Women and Pilgrimage in Medieval Galicia ed. by Carlos Andrés González-Paz (review)

Women and Pilgrimage in Medieval Galicia consists mostly in the translation of a previous collection of articles published in 2010 under the title Mujeres y peregrinación en la Galicia Medieval, a volume coordinated by the same Carlos Andrés González-Paz and edited by the Instituto de Estudios Gallegos “Padre Sarmiento” as part of their monographies on Galician studies. There are differences, though, and these have to do with the presence of three new articles in the English version –those by Marta González Vázquez, José Augusto de Sottomayor-Pizarro and Päivi Salmesvuori– and the absence of those by Violeta Miraz Seco on Margery Kempe and José Eduardo López Pereira on the nun Egeria, which were included in the original Spanish book.

The aim of this collective volume is to offer a general perspective on pilgrimage from the point of view of female travelers in Galicia during the Middle Ages. In order to do so, the different contributors have approached the phenomenon in very different ways, from those studies that deal with the general characteristics of female pilgrimage to those that focus on specific cases, such as those of St. Bridget of Sweden or St. Elizabeth of Portugal.

The first chapter of the book, “Women and the Christian Middle Ages. The Theoretical Horizon” by María Isabel Pérez de Tudela Velasco, focuses on the different topics associated with the female condition in early-Spanish writers, especially that of Beatus of Liébana in his Apologeticus and Isidore of Seville. Although the negative conception appears as the main trend of thought, the Virgin is shown as the contrary of the vices associated with women; on the other hand, these vices were well represented by the figure of the Whore of Babylon of the Revelation 17:1–18, another book widely commented by Beatus. The article concludes with the medieval conception of the double nature of woman. The lack of a critical apparatus is compensated by the profuse quotations, making this article especially useful to access medieval sources on the same topic, comparing different authors.

The second article “Women and Pilgrimage in Medieval Galicia” is written by Marta González Vázquez and serves as title for the whole collection of essays. The author focuses on those women who went on pilgrimage to Compostela. After a general introduction on female pilgrimage and the dangers of travelling for medieval women, Marta González examines the double nature of textual evidence –narrative and documentary, referring to collections of miracles and deeds of donations– then proceeds to analyze some outstanding cases that illustrate this pilgrimage tradition: St. Bridget of Sweden and St. Elizabeth of Portugal, who deserve more attention that will be developed in later articles. The last part of the article deals with the circulation of relics and how archbishops of Santiago used parts of the holy body of the Apostle as a precious gift to the most important pilgrims –kings and queens– and how these replied by making valuable gifts to the see.

The third chapter, “Guncina González volens ire Iherusalem”, is written by the editor of the book, Carlos Andrés González-Paz, and discusses the particular case of this 12^th century Galician woman, noble by marriage, whose primary intention was to go on pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Her desire was expressed in two donations, dating from 1133 and 1137, which must be understood in the context of her powerful in-law family; members of the so called Traba family had gone in pilgrimage to Jerusalem before, but this tradition seems to come to its end by the late 1170s, when conflicts within the family arouse. The most interesting aspect of this chapter is the work of microhistory and the gaze the author bestows over this woman, whose life is reconstructed with the support of numerous textual references that help to understand...