PIMSPontifical Institute
of
Mediaeval Studies

The fourteenth-century Old French mystical work The Mirror of Simple Souls was condemned as heretical in Paris in 1310, and its author, Marguerite Porete, was burned at the stake for composing it. The Mirror, however, survived extermination and circulated in numerous languages as an anonymous work throughout the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. While its vernacular versions were received positively by a number of orthodox religious groups, its Latin tradition continued to encounter opposition and condemnation. This seminar will examine the Latin manuscripts which most clearly demonstrate this negative reception, and discuss how new manuscript evidence has the potential to change how scholars view the Mirror both in its later history and in the earliest years of its circulation.