Understanding Prognostic Texts: On prognostic texts and their intellectual contexts in eighth and ninth century Carolingian manuscripts

Abstract

This thesis concerns itself with how we can approach prognostic texts from the Early Middle Ages, within their historical and intellectual contexts. It explains how the scholarship into the subject evolved, from when it was first discussed in a work published in 1864-1866, until the most recent larger publication in 2013, and how it created a modern genre that mostly consists of Anglo-Saxon texts that are referred to as pagan, superstitio and magic. This thesis argues that this is a limiting approach towards prognostic texts and offers some alternative methods of approach instead. It demonstrates both these points by analysing authoritative texts from late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages that discuss subjects adjacent to prognostic texts, paganism and superstitio and by looking at three texts on the Egyptian Days, which was the most widely distributed prognostic text at the time, in eighth and ninth century Carolingian manuscripts.