Maier, Christoph T.

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Joachim of Fiore and his followers as forerunners of themodern Seventh-Day Adventists. Robert E. Lerner’sresearch on the Refreshment of the Saints and his ar-ticles on Joachim seem to have escaped Flori’s noticewhile his The Powers of Prophecy: The Cedar of LebanonVision from the Mongol Onslaught to the Dawn of theEnlightenment (1983), a study of the Tripoli prophecy,is listed in the bibliography but not cited in the relevantfootnotes. The bibliography is described as selective butthe omission of Bernard of Clairvaux’s De laude, whichFlori clearly used, puzzles this reviewer. In summary,Flori propounds an original and important synthesis ina book that deserves to be studied but approached cau-tiously.E. RANDOLPH DANIELUniversity of KentuckyADAM J. DAVIS. The Holy Bureaucrat: Eudes Rigaud andReligious Reform in Thirteenth-Century Normandy.Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. 2006. Pp. x, 268.$39.95.Writing medieval biographies is no easy undertaking.Rarely are there sufficient reliable sources to cover oneindividual’s entire life, let alone the world in which heor she lived. Any attempt will be geared toward thoseperiods and aspects of an individual’s life that happento be illuminated by the surviving records. As it hap-pens, the life of Eudes Rigaud, archbishop of Rouenfrom 1248 to 1276, is more richly documented thanmost owing to the survival of a detailed Register thatchronicles the archbishop’s pastoral and administrativeactivities between 1248 and 1269. In addition, there arehis theological writings produced while at the Univer-sity of Paris. But it is not only the relative richness ofthe sources that makes Rigaud an interesting characterfor today’s historian; he belonged to a new brand ofecclesiastical administrator in the thirteenth century. AParis academic and one of the first Franciscan bishops,Rigaud’s career taps some of the main strands of thestandard narrative of thirteenth-century history: thegrowth and increasing importance of the mendicant or-ders within the church and the rationalization of po-litical administration and economic management. It iswithin these parameters that Adam J. Davis presentsthis new biography.Davis chooses a chronological and thematic ap-proach starting with Rigaud’s formative years at theUniversity of Paris and his entry into the Franciscanorder. Subsequent chapters deal with the archbishop’spastoral visits, his relationship with his suffragan bish-ops, his propagation of monastic reform, his supervi-sion of the secular clergy, his jurisdictional authority,his role as economic and financial administrator, andhis relationship to the French king. In accordance withthe book’s title, Davis presents Rigaud as a ferventFranciscan who, as archbishop, tried to propagate the“holy” principles of Franciscan spirituality and pastoralendeavor while at the same time pursuing the “bureau-cratic” duties of an archbishop with exemplary energyand academic rigor. In doing so Davis rightly insists thatthe merging of Franciscanism and church governance,which lay at the heart of Rigaud’s episcopal program,fitted the thirteenth-century scene despite its apparentand inherent contradictions. The work and career ofRigaud can even be read as one of the great successstories of thirteenth-century Franciscan ambitions be-cause Rigaud managed to translate the Franciscan ide-als of spiritual dedication and moral integrity into hisefforts as a pastoral leader and church administrator.Davis presents a sound argument based on thoroughresearch. The picture he derives from this is lucid andcomprehensive. Thanks to Davis’s fresh treatment,which clearly extends the work of Rigaud’s earlier bi-ographers in both scope and quality, the famous arch-bishop of Rouen will now gain an even more prominentplace within the historiography of the thirteenth cen-tury. There cannot be many a medieval bishop whoselife and career have been rendered equally graspable tothe modern reader.I have two caveats, however. First, an in-depth anal-ysis of Rigaud’s Register is missing and would have beenwelcome as it is Davis’s main source. The principles ofrecord keeping employed must surely have had a bear-ing on the selection of information preserved in theRegister. Also, the chronology of compilation and an-notation might well reveal something of the techniquesand purposes of the administrative process. A more sys-tematic exploration of these issues could have yieldedfurther interesting insights. Second, I do not altogetheragree with the overall tone of the book and the resultingamount of implied praise heaped upon Rigaud. By thestandards of progressive churchmen and state admin-istrators of the thirteenth century, Rigaud was no doubtsomething of a hero and an example to be emulated.There must, however, have been a fair number of peo-ple who saw the archbishop as stubborn, intolerant, pe-dantic, and pompous despite his achievements. Somepassages of Salimbene de Adam’s chronicle certainlypoint toward this. Might it have been worth attemptingto capture the perspective of those who may be con-sidered the victims of people like Rigaud, i.e., all thosenegatively affected by the thirteenth-century drive to-ward control and standardization of people’s moral andspiritual lives and their forced integration into evermore efficient legal and economic structures? Theseshould be read as suggestions for further investigationrather than as criticism.Taken on its ownmerits, Davis’s book is a remarkableachievement that greatly enhances our knowledge of aprominent thirteenth-century archbishop and the worldin which he lived.CHRISTOPH T. MAIERUniversity of ZurichEVELYN EDSON. The World Map, 1300–1492: The Per-sistence of Tradition and Transformation. Baltimore:Johns Hopkins University Press. 2007. Pp. ix, 300.$50.00.890 Reviews of BooksAMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW JUNE 2008

Adam J. Davis. The Holy Bureaucrat: Eudes Rigaud and Religious Reform in Thirteenth-Century Normandy. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. 2006. Pp. x, 268. $39.95

Adam J. Davis. The Holy Bureaucrat: Eudes Rigaud and Religious Reform in Thirteenth-Century Normandy. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. 2006. Pp. x, 268. $39.95

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