Alexander III of Macedon (356-323 BC) has for over 2000 years been one of the best recognized names from antiquity. He set about creating his own legend in his lifetime, and subsequent writers and political actors developed it. He acquired the surname 'Great' by the Roman period, and the Alexander Romance transmitted his legendary biography to every language of medieval Europe and the Middle East. As well as an adventurer who sought the secret of immortality and discussed the purpose of life with the naked sages of India, he became a model for military achievement as well as a religious prophet bringing Christianity (in the Crusades) and Islam (in the Qur'an and beyond) to the regions he conquered. This innovative and fascinating volume explores these and many other facets of his reception in various cultures around the world, right up to the present and his role in gay activism.

"The core of this book on the French verse Alexander in France and Italy was written by eminent Alexander specialist David J.A. Ross, who left an incomplete typescript at his death. In its emphasis on illustration, this book offers new perspectives on the reception of one of the most popular medieval heroes. Ross's analysis of the illustrations proves that despite some convergent patterns there is no iconographic programme that coordinates the three major verse traditions as there is for the versions in prose. Nevertheless, the verse versions continued to be copied and illustrated long after the emergence of prose. The editors have expanded Ross's text, as he wished, to include a comparative analysis of the iconography and they have situated each manuscript as far as possible in its cultural context, demonstrating that the producers of the verse Alexander were also responsible for writing and illustrating a large number of other vernacular and liturgical books in Northern France, Paris, the South, and Italy. This volume is a sequel to Ross's Studies in the Alexander Romance and his Illustrated medieval Alexander-books in Germany and the Netherlands, and makes available an extensive corpus of high-quality images of this great hero."--

In the late middle ages (ca. 1200-1520), both religious and secular people used manuscripts, was regarded as a most precious item. The traces of their use through touching and handling during different rituals such as oath-taking, public reading, and memorializing the dead, is the subject of Kathryn Rudy’s research in Touching Parchment. This second volume, Social Encounters with the Book, delves into the physical interaction with books in various social settings, including education, courtly assemblies, and confraternal gatherings. Looking at acts such as pointing, scratching, and ‘wet-touching’, the author zooms in on smudges and abrasions on medieval manuscripts as testimonials of readers’ interaction with the book and its contents. In so doing, she dissects the function of books in oaths, confraternal groups, education, and courtly settings, illuminating how books were used as teaching aids and tools for conveying political messages. The narrative paints a vivid picture of medieval reading, emphasizing bodily engagement, from page-turning to the intimate act of kissing pages. Overall, this text offers a captivating exploration of the tactile and social dimensions of book use in late medieval Europe broadening our perspective on the role of objects in rituals during the middle ages. Social Encounters with the Book provides a fundamental resource to anybody interested in medieval history and book materiality more widely.

Featuring twenty major works of European poetry over a period of a thousand years, this collection charts the development of verse from the fall of the Roman Empire to the birth of the Renaissance. Contrary to popular belief, the poetry of the Dark Ages enjoyed a pioneering development, exploring new metres and complex imagery. Throughout the Middle Ages, poetry adopted numerous forms across the continent, from the epic greatness of the ‘chanson de geste’ to the sublime lyrical qualities of love poetry. This eBook provides a rich sample of medieval poetry; from the earliest dawn of English literature to the unparalleled brilliance of Dante; from the courtly adventures of Arthurian legend to the stirring lays of the Vikings; from the Eastern magic of Georgia to the ribald genius of Chaucer; this collection will immerse you in the perilous, amusing and tantalising world of the Middle Ages. (Version 1) * Beautifully illustrated with images relating to the poets’ lives and works * Concise introductions to the works * Most of the poems appear with their original medieval texts, as well as an English translation — ideal for students * Images of how the original manuscripts first appeared, giving your eReader a taste of the medieval texts * Excellent formatting of the poems * Easily locate the sections you want to read * Features three critical works on the development of medieval literature * Scholarly ordering of texts into chronological order Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to see our wide range of poet titles CONTENTS: Medieval Poetry Hymn by Cædmon (7th century) Christ II by Cynewulf (8th century) (Tr. Raymond Wilson Chambers) Beowulf (c.1000) (Tr. William Morris) The Song of Roland (c. 1050) (Tr. C. K. Moncreiff) The Poem of the Cid (c. 1140) (Tr. Robert Southey) Chronicle of the Norman Conquest from ‘Roman de Rou’ by Wace (c. 1170) (Tr. Edgar Taylor) Yvain, the Knight of the Lion by Chrétien de Troyes (c. 1180) (Tr. William Wistar Comfort) Parzival by Wolfram von Eschenbach (c. 1210) (Tr. Jessie Weston) The Troubadours (1100-1350) by H. J. Chaytor The Knight in the Panther’s Skin by Shota Rustaveli (c. 1190) (Tr. Marjory Wardrop) The Song of the Nibelungs (c. 1200) (Tr. Daniel Bussier Shumway) Lays of Marie de France (c. 1210) (Tr. Eugene Mason) The Romance of the Rose by Guillaume de Lorris [PARTIAL TRANSLATION] (c. 1230) (Tr. Geoffrey Chaucer) Poetic Edda (c. 13th century) (Tr. Benjamin Thorpe) Wine, Women and Song: Mediæval Latin Students’ Songs (c. 13th century) (Tr. John Addington Symonds) The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri (1320) (Tr. H. F. Cary) Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (c. 1375) (Tr. Jessie Weston) Sonnets by Francesco Petrarca (c. 1374) (Tr. Thomas Campbell) Piers Plowman by William Langland (c. 1380) Edited by Thomas Wright The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1400) The Criticism The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory by George Saintsbury Medieval English Literature by W. P. Ker Epic and Romance: Essays on Medieval Literature by W. P. Ker Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of poetry titles or buy the entire Delphi Poets Series as a Super Set

This is the third and final volume of essays issuing from the Leverhulme International Network 'Renaissance Conflict and Rivalries: Cultural Polemics in Europe, c. 1300–c. 1650'. The overall aim of the network was to examine the various ways in which conflict and rivalries made a positive contribution to cultural production and change during the Renaissance. The present volume, which contains papers delivered at the third colloquium, draws that examination to a close by considering a range of different strategies deployed in the period to manage conflict and rivalries and to bring them to a positive resolution. The papers explore these developments in the context of political, diplomatic, social, institutional, religious, and art history.

These two volumes are about the forty-five surviving manuscripts and fragments that transmit, and sometimes illustrate, the texts of Chrétien de Troyes. Here is presented, for the first time, a photographic corpus of those manuscripts that is as complete as possible and includes all the illustrations of the illustrated manuscripts, organized according to a new interpretation of their chronology and distribution. This visual material is complemented by a catalogue of all the extant manuscripts and their illustrations and by a series of analytical essays on aspects of the codicology, palaeography, the history of style and iconography, and the history of textual transmission of the manuscripts. The 24 colour and 435 black/white plates and figures include at least one reproduction of every manuscript and fragment, with the unfortunate exception of the fragments that have been lost since their texts were edited and of which no photograph has been preserved. The collaboration of literary scholars with art historians, codicologists, and palaeographers make this enterprise a new departure in manuscript and text studies: many of the essays are also illustrated.

An innovative overview of the influence of the Apocalypse on the shaping of the Christian culture of the Middle Ages.