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Love, hatred, crime and punishment, proverbs, heaven on earth, husband-beating -- all feature in the jewellery, tableware, illustrations, carvings and textiles of the period. This book offers a major reassessment of the high medieval period. It will be essential reading for medievalists and those interested in the history of language and customs. ......
"This book offers a major reassessment of the high medieval period and as such is not only important to specialists, but has much to appeal to the general reader. It is essential reading for medievalists and those interested in the history of language and customs."--BOOK JACKET.
The Secret Middle Ages is a controversial and completely fresh view of the medieval world through its rare and amazing artefacts. Using the wealth of medieval art, much of it unseen or ignored by museums and art historians, Malcolm Jones paints a compelling picture of the visual environment of the great mass of ordinary people between 1200 and 1500. The picture that emerges is of a civilisation that is both like and unlike our own, one that teems with the richness of life and its contradictions. Unlike most studies of the medieval world, it does not concern itself greatly with religious or aristocratic art but with the products of popular and folk art. Here we find beliefs and traditions rendered memorable by the vivid creative imagination and strong visual culture of the middle ages. Love, hatred, crime and punishment, proverbs, heaven on earth, husband-beating - all feature in the jewellery, tableware, illustrations, carvings and textiles of the period. This book offers a major reassessment of the high medieval period and as such is not only important to specialist, but has much appeal to the general reader. It is essential reading for medievalists and those interested in the history of language and customs. It provides a brilliant and evocative picture of medieval Europe where people spent their time wearing their hearts on their sleeves, snapping sausages and getting bees in their bonnets. As Malcolm Jones writes, gems and precious metals may dazzle the eye, but a pewter brooch, though it may look tawdry, may be of more significance and can tell us more about the middle ages than a cofferful of royal jewels.
"The beauty and levity that Perry and Gabriele have captured in this book are what I think will help it to become a standard text for general audiences for years to come….The Bright Ages is a rare thing—a nuanced historical work that almost anyone can enjoy reading.”—Slate "Incandescent and ultimately intoxicating." —The Boston Globe A lively and magisterial popular history that refutes common misperceptions of the European Middle Ages, showing the beauty and communion that flourished alongside the dark brutality—a brilliant reflection of humanity itself. The word “medieval” conjures images of the “Dark Ages”—centuries of ignorance, superstition, stasis, savagery, and poor hygiene. But the myth of darkness obscures the truth; this was a remarkable period in human history. The Bright Ages recasts the European Middle Ages for what it was, capturing this 1,000-year era in all its complexity and fundamental humanity, bringing to light both its beauty and its horrors. The Bright Ages takes us through ten centuries and crisscrosses Europe and the Mediterranean, Asia and Africa, revisiting familiar people and events with new light cast upon them. We look with fresh eyes on the Fall of Rome, Charlemagne, the Vikings, the Crusades, and the Black Death, but also to the multi-religious experience of Iberia, the rise of Byzantium, and the genius of Hildegard and the power of queens. We begin under a blanket of golden stars constructed by an empress with Germanic, Roman, Spanish, Byzantine, and Christian bloodlines and end nearly 1,000 years later with the poet Dante—inspired by that same twinkling celestial canopy—writing an epic saga of heaven and hell that endures as a masterpiece of literature today. The Bright Ages reminds us just how permeable our manmade borders have always been and of what possible worlds the past has always made available to us. The Middle Ages may have been a world “lit only by fire” but it was one whose torches illuminated the magnificent rose windows of cathedrals, even as they stoked the pyres of accused heretics. The Bright Ages contains an 8-page color insert.
Author : Steven J. Williams Publisher : University of Michigan Press Page : 496 pages File Size : 17,46 MB Release : 2003 Category : History ISBN : 9780472113088
A “wickedly entertaining, informative and thought-provoking” look at romance, courtship, and other intimacies behind closed Medieval doors (Dr. Markus Kerr, PhD, MDR). Were medieval women slaves to their husband’s desires, jealously secured in a chastity belt in his absence? Was sex a duty or could it be a pleasure? Did a woman have a say about her own female sexuality, body, and who did or didn’t get up close and personal with it? No. And yes. It’s complicated. The intimate lives of medieval women were as complex as for modern women. They loved and lost, hoped and schemed, were lifted up and cast down. They were hopeful and lovelorn. Some had it forced upon them, others made aphrodisiacs and dressed for success. Some were chaste and some were lusty. Having sex was complicated. Not having sex, was even more so. Inside The Very Secret Sex Lives of Medieval Women, a fascinating book about life during medieval times, you will discover tantalizing true stories about medieval women and a myriad of historical facts. Learn about: The true experiences of women from all classes, including women who made history The dos and don’ts in the bedroom Sexy foods and how to have them All you need to know for your wedding night, and well as insider medical advice How to get pregnant (and how not to), and more “Quite compelling and hilariously funny. I have been chuckling out loud and my husband says he thinks he ought to read it if it’s such a tonic. God forbid!” —Susanna Newstead, author of the Savernake Novels
A breathtaking journey into the hidden history of medieval manuscripts, from the Lindisfarne Gospels to the ornate Psalter of Henry VIII “A delight—immersive, conversational, and intensely visual, full of gorgeous illustrations and shimmering description.” –Helen Castor, author of She-Wolves Medieval manuscripts can tell us much about power and art, knowledge and beauty. Many have survived because of an author’s status—part of the reason we have so much of Chaucer’s writing, for example, is because he was a London-based government official first and a poet second. Other works by the less influential have narrowly avoided ruin, like the book of illiterate Margery Kempe, found in a country house closet, the cover nibbled on by mice. Scholar Mary Wellesley recounts the amazing origins of these remarkable manuscripts, surfacing the important roles played by women and ordinary people—the grinders, binders, and scribes—in their creation and survival. The Gilded Page is the story of the written word in the manuscript age. Rich and surprising, it shows how the most exquisite objects ever made by human hands came from unexpected places. “Mary Wellesley is a born storyteller and The Gilded Page is as good as historical writing gets. This is a sensational debut by a wonderfully gifted historian.” —Dan Jones, bestselling author of The Plantagenets and The Templars