3a, Consult, however, A. M. Koniger, in Schiele and Zschar- nack's Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart, vol. V, 1913, col. 924: "In the absolute sense in which it has been until recently thought to be such, Francis of Assisi does not begin the long list. It is, on the contrary, possible to show that at the least the idea of imitating the stigmata, as a consequence of longing after the sufferings of the Lord, was active for the period of the opening thirteenth century when not only was reverence for the sufferings of Christ fostered by the crusades, but more still self-mortifications of all sorts were set on foot by the growing call to repentance and
262 NOTES TO LECTURE III
amendment. Consult the self-mutilations of the Belgian Beguine Marie of Oignies (f 12 13), of the religious fanatic condemned by the Oxford Synod of 1222, further of the Marquis Robert of Mont- ferrand, about 1226, of the Dutch hermit Dodon von Hasha
(ti23i)."
Francis was not only the first of the stigmatics in both time and importance, but presented the stigmata in a form which has re- mained peculiar to himself. The contemporary accounts agree in describing the marks on his hands and feet as blackish, fleshy ex- crescences, recalling in form and color the nails with which the hands and feet of Jesus were pierced. Only the mark in the side was a wound, whence at times exuded a little blood. No bloody exudation took place except at the side. (Cf. Paul Sabatier, Life of Francis of Assisi, E. T., 1894, p. 296, note, and p. 435). Fran- cis's somatization consisted, then, not of five bleeding wounds but of the imitation of the four nails and the spear thrust in the side. The description given of them by Brother Elias (Sabatier, p. 436) in his letters as Vicar of the Order to the brothers, sent out after Francis's death, describes them as follows: "For (or Not) a long time before his death our Brother and Father appeared as crucified, having in his body five wounds, which are truly the stig- mata of Christ, for his hands and his feet bore marks as of nails without and within, forming a sort of scars; while at the side he was as if pierced with a lance, and often a little blood oozed from it." Joseph von Gorres, Die christliche Mystik, ed. of 1836, vol. II, p. 422, puts together a very detailed description of the wounds on the hands and the feet: "The wounds of notable extent opened in the centre of the extremities. In the middle of them had grown out of the flesh and cellular tissue nails like iron; black, hard, fixed, with heads above, below pointed and as if clinched, so that a finger could be inserted between them and the skin. They were movable from side to side, and if drawn out to one side, were cor- respondingly drawn in on the other but could not be extracted; as St. Clara discovered when she tried to extract them after his death, and could not do it. The fingers remained, moreover, flexible as before, and the hands performed their service; neither did the feet fail, although walking had become more difficult to him, and he therefore rode thereafter in his journeying through the neighborhood." A. Tholuck, Vermischte Schriften, 1839, I, pp. 105 f., points out the defects in the testimony: "In the case of all other saints the legend speaks only of wound scars, and the por- traits of Francis present him only with the scars; the old reporters nevertheless describe them in a peculiar way as if there had grown
ROMAN CATHOLIC MIRACLES 263
nails of flesh, with the color of fresh iron and with clinched points. Nevertheless perfect clearness is lacking in the reports. The report of the ires socii says: nails of flesh were seen et ferri quoque nigre- dinem. Celano says: Non clavorum quidem punduras, sed ipsos clavos in eis impositos, ex ferri recenti nigredine; the last words yield no sense, and the editors conjecture: ex ferri recentis nigredinem. The matter is spoken of still less clearly in a letter of Francis's im- mediate successor in the generalship of the Minorites (in Wadding, ad annum 1226, no. 45). Here we read: Nam manus ejus et pedes, quasi punduras davorum habuerunt ex utraque parte confixas, reser- vantes cicatrices, et clavorum nigredinem ostendentes. According to this also nails were present." For recent discussions see the works mentioned at the close of the article on the "Stigmatics" in Schiele and Zscharnack, as cited, pp. 433-443.
33. Gorres, as cited, pp. 426-428: cf. Margaret Roberts, Saint Catherine of Sienna and Her Times2, 1907, p. 103: "Catherine spent long hours in the Church of St. Cristina, and it was there that to her inner consciousness she received the stigmata, invisible to human eyes, but to her awfully real." On her bloody sweat and weeping with bloody tears, see Augusta T. Drane, The History of St. Catherine of Siena3, 1899, vol. I, p. 52.