The Ninth Century and the Holy Grail

The Ninth Century and the Holy Grail

Author: W. J. Stein

Publisher: Temple Lodge Publishing

Published: 2009-09-15

Total Pages: 382

ISBN-13: 190699904X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

"One of the most valuable and original works on the Grail yet to appear in any language." --John Matthews, author of The Mystic Grail "The definitive work on the historical background to the Grail Romances of the mediaeval age." --Trevor Ravenscroft, author of The Spear of Destiny Much plagiarized and its contents distorted over the years, Stein's seminal work is a classic of original scholarly and spiritual research. In studying the central Grail narrative of Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, Stein takes a twofold approach. On the one hand, he searches historical records for the identity of actual people and events concealed behind the Grail epic's veil of romance. On the other hand, Stein deciphers Eschenbach's hidden spiritual messages, showing Parzival to be an esoteric document containing powerful pictures of the human being's inner path of development. Stein reveals the period of the ninth century to be far deeper and more important than to be of mere historical and academic interest. It is the karmic ground from which grows the very destiny of our modern era--the grand battle that must take place between the powers of the Grail and the hindrance of sinister anti-Grail forces at large today.


The Legend of Charlemagne in Medieval England

The Legend of Charlemagne in Medieval England

Author: Phillipa Hardman

Publisher: Boydell & Brewer

Published: 2017

Total Pages: 491

ISBN-13: 1843844729

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The first full-length examination of the medieval Charlemagne tradition in the literature and culture of medieval England, from the Chanson de Roland to Caxton. The Matter of France, the legendary history of Charlemagne, had a central but now largely unrecognised place in the multilingual culture of medieval England. From the early claim in the Chanson de Roland that Charlemagne held England as his personal domain, to the later proliferation of Middle English romances of Charlemagne, the materials are woven into the insular political and cultural imagination. However, unlike the wide range of continental French romances, the insular tradition concentrates on stories of a few heroic characters: Roland, Fierabras, Otinel. Why did writers and audiences in England turn again and again to these narratives, rewriting and reinterpreting them for more than two hundred years? This book offers the first full-length, in-depth study of the tradition as manifested in literature and culture. It investigates the currency and impact of the Matter of France with equal attention to English and French-language texts, setting each individual manuscript or early printed text in its contemporary cultural and political context. The narratives are revealed to be extraordinarily adaptable, using the iconic opposition between Carolingian and Saracen heroes to reflect concerns with national politics, religious identity, the future of Christendom, chivalry and ethics, and monarchy and treason. PHILLIPA HARDMAN is Readerin Medieval English Literature (retired) at the University of Reading; MARIANNE AILES is Senior Lecturer in French at the University of Bristol.


The Song of Roland and Other Poems of Charlemagne

The Song of Roland and Other Poems of Charlemagne

Author: Simon Gaunt

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 0199655545

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The Song of Roland offers fascinating insights into medieval ideas about heroism, manhood, religion, race, & nationhood which were foundational for modern European culture. It is the oldest known surviving major work of French literature based on the Battle of Roncevaux in 778, during the reign of Charlemagne.


The Legend of Charlemagne in the Middle Ages

The Legend of Charlemagne in the Middle Ages

Author: M. Gabriele

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2008-09-29

Total Pages: 188

ISBN-13: 0230615449

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

These essays take advantage of a new, exciting trend towards interdisciplinary research on the Charlemagne legend. Written by historians, art historians, and literary scholars, these essays focus on the multifaceted ways the Charlemagne legend functioned in the Middle Ages and how central the shared (if nonetheless fictional) memory of the great Frankish ruler was to the medieval West. A gateway to new research on memory, crusading, apocalyptic expectation, Carolingian historiography, and medieval kingship, the contributors demonstrate the fuzzy line separating "fact" and "fiction" in the Middle Ages.


Byzantium in Dialogue with the Mediterranean

Byzantium in Dialogue with the Mediterranean

Author:

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2019-03-25

Total Pages: 300

ISBN-13: 9004393587

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

In thirteen contributions, Byzantium in Dialogue with the Mediterranean. History and Heritage shows that throughout the centuries of its existence, Byzantium continuously communicated with other cultures and societies on the European continent, as well as North Africa and in the East. In this volume, ‘History’ represents not only the chronological, geographical and narrative background of the historical reality of Byzantium, but it also stands for an all-inclusive scholarly approach to the Byzantine world that transcends the boundaries of traditionally separate disciplines such as history, art history or archaeology. The second notion, ‘Heritage’, refers to both material remains and immaterial traditions, and traces that have survived or have been appropriated. Contributors are Hans Bloemsma, Elena Boeck, Averil Cameron, Elsa Fernandes Cardoso, Cristian Caselli, Evangelos Chrysos, Konstantinos Chryssogelos, Penelope Mougoyianni, Daphne Penna, Marko Petrak, Matthew Savage, Daniëlle Slootjes, Karen Stock, Alex Rodriguez Suarez and Mariëtte Verhoeven.


