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Middle Ages (middle + ages)
Kinds of Middle Ages Selected AbstractsTangible Heritage: Production of Astrolabes on a Laser EngraverCOMPUTER GRAPHICS FORUM, Issue 8 2008G. Zotti I.3.5 [Computer Graphics]: Computational geometry and object modelling , geometric algorithms, languages and systems; I.3.8 [Computer Graphics]: Applications Abstract The astrolabe, an analog computing device, used to be the iconic instrument of astronomers during the Middle Ages. It allowed a multitude of operations of practical astronomy which were otherwise cumbersome to perform in an epoch when mathematics had apparently almost been forgotten. Usually made from wood or sheet metal, a few hundred instruments, mostly from brass, survived until today and are valuable museum showpieces. This paper explains a procedural modelling approach for the construction of the classical kinds of astrolabes, which allows a wide variety of applications from plain explanatory illustrations to three-dimensional (3D) models, and even the production of working physical astrolabes usable for public or classroom demonstrations. [source] Archeology and written sources on eighth- to tenth-century BohemiaEARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 3 2009'a Profantová This article examines the contribution of archaeology to our understanding of the history of Bohemia in the early Middle Ages. In a period for which only scarce information is available from written sources, archaeology is able to verify information from legend and confirm the scanty written evidence. The results of archaeological research, however, also strongly suggest that relations between Bohemians and Magyars were much more complex than the evidence of the written sources has until now led many to believe. [source] Courts, Elites, and Gendered Power in the Early Middle Ages: Charlemagne and Others , By Janet L. NelsonEARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 3 2009CAROL NEEL No abstract is available for this article. [source] The Bishop Reformed: Studies of Episcopal Power and Culture in the Central Middle Ages , Edited by John S. Ott and Anna Trumbore JonesEARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 3 2009SCOTT G. BRUCE No abstract is available for this article. [source] Power and Identity in the Middle Ages: Essays in Memory of Rees Davies , Edited by Huw Pryce and John WattsEARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 2 2009MATTHEW HAMMOND No abstract is available for this article. [source] Minting in Vandal North Africa: coins of the Vandal period in the Coin Cabinet of Vienna's Kunsthistorisches MuseumEARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 3 2008Guido M. Berndt This paper offers a re-examination of some problems regarding the coinage of Vandal North Africa. The coinage of this barbarian successor state is one of the first non-imperial coinages in the Mediterranean world of the fifth and sixth centuries. Based on the fine collection in the Coin Cabinet of Vienna's Kunsthistorisches Museum, this article questions the chronology of the various issues and monetary relations between the denominations under the Vandal kings, especially after the reign of Gunthamund (484,96). The Vandals needed and created a solid financial system. In terms of political, administrative and economic structures they tried to integrate their realm into the changing world of late antiquity and the early Middle Ages. [source] Selling archaeology and anthropology: early medieval artefacts at the Expositions universelles and the Wiener Weltausstellung, 1867,1900EARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 1 2008Bonnie Effros The archaeological and anthropological exhibits included in the four Expositions universelles held in Paris between 1867 and 1900 and the Wiener Weltausstellung in the Austro-Hungarian capital in 1873, contributed to the commercialization of antiquarianism and granted international attention to the amateur practitioners of these emerging disciplines. Displays of archaeological artefacts and human remains from the migration period and the early Middle Ages, juxtaposed with more exotic ,primitive' art, permitted organizers to broaden the aesthetic sensibilities of fairgoers and promote the acquisition of native antiquities. Exhibiting private collections of early medieval objects likewise justified nineteenth-century concepts of French and ,pan-Germanic' identity by linking them to iconic artefacts and romanticizing the barbarity of this distant epoch. [source] Gender, memory and Jewish identity: reading a family history from medieval southern ItalyEARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 3 2005Patricia Skinner This article combines recent work on memory in the early and central Middle Ages to read the Scroll of Ahimaaz, a well-known eleventh-century Jewish text from