The Lapidary of King Alfonso X the Learned
Author:
Publisher:
Published: 1997
Total Pages: 360
ISBN-13:
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Alfonso X, the Learned
Author: H. Salvador Mart Nez
Publisher: BRILL
Published: 2010
Total Pages: 612
ISBN-13: 9004181474
DOWNLOAD EBOOKA truly groundbreaking book, presenting a portrait of Alfonso X, monarch and medieval intellectual "par excellence," and the extraordinary cultural history of Spain at that time.
The Cultural Power of Medieval Monarchy
Author: Manuel Alejandro Rodríguez de la Peña
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Published: 2023-09-22
Total Pages: 283
ISBN-13: 1000959007
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis book focuses on why the diffusion of the political theology of royal wisdom created “Solomonic” princes with intellectual interests all around the medieval West and how these learned rulers changed the face of Western Europe through their policies and the cultural power of medieval monarchy. Princely wisdom narratives have been seen simply as a tool of royal propaganda in the Middle Ages but these narratives were much more than propaganda, being rather a coherent ideology which transformed princely courts, shaped mentalities, and influenced key political decisions. This cultural power of medieval monarchy was channelled mainly through princely patronage of learning and the arts, but the rise of administrative monarchy and its bureaucracy are equally related to these policies. This can only be understood through a cultural approach to the history of medieval politics, that is, a history of the relationship between knowledge and power in the Middle Ages, a topic much analyzed regarding the medieval church but sometimes neglected in the princely sphere. This volume is a study that supplies an important comparative study of the reception in princely courts of a key aspect of European medieval civilization: The ideal of Christian sapiential rulership and its corollary, rationality in government. This volume is essential reading for students and scholars interested in understanding the medieval roots of the cultural process which gave rise to the modern state.
Demons and Illness from Antiquity to the Early-Modern Period
Author: Siam Bhayro
Publisher: BRILL
Published: 2017-02-06
Total Pages: 447
ISBN-13: 9004338543
DOWNLOAD EBOOKIn many near eastern traditions, including Christianity, Judaism and Islam, demons have appeared as a cause of illness from ancient times until at least the early modern period. This volume explores the relationship between demons, illness and treatment comparatively. Its twenty chapters range from Mesopotamia and ancient Egypt to early modern Europe, and include studies of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. They discuss the relationship between ‘demonic’ illnesses and wider ideas about illness, medicine, magic, and the supernatural. A further theme of the volume is the value of treating a wide variety of periods and places, using a comparative approach, and this is highlighted particularly in the volume’s Introduction and Afterword. The chapters originated in an international conference held in 2013. "Ultimately, Demons and Illness admirably performs the important task of reminding modern scholars of premodern health of the integral role played by these complex and shifting entities in the lives of people across the globe and through the centuries." -Rachel Podd, Fordham University, in: Social History of Medicine 32.3 (2019) "Given the sheer breadth of its scope, the volume is, of course, illustrative rather than comprehensive in its coverage, yet there is a definite coherence to its content, aided by the introduction and afterword which bookend the work and help begin to draw out the threads of commonality and difference. As such it constitutes a significant and welcome resource for comparative explorations of historical-cultural links between demons, illness, medicine, and magic, while offering a clear invitation to future work." -Matthew A. Collins, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 43.5 (2019)
Luxury Arts of the Renaissance
Author: Marina Belozerskaya
Publisher: Getty Publications
Published: 2005-10-01
Total Pages: 292
ISBN-13: 0892367857
DOWNLOAD EBOOKToday we associate the Renaissance with painting, sculpture, and architecture—the “major” arts. Yet contemporaries often held the “minor” arts—gem-studded goldwork, richly embellished armor, splendid tapestries and embroideries, music, and ephemeral multi-media spectacles—in much higher esteem. Isabella d’Este, Marchesa of Mantua, was typical of the Italian nobility: she bequeathed to her children precious stone vases mounted in gold, engraved gems, ivories, and antique bronzes and marbles; her favorite ladies-in-waiting, by contrast, received mere paintings. Renaissance patrons and observers extolled finely wrought luxury artifacts for their exquisite craftsmanship and the symbolic capital of their components; paintings and sculptures in modest materials, although discussed by some literati, were of lesser consequence. This book endeavors to return to the mainstream material long marginalized as a result of historical and ideological biases of the intervening centuries. The author analyzes how luxury arts went from being lofty markers of ascendancy and discernment in the Renaissance to being dismissed as “decorative” or “minor” arts—extravagant trinkets of the rich unworthy of the status of Art. Then, by re-examining the objects themselves and their uses in their day, she shows how sumptuous creations constructed the world and taste of Renaissance women and men.
