«Ò scritte di mia mano in su l’Isola della Rocca». Literacy and culture of Catherine of Siena

Authors

  • Giovanna Murano Firenze

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.6092/1593-2214/5081

Keywords:

Catherine of Siena, Religious Women, Women Literacy, Bible, Letters

Abstract

The aim of this essay is to investigate both reading and writing Catherine of Siena’s literacy. The traditional and still persistent image – built by his first hagiographer, the Dominican Raymond of Capua –  is that Catherine was entirely illiterate until God miraculously endowed her with some reading (but not writing) literacy. The evidence that Catherine of Siena was throroughly literate comes from a range of sources only partially examined by scholars until now. The first and foremost of these texts is an almost unknown Thomas Caffarini’s letter to Catherine written in 1374 about a philological problem on ps. 130.

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Published

2017-04-06

How to Cite

Murano, Giovanna. 2017. “«Ò Scritte Di Mia Mano in Su l’Isola Della Rocca». Literacy and Culture of Catherine of Siena”. Reti Medievali Journal 18 (1):139-76. https://doi.org/10.6092/1593-2214/5081.

Issue

Section

Essays

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