The Chan monk Qisong (1007-1072), an important figure in Northern Song religious and intellectual history, has garnered relatively little scholarly attention. This book provides a detailed biography with a focus on the influential historical writings he composed to defend Chan claims of a "mind-to-mind transmission" tracing back to the historical Buddha. It places his defense of lineage in the context not only of attacks by the rival Tiantai school but also of the larger backdrop of the development of lineage and patriarchs as sources of authority in Chinese Buddhism. It advances new arguments about these Chinese Buddhist innovations, challenges common assumptions about Chan masters, and offers insights into the interactions of Buddhists, Confucians, and the imperial court during the Song.

Engines of Influence is a fifty-year history of Victoria's country newspapers, beginning with James Harrison's ""Geelong Advertiser"" in 1840 and ending in December 1890 when 166 papers were being published in 122 country towns. This significant book identifies all press sites and newspapers of the era, whether long-lasting or short-lived, and highlights the major part played by them in helping construct the machinery of government, lay the foundations of party politics and foster a sense of rural Victorian identity. The country press was an important agent of political change leading up to events such as the separation of the Port Phillip District from New South Wales in 1851, and the federation of the colony of Victoria with other British dependencies into a single nation at the end of the nineteenth century. ""Engines of Influence"" shows how country newspapers also exercised cultural authority, circulating ideas generated both within local communities and from the wider world. Towards the end of the fifty years examined, this rural press was becoming a close part of a unified political state, linked through the metropolitan press and agencies to a technologically-based global communications network.

Brimming with lively animals both real and fantastic, the bestiary was one of the great illuminated manuscript traditions of the Middle Ages. Encompassing imaginary creatures, such as the unicorn, siren and griffin; exotic beasts, including the tiger, elephant and ape; as well as animals native to Europe, like the beaver, dog and hedgehog, the bestiary is a vibrant testimony to the medieval understanding of animals and their role in the world. So iconic were the stories and images of the bestiary that its beasts essentially escaped from the pages, appearing in a wide variety of manuscripts and other objects, including tapestries, ivories, metalwork and sculpture. With over 270 colour illustrations and contributions by twenty-five leading medieval scholars, this gorgeous volume explores the bestiary and its widespread influence on medieval art and culture as well as on modern and contemporary artists like Pablo Picasso and Damien Hirst.

One of the finest works from the golden era of Flemish manuscript illumination, the Getty's copy of the Romance of Gillion de Trazegnies tells of the adventures of a medieval nobleman. Part travelogue, part romance, and part epic, the text traces the exciting exploits of Gillion as he journeys to Jerusalem on pilgrimage, is imprisoned in Egypt and rises to the command of the Sultan's armies, mistakenly becomes a bigamist first with a Christian and then a Muslim wife, and dies in battle as a glorious hero. The tale encompasses the most thrilling elements of the Western romance genre -- love, villainy, loyalty, and war -- set against the backdrop of the East. This lavishly illustrated volume reveals for the first time the complexity of this illuminated romance. A complete reproduction of the book's illustrations and a partial translation of the text appear along with essays that explore the manuscript's vibrant cultural, historical, and artistic contexts. The innovative illuminations, by the renowned artist Lieven van Lathem, juxtapose the reality of medieval Europe with an idealized vision of the East. This unusual pairing, found in the text and illustrations, is the source of a rich discussion of the fifteenth-century political situation in the West and the Crusades in the East.

In Australia, from Victoria's goldrush of the 1850s to Melbourne's boom of the 1880s and bust-to-recovery of the 1890s, newspapers dominated the Australian publishing scene. Uniquely, they provided local, intercolonial, and international news; magazine content from the popular to the intellectual; and the latest literature, especially novels in serial installments. By the 1870s, the Melbourne Age newspaper dominated the journalistic stage. In the 1880s, its circulation was far in excess of any other daily throughout all British colonial possessions. Its proprietor, the driven and talented immigrant Scotsman David Syme, was acknowledged as the leader of the Australian press. For the influence that he and his newspapers exercised, Syme became a legend in his lifetime and for several generations after his death in 1908. Making use of family and business records, as well as the massive 19th-century newspaper archive now accessible through digitization, this biography of a powerful man goes behind the legend and rounds out the story of David Syme's life - primarily as a press 'baron, ' but also as a theorist, author, financier, farmer, property developer, and, not least, family man. (Series: Biography)

Beasts Factual and Fantastic is the first in the Medieval Imagination series of small, affordable books that will draw on manuscript illuminations from the Middle Ages and early Renaissance. Each volume will focus on a particular theme or subject as represented by medieval artists. Often, as in the case of the imaginary beasts that readers will encounter in this volume, artists depicted that which they did not see or know, but which was nonetheless shaped by the prevailing beliefs, fears, and rudimentary science of the time. In other cases, manuscript illuminators recorded what they indeed did see--which, centuries later, reveals much about the world in which they lived. This inaugural volume features vivid and charming details from the wealth of manuscripts in the collections of the J. Paul Getty Museum and the British Library, along with a lively text; together both word and image provide an accessible and delightful introduction to the imagination of the medieval world. Future volumes in this series will cover such topics as costumes, portraiture, and marginalia, among others.

The Livre des faits de Jacques de Lalaing (Book of the Deeds of Jacques de Lalaing), a famous Flemish illuminated manuscript, relays the audacious life of Jacques de Lalaing (1421-1453), a story that reads more like a fast-paced adventure novel. Produced in the tradition of chivalric biography, a genre developed in the mid-fifteenth century to celebrate the great personalities of the day, the manuscript's text and illuminations begin with a magnificent frontispiece by the most acclaimed Flemish illuminator of the sixteenth century, Simon Bening. A Knight for the Ages: Jacques de Lalaing and the Art of Chivalry presents a kaleidoscopic view of the manuscript with essays written by the world's leading medievalists, adding rich texture and providing a greater understanding of the many aspects of the manuscript's background, creation, and reception, revealing for the first time the full complexity of this illuminated romance. The texts are accompanied by stunning reproductions of all of the manuscripts' miniatures-never before published in colour-as well as a plot summary and translations, allowing the reader to follow Jacques de Lalaing on his knightly journeys and experience the thrilling triumphs of his legendary tournaments and battles.

From around 1250 to the close of the fifteenth century, the most important and original work being done in secular illumination was unquestionably in French vernacular history manuscripts. This volume celebrates the vivid historical imagery produced during these years by bringing together some of the finest masterpieces of illumination created in the Middle Ages. It is the first major publication to focus on exploring the ways in which text and illumination worked together to help show medieval readers the role and purpose of history. The images enabled the past to come alive before the eyes of medieval readers by relating the adventures of epic figures such as Hector of Troy, Alexander the Great, the Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne, and even the Virgin Mary.

Presented here are approximately fifty-five manuscripts from over twenty-five libraries and museums across the United States and Europe, supplemented by medieval objects ranging from tapestries to ivory boxes. Together they show how historical narratives came to play a decisive role at the French court and in the process inspired some of the most original and splendid artworks of the time. Additional contributors to this volume include elisabeth Antoine, R. Howard Bloch, Keith Busby, Joyce Coleman, Erin K. Donovan, and Gabrielle M. Spiegel.