A Companion to Medieval Toledo. Reconsidering the Canons explores the limits of "Convivencia" through new and problematized readings of material familiar to specialists and offers a thoughtful initiation for the non-specialist into the historical, cultural, and religious complexity of the iconic city of Toledo. The volume seeks to understand the history and cultural heritage of the city as a result of fluctuating coexistence. Divided into three themed sections,- the essays consider additional material, new transcriptions, and perspectives that contribute to more nuanced understandings of traditional texts or events. The volume places this cultural history and these new readings into current scholarly debates and invites its readers to do the same.

"Sites Unseen" examines the complex intertwining of race and architecture in nineteenth and early-twentieth century American culture, the period not only in which American architecture came of age professionally in the U.S. but also in which ideas about architecture became a prominent part of broader conversations about American culture, history, politics, and&#8212although we have not yet understood this clearly&#8212race relations. This rich and copiously illustrated interdisciplinary study explores the ways that American writing between roughly 1850 and 1930 concerned itself, often intensely, with the racial implications of architectural space primarily, but not exclusively, through domestic architecture.

In addition to identifying an archive of provocative primary materials, "Sites Unseen" draws significantly on important recent scholarship in multiple fields ranging from literature, history, and material culture to architecture, cultural geography, and urban planning. Together the chapters interrogate a variety of expressive American vernacular forms, including the dialect tale, the novel of empire, letters, and pulp stories, along with the plantation cabin, the West Indian cottage, the Latin American plaza, and the "Oriental" parlor. These are some of the overlooked plots and structures that can and should inform a more comprehensive consideration of the literary and cultural meanings of American architecture. Making sense of the relations between architecture, race, and American writing of the long nineteenth century&#8212in their regional, national, and hemispheric contexts&#8212"Sites Unseen" provides a clearer view not only of this catalytic era but also more broadly of what architectural historian Dell Upton has aptly termed the social experience of the built environment.

Masonry is a traditional, highly durable mode of construction; many heritage masonry structures, built at various historical periods, have survived, to a lesser or greater extent, adverse environmental conditions, which have reduced, sometimes considerably, their integrity, strength and durability. Due to the cultural significance of heritage architecture, resources are today allocated towards their restoration and conservation. This volume comprises distinguished contributions from the Transactions of the Wessex Institute describing research efforts towards achieving these objectives. Topics covered include: Understanding of constituent materials, modes of construction and overall mechanical behaviour; Dynamic behaviour; Sonic pulse velocity tests; Micro-vibration measurements; Failure mechanisms; Structural strength assessment; Binding material mixtures; Composition and properties of ancient mortars; Contemporary repair material; Infra-red thermography measurements; Mortars, plasters, renders and grouts. The various issues mentioned above are addressed by the present collection of scientific papers with considerable insight and thoroughness.It is thus hoped that this volume will fill a gap in the literature as a valuable source of information and guidance to researchers and engineers working in the area of restoration and conservation of heritage masonry structures.

A Companion to the Renaissance in Southern Italy will provide readers unfamiliar with Southern Italy with an introduction to different aspects of the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century history and culture of this vast and significant area of Europe, situated at the centre of the Mediterranean. Commonly regarded as a backward, rural region untouched by the Italian Renaissance, a team of specialists presents a general survey of the most recent research on the centers of southern Italy, as well as insights into the ground-breaking debates on wider themes, such as the definition of the city and continuity and discontinuity at the turn of the sixteenth century, and the effects of dynastic changes from the Angevin and Aragonese Kingdom to the Spanish Viceroyalty. Contributors: Giancarlo Abbamonte, David Abulafia, Guido Cappelli, Chiara De Caprio, Bianca de Divitiis, Fulvio Delle Donne, Teresa D'Urso, Dinko Fabris, Guido Giglioni, Antonietta Iacono, Fulvio Lenzo, Lorenzo Miletti, Francesco Montuori, Pasquale Palmieri, Eleni Sakellariou, Francesco Senatore, Francesco Storti, Pierluigi Terenzi, Carlo Vecce, Giuliana Vitale, and Andrea Zezza.

