116 Chapter 3 mobility. Pilgrimage is also represented in the saints’ Lives, although perhaps not as much as one might expect.361 These categories, such as voluntary and involuntary, are not perfect. Some motivations fit perfectly within a certain category and others only partly.362 Using categories in the first place makes us attune to these nuances. We also see this fluidity reflected in the hagiographical representations. For example, by giving more attention to the wishes of Elias, Elias’ hagiographer represents a journey that usually would be understood as involuntary as neither completely involuntary nor completely voluntary. That is, in his Life Elias is captured twice during Arab attacks on Sicily and is put on a ship to be sold as a slave. Earlier he has received a divine revelation that tells him that he is destined to go to North Africa for missionary work, so, according to the story, Elias feels that this journey is his destiny. However, he misses his family too much and prays to God to be rescued and brought back home – this then happens (showing the effectiveness of his prayers already as a child and the special interest God takes in Elias’ life). The second time he is captured, he realises that he now should take heed to the revelation and goes willingly.363 Mobility due to enslavement would be classified as involuntary mobility, but in the narrative Elias is represented as having some agency in when and why he makes this journey. These journeys of captivity are therefore not represented as completely involuntary. We will see more examples of such fluidity and complexity of representation later in this chapter. Additionally, we will see examples in which more than one category of motivation applies. Multi-layered mobility is generally reflective of reality, as people often have multiple motivations to make a single journey.364 361 In the previous chapter a passage on pilgrimage in the Life of Elias has already been discussed, see pp. 103105 above. Depending on the definition of pilgrimage it is more or less prevalent in the narratives. In a narrow understanding, pilgrimages are journeys to visiting sites with the purpose of venerating a place or relics that are considered holy. In this narrow definition, pilgrimage only played a minor part in the Life of Euthymius, but more extensively in the Life of Elias. Some scholars use a broader definition and see journeys generally motivated by the traveller’s belief or as having a spiritual purpose as pilgrimage, so that visiting a monastic community is also interpreted as pilgrimage, see e.g., Ritter (2019b). If we would use this broad definition, we can see more pilgrimage journeys reflected in the Lives of Gregory and Euthymius as well. However, I do not find such a broad definition helpful in distinguishing between representations of travel motivation, and prefer the narrow definition: I see venerating a place or bones as a distinct phenomenon from other journeys that also have a ‘spiritual’ purpose. Of course, pilgrims, in the narrow sense, often had multiple motivations for travelling, while travellers who did not have venerating a tomb or place as their primary aim, might just do that when they arrived at a place with venerable relics. In my analysis, however, I look at how journeys and motivations are represented in the text and how audiences might have interpreted these journeys. If a journey is not clearly represented as being motivated by the veneration of a holy place or tomb, they are not discussed as pilgrimage here. For a broader understanding of pilgrimage, see Ibid; Elsner and Rutherford (2005). 362 For example, one could easily imagine cases in which the decision to travel is made by someone else, so the mover in question has limited individual agency, but perhaps they still do not travel against their will (for example, such a situation could possibly occur for women accompanying their husbands on the move). In her PhD project on late-antique mobility (University of Vienna, working title: Gehen oder bleiben? Abhängigkeitsverhältnisse in Mobilitätsgeschichten des 4. und 5. Jh. n. Chr. anhand einer intersektionalen Analyse spätantiker Briefe), Nadine Riegler will discuss in more detail how reality is more complex than represented in mobility models, including a discussion of cases where the boundaries between voluntary and involuntary mobility are not clear-cut. 363 Life of Elias the Younger 4-9. 364 Also observed in Foubert (2018), p. 6.
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