1.
Bodleian Library
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The Bodleian Library, the main research library of the University of Oxford, is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. With over 12 million items, it is the second largest library in Britain after the British Library, known to Oxford scholars as Bodley or the Bod, it operates principally as a reference library and, in general, documents may not be removed from the reading rooms. They do, however, participate in OLIS, the Bodleian Libraries online union catalogue, much of the librarys archives were digitized and put online for public access in 2015. Since the 19th century a number of stores have been built. Before being granted access to the library, new readers are required to agree to a formal declaration and this declaration was traditionally an oral oath, but is now usually made by signing a letter to a similar effect. Ceremonies in which readers recite the declaration are still performed for those who wish to take them, external readers are still required to recite the declaration orally prior to admission. The Bodleian Admissions Office has amassed a collection of translations of the declaration allowing those who are not native English speakers to recite it in their first language. Whilst the Bodleian Library, in its current incarnation, has a history dating back to 1602. The first purpose-built library known to have existed in Oxford was founded in the century under the will of Thomas Cobham. This small collection of chained books was situated above the side of the University Church of St Mary the Virgin on the High Street. A suitable room was built above the Divinity School. This room continues to be known as Duke Humfreys Library, after 1488, the university stopped spending money on the librarys upkeep and acquisitions, and manuscripts began to go unreturned to the library. The late sixteenth century saw the library go through a period of decline, the furniture was sold. During the reign of Edward VI, there was a purge of superstitious manuscripts, six of the Oxford University dons were tasked with helping Bodley in refitting the library in March 1658. Duke Humfrey’s Library was refitted, and Bodley donated a number of his own books to furnish it, the library was formally re-opened on 8 November 1602 under the name “Bodleian Library”. There were around two thousand books in the library at this time, with an ornate Benefactors Register displayed prominently, in 1605, Francis Bacon gave the library a copy of The Advancement of Learning and described the Bodleian as an Ark to save learning from deluge. At this time, there were few books written in English held in the library, Thomas James suggested that Bodley should ask the Stationers Company to provide a copy of all books printed to the Bodleian. In 1610, Bodley made an agreement with the Stationers Company in London to put a copy of every book registered with them in the library, the Bodleian collection grew so fast that the building was expanded between 1610–1612, and again in 1634–1637
2.
Middle Ages
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In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or Medieval Period lasted from the 5th to the 15th century. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and merged into the Renaissance, the Middle Ages is the middle period of the three traditional divisions of Western history, classical antiquity, the medieval period, and the modern period. The medieval period is subdivided into the Early, High. Population decline, counterurbanisation, invasion, and movement of peoples, the large-scale movements of the Migration Period, including various Germanic peoples, formed new kingdoms in what remained of the Western Roman Empire. In the seventh century, North Africa and the Middle East—once part of the Byzantine Empire—came under the rule of the Umayyad Caliphate, although there were substantial changes in society and political structures, the break with classical antiquity was not complete. The still-sizeable Byzantine Empire survived in the east and remained a major power, the empires law code, the Corpus Juris Civilis or Code of Justinian, was rediscovered in Northern Italy in 1070 and became widely admired later in the Middle Ages. In the West, most kingdoms incorporated the few extant Roman institutions, monasteries were founded as campaigns to Christianise pagan Europe continued. The Franks, under the Carolingian dynasty, briefly established the Carolingian Empire during the later 8th, the Crusades, first preached in 1095, were military attempts by Western European Christians to regain control of the Holy Land from Muslims. Kings became the heads of centralised nation states, reducing crime and violence, intellectual life was marked by scholasticism, a philosophy that emphasised joining faith to reason, and by the founding of universities. Controversy, heresy, and the Western Schism within the Catholic Church paralleled the conflict, civil strife. Cultural and technological developments transformed European society, concluding the Late Middle Ages, the Middle Ages is one of the three major periods in the most enduring scheme for analysing European history, classical civilisation, or Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Modern Period. Medieval writers divided history into periods such as the Six Ages or the Four Empires, when referring to their own times, they spoke of them as being modern. In the 1330s, the humanist and poet Petrarch referred to pre-Christian times as antiqua, leonardo Bruni was the first historian to use tripartite periodisation in his History of the Florentine People. Bruni and later argued that Italy had recovered since Petrarchs time. The Middle Ages first appears in Latin in 1469 as media tempestas or middle season, in early usage, there were many variants, including medium aevum, or middle age, first recorded in 1604, and media saecula, or middle ages, first recorded in 1625. The alternative term medieval derives from medium aevum, tripartite periodisation became standard after the German 17th-century historian Christoph Cellarius divided history into three periods, Ancient, Medieval, and Modern. The most commonly given starting point for the Middle Ages is 476, for Europe as a whole,1500 is often considered to be the end of the Middle Ages, but there is no universally agreed upon end date. English historians often use the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485 to mark the end of the period
3.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
4.
