History in words and images

History in Words and Images

Proceedings of the Conference

on Historical Representation

held at the University of Turku,

Finland, 26–28 September 2002

Department of History, University of Turku

Turku 2005

© authors

ISBN 951-29-2874-4

CONTENTS

Hannu Salmi: Preface 5

Postmodern Medievalism 7

Anu Lahtinen (University of Turku, Finland): Past Events and Historical Backgrounds: Persuasive

Narratives in Swedish 16th Century Family Archives 9

Mikko Kallionsivu (University of Tampere, Finland): “Flesh, that stinking dunghill”.

The Pre-Cartesian Collision of Body and Soul in Late Medieval Moralities 16

Pekka Tolonen (University of Turku, Finland): Notions of True and False Identities in the High

Middle Ages 28

Interpreting Texts 35

Slavica Srbinovska (University of Skopje, Macedonia): Making the Identity through Memory of

the Images and Words 37

Jutta Ahlbeck-Rehn (Åbo Akademi University, Finland): Writing Madness: Constructing Gender

and Power in Medical Texts 53

Olli-Pekka Moisio (University of Jyväskylä, Finland): How Should We Understand Creativity in History 63

Jussi Parikka (University of Turku, Finland): Saving the Material: Towards Rhizomatic Reading of Texts 73

Myths and Stereotypes 81

Mikko Winberg (University of Turku, Finland): Historical Movies as Mythic Historiography William

Shakespeare’s Filmic Richard III (1995) as an Exemplum or as an Archetype of Evil 83

Eileen Slarke (University of New South Wales, Australia): Dante in Australian Cultural History

A cultural history with images from the land down under 94

Marja Vuorinen (University of Helsinki, Finland): Inventing an Enemy: Bloodsucking Noblemen

in Finnish Fiction 109

Antti Jaakkola (University of Turku, Finland): History and the Representations of Young Drug Users

in Finland during the 1960s 122

Towards Visual History 129

Brian D. Crawford (University of California, Irvine, USA): Limits and Strategies in Contemporary

Holocaust Photography 131

Hanna Järvinen (University of Helsinki, Finland): Performance and Historiography –The Problem of

History in Dance Studies 139

Deborah Schultz (University of Sussex, Great Britain): The Possibilities of Pictorial Narrative:

Word – Image – History in the Work of Arnold Daghani 149

Chris Vos (Erasmus University, Rotterdam, The Netherlands): The Past in Iconic Clichés.

The case of “the girl between the doors of a cattle-wagon to Auschwitz” 157

Audiovisuality and Popular Culture 171

Kimmo Ahonen (University of Turku, Finland): Red Planet Mars (1952) as a Cinematic

Manifestation of the Anticommunist Crusade 173

Kimi Kärki (University of Turku, Finland): “Daddy’s Flown Across the Ocean, Leaving Just a

Memory” – Pink Floyd’s The Wall as an Audiovisual (Re)Presentation of the Past 184

Cecilia Trenter (University of Växjö, Sweden): Seduced by History – Using the Past in Pornography 195

Focusing on Historical Film and Documentary 209

Leen Engelen (University of Leuven, Belgium): History on Film? What Belgian fiction films

(1918–1924) tell us about the Great War and its aftermath 211

Petteri Halin (European University Institute, Florence, Italy): Columbus in Columbian Quincentennial 221

David Ludvigsson (University of Uppsala, Sweden): The Historian-Filmmaker’s Dilemma 231

Re/Forming Historical Consciousness in the Age of Spectacle 243

Mario DiPaolantonio & Roger I. Simon (University of Toronto, Canada): Re-Staging Public

Memory in the Space of the Spectacle: The Project of an Historiographic Poetics 245

Lisa Farley (University of Toronto, Canada): The Problem of Historical Judgement:

On the Possibilities of Collective Study as a Structure of Responsibility 255

Irena Kohn (University of Toronto, Canada): Beyond Self-Evidence: Engaging With Photographic

Traces of the Shoah Outside a Logic of Simulation 269

Landscapes, Historic Sites and the Places of Memory 285

Isto Vatanen (University of Turku, Finland): Images and Narratives of Ancient Seafaring and

Maritime Landscape 287

Liisa Lindgren (Central Art Archives, Finland): The Spectacle of Grief – The Culture of Death

and Funerary Art in late 19th and Early 20th Century Finland 293

Sheila Hones (University of Tokyo, Japan): Place/Setting: Geographies of Narrative History 300

Marshall Johnson (University of Wisconsin, Superior, USA): Futures of the Past: Representations

of Historic Sites and the Manufacturing of Chinese Nationality in Taiwan 308

5

1

Earlier conference proceedings have been published by the Finnish Literature Society. See

Historical Perspectives on Memory. Edited by Anne Ollila. Helsinki: Finnish Historical

Society , 199 9; History and Change. Edited by A nu La htinen and K irsi Va inio -

Korhonen.Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society, 2004.

