MetaFilter posts tagged with medieval

Their balmy slumbers waked with strife

Abiezer — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 10:41:37 -0800

The Soldier in later Medieval England is a historical research project that seeks to 'challenge assumptions about the emergence of professional soldiery between 1369 and 1453'. They've compiled impressive databases of tens of thousands of service records. These are perhaps of interest only to specialists; but the general reader may enjoy the profiles of individual military men: these run the gamut from regional non-entities like John Fort esquire of Llanstephan ("in many ways a humdrum figure" though once accused of harbouring a hostile Spaniard!) to more familiar figures such as rebel Welsh prince Owain Glyndŵr, who began his soldiering, as did many compatriots, in the service of the English king. Between such extremes of high and low we find, for example, Reginald Cobham, who made 6,500 florins ransoming a prisoner taken at Poitiers and rests eternal in a splendid tomb; and various men loyal and rebel who fought at the bloody Battle of Shrewsbury in 1403.

Online courses on Western history

Kattullus — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 12:20:31 -0800

Dr. E.L. Skip Knox teaches history at Boise State University. His online courses have dedicated websites with his lectures and plenty of supporting material. There are five, History of Western Civilization, covering the wide sweep of European history from ancient Athens to Copernicus, The Crusades, Europe in the Late Middle Ages, focusing on the the Renaissance, and Europe in the Age of Reformation. You can also go on a Virtual Pilgrimage to the Holy Land in medieval times. Dr. Knox has written extensively about online teaching including a lecture called The Rewards of Teaching On-Line where he explains his methods and shares his experiences.

Jean Fouquet

thomas j wise — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 20:25:19 -0800

Jean Fouquet, peintre et enlumineur du XVe siecle is an exquisite French-language exhibition devoted to the fifteenth-century painter Jean Fouquet. Fouquet--known, among other things, as the painter of (possibly) the first stand-alone self-portrait--is best remembered for the Melun Diptych, now split between two museums. His illuminations include the Book of Hours of Étienne Chevalier and contributions to the Book of Hours of Simon de Varie, among others.

The Immaculate Tirant

Iridic — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 15:18:12 -0800

"God save me!" quoth the priest, with a loud voice, "is Tirante the White there? Give me him here, neighbour; for I make account I have found in him a treasure of delight, and a mine of entertainment. Here we have Don Kyrieleison of Montalvan, a valorous knight, and his brother Thomas of Montalvan, and the knight Fonseca, and the combat in which the valiant Tirante fought with the mastiff, and the smart conceits of the damsel Plazerdemivida, with the amours and artifices of the widow Reposada; and madam the empress in love with her squire Hypolito. Verily, gossip, in its way, it is the best book in the world..."

-Don Quixote de la Mancha, Part I, Chapter 6 Tirant Lo Blanc, written in the late fifteenth century by the Valencians Martorell and Joan de Galba, combines a fictionalized history of the two-fisted mercenary general Roger de Flor with elements of The Decameron, The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, and Ramon Llull's Book of the Order of Chivalry. A sense of life lifts the work above both its influences and the third-hand tropes of its contemporaries; as Cervantes writes, "here the knights eat and sleep, and die in their beds, and make their wills before their deaths; with several things which are wanting in other books of this kind." This realism was a revelation to Cervantes, whose own exploration of the border between high duty and base necessity inaugurated the Western novel. As such, Tirant the White is perhaps the most quietly influential book in all of literature. Bonus Cervantes Inspiration: Amadis of Gaul - in blog form!

Medieval Gastronomy

Ljubljana — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 07:04:17 -0800

Medieval Gastronomy. Food, cooking and meals in the Middle Ages. {via nsfw}

Medieval and early modern liturgical books

thomas j wise — Wed, 27 May 2009 19:26:13 -0800

Graduel à l'usage de Saint-Dié digitizes a French gradual (choir music for the Mass) created in the late fifteenth or early sixteenth century. For more information about what's what, see the handy definitions offered by the British Library or Celebrating the Liturgy's Books. A number of other beautiful liturgical manuscripts are now online. (Note: many sites are in French or German.)

Leaves from various liturgical books
Le Graduel de Bellelay (c. 12th century)
Graduel de St. Katharinenthal (14th c.; three images)
Sherborne Missal
Missale Manuscripta Bruges (15th century)
Book of Gregorian Chant (c. 16th century)
Gradual (c. 16th century)
Missale Lugdunense (16th century)
Spanish antiphoner (16th century)
Codices Electronici Sangallenses digitizes liturgical and other books from the Abbey Library of St. Gallen.
For a growing archive of medieval polyphonic manuscripts, visit the Digital Image Archive of Medieval Music (go to "search" and click on the "images only" box; full-sized view requires registration).

