Authority in Byzantine Provincial Society, 950–1100 by Leonora Neville (review)

REVIEWS 268 contemporary of Abelard, whose largely epistolary poems belong to the first metrical category. Hilary’s poetry is the most explicitly sexual of the poetry addressed in this book and speaks to the tension of homoerotic desire that may have arisen between a schoolmaster and his pupils. In his playful poetry, Hilary also pokes fun at the questionable sexual habits of his fellow clerics. Afterward, Moser goes on to discuss the changing verse forms that are exemplified in such erotic poetry as “Iam dulcis amica” from the Cambridge manuscript mentioned earlier. These new forms represent the concordant changes that were inspired by new liturgical and extraliturgical church songs. The latter parts of chapter 6 are dedicated to three poems from Bodleian MS Additional A.44 and one poem from Cambridge University Library MS Ff.1.17(I). Moser demonstrates that in these poems, poets who wrote Latin erotic lyric and who also experimented with verse form were among a group of clerics who sought to combine their interests in classical exegesis with the scientific humanism of the Neoplatonists. In chapter 7, Moser turns his attention to British Library MS Arundel 384, the largest single collection of Latin erotic poetry in England. In his close study, Moser argues for a single author for the Arundel manuscript, citing the fact that “the thematic, structural, and verbal parallels” evident in the poems imply that a “single mind” is at work (242). Whether this “single mind” is the Peter of Blois who wrote many letters or the Peter of Blois who was a canon at Chartres is somewhat irrelevant. In either case, the poetry of the Arundel manuscript continues the theme of the anxious poet philosopher who is at odds with the role of sexuality in his orderly life. Finally, Moser concludes with a chapter on the importance of myth to the erotic poet. He argues that “the reflex to think mythologically was much more than just an effort to imitate Ovid, it was part of how twelfth-century humanists learned to think about the world.” The importance of myth, moreover, needed to be present because such elements could be understood on multiple allegorical and literal levels; levels in which the level of the audience’s education did not affect the comprehensibility of the text. Moser examines three myths in particular: Hercules, Orpheus, and Leda. In his readings of these myths and in his conclusion to his book, Moser points out the uniqueness and complexity of the Latin verse in their ability to both recreate their authors’ anxieties and interact with a past and present that embraced the sexuality of classics yet still held onto a Neoplatonist world view. Although A Cosmos of Desire is ostensibly about Latin lyric in English manuscripts, it is equally enlightening as an introduction to Latin lyric in France. This synthetic work is friendly to the novice, complete with full translations of the Latin text and helpful bits of information that aid in situating erotic lyric in a larger context. It is in his close readings of the poetry, however, that Moser’s ability to deconstruct the poems’ meanings shines through. The analyses are dense with insightful commentary and fast-paced in their approach, covering a substantial amount of material in a relatively short amount of time. Both advanced and beginning scholars will find A Cosmos of Desire a valuable read. JENNIFER A. TRAN, English, UCLA Leonora Neville, Authority in Byzantine Provincial Society, 950–1100 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2004) xi + 210 pp., map. REVIEWS 269 The author’s main premise in this book is that the imperial administration of tenth- and the eleventh-century Byzantium only lightly touched on provincial society, concerning itself exclusively with the maintenance of imperial sovereignty , the suppression of revolt, and the collection of revenue. At the same time, social regulations were undertaken by individual provincial households. Thus personal freedom in the provinces was constrained more by neighbors and rival households than by the imperial government. The novelty and originality of Neville’s approach to the Byzantine tenth and eleventh centuries is in focusing on the provinces instead of the capital in both her choice of sources and in the questions she asks...