Preface

W

hat is the relation of historical representation to words and images? How

is history present in artifacts, media or texts? What is involved in the

presentation of the past through textual – or, say, audiovisual – means?

Can the past be approached performatively as well as narratively? These were the

questions we wanted to put forward in the conference History in Words and Images,

organized at the University of Turku, Finland, September 26–28, 2002. Because we

can claim that the past is present to us in textual form, as a text, the question of the

relation of words and images pertains to more than narration or performance. The

past is often also thought of visually. This visuality may be metaphorical, in which

case the textual level refers to visual sensations, the gaze – or images may be har￾nessed as vehicles for historical narration. A question in its own right is the way the

past – at least in our present history-culture – is present not only in words but also in

images whose meaning is constantly reinterpreted. Another interesting question is the

way in which the past as a whole can take on visual metaphors: in addition to the

“great book of history” we speak of the past as a fresco, a panorama, a picture book,

a cavalcade... The aim of the History in Words and Images conference was to

investigate these themes across a broad spectrum and with an open mind.

Since 1997, the Department of History and the Department of Contemporary

History at the University of Turku have organized conferences on the theory and

methodology of history. These conferences have dealt with the themes of memory,

time, space and change and have aimed at drawing together methodological debates.1

The 2002 conference History in Words and Images focused on the debate over

6

historical representation in recent decades. As historians have investigated the

problems involved with the narrativization of the past, questions concerning non￾literary means of representation in the production of historical knowledge and

conceptions of the past have also come increasingly to the fore.

The first day of the conference was dedicated to “the past as text”, to the past

as a text to be read, the second to “images of history”, to the past as a site or specta￾cle to be viewed, and the third to historical consciousness, to the question of how

conceptions of the past ultimately form on the basis of cultural products and cultural

practices not involved directly in historical representation.

The conference programme included lectures by such distinguished scholars as

Professor Peter Aronsson (University of Linköping), Professor Stephen Bann (Uni￾versity of Bristol), Professor Harry Harootunian (New York University), Professor

Maunu Häyrynen (University of Turku), Dr Ilona Reiners (University of Helsinki),

and Professor Gabrielle M. Spiegel (Johns Hopkins University). In addition to this,

the conference included a session programme, consisting of 17 thematic sessions

with 65 speakers from 14 countries.

Already during the conference it became evident that its wide spectrum of ideas

and its rich scholarly output should be documented and made accessible also to those

who could not participate in the discussions. It has, however, taken a long time to

gather all the papers and to complete this publishing project. But here they finally

are: 29 perspectives on history, on its textual as well as visual appearances.

I want to express my gratitude to the guests and participants of the conference

for sharing their time and ideas. I would also like to thank our conference secretary

Hanna Brandt and all the members of the organizing committee, Meri Heinonen,

Terhi Kivistö, Ilari Lindroos, Sami Louekari, Kalle Pihlainen, and Anna Sivula for

their commitment and enthusiasm.

Hannu Salmi

University of Turku

[email protected]

Postmodern medievalism

9

Anu Lahtinen

University of Turku, Finland

Past Events and Historical Backgrounds:

Persuasive Narratives in Swedish 16th Century

Family Archives

M

y article addresses past events in persuasive narratives in three different

types of Swedish 16th century documents: landed property, a genealogy

and a chronicle. All examples are taken from the archives of the noble

aristocratic Fleming family.

These documents were written with the specific purpose of persuading the

reader that the members of this family were the legitimate heirs of a powerful,

honourable and righteous tradition. In doing so the narratives provide us with repre￾sentations of social status, hierarchy and gender, and insights into actions deemed

either honourable or dishonourable for noblemen and noblewomen. Paradoxically,

the logic of the narratives becomes even more apparent when a number of contradic￾tory sources are compared.