southern Italy. It suggests that previous readings of the text have been shaped by the dominant tradition of intellectual history within Jewish studies, and that Ahimaaz's work has been overlooked for the information it contains about gender and family history. It concludes that whilst the primarily Jewish identity of Ahimaaz and his family is reinforced by the text, they were at the same time as much a product of the southern Italian environment in which they lived. [source] When documents are destroyed or lost: lay people and archives in the early Middle AgesEARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 4 2002Warren Brown In this paper, I discuss some largely unexplored evidence about lay archives in early medieval Europe. This evidence consists of a set of formulae from late Roman, Merovingian, and Carolingian Gaul, and from Carolingian Bavaria. According to these formulae, lay men and women in these regions from the sixth to the ninth centuries kept documents in private archivesbecause they regarded documents as vital to the security of their property holdings. The manuscripts in which the formulae survive indicate that lay people continued to keep archives throughout the ninth century and into the tenth. They also suggest, however, that by the end of the eighth century traditions about how lay people used and stored documents were being preserved and maintained to a large degree by churches and monasteries. [source] Review article: The dangers of polemic: Is ritual still an interesting topic of historical study?EARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE, Issue 4 2002Geoffrey Koziol Philippe Buc, The Dangers of Ritual: Between Early Medieval Texts and Social Scientific Theory. Gerd Althoff, Spielregeln der Politik im Mittelalter: Kommunikation in Frieden und Fehde. Frans Theuws and Janet L. Nelson (eds). Rituals of Power from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Joëlle Rollo-Koster (ed), Medieval and Early Modern Rituals: Formalized Behavior in Europe, China and Japan. [source] Impacts of long-term changes in fishery management on the trophic level water quality in Czech fish pondsFISHERIES MANAGEMENT & ECOLOGY, Issue 1-2 2000L. Pechar The management of Czech fish ponds changed little from the Middle Ages until the end of the nineteenth century. The intensification of fish production was initiated during the first half of the twentieth century. During the 1930s, liming and manuring of the ponds became common. A greater density of stocking led to the use of artificial feeds in the form of pellets and grain. These changes in pond management have led to an increase in fish production from ,,50 to >,500 kg ha,1 year,1 over the last 5 decades. At the same time, the quality of the water and sediments has been deteriorating, and the functioning of the pond ecosystem has been disturbed. There are now massive blooms of phytoplankton, especially cyanobacteria, accompanied by great fluctuations in the oxygen concentration and pH. Data collected since 1925, when systematic research on the ponds started, allow the mechanisms responsible for the changes to be traced. [source] Somatic Styles of the Early Middle AgesGENDER & HISTORY, Issue 3 2008Lynda L. Coon ,Somatic Styles' examines how classical modes of gender played significant roles in carving out competitive arenas between clerical and lay elites, c.600,900 CE. The paper explores the hermeneutical obstacles standing between the contemporary theorist of gender and the complex nature of the early medieval texts under scrutiny. The analysis reconstructs classicising techniques of gender deployed by early medieval churchmen, and it does so in a way that both challenges the stranglehold of the ,one-sex' model on pre-modern understandings of gender and heals the ,rupture' between the ,Ancient' and the ,Dark Age'. Finally, the essay maps early medieval somatic and gendered styles onto an architectural space where lay and consecrated bodies met , a ninth-century monastic basilica. [source] Medieval Marriage: Symbolism and Society by David d'Avray Byzantine Women: Varieties of Experience, AD 800,1200 edited by Lynda Garland Household, Women and Christianities in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages edited by Anneke B. Mulder-Bakker and Jocelyn Wogan-BrowneGENDER & HISTORY, Issue 2 2007E. M. C. VAN HOUTS First page of article [source] (Homo)sex in the City Only?GENDER & HISTORY, Issue 1 2004Change in the Gay Past, Finding Continuity Books reviewed in this article: Glenn Burger and Steven F. Kruger (eds), Queering the Middle Ages John Howard, Men Like That: A Southern Queer History Stephen O. Murray, Homosexualities [source] History of hemodialyzers' designsHEMODIALYSIS INTERNATIONAL, Issue 2 2008Zbylut J. TWARDOWSKI Abstract Accumulation of knowledge requisite for development of hemodialysis started in antiquity and continued