A 16thc Segen for the Mass, Pt 2

The Thalbach Segen for the Mass

The first half of this Segen – which I posted about last week – establishes its logic through enclosure, accumulation, and analogy: the devotee commends herself into sacred realities, borrows the authority of the Mass, and maps Christ’s body onto her own as a form of protection. Part 2 intensifies this same logic, shifting from verbal placement to embodied action. What was established through words is now reinforced through gesture, orientation, and repetition, as the sign of the cross is deployed to surround the body, bind danger, and authorize protection in motion. 

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PART TWO OF THE SEGEN, "HErr ich bevilch mich dir in alle die heillige wortt die alle Priieſter ſprech"  ÖNB Cod. 11750, fols. 21r-22v (Part 1 is transcribed and translated here). Division into segments reflects editorial assessments; bold is added to highlight structural repetition. Transcription and translation are CC-BY Cynthia Cyrus.

Beth ein vatter vnser vn̅ ein Aue mar[ia] 

           Pray an Our Father and a Hail Mary.

Das heïllig Gottes Creütz [REDCROSS] Jhesu christi seẏ heutt vor mir. [REDCROSS] Vnsers herrn creutz seẏ heutt hinder mir. Vnſers herrn creutz. [REDCROSS] ſei ob mir Vnſers herrn creutz [REDCROSS] sey heut zuͦ den ſeittenn neben mir. Ach Gott gesegne mich heut vnd Jmer bei dem heilligenn fron [REDCROSS] Creütz dagott die marter an leidt durch mich vund aller Chriſtenhait ·

The holy cross of God [REDCROSS] of Jesus Christ be before me today. [REDCROSS] Our Lord's cross be behind me today. Our Lord's cross [REDCROSS] be above me. Our Lord's cross [REDCROSS] be on my sides next to me today. Oh God, bless me today and forever by the holy [REDCROSS] cross, where God endured the suffering for me and all of Christendom.

Nur můs ich als wol geſegnet ſein als der Kelch unnd der wein den ein ieder Priester muß es das er die mass volbringen kan. [REDCROSS] Nur můs ich als war gesegnet sein, als des gutten hern Tobias ſun, do er in frembden landenn was [REDCROSS] Nur mus ich als war geſegnet sein, als dir heillige drei nagell / die Gott durch hend vnnd füess würden geſchlagen

I must be as well blessed as the chalice and the wine that every priest must have so that he can perform the Mass. I must be as truly blessed as the son of the good Lord Tobias, when he was in foreign lands. I must be as truly blessed as the three holy nails that God was struck with through his hands and feet.

Ich beüilch mich in die krafft vnd in die krafft wortt / da gott mensch inn ward. Ich beüilch mich in die fliessende bach vnd schwayss vnnd bluts, so vnnser lieber herr vergossenn hat. Ich beuil mich heut in die seligkeit ich armer sunder, vnd durch die krafft seines Lebendigen Sons gebe nedeiten tods. / Ich beuilch mich heutt in die seligkeit seines heilligen sacraments Ich fleuch heut vnder den schult vnnd vnder den frid, vnnd vnder dz heillig Creitz [22r] Das ſelber durch mich vnnd alle menſchen zuͦ einem Creutz gemacht hat Jch beuil mich heüt vnd allweg in die heillige Driualtigkeit vnſers herrnn Jeſu chriſti vnd in die heilige Senfftmuettigkeit Barmhertzigteit keuschheitt vnser lieben frawen Maria, vnd in die gemainſame aller heiligen.

I commend myself to the power and the word in which God became man. I commend myself to the flowing stream of sweat and blood that our dear Lord shed. I commend myself today to salvation, I poor sinner, and through the power of his living Son, grant me a blessed death. I commend myself today to the salvation of his holy sacrament. I flee today under the protection and under the peace, and under the holy cross which he himself has made into a cross for me and all people. I commend myself today and always to the Holy Trinity of our Lord Jesus Christ and to the holy gentleness, mercy, and chastity of our dear Lady Mary, and to the communion of all saints.

