Forging Memory: Falsified Documents and Institutional History in Europe, c. 970-1020

在过去的二十年里，历史学家对群体和机构身份是如何在中世纪(和以后)构建和争夺的表现出了极大的兴趣。人们特别注意第一个千年之交前后的几年，这被视为决定性的变革时期，在这一时期，以书面形式更加清楚地表达了这种身份。这一过程表现为新的纪录片形式，如Cartulary(记录授予机构的土地和合法权利的文件的集合)，以及叙事历史的繁荣，通常具有机构性质。尽管这些进展长期以来一直受到赞赏，但它们最重要和最持久的后果之一几乎没有得到治疗：伪造文件的增加。这个项目试图纠正平衡，将伪造置于我们对这些年的理解的中心。该项目考察了造假如何以及为什么在十世纪末和十一世纪初在西欧大片地区普遍存在。它建立在早期关于造假的工作基础上，辩称这是这些年来教士开始整理(和重新整理)他们的机构过去的手段之一。通过弥合历史记忆研究(通常以叙述为起点)和伪造(倾向于关注文件证据)之间的差距，该项目开辟了新的天地，认为伪造文件为人们对过去态度的变化提供了宝贵的见解，特别是在这些关键的年份。它的目的是消除有时对伪造文件表示的相当辉格党式的蔑视，认为它们是中世纪最有趣和最重要的历史记录之一。这个时代的赝品--通常是对早期视觉和语言形式的密切模仿--非但没有反映出幼稚的天真和乏味的不合时宜，反而见证了一种高度发达的历史感。虽然关于中世纪伪造的主题已经写了很多，但以前的工作都集中在“伪造的悖论”上：如何“信仰的时代”也是“制造的时代”。因此，个别伪造的文件往往仍然被忽视，被视为孤立的异常现象，而不是更广泛的欧洲造假文化的一部分。事实上，合成的尝试尤其罕见，这将是第一次超越单一领域或地区的重大研究。这一主题是通过精心挑选的五个案例研究来探讨的：蠕虫、帕骚、阿宾登、韦塞利和弗洛里。选择这些机构是为了涵盖一系列地区(两个来自现代德国--然后是其东部和西部边界；法国、英国和意大利各一个)和机构(三个主教教区和两个修道院)。其目的是在阳光下检查每一套文件，然后将共同的线索拉在一起，检查这一活动背后的局部和一般因素的复杂相互作用。通过研究跨越中世纪和现代边界的伪造这一主题，该项目提供了一个与欧洲和北美的学者接触和合作的独特机会。很少有历史学家能在所研究的所有地区声称拥有专业知识，这将使我站在这个领域的前沿，这个领域仍然经常被国家史学传统分裂。项目成果将在一系列国际会议上以论文形式进行讨论，包括在主办机构组织的一次会议，并将以研究专著和编辑后的卷的形式最终形成。这项研究的内容将通过一系列学校研讨会和在埃克塞特当地大教堂举行的活动向更广泛的受众传播(大教堂拥有一套耐人寻味的10世纪50年代的赝品)。通过加强与这些组织的联系，该项目还将使我走在地方和机构公众参与和影响活动的前沿。

Over the last two decades historians have shown great interest in how group and institutional identities were constructed and contested within (and beyond) the Middle Ages. Particular attention has been given to the years around the turn of the first millennium, which is seen as a period of decisive change, when such identities became more clearly articulated in written form. This process found expression in new documentary forms, such as the cartulary (a collection of documents recording grants of land and legal rights to an institution), and a flowering of narrative history, often of an institutional nature. Though these developments have long been appreciated, one of their most important and enduring consequences has received little if any treatment: a rise in documentary forgery. This project seeks to redress the balance, placing forgery at the centre of our understanding of these years. The project examines how and why falsification became widespread across large swathes of Western Europe in the late tenth and early eleventh centuries. It builds on earlier work on counterfeiting, arguing that this was one of the means by which churchmen began to order (and re-order) their institutional pasts in these years. By bridging the gap between studies of historical memory (which typically take narratives as their starting point) and forgery (which tend to focus on documentary evidence) the project breaks new ground, arguing that forged documents provide precious insights into changing attitudes towards the past, especially in these crucial years. It aims to dispel the rather Whiggish disdain sometimes expressed towards falsified documents, arguing that they are amongst the most interesting and important historical records of the Middle Ages. Far from reflecting childish naivety and blithe anachronism, the counterfeits of the era - which often closely mimic earlier visual and linguistic forms - bear witness to a highly developed sense of the past. Though much has been written on the subject of medieval forgery, previous work has focused on the 'paradox of forgery': how an 'Age of Faith' was also an 'Age of Fabrication'. As a consequence, individual groups of falsified documents are often still neglected, treated as isolated aberrations rather than part of a broader European culture of counterfeiting. Indeed, attempts at synthesis are particularly rare, and this will be the first major study to go beyond a single realm or region. The subject is approached through five carefully chosen case studies: Worms, Passau, Abingdon, Vercelli and Fleury. These have been selected in order to cover a range of regions (two from modern Germany - and then from its eastern and western borders; and one each from France, England and Italy) and institutions (three bishoprics and two monasteries). The intention is to examine each set of documents in insolation, then draw together the common strands, examining the complex interplay of local and general factors behind this activity. By pursuing the subject of forgery across medieval and modern borders, this project offers a unique opportunity to engage and collaborate with scholars across Europe and North America. Few historians can claim expertise across all the regions examined, and this will position me at the forefront of a field still all too often divided by national historiographical traditions. Project findings will be discussed in papers at a series of international conferences, including one organised at the host institution, and will reach their final form in a research monograph and edited volume. Elements of the research will be disseminated to a broader audience through a set of school workshops and events at the local Cathedral in Exeter (which boasts its own intriguing set of forgeries of the 1050s). By strengthening ties with these organisations, the project will also place me at the forefront of local and institutional public engagement and impact activities.