The Monstrous Races In Medieval Art And Thought

Author : John Block Friedman
Publisher : Syracuse University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780815628262
Total Pages : 332 pages
Book Rating : 4.69/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Monstrous Races in Medieval Art and Thought written by John Block Friedman and published by Syracuse University Press. This book was released on 2000-06-01 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Beyond the boundaries of the known Christian world during the Middle Ages, there were alien cultures that intrigued, puzzled, and sometimes frightened the people of Europe. The reports of travelers in Africa and Asia revealed that "monstrous" races of men lived there, whose appearance and customs were quite different from the European norm. This book examines the impact of these races upon Western art, literature, and philosophy, from their earliest mention until the age of exploration. Friedman furnishes a descriptive catalog of the races, most of which were real, geographically remote peoples, some of which were fabled creatures that served as symbols. He traces the evolution of European attitudes toward them, with particular emphasis on the high Middle Ages, when they seem most strongly to have captured the Western imagination. Ranging through literature, the arts, cartography, canon law, and theology, he considers the widely varying ways in which Christians viewed and depicted strange races of men. Finally, he examines transformations in European consciousness brought about by the discoveries of the exotic peoples of the Americas. Whatever their form—pygmy, giant, hirsute cave—dweller, cyclops, or Amazon-the monstrous races clearly challenged the traditional concept of man in the Christian world scheme. It is the medieval thinking about this challenge that Mr. Friedman addresses in this revealing account.

Author : John Friedman
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780802071736
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.32/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Monstrous Races in Medieval Art written by John Friedman and published by . This book was released on with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Debra Higgs Strickland
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780691057194
Total Pages : 348 pages
Book Rating : 4.92/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Saracens, Demons, & Jews written by Debra Higgs Strickland and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2003 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: These images, which reached a broad and socially varied audience across Western Europe, appeared in virtually all artistic media, including illuminated manuscripts, stained glass, sculpture, metalwork, and tapestry.".

Author : Bettina Bildhauer
Publisher : University of Wales Press
ISBN 13 : 1786831759
Total Pages : 330 pages
Book Rating : 4.50/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Monstrous Middle Ages written by Bettina Bildhauer and published by University of Wales Press. This book was released on 2017-05-15 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The figure of the monster in medieval culture functions as a vehicle for a range of intellectual and spiritual inquiries, from questions of language and representation to issues of moral, theological and cultural value. Monsters embody cultural tensions that go far beyond the idea of the monster as simply an unintelligible and abject other. This text looks at both the representation of literal monsters and the consumption and exploitation of monstrous metaphors in a wide variety of high and late-medieval cultural productions, from travel writing and mystical texts, to sermons, manuscript illuminations and maps. Individual essays explore the ways in which monstrosity shaped the construction of gendered and racial identities, religious symbolism and social prejudice in the Middle Ages. Reading the Middle Ages through its monsters provides an opportunity to view medieval culture from fresh perspectives. It should be of interest in the concept of monstrosity and its significance for medieval cultural production.

Author : Kirk Ambrose
Publisher : PIMS
ISBN 13 : 9780888441546
Total Pages : 216 pages
Book Rating : 4.41/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Nave Sculpture of Vézelay written by Kirk Ambrose and published by PIMS. This book was released on 2006 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This scholarly work fundamentally changes the way we think about the monastic church of Vezelay and its sculptures. Kirk Ambrose provides a new account of the celebrated sculptural ensemble at this important French Romanesque monastic church. Whereas scholarly attention in the past has focused almost exclusively on the Pentecostal portal, Ambrose devotes most of his analysis to the nave capitals. He considers how these works intersect with various aspects of monastic culture, from poetry to a sign language used during observed periods of silence. From this study it emerges how many of the sculptures resonated with communal practices and with interpretive modes in use at the site." "Deeming the attempt to uncover an underlying or unifying program to be an anachronistic project, Ambrose explores historically specific ways this ensemble cohered for medieval viewers. Covering a range of themes, including hagiography, ornament, and violence, he develops alternative approaches for the examination of serial imagery. As a result, this book has broad implications for the study of eleventh- and twelfth-century art in the West."--BOOK JACKET.

Author : Tina Marie Boyer
Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004316418
Total Pages : 273 pages
Book Rating : 4.16/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Giant Hero in Medieval Literature written by Tina Marie Boyer and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2016-05-18 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Giant Hero in Medieval Literature, Tina Boyer offers an analysis of giants as antagonists and heroes in medieval European epics and romances.

