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Rituals of Greeting and Farewell: Reflections on a Visit to the Royal Court of Norway in 1302

Portrait of Erik Magnusson in Stavanger CathedralRituals of Greeting and Farewell: Reflections on a Visit to the Royal Court of Norway in 1302

By Thomas Småberg

Collegium Medievale, Vol.25 (2012)

Abstract: This article argues that by close reading of passages concerning ritual occasions in medieval chronicles it is possible to gain insight into the construction and communication of power. The case study concerns certain rituals described in Erikskrönikan (the Chronicle of Duke Erik), a Swedish rhymed chronicle from the first part of the fourteenth century. An account of reception and farewell rituals at the royal court of Norway in 1302 is described in detail and analyzed through the use of ritual studies. Focus is on the portrayal of actors and actions. The rituals are shown to be important parts in the construction of ideals during a period when courtly and chivalric culture was gradually introduced in medieval Sweden. This article shows that through ritual analysis it is possible to gain insight into, and nuance the perception of, the construction, legitimization and perception of power and authority in Scandinavian society.

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Formalized and institutionalized personal bonds, such as friendship and patron-client relationships, were important in medieval Europe. By their very nature, these bonds were public, both when they were created, when they were maintained, and when they were ended. This visibility guaranteed their legitimization. The public and private power structures of medieval society were thus intertwined. This article argues that construction of power was in part done by public ritual. Ritual played a key role in medieval power relationships, which was all the more true in societies with a low degree of written administration and written culture, such as early medieval Sweden during the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, where norms and values needed to be performed and witnessed in order to be legitimized.

Ritual, however, is a complex term. Broadly speaking, there are two interpretations of ritual. The first sees ritual as separate from other forms of social interactions through the use of primarily sacred symbols. The second sees ritual as included in all forms of social reality. This latter interpretation of ritual is current in historical medieval research that uses ethnological and anthropological theories and will be used in this article. I define ritual as acts imbued with meaning. That is, acts where actors in a given time and place perform actions which are collective, formalized, institutionalized and repetitive. Ritual is a communicative action that transforms existing structures and can be used to create and legitimize power structures, social structures and social relationships such as collective ideals. Rituals are therefore not merely symbolic representations of society; they are arenas for power negotiations. Viewed in this way, rituals encode cultural values. Through an analysis of ritual it is therefore possible to discuss a society’s underlying values and norms.

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