God helps those who help themselves: negotiating a miracle in the fourteenth-century canonization of Delphine de Puimichel
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3989/aem.2013.43.1.01Keywords:
canonization, miracle, herbs, childbirth, doctors, hierarchy of resort, leprosyAbstract
While we know that medieval sufferers had health care options and knowledge about how to pursue those options, such “bottom up” evidence is rare. Using witness testimony from the canonization inquest for Countess Delphine de Puimichel, this essay explores how people negotiated for miraculous cures with a holy woman reluctant to heal. Testimonies reveal how witnesses used lack of access to medical care, unsuccessful medical care, immediate danger, and long-term suffering to get access to Countess Delphine’s healing touch or her relics.
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