Dz creutz [REDCROSS] vnſers herrn Jeſu chriſti ſei heut mit mir Das [REDCROSS] Creutz vnsers lieben herrn verbind mir aller meiner feinden ſchwert. Das [REDCROSS] Creutz vnsers herrn eroffne mir alles güts Dz [REDCROSS] Creutz vnsers herrn neme von mir alles vbell vnd alle pein des ewigen tods. Nur [REDCROSS] geſegne mich der heillig ſegenn den gott vber sich ynnd alle menschen hatt gebem da gott ſelbs inn beſchaffenn wz.

The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ be with me today. The cross of our dear Lord bind the sword of all my enemies. The cross of our Lord open to me all good things. The cross of our Lord take from me all evil and all the pain of eternal death. May the holy blessing that God gave over himself and all people, in which God himself was created, bless me.

Ich beuil mich heut in die ſiben wort, die gott selbs ſprach an dem heilligen creütz. Ich beuil mich heut in den heilligen frid vnſers hern gesuchristi, der sei mir heut ein anfang vnd einausgang in allen meinen nötten, wo ich Jn der Welltt hinkör

I commend myself today to the seven words that God himself spoke on the holy cross. I commend myself today to the holy peace of our Lord Jesus Christ, may it be for me today a beginning and an end in all my needs, wherever I go in the world.

Nur gelegne mich heut der lieb herr Sannt Johannes in ſeiner keussigheitt. Nur geſegne mich der gut ſant Benedict vor Zauberei, diſe zwen haben gebet vnſern herrn Jeſum chriſtum, Welcher man oder fraw ſchmertzen hat, dz in ſeinem verdiennſt er geſundt werd. O Schmertz dich zerſtrew gott der Sun. O ſchmertz dich zerstrew gott der Heillig Gayſt. Jn dem Namenn gott des Vatters vnnd des Süns vnnd des heilligen Geists. Amen.

May the dear Lord Saint John bless me today in his chastity. May the good Saint Benedict bless me against sorcery; these two prayed to our Lord Jesus Christ, that whoever, man or woman, has pain, may be healed through his merit. O pain, may God the Son scatter you. O pain, may God the Holy Spirit scatter you. In the name of God the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

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ASSESSMENT

Part 2 opens with formulaic prayer – an Our Father and a Hail Mary – and then immediately shifts register. The prayer stops asking and starts placing. What follows is no longer a petition addressed upward, but a sequence of directional statements that actively organize space around the speaker. Repeated invocations of “Das heilig Gottes Creutz … sey heut vor mir / hinder mir / ob mir / zu den seiten neben mir” (before me, behind me, above me, and to my sides) construct a six-directional enclosure, situating the devotee within a protective field defined by the cross.

This language is not metaphorical. It performs a spatial act. The cross is placed before and behind the body, above it, and on both sides; it creates a perimeter that surrounds rather than adorns. The red crosses marked in the manuscript are not ornamental flourishes, but operative cues. They prompt gesture, orientation, and repetition. They invite the speaker to action -- to trace the cross repeatedly in space, turning the prayer into enacted words that produce protection through kinetic movement.

In this sense, Part 2 takes up and extends the work already begun at the end of the first half of the prayer. There, the speaker mapped herself onto Christ’s body as a way of securing protection; here, that logic is expanded outward. Protection is no longer only anatomical or analogical but locational. The body is not simply aligned with Christ’s wounds or limbs, but physically enclosed within the sign of the cross itself, now rendered as a mobile defensive geometry.

This is characteristic Segen practice. Rather than cultivating inward reassurance, the prayer re-positions the body in sacred space. Safety is achieved not through reflection but through placement – through saying, marking, and standing within a configuration that has been declared protective. Like prayers before the image of Mary, the actions of the praying sister are integral to the prayer itself.

AUTHORIZATION THROUGH ANALOGY AND EQUIVALENCE

The prayer then pivots to a striking rhetorical strategy, signaled by the repeated formula “Nur muß ich als wol gesegnet sein als …” Rather than petitioning for blessing, the speaker asserts a claim to it through a series of carefully chosen comparisons. What follows is not metaphor but equivalence: the devotee aligns herself with persons and objects whose efficacy is already established.

