Murray, Alexander 1934-

PERSONAL:

Born May 14, 1934, in Oxford, England; son of Stephen Hubert (a barrister) and Margaret (an architect) Murray. Ethnicity: "White, Anglo-Saxon Catholic." Education: Attended New College, Oxford, 1955-61.

ADDRESSES:

E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

University of Leeds, Leeds, England, temporary assistant lecturer, 1961-63; University of Newcastle upon Tyne, Newcastle upon Tyne, England, began as lecturer, became senior lecturer, 1963-80; Oxford University, Oxford, England, lecturer in modern history and fellow of University College, 1980-2001; retired, 2001. Harvard University, visiting professor, 1989-90. Military service: British Army, served with Royal Artillery, 1953-55, and Territorial Army, 1955-58; became lieutenant.

MEMBER:

British Academy (fellow), Royal Historical Society (fellow).

WRITINGS:

Reason and Society in the Middle Ages, Clarendon Press (Oxford, England), 1978.

(Editor) Sir William Jones, 1746-1794: A Commemoration, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1998.

Suicide in the Middle Ages, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), Volume 1: The Violent against Themselves, 1999, Volume 2: The Curse on Self-Murder, 2000.

SIDELIGHTS:

Alexander Murray writes books about medieval religion and society. His first book, Reason and Society in the Middle Ages, traces the rise of rationalism in the Middle Ages. "[In] the twelfth and thirteenth centuries," wrote William J. Courtenay in his review of the book for Church History, "miracle gave way to reason and was forced to occupy a small but tension-filled corner within a rational view of nature."

Part one delineates the onset of a money economy and the social, political, and intellectual ramifications that ensued. Before the Middle Ages power rested solely in the hands of nobility. But with the onset of a money economy much power passed from individuals to institutions. Wealth became more fluid. Those who learned how to administer this new wealth learned another important lesson—knowledge is power—a lesson covered in the next two parts of the work.

Part two looks at the rise of mathematics—particularly arithmetic—and the effect it had in commercial and intellectual realms. A new mathematics was required to run the new monetary economy. To use arithmetic at all, one first must learn how to think. Literacy aids thinking. Numeracy then follows literacy.

Part three delves into another new phenomenon of the Middle Ages: the creation of an intellectual elite. The rise of mathematics had engendered the rise of other intellectual pursuits as well. Skill in arithmetic led to respect from both the nobility and the burgeoning elite. This recognition sparked a self-conscious quest for more knowledge and, hence, more power.

Part four looks at the religious backlash from mystics, saints, and reformers who mostly fared from noble backgrounds and who rejected the new rationalism. The new "Greek" culture with its trust in reason was anathema to the established "Hebrew" culture with its trust in divine intervention. One view fits the emerging secular society, and the other hearkens back to a religious, more traditional society.

The critics, with a few caveats, received Reason and Society in the Middle Ages favorably. A reviewer in History wrote: "Far from being dry or abstract scholarship, it is full of entertaining anecdote and fresh speculation on many aspects of medieval history…. Mr. Murray has an eye for telling quotations and a capacity to bring saints back to life out of their saints' lives." Michael S. Mahoney, reviewing the book in the American Historical Review, noted: "Murray's strategy of arguing a broad thesis from scattered fine details makes his book both stimulating and puzzling. How does one differentiate criticism from cavil?" As an example, Mahoney pointed to Murray's surprise that the abacus and Roman numerals survived the onslaught of decimal-place arithmetic for as long as they did. "But there is no mystery," Mahoney wrote, "the abacus is faster than written calculation and takes up no paper; Roman numerals betray tampering. The paradox is specious." Mahoney concluded: "One must read Reason and Society in the Middle Ages actively, challenging it in response to its challenges. The reward may lie more in the process than in the product."

Murray contributed to collections and periodicals but did not publish another book for twenty-one years. When he did, M.T. Clanchy described Suicide in the Middle Ages in the Times Literary Supplement as "a magnum opus … long awaited." The Violent against Themselves is the first volume of a proposed trilogy, and it looks at the act of suicide itself. Volume 2: The Curse on Self-Murder examines the law on suicide in various manifestations and origins, while Volume 3: The Mapping of Mental Desolation will trace the emotions behind the act through wide-ranging sources, including literary ones.