The Wise King
Author: Simon R. Doubleday
Publisher: Basic Books
Published: 2015-12-01
Total Pages: 337
ISBN-13: 0465073913
DOWNLOAD EBOOKAn illuminating biography of Alfonso X, the 13th-century philosopher-king whose affinity for Islamic culture left an indelible mark on Western civilization "If I had been present at the Creation," the thirteenth-century Spanish philosopher-king Alfonso X is said to have stated, "Many faults in the universe would have been avoided." Known as El Sabio, "the Wise," Alfonso was renowned by friends and enemies alike for his sparkling intellect and extraordinary cultural achievements. In The Wise King, celebrated historian Simon R. Doubleday traces the story of the king's life and times, leading us deep into his emotional world and showing how his intense admiration for Spain's rich Islamic culture paved the way for the European Renaissance. In 1252, when Alfonso replaced his more militaristic father on the throne of Castile and Leóthe battle to reconquer Muslim territory on the Iberian Peninsula was raging fiercely. But even as he led his Christian soldiers onto the battlefield, Alfonso was seduced by the glories of Muslim Spain. His engagement with the Arabic-speaking culture of the South shaped his pursuit of astronomy, for which he was famed for centuries, and his profoundly humane vision of the world, which Dante, Petrarch, and later Italian humanists would inherit. A composer of lyric verses, and patron of works on board games, hunting, and the properties of stones, Alfonso is best known today for his Cantigas de Santa Marí/i> (Songs of Holy Mary), which offer a remarkable window onto his world. His ongoing struggles as a king and as a man were distilled-in art, music, literature, and architecture-into something sublime that speaks to us powerfully across the centuries. An intimate biography of the Spanish ruler in whom two cultures converged, The Wise King introduces readers to a Renaissance man before his time, whose creative energy in the face of personal turmoil and existential threats to his kingdom would transform the course of Western history.
Alfonso X, the Learned
Author: H. Salvador Martínez
Publisher: BRILL
Published: 2010-03-02
Total Pages: 611
ISBN-13: 9004193421
DOWNLOAD EBOOKRecent publications about King Alfonso X have tended to focus on his role as monarch in the context of the institutions of the realm. This book, however, emphasizes the human dimension of this extraordinary figure. Drawing on King Alfonso’s own works and on extensive archival sources, both well-known and neglected, Salvador Martínez brings to life a king who valued the possession of knowledge above all earthly riches. The "Learned King" left a vast legacy of work, which would influence developments in both Spain and Europe, most significantly in the transfer of knowledge from the Arabs to the Christian West. With his intellectual curiosity and his pursuit of wisdom, Alfonso X is a towering figure at the origins of modernity.
A New Companion to the Libro de Buen Amor
Author: Ryan D. Giles
Publisher: Brill's Companions to Medieval
Published: 2021
Total Pages: 248
ISBN-13: 9789004448223
DOWNLOAD EBOOK"The New Companion to the Libro de buen amor provides a platform for exploring current, innovative approaches to this classic poem. It is designed for specialists and non-specialists from a variety of fields, who are interested in investigating different aspects of Juan Ruiz's poem and developing fruitful new paths for future research. Chapters in the volume show how the book engages with Christian, Jewish and Muslim cultures, and delve into its legacy in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Part One sheds light on intersecting cultural milieux, from the Christian court of Castile, to the experience of Jewish and Muslim communities. Part Two illustrates how the poem's meaning through time can be elucidated using an array of theoretical and interdisciplinary approaches. Contributors are Nora C. Benedict, Erik Ekman, Denise K. Filios, Ryan D. Giles, Michelle Hamilton, Carlos Heusch, José Manuel Hidalgo, Gregory S. Hutcheson, Veronica Menaldi, Simone Pinet, Michael R. Solomon"--
The Book of Immediate Magic - Part 2
Author: Jacobus G. Swart
Publisher: Lulu.com
Published: 2018-08
Total Pages: 526
ISBN-13: 0620807946
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe "Shadow Tree Series" comprises a unique collection of Western Esoteric studies and practices which Jacobus G. Swart, spiritual successor to William G. Gray and co-founder of the Sangreal Sodality, has actuated and taught over a period of forty years. In "The Book of Immediate Magic - Part 1" Jacobus G. Swart perpetuates the fundamental tenets of "Self Creation" in which it is maintained that the "Centre" establishes the "Circumference," and that personal reality is emanated in harmony with personal "Will." Hence this tome comprises an enhancement and expansion of the magical doctrines and techniques of Practical Kabbalah addressed in "The Book of Self Creation," "The Book of Sacred Names," and "The Book of Seals & Amulets." Jacobus Swart claims that working "Immediate Magic" is neither impossible nor difficult when we fully understand that consciousness is just one vast ocean, and that thoughts are the waves we make in it. It is all a matter of coordinating consciousness.
The Mineral and the Visual
Author: Brigitte Buettner
Publisher: Penn State Press
Published: 2022-06-29
Total Pages: 271
ISBN-13: 0271093692
DOWNLOAD EBOOKOpulent jeweled objects ranked among the most highly valued works of art in the European Middle Ages. At the same time, precious stones prompted sophisticated reflections on the power of nature and the experience of mineralized beings. Beyond a visual regime that put a premium on brilliant materiality, how can we account for the ubiquity of gems in medieval thought? In The Mineral and the Visual, art historian Brigitte Buettner examines the social roles, cultural meanings, and active agency of precious stones in secular medieval art. Exploring the layered roles played by gems in aesthetic, ideological, intellectual, and economic practices, Buettner focuses on three significant categories of art: the jeweled crown, the pictorialized lapidary, and the illustrated travel account. The global gem trade brought coveted jewels from the Indies to goldsmiths’ workshops in Paris, fashionable bodies in London, and the crowns of kings across Europe, and Buettner shows that Europe’s literal and metaphorical enrichment was predicated on the importation of gems and ideas from Byzantium, the Islamic world, Persia, and India. Original, transhistorical, and cross-disciplinary, The Mineral and the Visual engages important methodological questions about the work of culture in its material dimension. It will be especially useful to scholars and students interested in medieval art history, material culture, and medieval history.