Three such alignments structure this section. First, the speaker claims to be as well blessed as the chalice and the wine required for the priest to complete the Mass. Here, efficacy is functional and liturgical: these objects are blessed not because they are morally exemplary, but because without them the sacramental action cannot occur. Second, she likens herself to Tobias’ son, protected by the Angel Raphael while traveling in foreign lands. This comparison draws on narrative precedent, invoking a scriptural story in which divine protection accompanies movement, risk, and vulnerability. Third, she claims the blessing of the three holy nails of the Crucifixion, instruments rendered powerful through direct contact with Christ’s suffering body.

Taken together, these comparisons establish a logic of borrowed authority. The speaker does not present herself as worthy in her own right, nor does she wait for blessing to be conferred. Instead, she places herself on the same plane as liturgical vessels, biblical travelers, and relic-like instruments – things and figures already known to work. In doing so, the prayer authorizes lay access to protective power by grounding it in recognized sites of efficacy. Blessing here is not requested but claimed, secured through alignment with what has already proven capable of bearing and transmitting divine force.

SALVIC THINGS

The long middle section (Ich beüilch mich…) is a catalog of efficacious media:

• the wort of the Incarnation
• sweat, blood, and flowing fluids
• the sacrament
• peace
• the cross
• the Trinity
• Marian virtues
• the community of saints

This is not redundant piety. It is strategic stacking. Each item is something that:

• has already worked (historically or liturgically)
• can be entered or taken refuge under
• and can be carried by the speaker.

The repeated ich bevilch mich performs self-placement again and again. The speaker repeatedly moves themselves into zones of protection, as though tightening a net. Part one of the prayer set up her spiritual safety; her active remembrance of these holy things thus reinforces that zone.

The cross, of course, has a special status, and the next unit of the Segen re-activates it, showing its kinetic and temporal power through verb choice. It:

• binds enemies’ swords
• opens all good
• removes evil and eternal death

The cross operates metaphorically as weapon, key, and filter. This is apotropaic language in its strongest form: harm is actively restrained, not merely avoided.

COMPLETENESS IN TIME AND IN BINARIES

By invoking the seven last words spoken from the cross, peace as both Anfang and Ausgang (beginning and end), and movement “wherever I go in the world,” the prayer works deliberately to close all remaining gaps. Time is framed from beginning to end, speech is completed in silence, motion is paired with rest, pain with healing, and present vulnerability is extended forward to encompass future death. These paired terms are not incidental but systematic: the Segen seeks to leave no interval, condition, or threshold unguarded. What emerges is a prayer oriented toward completeness rather than intensity, one that aims not at a single moment of relief but at comprehensive coverage across the temporal and existential spectrum.

To this, she adds the saints as targeted intercessors. John, whose chastity aligns with bodily integrity; Benedict, who provides protection against sorcery, mark her world as one of pragmatic sanctity. Saints are invoked for what they do, not who they are. The direct address to pain (O Schmertz…) completes the transition from prayer to command. Pain is not asked to leave. It is told to disperse – twice, under Trinitarian authority.

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THE SEGEN AS PRAYER ACT

Taken together, the second half of this prayer is neither contemplative nor primarily petitionary. It is not oriented toward extended reflection or interior cultivation, but toward use. The prayer functions instead as a ritual technology of protection, assembled from spatial enclosure, authorized comparison, accumulated salvific matter, spoken command, and repeated acts of self-placement. What gives it force is not doctrinal exposition but correct enactment: familiar words spoken in the right order, gestures traced in space, and authoritative figures and objects invoked because they are already known to work.

Read in this way, the prayer aligns closely with recent scholarship that emphasizes the everyday, practice-oriented character of Segen. Ulrike Wagner-Rau, writing in Segen, characterizes blessings as rituals that are “unverbrüchlich angesehen” not because they offer explanation, but because they provide reliable ways of navigating ordinary life through repeated action. Christopher Spehr’s contribution to the same volume likewise underscores the diversity and adaptability of late medieval blessing practices, situating Segen firmly within lived religious routines rather than at the margins of official devotion. To make the point more directly: for our Thalbach sister to be enacting her Segen during and in the presence of the Mass is every bit as standard a sacred and parallel act as is the spoken delivery of requiem masses at a side altar underneath the Fronmass. Simultaneity has its own kind of sacred power.