through Middle Ages until the 20th century. Firstly, it was determined that the kidneys produce urine containing toxic substances that accumulate in the body if the kidneys fail to function properly; secondly, it was necessary to discover the process of diffusion and dialysis; thirdly, it was necessary to develop a safe method to prevent clotting in the extracorporeal circulation; and fourthly, it was necessary to develop biocompatible dialyzing membranes. Most of the essential knowledge was acquired by the end of the 19th century. Hemodialysis as a practical means of replacing kidney function started and developed in the 20th century. The original hemodialyzers, using celloidin as a dialyzing membrane and hirudin as an anticoagulant, were used in animal experiments at the beginning of the 20th century, and then there were a few attempts in humans in the 1920s. Rapid progress started with the application of cellophane membranes and heparin as an anticoagulant in the late 1930s and 1940s. The explosion of new dialyzer designs continued in the 1950s and 1960s and ended with the development of capillary dialyzers. Cellophane was replaced by other dialyzing membranes in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. Dialysis solution was originally prepared in the tank from water, electrolytes, and glucose. This solution was recirculated through the dialyzer and back to the tank. In the 1960s, a method of single-pass dialysis solution preparation and delivery system was designed. A large quantity of dialysis solution was used for a single dialysis. Sorbent systems, using a small volume of regenerated dialysis solution, were developed in the mid 1960s, and continue to be used for home hemodialysis and acute renal failure. At the end of the 20th century, a new closed system, which prepared and delivered ultrapure dialysis solution preparation, was developed. This system also had automatic reuse of lines and dialyzers and prepared the machine for the next dialysis. This was specifically designed for quotidian home hemodialysis. Another system for frequent home hemodialysis or acute renal failure was developed at the turn of the 21st century. This system used premanufactured dialysis solution, delivered to the home or dialysis unit, as is done for peritoneal dialysis. [source] English Church Monuments in the Middle Ages: History and Representation , By Nigel SaulHISTORY, Issue 318 2010ALAN B. COBBAN No abstract is available for this article. [source] English University Benefactors in the Middle AgesHISTORY, Issue 283 2001Alan B. Cobban The medieval universities of Oxford and Cambridge owed an enormous debt to the generosity of a plurality of benefactors of diverse social origins. Given their limited incomes, the universities could not have functioned at a successful level without the substantial material aid of benefactors. Although the English monarchy made a valuable contribution to several areas of university and collegiate life, it nevertheless appears that this monarchical beneficence was less extensive than might have been supposed. The English male nobility gave the occasional gift of property and made donations to loan-chests but before 1500 only one nobleman was a principal founder of a secular academic college. This opened the way for queens consort and female members of the greater aristocracy to emerge as significant benefactresses in both the university and collegiate spheres. Indeed, it could be argued that women from the upper echelons of society came to rank in importance as university and college benefactors with lesser ecclesiastics, knights, burgesses, merchants, current and former members of colleges and university servants. However, taking the donations of the episcopate in the round, it is probably true to say that the English bishops made the most decisive contribution [source] The Courts of the Prior and the Bishop of Durham in the Later Middle AgesHISTORY, Issue 278 2000Cynthia J. Neville The operation of the common law in late medieval county Durham was characterized by several unique features. Among these were the independence of episcopal officials from interference from royal agents in the execution of the law, and the great variety of temporal courts found there. Within the lands of the palatinate, jurisdiction over suspects accused of felony was shared by both the bishop and the prior of Durham. The origins of this unusual division of judicial authority was an agreement dated c.1229, known as Le Convenit. It defined the relationship between the bishop, the temporal lord of the palatinate, and the prior of the Benedictine monastery in Durham who, as a landholder second only to the bishop, held a separate court for the suit of his free tenants. That relationship was often fraught with tension, for both lords were jealous of the prestige , and the revenues , incumbent on the exercise of judicial authority