A major new history of the Crusades with an unprecedented wide scope, told in a tableau of portraits of people on all sides of the wars, from the author of Powers and Thrones. For more than one thousand years, Christians and Muslims lived side by side, sometimes at peace and sometimes at war. When Christian armies seized Jerusalem in 1099, they began the most notorious period of conflict between the two religions. Depending on who you ask, the fall of the holy city was either an inspiring legend or the greatest of horrors. In Crusaders, Dan Jones interrogates the many sides of the larger story, charting a deeply human and avowedly pluralist path through the crusading era. Expanding the usual timeframe, Jones looks to the roots of Christian-Muslim relations in the eighth century and tracks the influence of crusading to present day. He widens the geographical focus to far-flung regions home to so-called enemies of the Church, including Spain, North Africa, southern France, and the Baltic states. By telling intimate stories of individual journeys, Jones illuminates these centuries of war not only from the perspective of popes and kings, but from Arab-Sicilian poets, Byzantine princesses, Sunni scholars, Shi'ite viziers, Mamluk slave soldiers, Mongol chieftains, and barefoot friars. Crusading remains a rallying call to this day, but its role in the popular imagination ignores the cooperation and complicated coexistence that were just as much a feature of the period as warfare. The age-old relationships between faith, conquest, wealth, power, and trade meant that crusading was not only about fighting for the glory of God, but also, among other earthly reasons, about gold. In this richly dramatic narrative that gives voice to sources usually pushed to the margins, Dan Jones has written an authoritative survey of the holy wars with global scope and human focus.

Alfred Edersheim's well-researched account of everyday Jewish life at the time the New Testament Gospels took place remains one of the best texts on the subject ever authored. This edition includes the author's appendixes. The reader is taken back to Israel and the surrounding areas more than 2,000 years ago. How the society would appear to the casual traveler, what customs the people practiced, how everyday life proceeded in the Jewish homestead and towns, and how women were treated are topics which Edersheim examines. The author goes into much detail, presenting an evocative picture of a sophisticated ancient society. We also hear of the political landscape of the era, particularly concerning the Pharisees - the leading social and political movement of the time - and its interactions with rival movements such as the Sadducees and Essenes. Religious rites, the layout and ceremonies of ancient Jewish synagogues and temples, and the creation of the ancient religious Talmudic literature, are related.

A series which is a model of its kind. Edmund King, History The wide-ranging articles collected here represent the cutting edge of recent Anglo-Norman scholarship. Topics include English kingship, legends of the Battle of Bouvines, ideas of empire, the practicalities of child kingship, and female rulership in Brittany. The volume continues in its proud tradition of source analysis: there are studies of northern French urban franchises, and Norman charters and a logistical take on the making of the Domesday Book, while narrative sources are represented in the vernacular by a study of Herman of Valenciennes' Bible and in Latin by the historiography of Robert of Torigni and Ralph Niger. Further contributions focus on the twelfth-century ecclesiastical officers Abbot Peter the Venerable and Archbishop Thomas Becket, and the volume is completed with an analysis of the concept of economic resources with respect to Normandy. Contributors: Mathieu Arnoux, JamesBarnaby, Dominique Barthelemy, Thomas Bisson, Scott G. Bruce, Francis Gingras, Frederique Lachaud, Anne E. Lester, C.P. Lewis, Amy Livingstone, Fanny Madeline, Nicholas Vincent, Emily Ward

Fruits of the most recent research into the "long" thirteenth century. The twin themes of authority and resistance are the focus of this volume, explored through topics such as landholding and secular politics, the church and religious orders and contemporary imagery and its reception. Together, thepapers combine to illustrate the variety of ways in which historians of the "long" thirteenth century are able to examine the practices and norms through which individuals and institutions sought to establish their authority, andthe ways in which these were open to challenge. JANET BURTON is Professor of Medieval History at University of Wales: Trinity Saint David; PHILLIPP SCHOFIELD is Professor of Medieval History at Aberystwyth University; BJORN WEILER is Professor of History at Aberystwyth University. Contributors: Helen Birkett, Richard Cassidy, Judith Collard, Peter Coss, Ian Forrest, Philippa Hoskin, Jennifer Jahner, Melissa Julian Jones, Fergus Oakes, John Sabapathy, Sita Steckel.