Although he deals with an earlier 12^th to 14^th century repertoire of such Segen, Derek A. Rivard’s Blessing the World helps clarify what is at stake. His study shows that blessings were shaped by lay needs and aspirations and that their protective focus complemented the Mass’s role in sustaining communal order and integrity. I would argue that the Thalbach Segen operates in precisely this register. Drawing on familiar narratives, liturgical forms, and bodily practices, it translates shared Christian knowledge into ritual action calibrated for vulnerability – illness, danger, movement, and the prospect of death.

What emerges, then, is not an alternative to theology, but a way of living it. This Segen does not seek to explain suffering or risk; it offers a means of addressing them through repeated, embodied practice. Anchored in the Mass yet usable beyond it, the prayer extends ecclesial protection into the rhythms of everyday life. For the Thalbach sisters, and for others who prayed in similar ways, safety was not a matter of abstract belief but of learned habit: something done, enacted, and carried forward through words and gestures that had already proven their worth. At Thalbach, such habits were cultivated collectively – through shared prayerbooks, repeated attendance at the parish Mass, and the parallel rhythms of memoria and devotion – so that protection was not merely personal, but explicitly embedded in the sisters’ communal practice.

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WORKS CITED

Cynthia Cyrus, "Praying Before the Image of Mary: Nuns’ Prayerbooks and the Mapping of Sacred Space" Religions 16, no. 10 (2025): 1277. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16101277, https://www.mdpi.com/3532324

Martin Leuenberger (ed.) Segen. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2015.

See especially Ulrike Wagner-Rau and her discussion of everyday rituals, “Unverbrüchlich angesehen – Der Segen in praktisch-theologischer Perspektive,” 187-210, here p. 194.

In the same volume, Christopher Spehr addresses the diversity of blessings in late medieval practice, and their re-evaluation in the Reformation; “Sengespraxis und Segenstheologie in der Christentumsgeschickte,” 135-164.

Derek A. Rivard, Blessing the World: Ritual and Lay Piety in Medieval Religion (Washington DC: Catholic U of America Press, 2009)

Note: This post presents a working transcription, translation, and preliminary analysis in advance of a planned journal article.

A Sixteenth-Century Segen for the Mass, Pt 1

A “Segen” is a prayer genre that combines words, gestures, and formulas to bring about a positive end such as divine grace, desired happiness, or protection from harm. Commonly translated as “blessing,” it is more than just cheery words or good wishes. It exists as a multi-dimensional “act” that can create good. Each element – words said, gesture properly performed, and multiple iterations – contributes to its successful deployment. A Segen is effficacious through utterance when properly performed. I always think of them as “an active saying”: something that calls on a human agent to take on its power. It is a speech act with material consequences.

PRAYER TYPE

A Segen differs from a Collect, which belongs to the formal liturgy, and from prayers of petition (Gebet, Bitte), which structure ordinary devotional speech. It can be recognized by its formal stability – since the wording matters, variation is limited. It’s also inherently performative speech. It does something when spoken: it protects, heals, averts danger, prepares for death. If you’re traveling? There’s a Segen for that. Childbirth? Likewise. Is it time for a transition, say, to get out of bed, or go to sleep? There is a Segen that will suit your purpose. Danger, uncertainty, the evils of pestilence? The warding function of the Segen makes it a deployable ritual technology for navigating risk, transition, and moments of vulnerability. They fit into the rhythms of the everyday.

Because it is a prayer of “doing,” it is suitable for a variety of contexts, be they lay, domestic, or paraliturgical. Segen often occupy spaces later described as “folk,” since apotropaic functions and familiar protective formulas are common. Warding off evil and thereby doing good in the world: Segen were thought to do useful work. And, the prayer workers, importantly, did not need to be clerical. Lay folk could use them, and so could monastics. In memorial contexts, like the ones I’m working on, a Segen can function as a spoken intervention on behalf of souls, even when no mass is present.