The Baroque is back in contemporary culture. The ten essays authored by international scholars, and three interventions by artists, examine the return of the baroque as Neo-Baroque through interdisciplinary perspectives. Understanding the Neo-Baroque as transcultural (between different cultures) and transhistorical (between historical moments) the contributors to this volume offer diverse perspectives that suggest the slipperiness of the Neo-Baroque may best be served by the term 'Neo-Baroques'. Case studies analysed reflect this plurality and include: the productions of Belgian theatre company Abattoir Ferme; Claire Denis' French New Extremist film Trouble Every Day; the novel Lujuria tropical by exiled El Salvadorian Quijada Urias; the science fiction blockbuster spectacles The Matrix and eXistenZ; and the spectacular grandeur of early Hollywood movie palaces and the contemporary Las Vegas Strip. Contributors: Jens Baumgarten, Marjan Colletti, Bolivar Echeverria, Rita Eder, Hugh Hazelton, Monika Kaup, Peter Krieger, Patrick Mahon, Walter Moser, Angela Ndalianis, Richard Reddaway, Karel Vanhaesebrouck, Saige Walton.

This innovative urban history of Dublin explores the symbols and spaces of the Irish capital between the Restoration in 1660 and the advent of neoclassical public architecture in the 1770s. The meanings ascribed to statues, churches, houses, and public buildings are traced in detail, using a wide range of visual and written sources.

Neoclassicism refers to the revival of classical art and architecture beginning in Europe in the 1750s and lasting until around 1830, with late Neoclassicism lingering through the 1870s. Neoclassicism is a highly complex movement that brought together seemingly disparate issues into a new and culturally rich era, one that was, however, remarkably unified under the banner of classicism. This movement was born in Italy and France and then spread across Europe to Russia and across the ocean to the United States. The Historical Dictionary of Neoclassical Art and Architecture provides an overview of Neoclassicism, focusing on its major artists, architects, stylistic subcategories, ideas, and historical framework of the 18th century style found mainly in Europe and the United States. This is done through a chronology, an introductory essay, an extensive bibliography, and over 200 dictionary entries on famous artists, sculptors, architects, patrons, and other historical figures and events.

This book brings a variety of fresh perspectives to bear on the diverse people and settlements of the eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century southern backcountry. Reflecting the growth of interdisciplinary studies in addressing the backcountry, the volume specifically points to the use of history, archaeology, geography, and material culture studies in examining communities on the southern frontier. Through a series of case studies and overviews, the contributors use cross-disciplinary analysis to look at community formation and maintenance in the backcountry areas of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. These essays demonstrate how various combinations of research strategies, conceptual frameworks, and data can afford a new look at a geographical area and its settlement. The contributors offer views on the evolution of backcountry communities by addressing such topics as migration, kinship, public institutions, transportation and communications networks, land markets and real estate claims, and the role of agricultural development in the emergence of a regional economy. In their discussions of individuals in the backcountry, they also explore the multiracial and multiethnic character of southern frontier society. Yielding new insights unlikely to emerge under a single disciplinary analysis, The Southern Colonial Backcountry is a unique volume that highlights the need for interdisciplinary approaches to the backcountry while identifying common research problems in the field. The Editors: David Colin Crass is the archaeological services unit manager at the Historic Preservation Division, Georgia Department of Natural Resources. Steven D. Smith is the head of the Cultural Resources Consulting Division of the South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Antrhopology. Martha A. Zierden is curator of historical archaeology at The Charleston Museum. Richard D. Brooks is the administrative manager of the Savannah River Archeological Research Program, South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Antrhopology. The Contributors: Monica L. Beck, Edward Cashin, Charles H. Faulkner, Elizabeth Arnett Fields, Warren R. Hofstra, David C. Hsiung, Kenneth E. Lewis, Donald W. Linebaugh, Turk McCleskey, Robert D. Mitchell, Michael J. Puglisi, Daniel B. Thorp. "