Following the Frankish conquest of the Peloponnese in the thirteenth century, William II of Villehardouin built a great castle on a hill near Sparta that later came to be known as Mistra. Ten years later, in a battle in northern Greece, Villehardouin was defeated and captured by the Byzantine emperor. The terms for his release included giving Mistra to the Byzantine Greeks. Under their rule, the city flourished and developed into a center of learning and the arts and was a focal point for the cultural development of Europe. Sir Steven Runciman, one of the most distinguished historians of the Byzantine period, traveled to Mistra on numerous occasions and became enchanted with the place. Now published in paperback for the first time, Lost Capital of Byzantium tells the story of this once-great city--its rise and fall and its place in the history of the Peloponnese and the Byzantine empire.

    Written in Iceland a century after the close of the Viking Age, it tells ancient stories of the Norse creation epic and recounts the battles that follow as gods, giants, dwarves and elves struggle for survival. It also preserves the oral memory of heroes, warrior kings and queens. In clear prose interspersed with powerful verse, the Edda provides unparalleled insight into the gods' tragic realisation that the future holds one final cataclysmic battle, Ragnarok, when the world will be destroyed. These tales from the pagan era have proved to be among the most influential of all myths and legends, inspiring modern works as diverse as Wagner's Ring Cycle and Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings.This new translation by Jesse Byock captures the strength and subtlety of the original, while his introduction sets the tales fully in the context of Norse mythology. This edition also includes detailed notes and appendices.

    Spreading from academia into mainstream media, the suggestion that diversity of doctrine in the early church led to many competing orthodoxies is indicative of today's postmodern relativism. Authors K�stenberger and Kruger engage Ehrman and others in this polemic against a dogged adherence to popular ideals of diversity.K�stenberger and Kruger's accessible and careful scholarship not only counters the Bauer Thesis using its own terms, but also engages overlooked evidence from the New Testament. Their conclusions are drawn from analysis of the evidence of unity in the New Testament, the formation and closing of the canon, and the methodology and integrity of the recording and distribution of religious texts within the early church.

    Bloch dared to do this and was successful; therein lies the enduring achievement of Feudal Society."—Charles Garside, Yale Review

    After a desperate six weeks, the beleaguered citadel surrendered to the Mamluks, bringing an end to Christendom's two-hundred year adventure in the Middle East.In The Accursed Tower, Roger Crowley delivers a lively narrative of the lead-up to the siege and a vivid, blow-by-blow account of the climactic battle. Drawing on extant Arabic sources as well as untranslated Latin documents, he argues that Acre is notable for technical advances in military planning and siege warfare, and extraordinary for its individual heroism and savage slaughter. A gripping depiction of the crusader era told through its dramatic last moments, The Accursed Tower offers an essential new view on a crucial turning point in world history.

    'In his 'Short Life', Dr Lowrie gives a clear & moving account of the history of Kierkegaard's development & his writings; of the phases & periods of his work; & of the happenings which...helped shape the nature & course of that work.'--Baltimore Evening Sun

    Norwich presents such popes as Innocent I, who in the fifth century successfully negotiated with Alaric the Goth, an invader civil authorities could not defeat; Leo I, who two decades later tamed (and perhaps paid off) Attila the Hun; the infamous “pornocracy”—the five libertines who were descendants or lovers of Marozia, debauched daughter of one of Rome’s most powerful families; Pope Paul III, “the greatest pontiff of the sixteenth century,” who reinterpreted the Church’s teaching and discipline; John XXIII, who in five short years starting in 1958 instituted reforms that led to Vatican II; and Benedict XVI, who is coping with today’s global priest sex scandal.

    But those comic creations cannot save us from our greatest foes—sin and death. Throughout the history of the Church there have been bad ideas, misconceptions, and heretical presentations of Jesus. Each one of these heresies fails to present Jesus as the Bible reveals him. In Superheroes Can’t Save You, Todd Miles demonstrates how these ancient heresies are embodied in contemporary comic superheroes. Miles compares something everybody already knows (who the superheroes are) with what they need to know (who Jesus is), in a book that makes vitally important Christian truths understandable and applicable to a wide audience.

