Attuning Rough Voices to the Hymns of God. : John Mauropous, His People, His Audience

With the noteworthy exception of Michael Psellos’ poetical corpus, the literary works of the other two major Byzantine poets of eleventh century, John Mauropous and Christophoros Mitylenaios, are traditionally categorized into two different macrogenres: ‘saecular’ and ‘ecclesiastical’ poetry. Regarding the first, BERNARD 2014 has enhanced our knowledge of its contexts of production and fruition, without an extensive reflection about the numerous religious poems of both authors. Nevertheless, this demarcation stands on a dichotomy deeply rooted in Byzantine Studies, which should be reconsidered to reach a wider understanding of the historical relevance of Byzantine authors in the light of their production as a whole. John Mauropous’ corpus is a prime example of the complex interaction between author, styles, and audience. On the one hand, he recollected his own works written in a high literary style (dodecasyllabic poems, epistles, orations) into a single manuscript (MS Vat. gr. 676, see BIANCONI 2011) for a learned audience. On the other hand, as Michael Psellos testimonies (Panegyric Oration 17, 493-527 Dennis), Mauropous strived to enable common people to properly glorify God through hymns. Thus, people would get accostomed both to liturgical rhytmical modes and to the content of canons. This pedagogical and religious task perfectly suits his episcopal activity, and the large number of canons ascribed to Mauropous demonstrates that they played a major role in his literary production. Although his canons were composed for public performance, Mauropous did not renounce to the same theological density which can be found in his religious epigrams in learned metre, above all in the ekphrastic poems on Great Feasts. In these poems, he raises the literary style and organizes the contents according to the ekphrastic topoi. However, these dodecasyllables display lexicon and images directly inspired to the corresponding canons used in the liturgy of each festivity. In fact, Mauropous was obviously acquainted with the traditional Greek liturgy because of his religious activity, but the importance of canons in his production is neither casual nor restricted to intertextual references. Mauropous’ efforts towards ‘saecular’ and ‘ecclesiastical’ poetry are manifestly equivalent: their contents are similar; their style and lexicon are based on the same sources; the amount of writings in each genre is analogous. As FOLLIERI 1964 explains, Mauropous’ canons had been scattered throughout textual tradition and yet they are gathered in recognizable compact groups. This datum could reveal an original authorial organization of Mauropous’ canons: in contrast to what happened to his learned literary works, this project didn’t result in a manuscript, but it may have left traces in manuscripts. In any case, John Mauropous was indeed aware of the difference between ‘learned’ and ‘ecclesiastical’ styles, but he didn’t favor one to the detriment of the other. His poetical corpus is the most interesting case study in eleventh-century Byzantine poetry and its comprehensive analysis provides access to Mauropous’ literary workshop as well as a methodological ratio applicable to other contemporary corpora.