Best of
Middle-Ages

1988

Byzantium: The Early Centuries


John Julius Norwich - 1988
    48 pages ofillustrations, 16 in color. Maps.

A Vision of Light


Judith Merkle Riley - 1988
    However, like most women in fourteenth-century England, she is illiterate. Three clerics contemptuously decline to be Margaret’s scribe, and only the threat of starvation persuades Brother Gregory, a Carthusian friar with a mysterious past, to take on the task. As she narrates her life, we discover a woman of startling resourcefulness. Married off at the age of fourteen to a merchant reputed to be the Devil himself, Margaret was left for dead during the Black Plague. Incredibly, she survived, was apprenticed to an herbalist, and became a midwife. But most astonishing of all, Margaret has experienced a Mystic Union—a Vision of Light that endows her with the miraculous gift of healing. Because of this ability, Margaret has become suddenly different—to her tradition-bound parents, to the bishop’s court that tries her for heresy, and ultimately to the man who falls in love with her.

Daughter of Lir


Diana Norman - 1988
    

Arms & Armour of the Crusading Era, 1050-1350: Islam, Eastern Europe and Asia (Vol 2)


David Nicolle - 1988
    This is the second volume in a comprehensive study of military weapons and equipment in the Middle Ages.

The Maid of Orleans


Sven Stolpe - 1988
    Stolpe vividly creates the contemporary situation in France, evaluates the latest research in her life, and arrives at a highly original and yet completely believable portrait which is also a work of literature.Stolpe sees Joan of Arc as primarily a mystic, and her supreme achievement and lasting significance not in a mission to deliver France, though important, but in her share in the passion of Christ. By shifting the emphasis from the national to the universal, he brings the saint closer to the modern reader. His scholarship is informed by a profound understanding and sympathy for the Maid that gives this essentially sober work the absorbing interest of a novel.As one critic stated, “Stolpe succeeds in producing a very tense interest, so that it is impossible to lay it aside until the last word is reached.” It should do much to present a new evaluation of the life and significance of St. Joan of Arc, the Maid of Orleans.

Money and Its Use in Medieval Europe


Peter Spufford - 1988
    The book is not limited to one country, or to any one period or theme, but extracts the most important elements for the historian across the broadest possible canvas. Its scope extends from the mining of precious metals on the one hand, to banking, including the use of cheques and bills of exchange, on the other. Chapters are arranged chronologically, rather than regionally or thematically, and offer a detailed picture of the many and changing roles played by money, in all its forms, in all parts of Europe throughout the Middle Ages. Thus money is seen as having differing values for differing parts of individual societies. The book shows money moving and changing as a result of war and trade and other political, economic and ecclesiastical activities without regard for national barriers or the supposed separation between 'East' and 'West'.

Ulysses' Sail: An Ethnographic Odyssey of Power, Knowledge, and Geographical Distance


Mary W. Helms - 1988
    She assesses the diverse goals of travelers, be they Hindu pilgrims in India, Islamic scholars of West Africa, Navajo traders, or Tlingit chiefs, and discusses the most extensive experience of long-distance contact on record--that between Europeans and native peoples--and the clash of cultures that arose from conflicting expectations about the faraway..The author describes her work as especially concerned with the political and ideological contexts or auras within which long-distance interests and activities may be conducted ... Not only exotic materials but also intangible knowledge of distant realms and regions can be politically valuable `goods, ' both for those who have endured the perils of travel and for those sedentary homebodies who are able to acquire such knowledge by indirect means and use it for political advantage.Originally published in 1988.The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

The Church in Western Europe from the Tenth to the Early Twelfth Century


Gerd Tellenbach - 1988
    900 to c. 1125, which is considered both as a set of institutions and as a spiritual body. The first half concentrates on the structures of religious belief and practice in the period 900-1050; the second half concentrates on the revolutionary changes associated with the rise of the papacy to a new level of rulership. It shows how far one can talk of a reform movement, and how the idea and ideal of papal monarchy became both the prisoner and the leader of those who sought for a renewal of Christian life. Tellenbach's survey is the work of a scholar who has been working in the field for over sixty years. It is characterized by the freshness and maturity of its judgments, which cut through many fashionable theories. No other work on this topic offers comparable range, depth and authority.

Robert Grosseteste: The Growth of an English Mind in Medieval Europe


Richard William Southern - 1988
    Johnson in his powers of mind and personality. As a scientist, theologian, and pastoral leader, he was rooted in an English tradition going back beyond the Norman Conquest. Thiscomprehensive study of one of England's great intellects is an important contribution to the history of ideas.

Predatory Kinship and the Creation of Norman Power, 840-1066


Eleanor Searle - 1988
    

Champion


L. Christian Balling - 1988
    Marshall saves the castle through single combat, champions the lady’s cause before King Henry II and the exiled Queen Eleanor, and remains at Henry’s side to fight in the aging king’s final offensive against Phillip of France.

Death and Life in the Tenth Century


Eleanor Shipley Duckett - 1988
    A vivid portrait of political and cultural life in the 10th century