Note to the Reader
Preface
1. The Medieval Beginnings of Our Lady's Tumbler. The French Poem ; The Manuscripts ; Gautier de Coinci and Anonymity ; Picardy ; The Identity of the Poet ; The Bas-de-Page Miniature: Of Marginal Interest ; The Genre: Long Story Short ; The Table of Exempla, in Alphabetical Order ; The Latin Exemplum ; The Life of the Fathers ; True Story: Why the Story Succeeded
2. Dancing for God. The Tumbler ; Notre Dame versus Saint Mary ; The Equivocal Status of Jongleurs ; Trance Dance ; Jongleurs of God ; Holy Fools ; Fact or Fiction?
3. Cistercian Monks and Lay Brothers ; The Order of Cîteaux ; Cistercians and the Virgin ; Mother's Milk ; Mary's Head-Coverings ; Cistercian Lay Brothers ; Conversion Therapy ; The Language of Silence ; Gym Clothes ; Sweat Cloth ; The Weighing of Souls ; The Latin-Less Lay Brother and Our Lady
4. Reformation Endings: A Temporary Vanishing Act. What Makes a Story Popular? ; Walsingham, England's Nazareth ; Madonnas of the World Wars ; Literary Iconoclasm ; Marian Apparitions
5. A Troupe of Sources and Analogues. King David's Dancing ; The Widow's Mites ; The Virgin's Miraculous Images and Apparitions ; The Jongleur of Rocamadour ; The Holy Candle of Arras ; The Pious Sweat of Monks and Lay Brothers ; The Love of Statuesque Beauty ; The Holy Face of Christ and Virgin Saints
Notes. Notes to Preface ; Notes to Chapter 1 ; Notes to Chapter 2 ; Notes to Chapter 3 ; Notes to Chapter 4 ; Notes to Chapter 5
Bibliography
List of Illustrations
Index.