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This volume brings together a team of leading scholars in Spanish studies to interrogate the contemporary significance of the medieval past, offering a counterbalance to intellectual withdrawal from urgent public debates.
In Christian Identity amid Islam in Medieval Spain Charles L. Tieszen explores a small corpus of texts from medieval Spain in an effort to deduce how their authors defined their religious identity in light of Islam, and in turn, how they hoped their readers would distinguish themselves from the Muslims in their midst. It is argued that the use of reflected self-image as a tool for interpreting Christian anti-Muslim polemic allows such texts to be read for the self-image of their authors instead of the image of just those they attacked. As such, polemic becomes a set of borders authors offered to their communities, helping them to successfully navigate inter-religious living.
Medieval Spain is brilliantly recreated, in all its variety and richness, in this comprehensive survey. Likely to become the standard work in English, the book treats the entire Iberian Peninsula and all the people who inhabited it, from the coming of the Visigoths in the fifth century to the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella. Integrating a wealth of information about the diverse peoples, institutions, religions, and customs that flourished in the states that are now Spain and Portugal, Joseph F. O'Callaghan focuses on the continuing attempts to impose political unity on the peninsula. O'Callaghan divides his story into five compact historical periods and discusses political, social, economic, and cultural developments in each period. By treating states together, he is able to put into proper perspective the relationships among them, their similarities and differences, and the continuity of development from one period to the next. He gives proper attention to Spain's contacts with the rest of the medieval world, but his main concern is with the events and institutions on the peninsula itself. Illustrations, genealogical charts, maps, and an extensive bibliography round out a book that will be welcomed by scholars and student of Spanish and Portuguese history and literature, as well as by medievalists, as the fullest account to date of Spanish history in the Middle Ages.
The culture of medieval Spain was anything nut homogeneous. It varied not only through time, with the approach of the Renaissance, but also geographically, with great differences between north and south. In this study, author Lucy A. Sponsler illuminates the role of women during this interesting period by exploring their portrayal in literature. Women in the Medieval Spanish Epic and Lyric Traditions examines the various ways in which women were portrayed in the formative years of medieval society, as well as the development of these views as new social mores evolved. Employing a thorough examination of the literature, Sponsler reveals that a high degree of respect was demonstrated toward women in Spanish prose and poetry of this period. Her study sheds new light on the role of women in relation to men, family, and social organization in medieval Spain.
A finalist for World Magazine's Book of the Year! Scholars, journalists, and even politicians uphold Muslim-ruled medieval Spain—"al-Andalus"—as a multicultural paradise, a place where Muslims, Christians, and Jews lived in harmony. There is only one problem with this widely accepted account: it is a myth. In this groundbreaking book, Northwestern University scholar Darío Fernández-Morera tells the full story of Islamic Spain. The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise shines light on hidden history by drawing on an abundance of primary sources that scholars have ignored, as well as archaeological evidence only recently unearthed. This supposed beacon of peaceful coexistence began, of course, with the Islamic Caliphate's conquest of Spain. Far from a land of religious tolerance, Islamic Spain was marked by religious and therefore cultural repression in all areas of life and the marginalization of Christians and other groups—all this in the service of social control by autocratic rulers and a class of religious authorities. The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise provides a desperately needed reassessment of medieval Spain. As professors, politicians, and pundits continue to celebrate Islamic Spain for its "multiculturalism" and "diversity," Fernández-Morera sets the historical record straight—showing that a politically useful myth is a myth nonetheless.
This volume of essays contains contributions from a very wide range of British, American and Spanish scholars. Its primary concern is the relationships between the various ethnic, cultural, regional and religious communities that co-existed in the Iberian peninsula in the later Middle Ages. Conflicts and mutual interactions between them are here explored in a range of both historical and literary studies, to expose something of the rich diversity of the cultural life of later medieval Spain.
As the end of the first millennium drew near - a date when many expected the end of the world - the beleaguered Christian communities of Spain, still dominated by Islam, were experiencing a profound spiritual crisis. To make sense of their predicament, they turned to the Revelation of St John the Divine, in particular the commentary written three centuries before by the monk Beatus of Liebana, making of their illuminated manuscripts an art form of extraordinary expressive power. More than twenty of these manuscripts survive, dating from between 900 and 1100, all illuminated in a colorful style known as Mozarabic - a combination of Carolingian, Islamic, Byzantine and Visigothic art. The Beatus manuscripts are the largest, but not the only, body of such work; there are Bibles and a small number of other religious texts. All, however, share the same apocalyptic vision. Cut off from the rest of Europe and obsessed by the imminence of God's judgement, these artists invented a world peopled by angelic warriors, demons and beasts, exotic birds and serpents and luxuriant trees. This bizarre, psychologically fascinating world is revealed here in superb colour plates and finely detailed black and white illustrations. Mireille Mentre explores the context of the illuminations and explains their dense theological meaning without dissipating their magic.
The description for this book, Apparitions in Late Medieval and Renaissance Spain, will be forthcoming.