This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages) This article is written like a review. Please help improve this article by rewriting it in encyclopedic style. (February 2010) This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (July 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this message) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Historia Calamitatum (known in English as The Story of My Misfortunes or The History of My Calamities), also known as Abaelardi ad Amicum Suum Consolatoria, is an autobiographical work in Latin by Peter Abelard (1079–1142), a medieval French pioneer of scholastic philosophy. The work, written in 1132 or soon after, is one of the first autobiographical works in medieval Western Europe, written in the form of a letter (and, as such, is clearly influenced by Augustine's Confessions).[1]

The letter is an extensive and honest self-analysis of Abelard up to the age of about fifty-four, and provides readers with knowledge of his views of women, learning, monastic life, Church and State combined, and the social milieu of the time. It should be particularly noted that the work was written at a time when Western Europe had only recently surfaced into the world of philosophy.

Abelard emphasizes how persecuted he feels by his peers throughout the work. He quotes saints, apostles, and at one point, compares his struggles in likeness to those of Christ.[2]

Editions

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "Medieval Sourcebook: Peter Abelard: Historia Calamitatum".
  2. ^ Schrock, Chad (2010). "The Proportion of His Purpose: Peter Abelard's "Historia Calamitatum" as Sacred History". Archives d'histoire doctrinale et littéraire du Moyen Age. 77: 29–46. doi:10.3917/ahdlm.077.0029. ISSN 0373-5478. JSTOR 44513825.
[edit]