Hildegard of Bingen

In Our Time

BBC

History

4.6 • 9.2K Ratings

🗓️ 26 June 2014

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss one of the most remarkable figures of the Middle Ages, Hildegard of Bingen. The abbess of a Benedictine convent, Hildegard experienced a series of mystical visions which she documented in her writings. She was an influential person in the religious world and much of her extensive correspondence with popes, monarchs and other important figures survives. Hildegard was also celebrated for her wide-ranging scholarship, which as well as theology covered the natural world, science and medicine. Officially recognised as a saint by the Catholic Church in 2012, Hildegard is also one of the earliest known composers. Since their rediscovery in recent decades her compositions have been widely recorded and performed.

With:

Miri Rubin Professor of Medieval and Early Modern History and Head of the School of History at Queen Mary, University of London

William Flynn Lecturer in Medieval Latin at the Institute for Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds

Almut Suerbaum Professor of Medieval German and Fellow of Somerville College, Oxford.

Producer: Thomas Morris.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know.
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0:47.0	Hello if you'd walked into the Abbey of the Monastery chair in Germany
0:51.2	850 years ago it's quite possible that this is what you would have heard. That is a
1:19.0	Oe Carrey, a piece of sacred music by the 12th century composer Hildegard of Bingen. Little known until 30 years ago, the music of Hildegard is now regarded as among the best of the Middle Ages
1:24.6	but remarkably her music is only a small aspect of her overall achievement.
1:29.6	Hildegard was a 12th century none and a scholar of impressive breadth, sometimes known as the
1:34.4	Sybil of the Rhine. She wrote a series of works documenting prophetic visions she had experienced.
1:39.6	She was an accomplished theologian who also wrote about science, medicine and the natural world.
1:45.0	Held in high regard by royalty and religious figures alike, she's long been revered as a saint,
1:49.4	although it was not until 2012 that she was officially colonized by Pope Benedict. We'd mean to discuss
1:55.8	Hildegard and being R. Mary Rubin, professor of medieval and early modern history at Queen
2:01.0	Mary, University of London, William Flynn, lecturer in medieval Latin at
2:06.1	the University of Leeds, and Albert Suuban Professor of Medieval German at the University of
2:11.5	Oxford. Many Ruben Hildegard was born around 1098 in the Rhineland in what we now call
	...

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