'Clavijo was so keen and intelligent an observer and so lively a retailer of travel gossip that this is a very welcome addition to the series.' New Statesman
Covering thousands of miles, Clavijo's epic journey began and ended in Cadiz taking in Rhodes, Constantinople, the Black Sea, and Central Asia.
Guy Le Strange's extensive introduction gives excellent historical and political background for the account and the material is supplemented with seven maps and plans.

The boundaries between mental, social and physical order and various states of disorder - unexpected mood swings, fury, melancholy, stress, insomnia, and demonic influence - form the core of this compilation. For medieval men and women, religious rituals, magic, herbs, dietary requirements as well as to scholastic medicine were a way to cope with the vagaries of mental wellbeing; the focus of the articles is on the interaction and osmosis between lay and elite cultures as well as medical, theological and political theories and practical experiences of daily life. Time span of the volume is the later Middle Ages, c. 1300-1500. Geographically it covers Western Europe and the comparison between Mediterranean world and Northern Europe is an important constituent. Contributors are Jussi Hanska, Gerhard Jaritz, Timo Joutsivuo, Kirsi Kanerva, Sari Katajala-Peltomaa, Marko Lamberg, Iona McCleery, Susanna Niiranen, Sophie Oosterwijk, and Catherine Rider.

This is an exploration of how the legend of Thor has been adopted, adapted and transformed through history. The myths of the Norse god Thor were preserved in the "Icelandic Eddas", set down in the early Middle Ages. The bane of giants and trolls, Thor was worshipped as the last line of defence against all that threatened early Nordic society. Thor's significance persisted long after the Christian conversion and, in the mid-eighteenth century, Thor resumed a symbolic prominence among northern countries. Admired and adopted in Scandinavia and Germany, he became central to the rhetoric of national romanticism and to more belligerent assertions of nationalism. Resurrected in the latter part of the twentieth century in "Marvel Magazine", Thor was further transformed into an articulation both of an anxious male sexuality and of a parallel nervousness regarding American foreign policy. Martin Arnold explores the extraordinary regard in which Thor has been held since medieval times and considers why and how his myth has been adopted, adapted and transformed.

This new volume in the Routledge Medieval Casebooks series explores medieval rhetorical practices. Ten original essays examine the ways in which contemporary readers and scholars might employ rhetorical theory to illuminate underlying meanings in medieval texts. The contributors also explore how rhetoric was used as a means of textual innovation in the work of medieval authors such as Chaucer and his contemporaries.

This book is about philology and its relevance over time. The compilation foregrounds a multi-faceted field of research that has dealt with the relationship between language, literature and culture for over 2,000 years. The main thread of this volume, comprising ten scholarly essays, is to show that philology as an academic field and a scholarly perspective understood in its widest sense as the profound understanding of language, literature and culture does matter in the twenty-first century, that is to say, in our own time characterized by globalization and digitalization. The contributions reflect the many dimensions of philology and its plurality, interdisciplinarity and the humanities. The volume seeks to illustrate various ways of engaging with philology. Here lies the true nature of philology, and this is why it still matters. Contributors are Massimiliano Bampi, Maja Backvall, Jonas Carlquist, Odd Einar Haugen, Helge Jordheim, Karl G. Johansson, Lino Leonardi, Harry Loennroth, Outi Merisalo, Marita Akhoj Nielsen and Nestori Siponkoski.

"Medieval and Early Modern Film and Media" contextualizes historical films in an innovative way--not only relating them to the history of cinema, but also to premodern and early modern media. This philological approach to the (pre)history of cinema engages both old media such as scrolls, illuminated manuscripts, the Bayeux Tapestry, and new digital media such as DVDs, HD DVDs, and computers. Burt examines the uncanny repetitions that now fragment films into successively released alternate cuts and extras (footnote tracks, audiocommentaries, and documentaries) that (re)structure and reframe historical films, thereby presenting new challenges to historicist criticism and film theory. With a double focus on recursive narrative frames and the cinematic paratexts of medieval and early modern film, this book calls our attention to strange, sometimes opaque phenomena in film and literary theory that have previously gone unrecognized.

