Abstract This article proposes a functional, cognitively-informed model for analysing transtextual figures, using the example of Mary of Nazareth in medieval literature. Rather than approaching transtextuality through ontological identity or referential continuity, it foregrounds the relevance these figures generate by reducing cognitive processing demands and enhancing interpretive reward. Transtextual figures reduce cognitive effort by activating pre-existing knowledge and at the same time encourage reflection on variation, generating aesthetic pleasure, intellectual insight, or cultural significance. This comparative dimension becomes especially productive in the case of high-frequency figures, or cultural icons, whose recurrence across time and media allows them to absorb and reflect broader cultural values and shifting collective concerns. The case of Mary of Nazareth exemplifies how transtextual figures grow through layered textual accumulation. Medieval texts extend her biblical presence by constructing a full biography from different sources, by exploring her interiority through focalization, inner monologue, and direct speech, and by transposing her into the lifeworld of contemporary recipients. The high frequency has a paradoxical effect, creating diffuse impressions no single reader can fully oversee, yet simultaneously creating an icon with a condensed identity. This iconicity nevertheless is not a stable core, but constantly shaped and re-shaped, itself offering insights not so much in the ›nature‹ of the literary figure but in the interests, needs, and anthropological concepts of certain literary communities.
Rabea Kohnen (Thu,) studied this question.