in their lands. This article examines the origins of Le Convenit, and the consequences of the agreement on criminal legal procedure in late medieval Durham. Successive priors of the monastery struggled tirelessly against the bishops to preserve the privileges they won in 1229, and Le Convenit remained throughout this period a potent weapon in their determination to give expression to lordly power and authority. [source] The Fate of Jewish Historiography after the Bible: A New InterpretationHISTORY AND THEORY, Issue 2 2004Amram Tropper What caused the eventual decline in later Jewish history of the vibrant historiographical tradition of the biblical period? In contrast to the plethora of historical writings composed during the biblical period, the rabbis of the early common era apparently were not interested in writing history, and when they did relate to historical events they often introduced mythical and unrealistic elements into their writings. Scholars have offered various explanations for this phenomenon; a central goal of this article is to locate these explanations within both the immediate historical setting of Roman Palestine and the overarching cultural atmosphere of the Greco-Roman Near East. In particular, I suggest that the largely ahistorical approach of the rabbis functioned as a local Jewish counterpart to the widespread classicizing tendencies of a contemporary Greek intellectual movement, the Second Sophistic. In both cases, eastern communities, whose political aspirations were stifled under Roman rule, sought to express their cognitive and spiritual identities by focusing on a glorious and idealized past rather than on contemporary history. Interestingly, the apparent lack of rabbinic interest in historiography is not limited to the early rabbinic period. Throughout the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance, Jews essentially did not write their political, diplomatic, or military history. Instead, Jews composed "traditional historiography" which included various types of literary genres among which the rabbinic "chain of transmission" was the most important. The chain of transmission reconstructs (or fabricates) the links that connect later rabbinic sages with their predecessors. Robert Bonfil has noted the similarity between this rabbinic project and contemporary church histories. Adding a diachronic dimension to Bonfil's comparison, I suggest that rabbinic chains of transmission and church histories are not similar though entirely independent phenomena, but rather their shared project actually derives from a common origin, the Hellenistic succession list. The succession list literary genre, which sketches the history of an intellectual discipline, apparently thrived during the Second Sophistic and diffused then into both rabbinic Judaism and early Christianity. Thus, even though historiography was not terribly important to the early rabbis or to most Second Sophistic intellectuals, the succession list schematic, or the history of an intellectual discipline, was evaluated differently. Rabbis and early Christians absorbed the succession list from Second Sophistic culture and then continued to employ this historiographical genre for many centuries to come. [source] Re-Forging the ,Age of Iron' Part II: The Tenth Century in a New Age?HISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 9 2010John Howe The tenth century, once dismissed as an unpleasant ,Age of Iron', now receives increased attention as an important age of transition. Historians are attempting to understand how it fits into the broader narrative of Western Civilization. Although some scholars have identified it as the last act of the post-Roman world, others see it as a new age. Perhaps the High Middle Ages with its agricultural and demographic revolution, its new villages and parishes, its revived cities, its reformed churches and schools, and its medieval monarchs began in the tenth century? Or were those changes not novelties of the tenth century but rather manifestations of a ,take off' that had already begun back in the Carolingian Empire, and which, despite the problems posed by late Carolingian wars and invasions, was able to continue, spread, and blossom into the growth and prosperity of the High Middle Ages? New scholarly interest in the tenth century has made it much less of a ,dark age', but scholars still are not quite certain how to conceptualize its historical significance. [source] Recent Perspectives on Leprosy in Medieval Western Europe1HISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 5 2010Elma Brenner Responses to leprosy in medieval Western Europe were complex and often contradictory. Recent scholarship has challenged the predominant earlier view that lepers were excluded and stigmatized, suggesting instead that lepers were believed to have been chosen by God to be redeemed, and were thus the