This book brings together an international group of scholars to offer new perspectives on the political impact and afterlife of the dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix (138-78 B.C.), one of the most important figures in the complex history of the last century of the Roman Republic. It looks beyond the march on Rome, the violence of the proscriptions, or the logic of his political reforms, and offers case studies to illustrate his relations with the Roman populace, the subject peoples of the Greek East, and his own supporters, both veterans and elites, highlighting his long-term political impact and, at times, the limits on his exercise of power. The chapters on reception reassess the good/bad dichotomy of Sulla as tyrant and reformer, focusing on Cicero, while also examining his importance for Sallust, and his characterisation as the antithesis of philhellenism in Greek writers of the Imperial period. Sulla was not straightforward, either as a historical figure or exemplum, and the case studies in this book use the twin approach of politics and reception to offer new readings of Sulla's aims and impact, both at home and abroad, and why he remained of interest to authors from Sallust to Plutarch and Aelian.

In The Byzantine Turks, 1204-1461 Rustam Shukurov offers an account of the Turkic minority in Late Byzantium including the Nicaean, Palaiologan, and Grand Komnenian empires. The demography of the Byzantine Turks and the legal and cultural aspects of their entrance into Greek society are discussed in detail. Greek and Turkish bilingualism of Byzantine Turks and Tourkophonia among Greeks were distinctive features of Byzantine society of the time. Basing his arguments upon linguistic, social, and cultural evidence found in a wide range of Greek, Latin, and Oriental sources, Rustam Shukurov convincingly demonstrates how Oriental influences on Byzantine life led to crucial transformations in Byzantine mentality, culture, and political life. The study is supplemented with an etymological lexicon of Oriental names and words in Byzantine Greek.

The theme of warfare as a collective enterprise investigated in the theatres of both land and sea. From warhorses to the men-at-arms who rode them; armies that were raised to the lords who recruited, led, administered, and financed them; and ships to the mariners who crewed them; few aspects of the organisation and logistics ofwar in late medieval England have escaped the scholarly attention, or failed to benefit from the insights, of Dr Andrew Ayton. The concept of the military community, with its emphasis on warfare as a collective social enterprise, has always lain at the heart of his work; he has shown in particular how this age of warfare is characterised by related but intersecting military communities, marked not only by the social and political relationships within armies and navies, but by communities of mind, experience, and enterprise. The essays in this volume, ranging from the late thirteenth to the early fifteenth century, address various aspects of this idea. They offer investigations of soldiers' and mariners' equipment; their obligations, functions, status, and recruitment; and the range and duration of their service. Gary P. Baker is a Research Associate at the University of East Angliaand a Researcher in History at the University of Groningen; Craig L. Lambert is Lecturer in Maritime History at the University of Southampton; David Simpkin teaches history at Birkenhead Sixth-Form College. Contributors: Gary P. Baker, Adrian R. Bell, Peter Coss, Anne Curry, Robert W. Jones, Andy King, Craig L. Lambert, Tony K. Moore, J.J.N. Palmer, Philip Preston, Michael Prestwich, Matthew Raven, Clifford J. Rogers, Nigel Saul, David Simpkin.

This comprehensive volume provides easily-accessible factual material on all major areas of warfare in the medieval west. The whole geographical area of medieval Europe, including eastern Europe, is covered, including essential elements from outside Europe such as Byzantine warfare, nomadic horde invasions and the Crusades. Progressing chronologically, the work is presented in themed, illustrated sections, with a narrative outline offering a brief introduction to the area. Within each chronological section, Jim Bradbury presents clear and informative pieces on battles, sieges, and generals. The author examines practical topics including: castle architecture, with examinations of specific castles ship building techniques improvements in armour specific weapons developments in areas such as arms and armour, fortifications, tactics and supply. Readable and engaging, this detailed provides students with an excellent collection of archaeological information and clear discussions of controversial issues.

This book traces the history and ecology of the Aymaras and the Quechuas: the highland peoples of the Central Andes, who formed the nucleus of the great Inca Empire which extended for two thousand miles along the Pacific coast to the fringes of the tropical interior. In twenty millennia the Indians of the Andes had had no cultural contacts with the Old World yet they had already passed independently through stages of development usually associated with the Neolithic Age and had achieved a degree of technical and artistic excellence. In four centuries of contact there has of course been appreciable acculturation and osmosis. Originally published in 1952.