Because suicide is very rarely mentioned in medieval histories, most scholars have presumed that it occurred far less frequently than it does today. Murray sets out to modify this assumption in his new work. In researching The Violent against Themselves Murray cast a wide net, and he was able to document 560 cases of suicide in the Middle Ages. He gathered this information largely from manuscripts as opposed to published sources. The greatest source was English coroners' and judicial records. Most French legal documents from the same period were destroyed during the French Revolution of 1789, but Murray dug some up in Paris. The Parisian records are valuable because, unlike the English documents, they included eyewitness accounts. Murray found German town chronicles also to be a good source. Interestingly, he was only able to uncover three suicides in Italian court documents, but since suicide was not considered a crime in Italian cities, it would not usually be written about in official documents. Murray was able to extend his coverage by combing through religious chronicles—which he found to be good, if biased, sources. He limited his coverage in general to the countries enumerated above because he is fluent in the languages of those regions and has thus left it open for other scholars to extend his work geographically.

Murray gives many case histories in his work—that of the bridegroom who jumped from a window, of a despondent son who threw himself down a well, of a postpartum depressed mother attempting to hang herself but saved by a vision of the Virgin Mary, and many others. Even though his information is sketchy at best, Murray concludes his volume with a series of useful graphs and statistical tables. What emerges from the study is that suicide in the Middle Ages essentially differs little from suicide in modern times. In all times, it seems, suicide has a variety of causes, most personal and few societal in nature.

M.T. Clanchy, reviewing The Violent against Themselves in the Times Literary Supplement, commented: "The historian of the emotions … needs to be a polymath with imagination, a rare combination." Murray fits the bill, according to Clanchy, and "[his case studies] make compelling reading." Clanchy added, "In normalizing the Middle Ages, [Murray] has shown us where we stand as human beings, subject to the thousand natural shocks the flesh is heir to."

In addition to his authorial ventures, Murray also edited Sir William Jones, 1746-1794: A Commemoration. Jones was a master of classical and modern European languages, and he knew many Asian languages as well. He served as a Supreme Court judge in India and was involved in radical politics in England. In fact, Jones has often been criticized by scholars for being a radical at home and a colonist abroad. This book attempts to rehabilitate Jones's reputation by collecting together five salutary essays about Jones's life under one cover. Times Literary Supplement contributor P.J. Marshall observed: "This collection is a work of piety, but one of measured and justifiable piety." Colin Heywood, in the English History Review, called the book "a collective tribute which combines disinterested kindness and deep insight into the life and works of [Jones]."

Murray once told CA: "I have a stepfather's interest in the Jones volume. There is a big statue of him in my college which said he died in 1794. I knew he was a great scholar, but did not know why. So when 1994 approached I thought it wise to raise everyone's eyes from the ground by having a celebration of Jones, and got various lecturers to hold forth. Of course when you have good ideas, you end up doing the work, so it fell to me to edit the book. Among its many spin-offs were to acquaint me personally with the Sanskrit and Arabic scholars in my university, whose cooperation has proved invaluable in the writing of The Curse on Self-Murder, which is about medieval European suicide law and its rationale—to the assessment of which a lot of ancient and comparative material is accessory."

"So," as Murray noted later, "William James was a complete hors d'oeuvre for me, at best; Suicide volume two was and is much more my main meal."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Historical Review, December, 1979, Michael S. Mahoney, review of Reason and Society in the Middle Ages, pp. 1345-1346.

Choice, June, 1979, review of Reason and Society in the Middle Ages, p. 544.

Church History, March, 1980, William J. Courtenay, review of Reason and Society in the Middle Ages, pp. 81-82.

Times Literary Supplement, March 5, 1999, P.J. Marshall, review of Sir William Jones, 1746-1794: A Commemoration, p. 30; April 2, 1999, M.T. Clanchy, review of Suicide in the Middle Ages, Volume 1: The Violent against Themselves, p. 2.