Studies in Medievalism is the only journal entirely devoted to modern re-creations of the middle ages: a field of central importance not only to scholarship but to the whole contemporary cultural world. The middle ages remain a prize to be fought for and a territory to control. From early modern times rulers and politicians have sought to ground their legitimacy in ancient tradition - which they have often invented or rewritten for their own purposes. This issue of Studies in Medievalism presents a number of such cases, ranging from the rewriting of Mozart, and Merovingian history, for the King of Bavaria, to the anglicization of the medieval WelshMabinogion by the wife of an English ironmaster. Other articles consider the involvement of scholarship with national and professional self-definition, whether in Renaissance Holland or Victorian Britain. And who "discovered" America, Christopher Columbus or Leif Ericsson? This is an issue of vital importance to many 19th-century Americans, but one created and determined entirely by scholarship. Simple commercial motives for exploiting the middle ages are also represented, whether straightforward forgery for sale, or the giant modern industry of tourism. Professor TOM SHIPPEY teaches in the Department of English at the University of St Louis; Dr MARTIN ARNOLD teaches at University College, Scarborough. Contributors: SOPHIE VAN ROMBURGH, ROLF H. BREMMER JR, BETSY BOWDEN, WERNER WUNDERLICH, JUDITH JOHNSTON, GERALDINE BARNES, RICHARD UTZ, JOHN BLOCK FRIEDMAN, STEVE WATSON.

The best new research on medieval clothing and textiles, drawing from a range of disciplines and with a special focus on reconstruction. The fourth volume of this landmark series features a special focus on headdress, with papers analysing women's turbans in fifteenth-century French manuscript paintings; the changing meaning of the term cuff; the spread of wimple from England to Southern Italy; and a surviving embroidered linen cap attributed to Saint Birgitta of Sweden. Northern European dress and textiles are further explored in papers on archaeological textiles from medieval towns in Finland, Norway, and Sweden; the construction of gowns excavated at Herjolfsnes, Greenland; and references to scarlet clothing in Icelandic sagas. Other papers focus on linen production in medieval Russia and an enigmatic quilt of Henry VIII's that almost certainly arrived in England as part of the dowry of Catherine of Aragon. Also included are reviews of recent books on clothing and textiles. ROBIN NETHERTON is a professional editor and a researcher/lecturer on the interpretation of medieval European dress; GALE R. OWEN-CROCKER is Professor of Anglo-Saxon Culture at the University of Manchester. Contributors: MARK CHAMBERS, CAMILLA LUISE DAHL, LISA EVANS, JOHN BLOCK FRIEDMAN, LENA HAMMARLUND, HEINI KIRJAVAINEN, ALEXANDRA M. LESTER, ROBIN NETHERTON, GALE R. OWEN-CROCKER, KATHRINE VESTERGARD PEDERSEN, HEIDI M. SHERMAN, LUCIA SINISI, ISIS STURTEWAGEN, MARIANNE VEDELER, ANNA ZANCHI

What do Brueghel's mid-sixteenth-century portrayals of 'heavy' wedding dancers and feasters have in common with many late medieval poems and manuscript illustrations? Certain of his paintings, with their obsessive social detail, have often been treated as if they heralded a set of cultural attitudes peculiar to the Early Modern period. Yet the way that the painter combines, in a single scene, scurrilous behavior with dress not only unsuited to the rustic status of the wearers but often sexually revealing, reflects attitudes toward clothing, class, and culture that are deeply medieval. In this expansive and highly original book, Friedman reveals how portrayals of peasants from the literature of the Golden Age of Virgilian Pastoral, who behave according to their social station, were increasingly replaced in the Middle Ages by portrayals that present the realistic peasant, whose outrageous behavior betrays his or her class while it threatens those who stand 'above'. Capacious in scope, the book covers poems from England, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain from the twelfth through the sixteenth centuries. In addition, Friedman draws on texts from various genres, particularly the Pastourelle, giving readers the first panoramic approach to late medieval views of peasant clothing and certain related social behaviors such as eating, publicly excreting, brawling, and 'mooning'. The book examines elite anxiety over the socially striving lower classes during a period in which social identity was fluid and hierarchies were increasingly challenged by pressure from below. Illustrated with over twenty black-and-white images and offering detailed analyses of poems, plays, and stories, ""Brueghel's Heavy Dancers"" offers a fresh and illuminating contribution to the field of medieval studies.

This is a new edition of Friedman's classic examination of the myth of Orpheus in the late antique and medieval periods. Friedman discusses Christian, Jewish and romantic secular `portraits' of Orpheus, and considers artistic, literary and philosophical sources. In this edition the original text remains unchanged, but the bibliography has been updated.

During the Middle Ages, travelers in Africa and Asia reported that "monstrous races" thrived beyond the boundaries of the known world. John B. Friedman offers an introspective look at these races and their interaction with Western art, literature, and philosophy.