First full examination of why and how certain locations were chosen for opposition to power, and the meaning they conveyed. The direct contestation of power played a crucial role in early medieval politics. Such actions, often expressed through violence, reveal much about established authorities, power and lordship. Here the hitherto neglected role of place and landscape in acts of opposition and rebellion is explored for its meaning and significance to the protagonists. The book includes consideration of a range of factors relevant to the choice of location for such events, and examines the declarations and motivations of political actors, from disaffected princes to independently minded nobles, as well as those who responded to rebellion, to show how places and landscapes became used in political disputes. These include both "public" and "private", religious, urban and rural space. Covering a long period in England and northern France, from the late Carolingian period through to the emergence of cross-Channel polities in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest, this book casts valuable light on the political relations of the early and central Middle Ages.

In From Nicopolis to Mohacs, Tamas Palosfalvi offers an account of Ottoman-Hungarian warfare from its start in the late fourteenth century to the battle of Mohacs in 1526. During this period of one century and a half, the Kingdom of Hungary was the most constant and strongest rival of the expanding Ottoman Empire in Europe, and as such waged constant warfare in defence of its borders. Based on the extensive use of hitherto unexplored source material, Palosfalvi not only offers a sound chronology of military events, but also a description of Hungarian military structures and their transformation under constant Ottoman pressure, as well as an analysis of the reasons that lay behind the military breakdown of Hungary in the third decade of the sixteenth century.

Essays into numerous aspects of the Domesday Book, shedding fresh light on its mysteries. Compiled from the records of a survey of the kingdom of England commissioned by William the Conqueror in 1085, Domesday Book is a key source for the history of England. However, there has never been a critical edition of the textand so, despite over 200 years of intense academic study, its evidence has rarely been exploited to the full. The essays in this volume seek to realize the potential of Domesday Book by focussing on the manuscript itself. There are analyses of abbreviations, letter forms, and language; re-assessments of key sources, the role of tenants-in-chief in producing them, and the nature of the Norman settlement that their forms illuminate; a re-evaluation of the data and its referents; and finally, fresh examinations of the afterlife of the Domesday text and how it was subsequently perceived. In identifying new categories of evidence and revisiting old ones, these studies point to a better understanding of the text. There are surprising insights into its sources and developing programme and, intriguingly, a system of encoding hitherto unsuspected. In its turn the import of its data becomes clearer, thereby shedding new light on Anglo-Norman society and governance. It is in these terms that this volume offers a departure in Domesday studies and looks forward to the resolution of long-standing problems that have hitherto bedevilled the interpretation of an iconic text. David Roffe and K.S.B. Keats-Rohan are leading Domesday scholars who have published widely on Domesday Book and related matters. Contributors: Howard B. Clarke, Sally Harvey, K.S.B. Keats-Rohan, Andrew Lowerre, John Palmer, David Roffe, Ian Taylor, Pamela Taylor, Frank Thorn, Ann Williams.

This book traces the 800-year history of Byzantium. From the early uncertain years of the Empire, to the triumphal period when its wealth attracted Viking and Asian warriors to join its armies, and finally to the death of Byzantium's last emperor in 1453, the Empire's military history is laid bare.

This collection of new essays examines the long-standing question of apocalyptic expectations around the turn of the first millennium. Including works by scholars of medieval history, literature, and religion, this book argues that apocalyptic expectations did exist around the year 1000. It provides a more balanced and nuanced approach to the issue than the traditional views that either identify a time of fear, the “terrors of the year 1000,” or deny that awareness of the millennium existed. This book, instead, recognizes that there were a variety of responses to the eschatological years 1000 and 1033 and that these responses contributed to the broader social and religious developments associated with the birth of European civilization.

These essays explore aspects of the English colony in medieval Ireland and its relations with the Gaelic host society. They deal with both the foundation and expansion of the English lorsdship in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, and with the problems and adjustments that accompanied its contraction in the later middle ages. Attention is paid to the government and society of the colony itself, and to the interactions between settler and native.