In medieval literature, when humans and animals meet – whether as friends or foes – issues of mastery and submission are often at stake".In the Skin of a Beast" shows how the concept of sovereignty comes to the fore in such narratives, reflecting lar...

For many, the medieval world seems dark and foreign – a miraculous, brutal and irrational time of superstition and strange relics. The pursuit of heretics, the inquisition, the crusades and the domination of the "Holy Land" come to mind. Yet the medi...

During the Middle Ages in Europe, some sexual and gendered behaviors were labeled "sodomitical"‌ or evoked the use of ambiguous phrases such as the "unmentionable vice" or the "sin against nature". How, though, did these categories enter the field of...

In the late Middle Ages, Europe saw the rise of one of its most virulent myths: that Jews abused the eucharistic bread as a form of anti-Christian blasphemy, causing it to bleed miraculously. The allegation fostered tensions between Christians and Je...

When eight-year-old Lucrezia Orsina Vizzana (1590-1662) entered one of the preeminent convents in Bologna in 1598, she had no idea what cloistered life had in store for her. Thanks to clandestine instruction from a local maestro di cappella – and des...

This is an extravagantly illustrated and engrossing exploration of the art of medieval fighting. This volume offers an intriguing look into the world of late medieval martial arts, from wrestling to swordsmanship and to the subtle tricks that could b...

Witchcraft. Arson. Going AWOL. Some nuns in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Italy strayed far from the paradigms of monastic life. Cloistered in convents, subjected to stifling hierarchy, repressed, and occasionally persecuted by their male superi...

Why did capitalism and colonialism arise in Europe and not elsewhere? Why were parliamentarian and democratic forms of government founded there? What factors led to Europe's unique position in shaping the world? Thoroughly researched and persuasively...