About
Is it possible to reconstruct the parochial communities of a city from the computational analysis of obituaries, wills and the post-mortem donations benefiting their churches? This topic discusses a classical subject of European medieval historiography – the study of Death and the Economy of Salvation – with an up-to-date and innovative methodology, conceived for social and prosopographical analysis in History and Micro-history, the software Timelink, a information system for processing person related information collected from historical sources. The goal of this exploratory project is to test the applicability of this computing tool, which has been in use in the last few decades, processing different types of source. If it proves viable – as the Team believes – the method will be used in future projects, applied across wider areas, nationally and internationally.
Mission
What is the advantage of bringing this subject up again in the present? The study of the medieval European parish is not exhausted and has been considerably conditioned by markedly institutional and fiscal approaches. From an epistemological point of view, the parishioners must be rescued from the shadow of the parish church, and their communities better understood. Secondly, studying post-mortem commemoration strategies from sources before and after the Black Death will allow tackling issues such as the fear of death, social restructuring in a post-pandemic period, and resilience of societies in the face of crisis – a challenge our societies are currently facing. It is essential to examine the communities of the past for the social mechanisms in overcoming crises.
Goals
The ultimate goal of the project is making the databases available to the general public digitally, thus providing an historical perspective to the current economic and health crisis; it will contribute to the selfknowledge of current societies and foster the acceptance of the present moment, reinforcing social skills in the face of adversity.