    Catholics, on the other hand, venerate Tradition, yet often without adequately understanding it. In this masterful book, the great theologian Yves Congar explains why Tradition is an inescapable aspect of a fully biblical Christian faith. He explores the various forms of Tradition and discusses the relationship between Scripture and Tradition, as well as the role of the Magisterium of the Church. The Meaning of Tradition clears up misconceptions held by many Evangelical Christians and even some Catholics on this important subject. Congar's study of Tradition greatly contributed to the teaching of Vatican II and to a deeper appreciation of the Church Fathers.

    Violence in the Middle Ages, however, functioned differently, according to David Nirenberg. In this provocative book, he focuses on specific attacks against minorities in fourteenth-century France and the Crown of Aragon (Aragon, Catalonia, and Valencia). He argues that these attacks--ranging from massacres to verbal assaults against Jews, Muslims, lepers, and prostitutes--were often perpetrated not by irrational masses laboring under inherited ideologies and prejudices, but by groups that manipulated and reshaped the available discourses on minorities. Nirenberg shows that their use of violence expressed complex beliefs about topics as diverse as divine history, kinship, sex, money, and disease, and that their actions were frequently contested by competing groups within their own society.Nirenberg's readings of archival and literary sources demonstrates how violence set the terms and limits of coexistence for medieval minorities. The particular and contingent nature of this coexistence is underscored by the book's juxtapositions--some systematic (for example, that of the Crown of Aragon with France, Jew with Muslim, medieval with modern), and some suggestive (such as African ritual rebellion with Catalan riots). Throughout, the book questions the applicability of dichotomies like tolerance versus intolerance to the Middle Ages, and suggests the limitations of those analyses that look for the origins of modern European persecutory violence in the medieval past.

    Actually, it was Only the Beginning... Welcome to the Year 1000. This is What Life was Like. How clothes were fastened in a world without buttons, p.10 The rudiments of medieval brain surgery, p.124 The first millennium's Bill Gates, p.192 How dolphins forecasted weather, p.140 The recipe for a medieval form of Viagra, p.126 Body parts a married woman had to forfeit if she committed adultery, p.171 The fundamental rules of warfare, p.154 How fried and crushed black snails could improve your health, p.127 And much more...

    Fox recreates the period from the 2nd to the 4th century, when the Olympians lost their dominion and Christianity, with Constantine's conversion, triumphed in the Mediterranean world.CONTENTSList of MapsPrefacePagans & ChristiansPagans & their citiesPagan cultsSeeing the godsLanguage of the godsThe spread of ChristianityLiving like angelsVisions & prophecy Persecution & martyrdom Bishops & authoritySinners & saintsConstantine & the churchFrom pagan to ChristianNotesIndex

    . . as when iron is drawn to a magnet, camphor is sucked into hot air, crystal lights up in the Sun, sulfur and a volatile liquid are kindled by flame, an empty eggshell filled with dew is raised towards the Sun . . .' The Bible is full of stories featuring forms of magic and possession - from Moses battling with Pharaoh's wizards to the supernatural actions of Jesus and his disciples. As, over the following centuries, the Christian church attempted to stamp out 'deviant' practices, a persistent interest in magic drew strength from this Biblical validation. A strange blend of mumbo-jumbo, fear, fraud and deeply serious study, magic was at the heart of the European Renaissance, fascinating many of its greatest figures.This is a book filled with incantations, charms, curses, summonings, cures and descriptions of extraordinary, shadowy, only half-understood happenings from long ago. It features writers as various as Thomas Aquinas, John Milton, John Dee, Ptolemy and Paracelsus along with anonymous ancient and medieval works which were, in some cases, viewed as simply too dangerous even to open.Brian Copenhaver's wonderful anthology will be welcomed by everyone from those with the most casual interest in the magical tradition to anyone drawn to the Renaissance and the tangled, arcane roots of the scientific tradition.

    Table of Contents: Introduction: Who Are the American Puritans? 1. William Bradford 2. John Winthrop 3. John Cotton 4. Thomas Hooker 5. Thomas Shepard 6. Anne Bradstreet 7. John Eliot 8. Samuel Willard 9. Cotton Mather

    Some were people of rank and influence. Some were ordinary folk. Some were even his friends. Four centuries later, these deeply moving accounts of faith and courage mark a path for modern Christians to measure the depth of their commitment.