Monasticism and Manuscript Culture in Medieval Europe offers a new perspective on the abbey at Cluny, one of the medieval Christianity's most influential institutions. Most historical approaches to Cluny have embraced a predictable "rise and fall" narrative, determined largely by the extent of the abbey's legislative reach. In this volume, Scott ......
Monasticism and Manuscript Culture in Medieval Europe offers a new perspective on the abbey at Cluny, one of the medieval Christianity's most influential institutions. Most historical approaches to Cluny have embraced a predictable "rise and fall" narrative, determined largely by the extent of the abbey's legislative reach. In this volume, Scott ......
Magic, Ritual, and Gender from Late Antiquity to 1000
Trafficking with Demons explores how magic was perceived, practiced, and prohibited in western Europe during the first millennium CE. Through the overlapping frameworks of religion, ritual, and gender, Martha Rampton connects early Christian reckonings with pagan magic to later doctrines and dogmas. Challenging established views on the role of ......
If ever a play had something to say about the art of statesmanship, that play is Sir Thomas More. Its origins and authorship shrouded in mystery, the manuscript was likely written and revised between 1593 and 1604. This carefully crafted and dramatically compelling work pays tribute to a man eminent in philosophy and literature as well as ......
Through a carefully curated collection of readings and sources, this text focuses on critical issues that have concerned people throughout time and illustrates how studying the Middle Ages from an interdisciplinary perspective can shed light on contemporary efforts to deal with these issues. The book explores a variety of themes from philosophical ......
Sexuality, Humanism, and Ephemeral Performances in Fifteenth-Century Italy
Entertaining Ambiguities explores the intersections of male-male sexual activities, subcultures, and coded language with classical reception, university culture, and Italian humanism. Through his excavation of a pair of Latin comedies-Janus the Priest and The False Hypocrite, written and performed by law students at the University of Pavia in 1427 ......
The Black Death that arrived in the spring of 1348 eventually killed nearly half of England's population. In its long aftermath, wages in London rose in response to labor shortages, many survivors moved into larger quarters in the depopulated city, and people in general spent more money on food, clothing, and household furnishings than they had ......
Challenges the assumptions made over the medieval/modern divide by examining the medieval roots of modern racism Humanists have long insisted on a chasm separating modernity and the Middle Ages. In Bad Medievalism and the Modernity Problem, Kathy Lavezzo demonstrates how the temporal divide scholars typically accept is a fiction that has shaped ......
Challenges the assumptions made over the medieval/modern divide by examining the medieval roots of modern racism Humanists have long insisted on a chasm separating modernity and the Middle Ages. In Bad Medievalism and the Modernity Problem, Kathy Lavezzo demonstrates how the temporal divide scholars typically accept is a fiction that has shaped ......