Medieval crimes of finnish people in Helsingin Sanomat Turku

Hanna-Mari Kupari is doing her doctoral studies at the School of Languages and Translation Studies at Universtiy of Turku. As part of research she has investigated letters sent to penitentiary of the catholic church in Vatica. With natural language processing tools Hanna-Mari has been able to identify vocabulary related to crimes but as side find wrongdoings of  medieval finns and Turku inhabitants. Next Hanna-Mari tells more about her results:

I had the opportunity to give an interview about my dissertation topic and especially data to Helsingin Sanomat journalist Jonna Rönkä and the article was published on the 21st of September 2023. The title “John Philippi ‘got carnally acquainted’ with two nuns of a convent – Results in a sex scandal that was taken up in the Vatican” gives a little bit more exiting view of my every work than perhaps is reality. Just to note that the title in the printed version the next day was a lot more neutral and descriptive. But maybe it was the fact that the title online was so exiting that the reporters in YleX also decided to discuss the matter in the morning radio show. And just a word of consolidation, I have struggled to pronounce and spell the word “penitentiary” correctly so many times that the reporters have nothing to stress about at this point.

This was my first interview with national media, and I was really amazed by the wide interest this rose. I have heard from a friend that the topic has been discussed in a teachers’ coffee room and I also looked at the comments section. The article itself was behind a paywall and available to those with a subscription. I don’t know how many people have read the article since that kind of information is not public.

One of my key take home messages was well present in the article. Jonna Rönkä writes: “The Dark Ages are a complete myth,” says Kupari. “In those days, people followed the letter of the law to the letter and heard witnesses. There was nothing shady about it, it was all strictly bound by legality.” It was also commented by many readers that all time periods have their own lurky components. Our own era is shadowed by wars and inappropriate conduct as well. There was also a question about the time that letters took to reach the diverse corners of Europe at that time. I hope some historian would like to take up the matter and publish about it. They could perhaps even use the penitentiary letters as a case study and have a look the time there is between two similar applications. The reason for sending a new application was the assumption that it was lost under way.
Jonna Rönkä also wrote about my personal experiences. She writes: “Kupari says that while doing his research and studying the crime stories, she imagined the events in the present-day Tuomiokirkko, the Old Market Square and the Aboa Vetus archaeological museum on the banks of the Aura River, where the ruins of medieval stone houses are on display. ‘In addition to the familiar sites, many of the crimes committed in Turku at that time can still be identified with today. Quarrels, drunken brawls and bullying of all sorts took place in the Middle Ages just as they do today.’” I hope this will also spark some inspiration for others as well to view these surviving monuments with new insight. Contrary to my experiences with studies of Classical antiquity, these sites are right next to us living in Turku.

You can read the full article in finnish from  Helsingin Sanomat Turku (behind paywall) or listen to the finnish podcast of Hanna-Mari’s visit to YleX morning show in Yle Areena.