With these examples, I hope to illustrate the value in studying the shared values

and implications of narratives, as opposed to analysing the "reliability" of "facts"

presented in documents.

Records of Landed Property

A number of members of the Fleming family gained very influential positions in

Swedish society at the beginning of the 16th century. The aristocratic brothers and

knights, Erik and Ivar Fleming, for example, were among the most powerful repre￾sentatives of Swedish nobility. This is illustrated by records of landed property,

which not only give information about the location and value of their numerous

10

estates; but also provide the reader with records concerning previous ownership and

disputes.

The records reveal disputes between the Fleming brothers and their less

wealthy female relatives, and there are several descriptions of how these women lost

property to Ivar and Erik. Property transactions were partly motivated by statements

purporting that the women had let themselves be seduced by common men, or that

they had married against the will of their relatives. These alleged acts of licentious￾ness were presented as severe enough to ensure the confiscation of their landed

property, despite the fact that this was not entirely legal.

Contemporary complaints and appeals against Erik and Ivar Fleming provide a

dramatic contrast to the above descriptions. In these complaints, the brothers are

portrayed as exploiting the property rights of peasants, monasteries and lesser

nobility. Female relatives appear as helpless maidens who were forcibly married off

to common men. The clear villain of the story is Erik Fleming, who acts as a sup￾posed guardian for his female relatives, whilst in fact forcibly marrying them off to

his common servants, "such as scribes, shoemakers and other workers". After mar￾riage, these women are no longer regarded as noble and are forced to sell their estates

to Erik Fleming.

Although contradictory, both accounts comment on the honour and the respon￾sibilities of high nobility. They also weigh the righteousness of the present situation

according to the past honourable conduct of the parties involved.

The records of the Fleming brothers record that rebellious women of easy

virtue deserved to lose their landed property, even though this was not completely

legal. Being virtuous and good knights, however, they would subsequently help these

troublesome women by giving, for example, gifts of cloth. In the records, therefore,

they are portrayed as good and honest noblemen trying to maintain the social order

and to rescue the property of the landed nobility from the seducers of dissolute

women.

In the complaints, on the other hand, the central theme is the way in which the

brothers are misusing their power. "Master Erik has been too hard on those he ought

to have been a guardian to", writes a lesser nobleman, thus emphasising that influen￾tial personages were expected to have mercy on those less influential and less

fortunate than themselves. The Fleming brothers are described as scurrilous individu￾als utilising their legal knowledge to give priority to their own economic interests, at

the expense of protecting their protégées and the meek. It is emphasised that the

11

noble women are degraded by their marriages to “farm-hands", thus losing their

birth-right to a certain position in society.

I find these elements of narrative more rewarding than the hopeless task of

attempting to retrace the "true" course of action. The same is also true concerning

family trees and books of genealogy, written and drawn for the Swedish nobility.

Genealogy

In the 16th century, genealogical trees of the Swedish nobility tended to present

European kings as forefathers. Later, in the 17th and 18th centuries, the Fleming

family were described as heirs to the Flaminius family of Ancient Rome, thereby

inheriting the influence and virtue of the classical period.

Claiming influential forefathers is one method whereby a family can justify and

highlight their lofty position. In the 1570s, an especially illustrative book of geneal￾ogy was written for the wedding of Klaus Hermansson Fleming and his genteel

spouse, Elin Henriksdotter Horn.

The book begins by presenting the most notable aristocratic family of the

eastern part of the Kingdom of Sweden, the leader of whom is Klaus Eriksson

Fleming. The following pages list the forefathers and mothers of Klaus Hermansson

Fleming and his wife, indicating their connection to most local aristocratic families.

Thus, the book signals the wealth and power of the bride and the groom in the

Kingdom by placing them immediately after the elder branch of the Fleming family.

Klaus Hermansson Fleming was not at all on good terms with the head of the

older branch of the family. It is not surprising therefore, that his genealogy made it

clear that the elder branch of the family was dying out and that Klaus Hermansson

Fleming was the inheritor of the wealth and influence of the clan. After the passing

away of the last sons of the elder branch of the family, it would be his branch of the

family that would take its rightful place at the top of the Finnish nobility.