Author : Asa Simon Mittman
Publisher : ARC Reference
ISBN 13 : 9781641894272
Total Pages : 136 pages
Book Rating : 4.7X/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Classic Readings on Monster Theory written by Asa Simon Mittman and published by ARC Reference. This book was released on 2020-04-30 with total page 136 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Companion volumes Classic Readings on Monster Theoryand Primary Sources on Monstersgather a wide range of readings and sources to enable us to see and understand what monsters can show us about what it means to be human. The first volume introduces important modern theorists of the monstrous and aims to provide interpretive tools and strategies for students to use to grapple with the primary sources in the second volume, which brings together some of the most influential and indicative monster narratives from the West.

Author : Esther J. Hamori
Publisher : Broadleaf Books
ISBN 13 : 1506486339
Total Pages : 299 pages
Book Rating : 4.38/5 ( download)

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Download or read book God's Monsters written by Esther J. Hamori and published by Broadleaf Books . This book was released on 2023-10-31 with total page 299 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Bible is teeming with monsters. Giants tromp through the land of milk and honey; Leviathan swims through the wine-dark sea. A stunning array of peculiar creatures, mind-altering spirits, and supernatural hitmen fill the biblical heavens, jarring in both their strangeness and their propensity for violence--especially on God's behalf. Traditional interpretations of the creatures of the Bible have sanded down their sharp, unsavory edges, transforming them into celestial beings of glory and light--or chubby, happy cherubs. Those cherubs? They're actually hybrid guardian monsters, more closely associated with the Egyptian sphinx than with flying babies. And the seraphim? Winged serpents sent to mete out God's vengeance. Demons aren't at war with angels; they're a distinct supernatural species used by Satan and by God. The pattern is chilling. Most of these monsters aren't God's opponents--they're God's entourage. Killer angels, plague demons, manipulative spirits, creatures with an alarming number of wings (and eyes all over)--these shapeshifters and realm-crossers act with stunning brutality, each reflecting a facet of God's own monstrosity. Confronting God's monsters--and the God-monster--may be uncomfortable, but the Bible is richer for their presence. It's not only richer; the stories of the monsters of the Bible can be as fun, surprising, and interesting as any mythology. For anyone interested in monsters, myths, folklore, demons, and more, God's Monsters is an entertaining deep dive into the creaturely strangeness of the Bible.

Author : Steve Donaldson
Publisher : Springer
ISBN 13 : 3319903233
Total Pages : 271 pages
Book Rating : 4.31/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Christian Perspectives on Transhumanism and the Church written by Steve Donaldson and published by Springer. This book was released on 2018-08-02 with total page 271 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Christians have always been concerned with enhancement—now they are faced with significant questions about how technology can help or harm genuine spiritual transformation. What makes traditional and technological enhancement different from each other? Are there theological insights and spiritual practices that can help Christians face the challenge of living in a technological world without being dangerously conformed to its values? This book calls on Christians to understand and engage the deep issues facing the church in a technological, transhumanist future.

Author : Colum Hourihane
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
ISBN 13 : 1315298368
Total Pages : 588 pages
Book Rating : 4.68/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Routledge Companion to Medieval Iconography written by Colum Hourihane and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2016-12-19 with total page 588 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sometimes enjoying considerable favor, sometimes less, iconography has been an essential element in medieval art historical studies since the beginning of the discipline. Some of the greatest art historians – including Mâle, Warburg, Panofsky, Morey, and Schapiro – have devoted their lives to understanding and structuring what exactly the subject matter of a work of medieval art can tell. Over the last thirty or so years, scholarship has seen the meaning and methodologies of the term considerably broadened. This companion provides a state-of-the-art assessment of the influence of the foremost iconographers, as well as the methodologies employed and themes that underpin the discipline. The first section focuses on influential thinkers in the field, while the second covers some of the best-known methodologies; the third, and largest section, looks at some of the major themes in medieval art. Taken together, the three sections include thirty-eight chapters, each of which deals with an individual topic. An introduction, historiographical evaluation, and bibliography accompany the individual essays. The authors are recognized experts in the field, and each essay includes original analyses and/or case studies which will hopefully open the field for future research.