II.
On the foolishness of popular belief in aerial ships from Magonia: (1) that there are ships emerging from the clouds, from a region called Magonia; (2) that what they transport to that region are crops (including grain) which either fail or become lost because of hail or storm; (3) that there are tempestarii (storm-workers) who are paid for their work by sailors navigating these ships. Agobard recalls a meeting over which he presided. Four captives — three men and one woman — were presented as if they were thieves who had fallen down from these ships and deserved to be stoned to death. When after much deliberation [through the bishop’s intervention] the truth was established and the matter was resolved, those who had presented the captives were confounded.
Rob Meens, ‘Thunder over Lyon: Agobard, the tempestarii and Christianity’ in Paganism in the Middle Ages... (2012): 164 offers a seventh-century parallel from the Vita of St Richarius (Riquier): here two Irish monks, on arriving in Siccambria, are encountered by a crowd of people who believe them to be dusi, or hemaones (var. maones, potentially related to Magonia) as they call them, who are intent on stealing crops from the land. Just as Agobard saves the day, Richarius saves the monks from the angry mob. For ma(v)ones in other sources (e.g. Scarapsus Pirminii), see Meens and now also a marginal note by Florus of Lyon, which is described and discussed by Pierre Chambert-Protat (citation forthcoming).
Subjects
aerial shipsextraordinary sky and weather phenomena, extraordinary boats and ships
aerial ships
aerial ships
id. 27939
The motif of ships appearing in the sky as known, for instance, from certain Irish monastic legends and ‘Irish mirabilia’.
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Agobard of LyonsAgobard of Lyons
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MagoniaMagonia
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Lat. MagoniaLatin Magonia
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Vita Richarii primigeniaVita Richarii primigeniaEarliest vita of Richarius (Riquier), an early 7th-century Frankish nobleman and founder of the monastery of Centula (Saint-Riquier, Picardy). The text has been dated to the late 7th century.
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