The Medieval Vegetarian
The idea that it was wrong to meat in the Middle Ages was certainly not widely held. Most people would consume meat from cattle, sheep and other animals without any vexation. However, one well-known 11th century poet was not only a vegetarian, but also a practicing vegan.
The Battle of Culloden in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery – Part 2: The Battle and Aftermath
This lady’s story is one of courage and Jacobite patriotism; without her, the Prince may never succeed in making his voyage to Skye, which inspired the folk song quoted in the beginning.
The Battle of Culloden in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery – Part 1: Prelude
When day dawned on April 16th, 1746, what would be the final pitched battle on the British soil took place on the field of Culloden near Inverness in the Scottish Highlands.
The Women around an Emperor: Mary of Burgundy
In the first in a series of features exploring the early modern women whose lives intersected in some way with that of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, Natalie Anderson examines the life of Mary of Burgundy.
Stefan Nemanja: A Case Of Sacral Kingship
This PhD thesis investigates how the successors to the first ruler of an amalgamation of Serb lands, the Raškan Serb Veliki Župan, Stefan Nemanja, sought to create legitimacy for what otherwise may have been the passing successes of one local chieftain.
The Customary of the Royal Convent of Las Huelgas of Burgos: Female Liturgy, Female Scribes
This article explores the medieval customary of the royal convent of Las Huelgas of Burgos, a hitherto unpublished document of critical importance for the knowledge of one of the most emblematic institutions of medieval Castile.
A Will of their Own? Children’s Agency and Child Labour in Byzantium
This paper examines the relation between three concepts: a child’s will, children’s agency and child labour. This paper shows how these concepts were developed in Byzantine society in order to advance a religious agenda.
Mercantile Arithmetic in Renaissance Italy: A Translation and Study of Selected Passages from a Vernacular Abbaco Work
This essay is a study of a Renaissance Italian manuscript which has been published under the title Arte Giamata Aresmetica (‘The Art Called Arithmetic’).
The Inverse Perspective in Byzantine Painting
The inverse perspective is a method of representing spatial depth used only in Byzantine painting. It is different from Renaissance perspective. The inverse perspective, with two-dimensional axonometric representations, is more complex, offering multiple possibilities of symbolization.
Beard Pulling in Medieval Christian Art: Various Interpretations of a Scene
Christian iconography contains a lot of subjects with unclear interpretation. More difficult are the cases where unclear subjects could have several possible interpretations. That is the case of the scene where one man is pulling out the beard of another one.
Krakow, the Old Town – A Continental Venice
Surviving the destructions of the war, the old town of Krakow is a lesson of architecture and urbanism through the multitude of architectural styles, coherence and urban continuity.
Was a lease effective as a weapon of lordship? The use of documents in the principality of Salerno (10th-11th Century)
This paper attempts to examine the strategic use of the agrarian contracts by the landlords of the principality of Salerno in the tenth and eleventh centuries.
After Soissons: The Last Years of Charles the Simple (923-929)
In August 923, Charles the Simple was imprisoned by Count Heribert II of Vermandois, spending the rest of his life in prison. The six years between his imprisonment and his death, however, have never been the focus of a sustained study.
Outcasts: Prejudice and Persecution in the Medieval World comes to the Getty
Outcasts: Prejudice & Persecution in the Medieval World, on view January 30—April 8, 2018 at the J. Paul Getty Museum at the Getty Center, presents individual case studies that examine the way art, like language, was used to articulate a rhetoric of exclusion.
Now and Forever: The Art of Medieval Time – new exhibition comes to the Morgan Library
Drawing upon the rich holdings of the Morgan Library & Museum’s collection of medieval and Renaissance illuminated manuscripts, Now and Forever explores how people told time in the Middle Ages and what they thought about it.
Political and Cultural Relations between Norway and England after the Conquest
What I want to suggest here is that there were important connection between Anglo-Norman England and Scandinavian literature and culture as well, even though the Anglo-Norman kings and writers increasingly looked to the continent for modes of explaining their society.
Is the Bayeux Tapestry coming to Britain?
Reports suggest the Bayeux Tapestry – one of the most famous pieces of medieval art – will be loaned to the British Museum for several months.
Is it medieval or mediaeval?
Why do we have these two spellings, and why has medieval become more popular?
New Medieval Books: The Anglo-Saxon World
Here are five (plus one) new books about Anglo-Saxon England.
How the parrot tricked the knight
In the following story from the late twelfth-century, Alexander Neckham describes how deceitful parrots could be.
Which Medieval Battle Role Would You Be Given?
This test allows you to discover which role on a medieval battlefield you would be given.
Not All Fun and Games: The Dangers of the Medieval Tournament
The tournament, with all its elements of theatre and spectacle, was the ideal showground for martial skill, chivalric values, and medieval masculinity. But, behind the glamour, was a dangerous sport that often involved life or death circumstances.
Women in the Tang Dynasty: Prescribed, dependent and scary
Images from the Tang dynasty 唐朝 (618–907) present us with independent and powerful women, conferring the idea that the Tang dynasty was the one era in Chinese history in which the patriarchal grip was not as tight as during other dynasties.
Venice’s Need for Settling the ‘Byzantine question’ by Conquest: The Fourth Crusade’s Second Siege of Constantinople (early 1204)
This article is a contribution to the ‘diversion debate’ concerning the Fourth Crusade (1202-1204), which argues that ultimately the endangered Venetian commercial interests were at the core of the final decision by the crusade leadership to conquer and take over the Byzantine empire.
Cardinals and the War of Ferrara
The bestowal of a red hat can turn even the most humbly born cleric into an ecclesiastical prince, but whereas few cardinals of the modern era have been born princely, most of those created in the Renaissance period could claim to be of noble lineage.