objects of sympathy and compassion. Research in the fields of history, archaeology and literature has addressed the social and religious status of lepers, the clinical identity and prevalence of medieval leprosy, and the medieval medical understanding of the disease. Much research has also focused on the endowment and functioning of leper hospitals (leprosaria). Although these institutions were situated outside towns and cities, they were still connected to mainstream society as a key focus of charity. The study of leprosy in the Middle Ages has been a vibrant field of scholarship in recent years , yet much still remains to be discovered about medieval lepers, leprosy and leprosaria. The field would benefit from studies comparing the situation of lepers in different regions, and from greater consideration of leprosy in its broader cultural, political, iconographic and ethical context. Such work would contribute not only to our understanding of leprosy, but also to the wider social, medical and religious history of the medieval West. [source] The Changing Fortunes of Early Medieval Bavaria to 907 adHISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 4 2010Jonathan Couser This essay surveys the political historiography of the early medieval principality of Bavaria, particularly in three periods; that of the Bavarians' emergence in the sixth century, the time of a complex interrelationship between Bavarians and Franks and their Agilolfing and Carolingian ruling houses in the eighth century, and the transitions of power from Charlemagne's takeover of Bavaria in 788 and the transfer to a new Luitpolding duchy in 907. The Bavarian case serves as a useful counternarrative to those of larger peoples like the Franks or Lombards, and illustrates that the inheritance of Roman tradition, the relationship between rulers and ruled, and the creation and maintenance of ethnic identities could be flexible and complex in the early Middle Ages. [source] The Historiography of a Construct: "Feudalism" and the Medieval HistorianHISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 3 2009Richard Abels Between 1974 and 1994, two influential critiques of feudalism were published, an article in 1974 by Elizabeth A. R. Brown and a book by Susan Reynolds in 1994, that crystallized doubts about the construct of feudalism harbored by many historians of the Middle Ages. Over the last few years textbooks have begun to reflect the new consensus. Medieval historians responsible for chapters on the Middle Ages in Western Civilization and World Civilization textbooks now shy away from the term ,feudalism'. This reticence is less evident in civilization textbooks lacking a medievalist among the collaborators. In several of these we still find the ,feudal Middle Ages' presented without apology, as well as comparisons drawn between Japanese, Chinese, and medieval Western feudalisms. Whether or not the assigned textbook mentions ,feudalism', most Western civilization instructors probably continue to use the term because it is familiar to them and to their students. This article presents an overview of the historiography of one of the key concepts for the study of the Middle Ages, and an assessment of where the state of the question now stands. The author concludes that, although the critique of feudalism is powerful and necessary, the pendulum is threatening to swing too far in the other direction, away from the vertical ties and power relations that once dominated discussions of medieval politics and society, and toward a new paradigm of horizontal bonds, consensus making, and community. [source] Postcolonialism and the Study of the Middle AgesHISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 2 2008Nadia R. Altschul This article focuses on the use of postcolonial criticism in the study of the European Middle Ages. It concentrates on two issues critiqued in particular by historians: anachronism and applicability. The article is thus structured around two questions: Why should medievalists explore contemporary postcolonial issues instead of strictly medieval ones? And why should the tools of postcolonial theory be considered applicable to medieval societies and times? [source] Dismantling the Built Drawing: Working with Mood in Architectural DesignINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ART & DESIGN EDUCATION, Issue 1 2010Randall TealArticle first published online: 15 MAR 2010 From the late Middle Ages onward an emphasis on the rational and the technical aspects of design and design drawing gained hold of architectural practice. In this transformation, the phenomenon of mood has been frequently overlooked or seen as something to be added on to a design; yet the fundamental grounding of mood, as described in Martin Heidegger's philosophy, is anything but secondary to our experience of the world. In fact, other facilities such as embodied