Anti-Hagiography: Embrico of Mainz's Vita Mahumeti

Embrico of Mainz's Vita Mahumeti, composed near the year 1100, is the first substantial biography of Muhammad written in Latin. Embrico wrote it in verse, modelled on the verse hagiography of contemporaries such as Hildebert of Le Mans. Whereas earlier texts had portrayed Islam as pagan idolatry and Muhammad as an idol, Embrico (and subsequent twelfth-century authors) see Islam as a form of Christian heresy-and Muhammad as a particularly vile heresiarch. Earlier studies of this change have explained it as a response to increased knowledge about Islam, but this article argues that the resurgence of heresy within Christian Europe is equally important. In each case, Islam is associated with more familiar forms of doctrinal error: paganism for the early middle ages, heresy for the twelfth century.