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Document Details : Title: Huis-tuin-en-keukenmoraal? Subtitle: Jan van Leeuwen en de tien geboden Author(s): DESPLENTER, Youri Journal: Spiegel der Letteren Volume: 52 Issue: 1 Date: 2010 Pages: 1-29 DOI: 10.2143/SDL.52.1.2045867 Abstract : Among the more than twenty texts that have been handed down from Jan van Leeuwen († 1378), lay brother and first cook of the monastery of Groenendaal, there are two extensive treatises on the Ten Commandments. The present contribution first of all compares these two with each other, focussing on the composition, the style and the intended public. Furthermore, it situates the treatises in the Middle Dutch literature on the Decalogue, and finally, it places them into the medieval vernacular traditions of writings on the Ten Commandments. The main purpose of the article is to examine why Jan van Leeuwen enjoyed such appreciation in the Middle Ages, but hasn’t been studied exhaustively by historians of literature up until now. The results of the investigation show that the bonus cocus doesn’t reach the ‘literary level’ of his master Ruusbroec, but that he nevertheless should be counted as one of the first to transpose theological knowledge and theological textual traditions into Middle Dutch literature. |
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