The Conversion of Herman the Jew by Jean-Claude Schmitt (review)

REVIEWS 285 of ongoing controversy. It is easy to praise a book like this, which convinces with elegant arguments clothed in eloquent prose. That its faults are so minor is even more surprising given that the work is in substance a Ph.D. dissertation (x). First, Rio takes great care to examine the manuscript context of her formulae, and even presents an appendix with detailed descriptions of the formulae manuscripts (241– 271). But at least one of these, Karlsruhe Aug. 112,7 is not entirely accurate: fols. 6r–13r are described as “hymns” when in fact fols. 3v–13r are a grammatical work known as the De Litteris, which happens to contain a few hymns on fols. 6 and 13. Rio also doesn’t seem to recognize (or does not mention) that Mone no. 4 on fol. 111v is the dedication verses of Gerold’s chapel at Reichenau , something that would have implications for her argument in chapter 4 (144–150) on the origin of the Formulae Augienses. Rio may have been led astray in her description of this manuscript by Holder, a cataloguer of Zeumer’s generation, when a more accurate description of the manuscript was made by Louis Holtz.8 Rio’s guides can be useful starting point, therefore, but one is warned against relying on them entirely. Second, Rio offers only the barest mention of southern formularies, especially the famous Liber Diurnus (194– 195), the formulary drawn from papal sources. Here her acumen could have been well-used. Since the L.D. survives in manuscripts from Bobbio and Nonantola, it may hold the answer to Rio’s quandary about St. Denis’ papal letter collection (143). Third, as Rio is demolishing old arguments in chapter 4, we are sometimes left wondering where she stands amongst the ruins. It is for instance not entirely clear why Dümmler’s argument for Passau is rejected as an origin for the Collectio Pataviensis (137–139).9 Finally, there some very trivial errors, such as a missing macron over the n in senicas (122); clumsy translations of personis mutatis and the sentence scribe nomina … (155). Rio has remade the study of formulae in her first book, and its associated volume of translations.10 Formulae are finally opened up for all to use with confidence, and we are presented with a model of intelligent, careful, and wellspoken scholarship. Omnibus hinc formulam habere placeat, quia melius non valent. RICHARD MATTHEW POLLARD, St. Gall Project, UCLA Jean-Claude Schmitt, The Conversion of Herman the Jew, trans. Alex J. Novikoff (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press 2010) 302 pp., 9 ill. The Opusculum de conversione sua is a first-person account of the Jew Judas, born in Cologne and who later in life converted to Christianity and the priesthood , taking the name Herman. Written in the middle of the twelfth century, 7 Now available online at www.stgallplan.org. 8 Louis Holtz, Donat et la tradition de l'enseignement grammatical (Paris 1981) 367– 371. 9 Here I am supported by Warren Brown’s review of Rio in Early Medieval Europe, 19.2 (2011): 251. 10 The Formularies of Angers and Marculf: Two Merovingian Legal Handbooks, trans. A. Rio (Liverpool 2008). REVIEWS 286 the Opusculum was part of the revival of autobiography after the relative dearth of autobiographical accounts during the early Middle Ages. Jean-Claude Schmitt uses the text as a window into the world of the twelfth-century Germany as well as entry into some of the major issues of modern historiography. He tackles questions of the relations between Christians and Jews in the Middle Ages, the nature of the twelfth-century revival, and the place of fiction and reality in understanding medieval texts. The unique story of Judas/Herman also allows Schmitt to explore the role of images, dreams, and names in the process of conversion. After a short introduction detailing the major events in the text and its manuscript tradition, Jean-Claude Schmitt begins the book with a discussion of the historiography of the Opusculum. According to Schmitt, the majority of scholarly attention to the text has focused on the question of truth of the text: did Herman/Judas really live and write the...