Liturgists and Dance in the Twelfth Century: The Witness of John Beleth and Sicard of Cremona 1 CONSTANT J. MEWS D ANCING is not often associated with Christian liturgy, at least in modern experience. Yet according to the Mitralis de Officio of Sicard, bishop of Cremona (1185–1215), composed about 1200, the circular dance (chorea) provides a key metaphor for understanding the liturgy of Easter. 2 Sicard here draws together two earlier discussions of the subject, both from the twelfth century and of enormously wide influence, manifesting a more positive attitude toward dance than found in many early medieval commentators on the liturgy: the Gemma animae (Jewel of the soul) of Honorius Augustodunensis, composed for a monastic audience in the early twelfth century, probably in Germany, and the De ecclesiasticis officiis of John Beleth, a secular cleric writing probably in Paris circa 1150–1160. 3 While many scholars have observed the renewal of interest in the pagan authors within a literary context in the twelfth century, the witness of liturgical commentaries from the period has been little noticed. Sicard implies that the festivities of the pagan Saturnalia and its associated freedom 1 I am indebted to Dawn McGann for originally awakening my interest in liturgical dance, and am grateful to Donnalee Dox, Bruce Holsinger, and many others for discussing issues and translations in this paper. Constant J. Mews is professor of history and director of the Centre for Studies in Religion and Theology at Monash University, Australia. 2 Sicard of Cremona, Mitralis de Officiis 6.15, ed. Gabor Sarbak and Lorenz Weinrich, Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediaeualis (CCCM) 228 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2008), 545– 546; PL 213: 351D– 352B. Augustine Thompson draws extensively on the testimony of Sicard, including his comments about Easter, in Cities of God: The Religion of the Italian Communes, 1125– 1325 (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2005), 335. Lorenz Weinrich suggests that the Mitralis, not widely circulated outside northern Italy, was written over several years, between 1191 and 1205: “Die Handschriften des ‘Mitralis de officiis’ des Sicard von Cremona,” in Franz J. Felten and Nikolas Jaspert, eds., Vita Religiosa im Mittelalter: Festschrift fu ¨r Kaspar Elm zum 70. Geburtstag (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1999), 865– 876. 3 Honorius Augustodunensis, Gemma animae, PL 172: 541D–738B; Valerie I. J. Flint lists more than fifty surviving manuscripts in Honorius Augustodunensis, Authors of the Middle Ages (Aldershot, U.K.: Ashgate, 1995), 164. John Beleth, Summa de ecclesiasticis officiis, ed. Heribert Douteil, CCCM 41– 41A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1976); Douteil describes over one hundred and eighty surviving manuscripts, CCCM 41: 75*– 271*, assigning most of the ones he uses to the thirteenth century (CCCM 41: 13*). 512 Church History 78:3 (September 2009), 512–548. # 2009, American Society of Church History doi:10.1017/S0009640709990412 Printed in the USA