Between the birth of Dante in 1265 and the death of Galileo in 1642 something happened which completely revolutionized Western civilization. Painting, sculpture and architecture would all visibly change in a striking fashion. Likewise, the thought and self-conception of humanity would take on a completely different aspect. Sciences would be born - or emerge in an entirely new guise. In this sweeping 400-year history, Paul Strathern reveals how, and why, these new ideas which formed the Renaissance began, and flourished, in the city of Florence. Just as central and northern Germany gave birth to the Reformation, Britain was a driver of the Industrial Revolution and Silicon Valley shaped the digital age, so too, Strathern argues, did Florence play a similarly unique and transformative role in the Renaissance. While vividly bringing to life the city and a vast cast of characters - including Dante, Botticelli, Machiavelli, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Galileo - Strathern shows how these great Florentines forever altered Europe and the Western world.

The The Olsztyn Group in the Early Medieval Archaeology of the Baltic Region: The Cemetry at Leleszki deals with a much neglected problem of the archaeology of the early Middle Ages. Between the 5th and the 7th century, the region of the Mazurian Lakes in northeastern Poland witnessed the rise of communities engaged in long-distant contacts with both Western and Eastern Europe. Known as the Olsztyn Group, the archaeological remains of those communities have revealed a remarkable wealth and diversity, which has attracted scholarly attention for more than 130 years. Besides offering a survey of the current state of research on the Olsztyn Group, Miroslaw Rudnicki introduces the monographic study of the Leleszki cemetery (district of Szczytno, Poland) as one of the most representative sites. The prosperity and long-distance contact revealed by the examination of this cemetery shows that the West Baltic tribes had considerable influence in early medieval Europe, much more than scholars had been ready to admit until now.

The Mixtec peoples were among the major original developers of Mesoamerican civilization. Centuries before the Spanish Conquest, they formed literate urban states and maintained a uniquely innovative technology and a flourishing economy. Today, thousands of Mixtecs still live in Oaxaca, in present-day southern Mexico, and thousands more have migrated to locations throughout Mexico, the United States, and Canada. In this comprehensive survey, Ronald Spores and Andrew K. Balkansky--both preeminent scholars of Mixtec civilization--synthesize a wealth of archaeological, historical, and ethnographic data to trace the emergence and evolution of Mixtec civilization from the time of earliest human occupation to the present.
The Mixtec region has been the focus of much recent archaeological and ethnohistorical activity. In this volume, Spores and Balkansky incorporate the latest available research to show that the Mixtecs, along with their neighbors the Valley and Sierra Zapotec, constitute one of the world's most impressive civilizations, antecedent to--and equivalent to--those of the better-known Maya and Aztec. Employing what they refer to as a "convergent methodology," the authors combine techniques and results of archaeology, ethnohistory, linguistics, biological anthropology, ethnology, and participant observation to offer abundant new insights on the Mixtecs' multiple transformations over three millennia.

An Open Access edition of this book is available on the Liverpool University Press website and the OAPEN library. Imperial Emotions: Cultural Responses to Myths of Empire in Fin-de-Siecle Spain reconsiders debates about historical memory from the perspective of the theory of emotions. Its main claim is that the demise of the Spanish empire in 1898 spurred a number of contradictory emotional responses, ranging from mourning and melancholia to indignation, pride, and shame. It shows how intellectuals sought to reimagine a post-Empire Spain by drawing on myth and employing a predominantly emotional register, a contention that departs from current scholarly depictions of the fin-de-siecle crisis in Spain that largely leave the role of both emotions and imperial myths in that crisis unexplored. By focusing on the neglected emotional dimension of memory practices, Imperial Emotions opens up new ways of interpreting some of the most canonical essays in twentieth-century Iberian literature: Miguel de Unamuno's En torno al casticismo, Angel Ganivet's Idearium espanol, Ramiro de Maeztu's Hacia otra Espana, and Enric Prat de la Riba's La nacionalitat catalana. It also examines the profound implications the emotional attachment to imperial myths has had for the collective memory of the conquest and colonization of the Americas, a collective memory that today has acquired a transnational character due to the conflicting emotional investments in the Spanish empire that are performed throughout the Americas and Spain.

