizations of truth, authentication, fiction and narrative;

3. the reconstruction of routes of transmission in both the West and the East.

Given the project’s innovative focus, it will enhance our understanding of both the corpus texts and the early history of the novel; place the study of corpus texts on an improved methodological footing; and contribute to the theoretical study of the much-vexed question of how to conceptualize fiction.

The aim of this research is an analysis of the influences of Plato and the First and Second Sophistic in the Pseudo-Clementines. Until now, the study of philosophy in the Pseudo-Clementines has largely remained limited to the possible stoic and epicurean influence. Nonetheless the influence of Plato cannot be underestimated, nor that of his contemporaries: the sophists. Similarities with the platonic dialogues and sophistic works as Gorgias’ Helena need to be examined more closely.

This stands in combination with a narrative and rhetorical approach of this work. How is the work constructed, where can we notice the influence of Plato or the Sophists and how does that fit in the whole construction? But the context (3rd -4th century) may not be lost out of sight. This context is much debated, so caution with probable notions of anti-Paulinism, the Neoplatonic Iamblichus and his Theurgy, Elcesaitic influences, etc. is necessary. In this respect, the question of the Jewish, Christian, pagan identities will be treated in this literary corpus.

To conclude, it wants to achieve a greater understanding of this literary corpus making use of a combination of methodologies from the fields of philosophy, religious studies and philology. By combining these fields of research, it wants to shed a fundamentelly new light on this corpus.

The novel is today the most popular literary genre worldwide. Its early history has not been written yet. In order to enhance our understanding of this history (both conceptually and cross-culturally), this project offers the first comprehensive reconstruction and interpretation of the persistence of ancient novelistic material in hagiographical narrative traditions in the Mediterranean in Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages (4th-12th cent.). This period constitutes a blind spot on the radar of scholars working on the history of the novel, who conceptualize it, much to the detriment of the study of narrative in subsequent periods, as an ‘empty’ interim period between the latest ancient representatives of the genre (ca. 3rd-4th cent.) and its re-emergence in 11th/12th-century Byzantium and 11th-century Persia. This project, on the other hand, advances the hypothesis that different hagiographical traditions throughout Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages were impacted (directly or indirectly) by ancient novelistic influences of different kinds and adopted, rehearsed, re-used and adapted them to various degrees as tools for the representation of saints as heroes/heroines. In this sense, constructions of heroism in these traditions should be understood to varying degrees as ‘novelistic’ and raise crucial issues about fictionalization and the texts’ own implicit conceptualizations of fiction. Three stages of the project will test different aspects of this hypothesis. Firstly, the project will chart for the first time all novelistic influences in the hagiographical corpus texts. Secondly, it will analyze the impact of these influences on constructions of heroism in specific hagiographical traditions (mainly Latin, Greek and Syriac Martyr Acts, hagiographical romances and saints’ Lives) and examine implications for notions of fictionalization and/or strategies for enhancing verisimilitude and authenticity. Finally, diachronic and cross-cultural dimensions of the research hypothesis will be articulated through the study of continuity of hagiographical traditions (and their constructions of heroism) in narrative genres from the 11th and 12th centuries in the West (medieval romance), Byzantium (novels) and the East (Persian romance). By generating an improved understanding of the impact of ancient novelistic material in different hagiographical traditions throughout Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages, this project aims to contribute not just to the history of the idea of fiction but also to the study of hagiography, the early history of the novel and to all disciplines that study these literary genres.