experience, tactile and spatial awareness, and temporal perception all spring from the basic encounter with mood. In this article I describe how a lack of attunement to, and limited ability with, the various manifestations of mood perpetuates a disconnection between the architectural drawing and real buildings. I argue that as long as educational frameworks relegate the emotional and experiential to the place of a supplement, then our design processes will continue to unconsciously promote environments of thinness and superficiality. [source] Seafarers, Merchants and Pirates in the Middle AgesINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF NAUTICAL ARCHAEOLOGY, Issue 2 2007MARK REDKNAP No abstract is available for this article. [source] Trends in adult stature of peoples who inhabited the modern Portuguese territory from the Mesolithic to the late 20th centuryINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF OSTEOARCHAEOLOGY, Issue 6 2009H. F. V. Cardoso Abstract This study documents long-term changes in stature from the Mesolithic to the late 20th century in the territory of modern Portugal. Data utilised originated from published sources and from a sample of the Lisbon identified skeletal collection, where long bone lengths were collected. Mean long bone lengths were obtained from 20 population samples and compiled into nine periods. Pooled long bone lengths for each period were then converted to stature estimates. Results show three major trends: (1) a slow increase in stature from prehistory to the Middle Ages; (2) a negative trend from the Middle Ages to the late 19th century; and (3) a very rapid increase in mean stature during the second half of the 20th century. The political and territorial stability of the Kingdom of Portugal may have contributed to the greater heights of the medieval Portuguese, compared with the Roman and Modern periods. The negative secular trend was rooted in poor and unsanitary living conditions and the spread of infectious disease, brought about by increased population growth and urbanisation. Although the end of the Middle Ages coincided with the age of discoveries, the population may not have benefited from the overall prosperity of this period. The 20th century witnessed minor and slow changes in the health status of the Portuguese, but it was not until major improvements in social and economic conditions that were initiated in the 1960s, and further progress in the 1970s, that the Portuguese grew taller than ever before. Since the Middle Ages other European countries have experienced similar oscillations, but showed an earlier recovery in stature after the industrial period. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Developmental anomalies in skeletal remains from the Great Moravia and Middle Ages cemeteries at Devín (Slovakia)INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF OSTEOARCHAEOLOGY, Issue 5 2003S. Masnicová Abstract Developmental anomalies were scored and prevalences were computed for two skeletal collections from Devín (southwestern Slovakia). The first sample Devín-Hrad (DH) is dated to the Middle Ages (11th,12th century) and includes 217 skeletons. The second collection Devín-Za kostolom (FR) includes 112 burials and is dated to the Great Moravian period (9th century). In both samples, the evidence of spina bifida occulta occurred most frequently of all the defects examined (24% in DH, 23% in FR). Sacralization (8% in DH, 7% in FR) was more common than lumbarization (2% in DH, 0% in FR), and spondylolysis (7% in DH, 4% in FR) was relatively frequent in both samples. The other developmental defects occurred in only one or a few individuals and represented sporadic occurrences. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Corpus Mysticum: The Eucharist and the Church in the Middle Ages , By Henri Cardinal de LubacINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY, Issue 4 2010Rustin E. Brian First page of article [source] Horror Crime or Bad Habit?JOURNAL OF RELIGIOUS HISTORY, Issue 4 2008Blasphemy in Premodern Europe In public debates the issue of blasphemy is often marked as a modern phenomenon. In fact, blasphemous speech acts were also an integral part of everyday life in the Middle Ages and in Early Modern Europe. Cursing and swearing, oaths and other blasphemous utterances were used in all strata of society. While enraged preachers condemned this mortal sin and various laws threatened with capital punishment, the common practice was different as most blasphemies passed with minor punishments or even without any kind of prosecution. Attacks on the honour of God were constituent elements of everyday conflict behaviour. Blasphemy therefore must not be misinterpreted as indication of religious indifference or even unbelief, but rather as different usage of the religious sphere in premodern times. [source] | ||||||||||||||||||||||