One of the reasons I’m drawn to Segen as a category is that they have a devotional logic that prioritizes outcome over explanation. They show a world in which prayer is not only expressive but operative. In other words: a Segen is not just a blessing, but a technology of care and control, especially potent in contexts of illness, death, and remembrance.

THE SEGEN ITSELF

To take up a specific case, here is “A Protective Segen anchored in the Mass,” as its label tells us, this one a sixteenth century prayer from a Thalbach prayerbook, ÖNB Cod. 11750, fols. 20v-21r.

Line numbers are for ease of reference; bold is to highlight the formulaic elements of the prayer. This is the first half of a two-part prayer.

Ein schoner segenn bei der heilligen Mäß

1. HErr ich bevilch mich dir in alle die

2. heillige wortt die alle Priieſter ſprech

3. enn von dem da du in verwanndlet haſt vorrden

4. brott in fleiſch vnnd in blutt. Herr ich beuilch

5. mich heut vnd allweg in die heillige gottheitt

6. vnd in die heillige menſchhait vnnd in die heil

7. lige Drÿfalltigkeitt vnnd in dem heillige seel

8. deinem leib / Jn dein heillige gegenwertigkeit

9. in deinem heilligenn fronleichnam deinem

10. heilligen fleisch deinem heilligen blutt beuilch

11. ich mich mit flaiſch vnnd blut mit leib vnd ſeel

12. mit zeittlicher eher vnnd allen meinen gelider

13. in deinen heilligenn frid / dz du mich beſchur⸗

14. meſt vnd behuetest vor allem ybel vor waffen

15. vor gefenckhnüs vor gesigung [=Geißigung] vor werffenn

16. Schüessenn vor waſſer vor Zauberey ehren

17. abſchneidenn vor feur / vor allem dem dz du er⸗

18. inneſt in deiner weiſzheit dz mir ſchaden mag

19. an leibvnnd seel an allen zeittlichenn dingen

20. vnd ehren: Behuetest mich herr durch dein

21. grundlose barmhertzigkeit, durch dein manig

22. faltige erbernd Guettiger herr ich bürg mich

23. in die verborgne tugent, als sich die hoche gott,

24. heitt verbarg indte krancke menſchheut vnd

25. als du dich uerbirgeſt in des Pruësters hennd

26. indem ſchein des brotts warer gott vnnd mēſch

27. Herr ich bürg mich heüt vnnd Jmer in deine

28. heillige fünnff wunden / trennck mich mitt

29. deinem roſen farbenn blutt: dein heillige dri-

30. ualltigkeit ſei mir ein ſchüllt vnnd ſchürm,

31. vor allem meinenn feinden / deine heillige

32. hennd seÿenn heütt v̈ber mich/ deine heillige

33. füess seind heut vor mir dein heilliger mund

34. beſcharme mich heütt / fruſch vnnd geſünd

35. vnnd vor allem vnglückh. Amen.

This is a protective, performative Segen that anchors itself in the Mass in order to borrow its power. The Mass is the source of authority, but the Segen is the mechanism by which the devout sister will deploy it. Flesh, blood, body; body, blood, flesh: this is God made man to act as armor. He can protect her without being consumed.

A TRANSLATION

1 Lord I commend myself to you in all the 2 holy words that all priests speak 3 from that moment, when you transformed it, 4 the bread turned into flesh and blood. Lord, I commend 5 myself today and always in the holy Godhead 6 and in the holy humanity and in the holy 7 Trinity and in the holy soul 8 of your body / In your holy presence 9 in your holy body, your 10 holy flesh, your holy blood, I commend 11 myself with flesh and blood, with body and soul, 12 with temporal honor and all my limbs 13 in your holy peace, that you may protect 14 and guard me from all evil, from weapons, 15 from imprisonment, from defeat, from throwing [=missiles] 16 and shooting, from water, from sorcery, from 17 dishonor, from fire, from everything that you 18 know in your wisdom that may harm me 19 in body and soul, in all temporal things 20 and honors: Protect me, Lord, through your 21 boundless mercy, through the many and 22 manifold compassionate goodness, O gracious Lord, I entrust myself 23 to the hidden virtue, as the high God 24 hid himself in frail humanity and 25 as you hide yourself in the priest's hands 26 in the appearance of bread, true God and man. 27 Lord, I entrust myself today and forever to your 28 holy five wounds; refresh me with 29 your rose-colored blood: may your holy 30 Trinity be my shield and protection, 31 from all my enemies; may your holy 32 hands be over me today; may your holy 33 feet be before me today; may your holy mouth 34 protect me today, fresh and healthy, 35 and from all misfortune. Amen.

