Abstract

The annual commemoration of the Faithful Departed on 2 November is commonly considered to have spread to become practically universal in the Latin West by the close of the Middle Ages. However, as late as the fifteenth century, there are signs that in the important French city and diocese of Lyon this occurrence had still made little impact and that though a similar celebration was practised there, it took place on 14 January. This study investigates the evidence for this original Lyonese usage in the surviving local liturgical books, archeology and topography, identifying the liturgical texts employed and portraying in vivid detail the various ritual practices and the interraction with circumstances and their physical settings