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St. Ursula and the Eleven Thousand Virgins of Cologne: Relics, Reliquaries and the Visual Culture of Group Sanctity in Late Medieval Europe. By Scott B. Montgomery. (Bern: Peter Lang. 2010. Pp. xvi, 207. $60.95 paperback. ISBN 978-3-039-1 1852-6.)
As Scott Montgomery argues, the cult of St. Ursula and her companion martyrs deserves attention as the most widespread in Europe. Given the treasure trove of relics discovered in a cemetery under the medieval walls of Cologne, identified and disseminated from the early-twelfth century as the relics of the saint's cohort (both male and female), such ubiquity is not surprising. Montgomery's task, however, is not primarily that of discussing the "bones," but rather, as an art historian, "to explore . . . collective imaging, investigating how text, image and relic display . . . fashion [ed] a total cult environment that expressed the power, presence and cohesion of [the] company of the Holy Virgins of Cologne" (p. 3). Excepting the excellent 1997 study by Joan Holladay in Studies in Iconography,...