Chronicle

The younger branch of the Fleming family proved to be more fortunate, surviving the

political conflicts and civil war in Sweden at the end of the 16th century. In these

12

conflicts, Klaus Hermansson Fleming and Klaus Eriksson Fleming supported oppo￾site pretenders to the throne. The older branch lost its position and its last male

representatives were executed.

Though a supporter of the winner - Duke Charles, later CharlesIX of Sweden -

Klaus Hermansson Fleming fell under suspicion of treason and had to flee to Ger￾many for two years. During his exile, he wrote two short chronicles exonerating his

conduct, whereby he admitted that although some of his actions might have seemed

treacherous, he had actually been most honourable and courageous.

These chronicles describe the political events of the kingdom and personal

experiences of the writer, and have been subject to debate in terms of their reliability

regarding dates, names etc. Here again, however, one can discern other interesting

elements, such as the description of the conflict between the two family branches.

According to Klaus Hermansson Fleming, it was the wrath, envy and thirst for

power nourished by his namesake and cousin, Klaus Eriksson Fleming, which was at

the root of both the 16th century civil war in Finland and the personal misfortunes of

the Finnish nobility. This wrath was especially directed towards the younger branch

of the family and can be traced to Klaus Fleming the Elder, who once lost an impor￾tant post to his namesake’s father. He is merciless in his thirst for revenge, not

allowing Klaus Hermansson Fleming to take part in decision-making and spreading

rumours about his treachery. It was this resentful relative who had ruined the reputa￾tion of Klaus Hermansson Fleming and prevented him from displaying his loyalty.

The rhetoric of the first chronicle is especially interesting, as it can be seen that

classical studies had played an important part in the education of Klaus Hermansson

Fleming. The chronicle begins by quoting Cicero's thoughts on truth, and parallels

between the author and the fate of Cicero and other ancient authors, are alluded to.

The rhetoric is much more polished than in other contemporary political publica￾tions, especially in its explicit demand for and idealization of a rational and unbiased

approach of investigation.

The text is based on juxtapositions. Klaus Hermansson Fleming is frank, honest

and honourable and bravely appeals for a righteous judgement to reflect his clear

conscience. He is defending old virtues against the dishonourable habits of the

present. Klaus Eriksson Fleming and his allies, on the other hand, thirst for power

and revenge. They are cunning and sly, choose their own short-time benefit before

the common good, plot secretly against their enemies and are happy to ruin the lives

of the innocent (read: that of Klaus Hermansson Fleming and his family).

13

In the chronicles of Klaus Hermansson Fleming, the source of unhappy events

lies in the irrational and excessive wrath of the elder relative, borne out of personal

failure in the past. These unhappy series of events are compared to those experienced

by Cicero in the civil war of Ancient Rome. Thus, while recording his family and

contemporary history, Klaus Hermansson Fleming is searching for precedents among

virtuous people of antiquity.

The chronicle form also serves as a rational and "impartial" context for defend￾ing oneself. The latter chronicle succinctly vindicates the writer in a style mixed with

historical "facts" beginning from the invention of gunpowder and claims to be a

"record of events to be remembered". While interweaving "historical facts" of

common interest with statements vindicating the writer, it aims to persuade the

reader that the statements concerning Klaus Hermansson Fleming are likewise,

reliable and rational accounts of past events.

Ebba Stenbock

According to the chronicle of Klaus Hermansson Fleming, the feud between family

branches is sustained by the widow of Klaus Eriksson Fleming, Ebba Gustavsdotter

Stenbock. After the death of her husband, she briefly took part in the defence of

Turku Castle against Duke Charles.

Contemporary documents describe the mixed feelings aroused by this widow,

among both her supporters and her enemies. Klaus Hermansson Fleming describes

her as a passionate woman without wisdom:

[--] viduam Flemingi prohibuisse nos intromitti: non esset enim permissura

mariti auctoritatem una cum ipso extingui, sed velle consilijs et administrandis

rebus interesse et praesse. [--] Impetum in foemina hac et animum nullus forte

desideret, non nemo judicium. dum id agit ut necogia promoveat, afveat (?),

affligit. quia accensa studia destituit sapientia. Et quis tam ignaus qui muliebri

imperio subesse sustinuisset, novo exemplo et apud nos inaudito.

His widow would not let us come to Turku Castle. She did not want the

authority of her late husband to vanish along with his death; she wanted to take

part in the negotiations, even to be the leader of the political plans and meet-