HOW THE SEGEN WORKS

The Thalbach speaker who reads this prayer starts here with an act of self-enclosure (ll. 1-13): as devotee, she uses the repeated formula “ich bevilch mich” (I commend myself) to place herself inside sacred realities. The words of consecration, the reality of Christ’s body and blood, the Trinity, the holy peace: these are the space of devout devotion that she is actively choosing to inhabit. Moreover, she treats the Eucharistic presence as protective substance, not through communion and consumption, but through observation and modeling. His embodiment (ll. 8-10) is a model for hers (ll. 11-13).

The Segen here has a broad apotropaic scope, from the abstract to the concrete (ll. 13-20). She is to be protected from evil, dishonor and defeat, and more tangibly from weapons, imprisonment, shooting. Water and fire, sorcery, and “everything that you know in your wisdom may harm me”: God’s protective shield is all-encompassing life protection: bodily, social, legal, and moral. A prayer that names Zauberey, magic, is almost never a neutral “Gebet”; it is operating in a world where spoken formulas are understood to counter spoken threats.

The Segen shifts from protection to hiddenness: the hidden virtue (die verborgne tugent), the hiddenness of Christ’s nature as frail human, and the hiding of the eucharistic wonder in the Priest’s hand. She entrusts herself to what is hidden; faith does not need to see to be lived. This is a sacramental theory of invisibility, and to my eye touches on what Maaike de Haardt terms the quotidian aspect of faith:

They [daily behaviors and spatial practices, aka the quotidian] reveal the how of belief, much more than the what of belief, the subject of the ministers of belief. Besides the ethical and political choice implicated in this approach, there is yet another important dimension, which I have called a sense of presence, or aesthetic presence, sacramental presence, or incarnational presence.

De Haardt describes the way in which sensorial abundance -- sensual knowledge of touching, tasting, smelling – become a way of being -- of inhabiting the everyday sacred. For the Thalbach sister, her presence in church, with incense and candles and ritual action observed intently, but not intimately, is sufficient to call to mind the divine.

The Segen ends by mapping Christ’s body to the speaker’s body. Hands above, feet before, mouth protecting, wounds enclosing. We have here somatic ritual geometry. The body is reoriented inside of Christ’s body, not so much improved as guarded. Through the Segen, she achieves safety.

SEGEN AS RITUAL OF PROTECTION

In articulating the segments of the prayer, the devotee generates her own ritual of protection from all ills, based on and parallel to that of the formal Mass on which it depends. By invoking the correct wording, by using the Segen in the correct ritual space (at Mass, in the presence of the host), and by invoking the correct theological anchors, she creates a sort of spiritual insurance policy that will protect her, body and soul. This shows that a Segen is not marginal or “folk-like” in opposition to theology. Rather, it is orthodox theology operationalized for protection and survival.

The first half of the Segen, then, carries the devotee on a multi-staged spiritual journey, where her act of commending herself results through transformation to her being mapped to Christ’s body, secure in the warded protection of Christ’s love:

Commend self >> Eucharist >> Protection >> Hiddenness >> Mapped to Christ’s body

As we will see in a future post, part 2 of this Segen provides a layered ritual deployment of these same themes -- protection, enclosure, and authorization remain central, but in part 2, the physicality of the prayer is reinforced through keyed moments of signing the cross.