Winner of the 2019 CEU Award for Outstanding Research The book explores the making of Romanian nation-state citizenship (1750-1918) as a series of acts of emancipation of subordinated groups (Greeks, Gypsies/Roma, Armenians, Jews, Muslims, peasants, women, and Dobrudjans). Its innovative interdisciplinary approach to citizenship in the Ottoman and post-Ottoman Balkans appeals to a diverse readership.

Private property in Rome effectively measures the suitability of each individual to serve in the army and to compete in the political arena. What happens then, when a Roman citizen is deprived of his property? Financial penalties played a crucial role in either discouraging or effectively punishing wrongdoers. This book offers the first coherent discussion of confiscations and fines in the Roman Republic by exploring the political, social, and economic impact of these punishments on private wealth.

In "The Turk" in the Czech Imagination (1870s-1923), Jitka Maleckova describes Czechs' views of the Turks in the last half century of the existence of the Ottoman Empire and how they were influenced by ideas and trends in other countries, including the European fascination with the Orient, images of "the Turk," contemporary scholarship, and racial theories. The Czechs were not free from colonial ambitions either, as their attitude to Bosnia-Herzegovina demonstrates, but their viewpoint was different from that found in imperial states and among the peoples who had experienced Ottoman rule. The book convincingly shows that the Czechs mainly viewed the Turks through the lenses of nationalism and Pan-Slavism - in solidarity with the Slavs fighting against Ottoman rule.

SILENT NIGHT brings to life one of the most unlikely and touching events in the annals of war. In the early months of WWI, on Christmas Eve, men on both sides left their trenches, laid down their arms, and joined in a spontaneous celebration with their new friends, the enemy. For a brief, blissful time, remembered since in song and story, a world war stopped. Even the participants found what they were doing incredible. Germans placed candle-lit Christmas trees on trench parapets and warring soldiers sang carols. In the spirit of the season they ventured out beyond their barbed wire to meet in No Man's Land, where they buried the dead in moving ceremonies, exchanged gifts, ate and drank together, and joyously played football, often with improvised balls. The truce spread as men defied orders and fired harmlessly into the air. But, reluctantly, they were forced to re-start history's most bloody war. SILENT NIGHT vividly recovers a dreamlike event, one of the most extraordinary of Christmas stories.

From the author of Cod—the illuminating story of an ancient and enigmatic people

Straddling a small corner of Spain and France in a land that is marked on no maps except their own, the Basques are a puzzling contradiction—they are Europe's oldest nation without ever having been a country. No one has ever been able to determine their origins, and even the Basques' language, Euskera—the most ancient in Europe—is related to none other on earth. For centuries, their influence has been felt in nearly every realm, from religion to sports to commerce. Even today, the Basques are enjoying what may be the most important cultural renaissance in their long existence.

Mark Kurlansky's passion for the Basque people and his exuberant eye for detail shine throughout this fascinating book. Like Cod, The Basque History of the World blends human stories with economic, political, literary, and culinary history into a rich and heroic tale.

Among the Basques' greatest accomplishments:

• Exploration—the first man to circumnavigate the globe, Juan Sebastian de Elcano, was a Basque and the Basques were the second Europeans, after the Vikings, in North America
• Gastronomy and agriculture—they were the first Europeans to eat corn and chili peppers and cultivate tobacco, and were among the first to use chocolate
• Religion—Ignatius Loyola, a Basque, founded the Jesuit religious order
• Business and politics—they introduced capitalism and modern commercial banking to southern Europe
• Recreation—they invented beach resorts, jai alai, and racing regattas, and were the first Europeans to play sports with balls