What's going on over there?

adamvasco — Sat, 02 May 2009 11:52:02 -0800

The Luttrell Psalter is the definitive example of Marginalia; the term used to describe drawings and flourishes in medieval illuminated manuscripts. Explore pages similar to this and this up close. Here is a medieval blog which has more Marginalia, both amusing and medievally ribauld or both. For serious scholars Marginalia is the website of the Medieval Reading Group at the University of Cambridge which has a myriad of online resources.

Chartres, virtually

thomas j wise — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 16:59:44 -0800

Chartres: Cathedral of Notre-Dame offers photographs, diagrams, antique prints, and maps of Chartres Cathedral. And that's not the only virtual Chartres site: there's a tour courtesy of San Jose SU and a more elaborate tour (requires Quicktime) offered by the Art History department at Ithaca College. Among other things, Great Buildings features some 3D models (additional, albeit free, software required to view). Speaking of virtual experiences, you can walk the Chartres labyrinth (see here for a more technical description). And don't forget video, including this National Geographic short on the cathedral's architecture; you can also listen to the bells.

Pants Optional

homunculus — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:32:48 -0800

Pants Optional - A Relatively Civilized Fashion Primer for the Well-Clad. [Via]

RaDaK

tellurian — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 16:27:07 -0800

The manuscripts of David Kaufmann, Jewish scholar extraordinaire. Wonderful illuminations, inventive typography and even a little bit of naughtiness.

Love has Enemies

Count — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 18:47:42 -0800

Chris Dane Owens' epic medieval bluescreen journey to poprock superstardom. Video directed by academy award winning Robert Short. Alright, the plot may have some holes, but the shimmering green guitar, slap bass, golden locks and lack of pretensions more than make up for it.

The Art of Onfim: Medieval Novgorod Through the Eyes of a Child

sidartha — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 08:37:42 -0800

Amazing collection of sketches and doodles, drawn on birch bark, created by a child in Medieval Novgorod.

What caused the Viking Age?

stbalbach — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 20:36:24 -0800

What caused the Viking Age? It has long been a source of, er, conflict among Nordic scholars. A new study ($ub-only) suggests the Viking Age was triggered by a shortage of women (lack of).

Tilman Riemenschneider

thomas j wise — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 22:09:01 -0800

Tilman Riemenschneider (1460-1531) was one of the great late medieval sculptors. Riemenschneider worked in both wood and stone, although his specialty was limewood sculpture. (Not surprisingly, he had imitators.) His greatest achievements, however, are his exquisitely carved and spectacular altars, of which the most famous is the Altar of the Holy Blood (Heilig-Blut-Altar). For comparative purposes, see some of Riemenschneider's contemporaries, such as Niclaus Gerhaert von Leiden and Veit Stoss (especially the High Altar of St. Mary).

Medieval church carvings, masturbation included

Kattullus — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 23:26:45 -0800

Tina Manthorpe's Flickr set of churces and church carvings has many lovely images of the kinds of things one isn't surprised to see in churches, trees of life, colorful roof bosses, misericords and many more such beauties. More shocking to modern sensibilities are the pictures in the set she calls exhibitionist church carvings, featuring such images as a protogoatse, Starbucksesque mermaids, autofellatio, free-hanging genitals and, uh... something involving thumb-sucking and snakes.

Ancient, Medieval and Classic Works

Kattullus — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 12:19:35 -0800

In Parentheses is a collection of many ancient, medieval and classic texts from all over the world, many of whom are hard to find anywhere, let alone on the internet. There are translations from Greek, Old Norse, Medieval Irish, Japanese, Incan, Old French, Medieval Latin and many more! As well as all that they have papers in medieval studies and vaguely decadent and orientalism series. Adding to that there's a linguistics section with wordlists and language flash cards in languages such as Icelandic, Quechua, Basque, Classical Armenian and a whole bunch more. [flashcard links go to pdf files]

Poison pen

WPW — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 02:18:21 -0800

Historical fact follows historical fiction. Lick your fingers to turn the page. Possible historical fact, anyway: "Medieval bones from six different Danish cemeteries reveal that monks who wrote Biblical texts and other religious materials may have been exposed to toxic mercury, which was used to formulate just one of their ink colors: red."

