Julien Macho et sa contribution à la vie culturelle de Lyon

The purpose of this thesis is to identify the contribution of Julien Macho, a member of the Order of Augustinian Hermits in Lyon, to the cultural life of his period.  His work is not, strictly speaking, original, but rather a series of translations from Latin to French, and corrections and editions of religious and moral texts. His books were published over a short period, from 1473 to 1480, and were followed by many more editions in the late 15th century and the early 16th century.   During that period, in Lyon as elsewhere in France, there was a great deal of disorder in the religious establishment and criticism was being heard throughout the country. In response to the decadence of the Church, private piety was starting to develop, piety that needed a new medium in order to make moral teachings accessible to a more and more literate bourgeois population. Well aware of these recent developments, Macho directed all his work toward the precise goal of reaching a broad audience using vernacular language.  The objective of this doctoral thesis is to analyze part of Macho's work in order to better understand the intentions of the author. This primary goal will also make it possible to document, from a new perspective, a key period in Western intellectual development, the transition from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance.  The work is divided into three parts. The first part is a detailed study of the social, historical and intellectual contexts of the period: first the history of the Order of Augustinian Hermits and the instruction given to its members, in the context of spirituality in France at the end of the 15th century. This is followed by an overview of the city of Lyon, its Church and the development of printing in the city. Part two discusses the works attributed to Macho, rightly or wrongly, in view of the lack of research on Julien Macho himself, and presents a systematic survey of the evidence of the existence of this translator. Part three consists of a reading of two works of the Augustine monk of Lyon: one from a long literary tradition, Ésope, an adaptation of a collection of fables, and a religious work related to contemporary religious practice, the Mirouer de la redemption de lumain lignage.   Ésope is Macho's most original work, i.e., the book in which he intervened the most with respect to the original text. A comparison with its source, the Latin-German Äsop by Heinrich Steinhöwel, shows how the fable writer from Lyon moved away from his source, adding a large number of proverbs to his text.   Mirouer de la redemption de lumain lignage, a summary of all the observances of religious life and readings that a Christian should know, includes parts of another well known work, the Golden Legend, a practice that we find in the other French translations of the Speculum humanae salvationis. Far from being an exhaustive analysis of the work, the compilation of quotations and of the very content of the text makes it possible to identify what a certain practice of religion in the 15th century consisted of.  The result is a panorama of the life and work of Julien Macho, theologian, prior and translator. This study reveals an intellectual who is representative of his period, the late 15th century.

Keyphrases: Julien Macho, Incunable, Ésope, Speculum humanae salvationis, Lyon, Didactic literature, Translation, Printing, Incunabula, Aesop, Speculum humanae salvationis