WORK CITED:

Maaike de Haardt, “Incarnational presence: Sacramentality of everyday life and the body or: unsystematic skeptical musings on the use of a central metaphor,” in Envisioning the Cosmic Body of Christ, edited by Aurica Jax and Saskia Wendel (Routledge, 2019): 114-125.

Note: This post presents a working transcription, translation, and preliminary analysis in advance of a planned journal article.

Smells and bells? Just bells!

So, I’m working through my memoria documents – charitable endowments for commemorative services – for a paper I’m writing. These are two sets of Charters from Bregenz, one cluster from the early 15^th century, and another from a century later, right at the start of the 16^th century.

I’ll save the big observations for the paper itself, but thought it interesting that the documents are very clear, abundantly clear, about many things. The donor wants this service and that one, done in this order, with this personel. That’s the what and the who. They want their services done in this place and that one, by these personnel. That’s the where and the who. (“Who” matters twice because payment depends on it).

In these documents, we also know the why and the how.The why has been well-studied; memoria are services of remembrance for the donor and his ancestors and descendents. The prayers given at the service help all these people toward salvation, and so engage with a different “who” than the question of who performs. The people being prayed for are often named family, and include marital family as well as natal. Sometimes, they include aunts and uncles, cousins (particularly those in orders), and even second spouses. They include the dead and the living, a point which has always struck me as a bit odd. What does it mean to be praying in remembrance of someone who might themselves be standing at graveside?

And the how is clear. With crosses and processions. At graveside. With singing and speaking and reading. With standing and sitting and bowing heads, and all the other choreography of ritual. Or, as Ursula Speckerin (1405) puts it in her own Alemannic dialect,

with worship and beginning with proclamation, with singing and with reading, with standing and with prayers, and with all other things in the way previously prescribed. [mit libtind (?) und begiengingt mit verkundung mit singet und mit lesent mit stende und mit genbent und mit allen andren dingen in der wiscz als vorgesteben stat.]

To this, we add the gifts to the sacristan for the provisions for service. There’s bread, and more specifically bread for the poor. There’s wine for the service. There are lights – candles – not just for the vigil, but for both masses as well. And there are bells, bells for the vigil, bells to be rung at mass, bells to announce the service.

All these things are mentioned, for all these things have costs.

And so we can run through the multisensory modalities of these memoria services:

• Sight: procession, cross, lights, people

• Sound: singing, reading, reciting, saying, bells

• Taste: bread, wine, “Tisch” or food at table (improved over their normal fare, in Ursula’s provisions)

• Feel: bowing, standing, sitting: all the embodied shifts of orientation of an active quasi-choreographed worship

• Smell: ???

The documents I’ve looked at, I realized, are completely tacet on the sense of smell. No mentions of incense or flowers or herbs or smoke or any other proxy for smell. The closest we get is the bread and the wine, placed on the altar and distributed to the poor, but the memoria endowments, for all their sometimes surprising specificity, don’t think to cover the sense of smell. And yet smell is typically a key part of liturgy. Its absence is striking.

I’m not entirely sure what to make of that. One plausible answer is because your incense for the censor is budgetted separately, and that in paying the sacristan you have already covered “the goods” necessary for the service.

But it is an interesting omission, and speaks to the question of what goes without saying and what must be specified when you’re seeking control of events-of-remembrance for after your demise.

Smell, it seems, was so woven into the fabric of ritual life that it didn’t need to be written down.

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RESOURCES:

Bregenz, Stadtarchiv Urk. 19. (Ursula Speckerin, 1405). Consulted via monasterium.net. (A list of other relevant charters is available from the author.)

For more on movement during prayer, see:

Cyrus, Cynthia J. 2025. "Praying Before the Image of Mary: Nuns’ Prayerbooks and the Mapping of Sacred Space" Religions 16, no. 10: 1277. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16101277

Two standard works on memoria are:

Geuenich, Dieter, and Otto Gerhard Oexle. 1994. Memoria in der Gesellschaft des Mittelalters. Veröffentlichungen des Max-Planck-Instituts für Geschichte, Bd. 111. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.

Geary, Patrick J. 1994. Phantoms of Remembrance: Memory and Oblivion at the end of the first Millennium. Princeton: Princeton UP.