Vidovdan

adricv — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 09:20:09 -0800

Today is June 28th, June 15th on the Julian Calendar, and it holds a great historical significance to Serbia. 619 years ago today, the Battle of Kosovo was fought between the Ottoman Empire and the Tsardom of Serbia, which ended as a victory for the Ottomans after an epic stand to the end, resulting in the deaths of both the Serbian king and the Ottoman Sultan. 94 years ago today, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in Sarajevo by Gavrilo Princip, a member of the Black Hand organisation, ultimately triggering the First World War. 5 years later, the Treaty of Versailles was signed in Paris, marking an end to the Great War (The Six Months That Changed The World video lecture by John V. Denson). In 1921, King Alexander I of Yugoslavia (what was then the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes) signed the Constitution for the country. In 1948, the Cominform condemned the Yugoslav Communist leaders in a "Resolution on the State of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia), formally splitting the Yugoslav partisans and the Soviet Union under Stalin. In 1989, Slobodan Milosevic delivered a speech in Kosovo, against a backdrop of tensions between an exploding Albanian population and the existing Serbian population, paradoxically advocating unity and brotherhood between the peoples of Kosovo and simultaneously fanning nationalist rhetoric, breaking from Tito's anti-nationalistic line. In 2001, Milosevic was deported to the International Criminal Courts of Justice in The Hague to stand trial for a slew of charges weighed against him, finally dying before any ruling could be served. And finally, in 2006, Montenegro became the 192nd member of the United Nations. All of these events, on June 28th, Saint Vitus' Day.

"Afterward, the locust with its execrable teeth"

Kattullus — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 05:00:06 -0800

The Speculum theologiae is a beautiful medieval manuscript. Its diagrams demonstrate visually various aspects of the medieval worldview. The diagrams are explained and translated and most of them are expounded upon in a short essay. My favorite diagrams are The Cherub with Six Wings, The 10 Commandments, Plagues of Egypt and Abuses of the Impious and The Tree of Virtue and The Tree of Vices.

Anglo-Saxon life

Upton O'Good — Tue, 27 May 2008 23:36:57 -0800

Regia Anglorum, an English re-enactment society, maintains a wealth of information about life in medieval England using the virtual village of Wichamstow and its surroundings. They have in-depth articles on many of the crafts and trades that the villagers would have undertaken, and about the places they would live and work. (A full listing is here.) They are perhaps unique, however, in building a medieval village and estate with which to demonstrate medieval craftsmanship.

Scans of medieval and renaissance manuscripts

Kattullus — Sat, 03 May 2008 10:06:45 -0800

Columbia University's Digital Scriptorium is a database of high quality scans from medieval and renaissance manuscripts. The highlights section alone is breathtaking, but you can search and browse through over 5000 manuscripts and almost 25000 individual images.

Gloria in electronica

1f2frfbf — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 11:54:28 -0800

The University of South Carolina recently completed an ambitious survey of all medieval texts in the state for an exhibit at the university library. All the works were scanned and archived electronically. However, not only can you view the texts online, you can hear the university's chorus sing (MP3) the musical manuscripts. Highlights include such content as Astronomical tables from 15th century Italy and commentaries on Aristotle, and such eye candy as miniature illuminations, and gilded grand illuminations. Nota bene: the java based browser seems to be flaky with some browsers.

Art Image Bank

Rumple — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 10:39:35 -0800

Art Images for College Teaching is a searchable, browsable collection of 2,027, well, art images for college teaching, and appears to be mainly the personal collection of Art Historian Allan Kohl (previously on MeFi), and thus represents his interests and specialities, not to mention the variable quality of his photographic skills. Rather strong in Ancient and Medieval, especially architecture, but tapers off as you become more distant from Europe or closer to the 20th century. Nice sets include the Lion Hunt from Ashurbanipal, Iraq; the exterior sculpture of Chartres; and grave stele.

Dispossess the swain

Abiezer — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 11:15:51 -0800

Wharram Percy [1996 vintage Web] was a Yorkshire Wolds village that survived for more than a millennium before being suddenly depopulated. Was it plague, Viking raids or William the Conqueror's Harrying of the North that drove the people from the land? No, it seems it was the sheep. The main link provides an overview of some of the findings about the village and medieval English peasant life [BBC radio programme] emerging from the decades of archaeological research into Wharram Percy.

Medieval Church Wall Paintings

thomas j wise — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 15:47:15 -0800

The Mills-Kronborg Collection of Danish Church Wall Paintings, courtesy of Princeton University's Index of Christian Art, includes descriptions and images of medieval and early modern church frescoes. There are more church frescoes at Painting and Sculpture in Medieval Hungary. (Another site features a fine panorama.) Anne Marshall has developed an extensive site devoted to similar paintings in England, many of which were whitewashed during the Reformation. The University of Leicester hosts a much more specialized database devoted to the Seven Deadly Sins and the Seven Corporal Works of Mercy (no images); La Mort Dans L'Art/Death in Art has some Continental examples of The Three Living and the Three Dead.