A frontier between both Christianity and Islam and between Francia and the Iberian Peninsula, the region that later became Catalonia was at the heart of the demographic and cultural expansion of the Carolingian empire between the 9th and 12th centuries. The author traces previously hidden social networks in this complex society.
'Beowulf', one of the earliest poems in the English language, recounts a tale of heroism played out against the backdrop of Scandinavia in the 5th to 6th centuries AD. And yet, this Old English verse narrative set in Scandinavia is – a little surprisingly, perhaps – populated with names of German descent. This insight into the personal names of 'Beowulf' acts the starting point for Philip A. Shaw's innovative and nuanced study. As Shaw reveals, the origins of these personal names provide important evidence for the origins of Beowulf as it enables us to situate the poem fully in its continental contexts. As such, this book is not only a much-needed reassessment of 'Beowulf''s beginnings, but also sheds new light on the links between 'Beowulf' and other continental narrative traditions, such as the Scandinavian sagas and Continental German heroics. In doing so, Names and Naming in 'Beowulf' takes readers beyond the continuing debate over the dating of the poem and provides a compelling new model for the poem's origins.
Anglo-Danish Empire is an interdisciplinary handbook for the Danish conquest of England in 1016 and the subsequent reign of King Cnut the Great. Bringing together scholars from the fields of history, literature, archaeology, and manuscript studies, the volume offers comprehensive analysis of England’s shift from Anglo-Saxon to Danish rule. It follows the history of this complicated transition, from the closing years of the reign of King Æthelred II and the Anglo-Danish wars, to Cnut’s accession to the throne of England and his consolidation of power at home and abroad. Ruling from 1016 to 1035, Cnut drew England into a Scandinavian empire that stretched from Ireland to the Baltic. His reign rewrote the place of Denmark and England within Europe, altering the political and cultural landscapes of both countries for decades to come.
Arabic-Islamic Views of the Latin West provides an insight into how the Arabic-Islamic world perceived medieval Western Europe in an age that is usually associated with the rise and expansion of Islam, the Spanish Reconquista, and the Crusades. Previous scholarship has maintained that the Arabic-Islamic world regarded Western Europe as a cultural backwater at the periphery of civilization that clung to a superseded religion. It holds mental barriers imposed by Islam responsible for the Muslim world's arrogant and ignorant attitude towards its northern neighbours. This study refutes this view by focussing on the mechanisms of transmission and reception that characterized the flow of information between both cultural spheres. By explaining how Arabic-Islamic scholars acquired and processed data on medieval Western Europe, it traces the two-fold 'emergence' of Latin-Christian Europe — a sphere that increasingly encroached upon the Mediterranean and therefore became more and more important in Arabic-Islamic scholarly literature. Chapter One questions previous interpretations of related Arabic-Islamic records that reduce a large and differentiated range of Arabic-Islamic perceptions to a single basic pattern subsumed under the keywords 'ignorance', 'indifference', and 'arrogance'. Chapter Two lists channels of transmission by means of which information on the Latin-Christian sphere reached the Arabic-Islamic sphere. Chapter Three deals with the general factors that influenced the reception and presentation of this data at the hands of Arabic-Islamic scholars. Chapters Four to Eight analyse how these scholars acquired and dealt with information on themes such as the western dimension of the Roman Empire, the Visigoths, the Franks, the papacy and, finally, Western Europe in the age of Latin-Christian expansionism. Against this background, Chapter Nine provides a concluding re-evaluation.
A major reassessment of the vikings and their legacy The Vikings maintain their grip on our imagination, but their image is too often distorted by myth. It is true that they pillaged, looted, and enslaved. But they also settled peacefully and traveled far from their homelands in swift and sturdy ships to explore. The Age of the Vikings tells the full story of this exciting period in history. Drawing on a wealth of written, visual, and archaeological evidence, Anders Winroth captures the innovation and pure daring of the Vikings without glossing over their destructive heritage. He not only explains the Viking attacks, but also looks at Viking endeavors in commerce, politics, discovery, and colonization, and reveals how Viking arts, literature, and religious thought evolved in ways unequaled in the rest of Europe. The Age of the Vikings sheds new light on the complex society, culture, and legacy of these legendary seafarers.
A ground breaking study, On Hospitals explores welfare institutions in western law in the middle ages and establishes a legal model for the hospital. Running against orthodox opinion, Watson places welfare institutions, rather than Church-run organisations, at the heart of the medieval hospital's history.
In the last twenty years scholarship on late antique and early medieval Ravenna has resulted in a certain number of publications mainly focused on the fields of architecture, mosaics and archaeology. On the contrary, much less attention has been paid on labour – both manual and intellectual – as well as the structure of production and objects derived from manufacturing activities, despite the fact that Ravenna is the place which preserves the highest number of historical evidence among all centres of the late Roman Mediterranean. Its cultural heritage is vast and composite, ranging from papyri to inscriptions, from ivories to marbles, as well as luxury objects, pottery, and coins. Starting from concrete typologies of hand-manufactured goods existing in the Ravennate milieu, the book aims at exploring the multifaceted traditions of late antique and early Byzantine handicraft from the fourth to the eighth century AD. Its perspective is to pay attention more on patronage, social taste, acculturation, workers and the economic industry of production which supported the demand, circulation and distribution of artefacts, than on the artistic evaluation of the objects themselves.
Debating medieval Europe serves as an entry point for studying and teaching medieval history. Rather than simply presenting foundational knowledge or introducing sources, it provides the reader with frameworks for understanding the distinctive historiography of the period, digging beneath the historical accounts provided by other textbooks to expose the contested foundations of apparently settled narratives. It opens a space for discussion and debate, as well as providing essential context for the sometimes overwhelming abundance of specialist scholarship. Volume I addresses the early Middle Ages, covering the period c. 450–c. 1050. The chapters are organised chronologically, and cover such topics as the Carolingian Order, England and the ‘Atlantic Archipelago’, the Vikings and Ottonian Germany. It features a highly distinguished selection of medieval historians, including Paul Fouracre and Janet L. Nelson.
The “Long Middle Ages” indicates a span of time extending from Antiquity, across the Middle Ages, to the Early Modern period. The author tries to understand factors of historical continuity binding this period together and the periodic scenes of violent change that disrupted societies and traditions. The Long Middle Ages were established on classical and biblical foundations, while each generation interpreted and expanded on those origins. The cohesion of the Long Middle Ages was brought about by continuous acts of reflection and renascence. Scholarly practices and ideas of Antiquity were taken up in the monasteries and cathedral schools of the Middle Ages, while during the Renaissance, and then the Baroque period, thinkers looked back to Antiquity and to the Middle Ages. Continuity and Rupture in the Long Middle Ages is an interdisciplinary approach to intellectual history, which puts the history of ideas in the context of cultural, political, religious, and legal history. Medieval history is the central moment, while continuity and change are found in traditions extending from the Lord’s Prayer (AD 30) to Jean Mabillon (AD 1632–1707) and onward to moderns like Ernst Cassirer and Paul Ricoeur. Readers will discover new significance in historical figures like the Venerable Bede, Boniface of Mainz, Charlemagne, and Pope Formosus – in the laws of medieval kings and bishops – and institutions like the monastery of Cluny. These essays, gathered together for the first time in this Variorum volume, offer powerful new interpretations for students and researchers in the fields of medieval studies, legal and literary interpretation, legal history, and the history of European intellectual life from ancient to modern times.