Teaching World Epics

Teaching World Epics

Author: Jo Ann Cavallo

Publisher: Modern Language Association

Published: 2023-07-27

Total Pages: 200

ISBN-13: 1603296190

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Cultures across the globe have embraced epics: stories of memorable deeds by heroic characters whose actions have significant consequences for their lives and their communities. Incorporating narrative elements also found in sacred history, chronicle, saga, legend, romance, myth, folklore, and the novel, epics throughout history have both animated the imagination and encouraged reflection on what it means to be human. Teaching World Epics addresses ancient and more recent epic works from Africa, Europe, Mesoamerica, and East, Central, and South Asia that are available in English translations. Useful to instructors of literature, peace and conflict studies, transnational studies, women's studies, and religious studies, the essays in this volume focus on epics in sociopolitical and cultural contexts, on the adaptation and reception of epic works, and on themes that are especially relevant today, such as gender dynamics and politics, national identity, colonialism and imperialism, violence, and war. This volume includes discussion of Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, Giulia Bigolina's Urania, The Book of Dede Korkut, Luís Vaz de Camões's Os Lusíadas, David of Sassoun, The Epic of Askia Mohammed, The Epic of Gilgamesh, the epic of Sun-Jata, Alonso de Ercilla y Zúñiga's La Araucana, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Kalevala, Kebra Nagast, Kudrun, The Legend of Poṉṉivaḷa Nadu, the Mahabharata, Manas, John Milton's Paradise Lost, Mwindo, the Nibelungenlied, Poema de mio Cid, Popol Wuj, the Ramayana, the Shahnameh, Sirat Bani Hilal, Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Statius's Thebaid, The Tale of the Heike, Three Kingdoms, Gaspar Pérez de Villagrá's Historia de la Nueva México, and Virgil's Aeneid.


In the Presence of Power

In the Presence of Power

Author: Maurice A. Pomerantz

Publisher: NYU Press

Published: 2017-12-05

Total Pages: 302

ISBN-13: 1479879363

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Insights into power, spectacle, and performance in the courts of Middle Eastern rulers In recent decades, scholars have produced much new research on courtly life in medieval Europe, but studies on imperial and royal courts across the Middle East have received much less attention, particularly for courts before 1500AD. In the Presence of Power, however, sheds new light on courtly life across the region. This insightful, exploratory collection of essays uncovers surprising commonalities across a broad swath of cultures. The pre-modern period in this volume includes roughly seven centuries, opening with the first dynasty of Islam, the Umayyads, whose reign marked an important watershed for Late Antique culture, and closing with the rule of the so-called “gunpowder” empires of the Ottomans and Safavids over much of the Near East in the sixteenth century. In between, this volume locates similarities across the Western Medieval, Byzantine and Islamicate courtly cultures, spanning a vast history and geography to demonstrate the important cross-pollinations that occurred between their literary and cultural legacies. This study does not presume the presence of one shared courtly institution across time and space, but rather seeks to understand the different ways in which contemporaries experienced and spoke about these places of power and performance. Adopting a very broad view of performances, In the Presence of Power includes exuberant expressions of love in Arabic stories, shadow plays in Mamluk Cairo, Byzantine storytelling, religious food traditions in Christian Cyprus, advice, and political and ethnographic performances of power.


Religious Art in France of the Thirteenth Century

Religious Art in France of the Thirteenth Century

Author: Emile Mâle

Publisher: Courier Corporation

Published: 2012-11-16

Total Pages: 450

ISBN-13: 0486143945

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Classic by noted art historian focuses on French cathedrals of the 13th century as apotheosis of medieval style. Iconography, bestiaries, illustrated calendars, gospels, secular history, many other aspects. 190 black-and-white illustrations.


Heroes and Marvels of the Middle Ages

Heroes and Marvels of the Middle Ages

Author: Jacques Le Goff

Publisher: Reaktion Books

Published: 2020-06-15

Total Pages: 233

ISBN-13: 1789142504

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Heroes and Marvels of the Middle Ages is a history like no other: it is a history of the imagination, presented between two celebrated groups of the period. One group consists of heroes: Charlemagne, El Cid, King Arthur, Orlando, Pope Joan, Melusine, Merlin the Wizard, and also the fox and the unicorn. The other is the miraculous, represented here by three forms of power that dominated medieval society: the cathedral, the castle, and the cloister. Roaming between the boundaries of the natural and the supernatural, between earth and the heavens, the medieval universe is illustrated by a shared iconography, covering a vast geographical span. This imaginative history is also a continuing story, which presents the heroes and marvels of the Middle Ages as the times defined them: venerated, then bequeathed to future centuries where they have continued to live and transform through remembrance of the past, adaptation to the present, and openness to the future.