Alumni Travel Reading: El Camino de Santiago

There are many traveler accounts of the Camino de Santiago. Art historian Conrad Rudolph provides a short, well written one that adds medieval history, art, and practical advice.

The road across northern Spain to Santiago de Compostela in the northwest was one of the three major Christian pilgrimage routes during the Middle Ages; tooday, the system of trails and roads that made up the old pilgrimage route is the most popular long-distance trail in Europe, passing through the Pyrenees to the fields and woods of Galicia. This book elucidates the beauty and uniqueness of the scenery, art, and architecture found along the way. Available at bookstores and online.

A program of music loosely connected with St. James or with stops along the road to Santiago (the Rhône region, Languedoc and Gascony, Aragon and Castile, and finally the gates of Santiago). Sample some of the sounds here.

Looking to undo the myth of the medieval cloistered woman, this book looks at documentary evidence to reconsider the role of women in the medieval pilgrimage, including the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela.

The author of this book considers two questions: "How did transient, mobile groups perceive and experience the diverse terrain of the pilgrim route in northern Spain? And how may their ephemeral presence be traced in the archaeological record?" Quotation from the Publisher.

The "Chronicle of Pseudo-Turpin" is one of the fundamental texts in the literary legend surrounding Charlemagne, Roland, Compostela and St. James. This Chronicle comprises Book IV of the "Liber Sancti Jacobi" (Codex Calixtinus), a twelfth-century manuscript from the archives of the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, the burial place and shrine of St. James.

This book presents the day-by-day account of a modern American pilgrim's solitary walk from St. Jean Pied de Port in France, by way of the Pyrenees and through northern Spain, to Santiago de Compostela.

Freund records the walk he and his wife took from Le Puy, France to Santiago de Compostela following the pilgrimage route. He describes both the natural beauty along the way as well as the physical challenge of the walk.

With no knowledge of Spanish or Donkeys, Tim Moore, begins his pilgrimage to the cathedral at Santiago de Compostela with Shinto his donkey companion. He takes the Codex Calixtinus, a twelfth-century handbook to the route, and a donkey manual of sorts from Robert Louis Stevenson as he attempts the five-hundred-mile route from St. Jean Pied-de-Port to the cathedral at Santiago de Compostela. Moore recounts the people, weather, and landscape that he and Shinto encounter together.

Illustrated with over 100 photos taken specifically for this work, this book also includes a complete plan and original drawings to orient the reader and show the building's historical development.

The authors of this work attempt to look at the pilgrimage through the art and cultural works associated with it and through the eyes of the medieval traveler. Heavily illustrated.