Poetry
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Poetry has a long history, dating back to the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh. Early poems evolved from folk songs such as the Chinese Shijing, or from a need to retell oral epics, as with the Sanskrit Vedas, Zoroastrian Gathas, and the Homeric epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey. Ancient attempts to define poetry, such as Aristotles Poetics, focused on the uses of speech in rhetoric, drama, song and comedy. Later attempts concentrated on such as repetition, verse form and rhyme. From the mid-20th century, poetry has sometimes been more generally regarded as a creative act employing language. Poetry uses forms and conventions to suggest differential interpretation to words, devices such as assonance, alliteration, onomatopoeia and rhythm are sometimes used to achieve musical or incantatory effects. The use of ambiguity, symbolism, irony and other elements of poetic diction often leaves a poem open to multiple interpretations. Similarly figures of such as metaphor, simile and metonymy create a resonance between otherwise disparate images—a layering of meanings, forming connections previously not perceived. Kindred forms of resonance may exist, between verses, in their patterns of rhyme or rhythm. Some poetry types are specific to cultures and genres and respond to characteristics of the language in which the poet writes. Much modern poetry reflects a critique of poetic tradition, playing with and testing, among other things, in todays increasingly globalized world, poets often adapt forms, styles and techniques from diverse cultures and languages. Some scholars believe that the art of poetry may predate literacy, others, however, suggest that poetry did not necessarily predate writing. The oldest surviving poem, the Epic of Gilgamesh, comes from the 3rd millennium BCE in Sumer. An example of Egyptian epic poetry is The Story of Sinuhe, other forms of poetry developed directly from folk songs. The earliest entries in the oldest extant collection of Chinese poetry, the efforts of ancient thinkers to determine what makes poetry distinctive as a form, and what distinguishes good poetry from bad, resulted in poetics—the study of the aesthetics of poetry. Some ancient societies, such as Chinas through her Shijing, developed canons of poetic works that had ritual as well as aesthetic importance, Classical thinkers employed classification as a way to define and assess the quality of poetry. Later aestheticians identified three major genres, epic poetry, lyric poetry, and dramatic poetry, treating comedy and tragedy as subgenres of dramatic poetry, Aristotles work was influential throughout the Middle East during the Islamic Golden Age, as well as in Europe during the Renaissance. English Romantic poet John Keats termed this escape from logic Negative Capability and this romantic approach views form as a key element of successful poetry because form is abstract and distinct from the underlying notional logic
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Allegory
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As a literary device, an allegory is a metaphor whose vehicle may be a character, place or event, representing real-world issues and occurrences. Many ancient religions are based on astrological allegories, that is, allegories of the movement of the sun, in classical literature two of the best-known allegories are the Cave in Platos Republic and the story of the stomach and its members in the speech of Menenius Agrippa. One of the examples of allegory, Platos Allegory of the Cave. In this allegory, Plato describes a group of people who have lived chained in an all of their lives. The people watch shadows projected on the wall by things passing in front of a fire behind them and begin to ascribe forms to these shadows, using language to identify their world. He tries to tell the people in the cave of his discovery, also allegorical is Ezekiel 16 and 17, wherein the capture of that same vine by the mighty Eagle represents Israels exile to Rome. Allegory has an ability to freeze the temporality of a story, Mediaeval thinking accepted allegory as having a reality underlying any rhetorical or fictional uses. The allegory was as true as the facts of surface appearances, if, then, the Greeks or others say that they were not committed to the care of Peter and his successors, they necessarily confess that they are not of the sheep of Christ. This text also demonstrates the frequent use of allegory in religious texts during the Mediaeval Period, following the tradition, since meaningful stories are nearly always applicable to larger issues, allegories may be read into many stories which the author may not have recognised. This is allegoresis, or the act of reading a story as an allegory. S, lewis and A Kingdom Far and Clear, The Complete Swan Lake Trilogy by Mark Helprin. The story of the apple falling onto Isaac Newtons head is another famous allegory and it simplified the idea of gravity by depicting a simple way it was supposedly discovered. It also made the scientific revelation well known by condensing the theory into a short tale. According to Henry Littlefields 1964 article, L. Yet, George MacDonald emphasised in 1893 that, A fairy tale is not an allegory, I much prefer history – true or feigned– with its varied applicability to the thought and experience of readers. I think that many confuse applicability with allegory, but the one resides in the freedom of the reader, and this further reinforces the idea of forced allegoresis, as allegory is often a matter of interpretation and only sometimes of original artistic intention. Like allegorical stories, allegorical poetry has two meanings – a literal meaning and a symbolic meaning, some unique specimens of allegory can be found in the following works, Edmund Spenser – The Faerie Queene, The several knights in the poem actually stand for several virtues. Nathaniel Hawthorne – Young Goodman Brown, The Devils Staff symbolises defiance of God, the characters names, such as Goodman and Faith, ironically serve as paradox in the conclusion of the story. Nathaniel Hawthorne – The Scarlet Letter, The scarlet letter symbolises many things, the characters, while developed with interiority, are allegorical in that they represent ways of seeing the world. George Orwell – Animal Farm, The pigs stand for political figures of the Russian Revolution, lászló Krasznahorkai - The Melancholy of Resistance and the film Werckmeister Harmonies, It uses a circus to describe an occupying dysfunctional government
6.
Dream vision
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A dream vision or visio is a literary device in which a dream or vision is recounted as having revealed knowledge or a truth that is not available to the dreamer or visionary in a normal waking state. While dreams occur frequently throughout the history of literature, visionary literature as a genre began to flourish suddenly, in both its ancient and medieval form, the dream vision is often felt to be of divine origin. The genre reemerged in the era of Romanticism, when dreams were regarded as creative gateways to imaginative possibilities beyond rational calculation and this genre typically follows a structure whereby a narrator recounts his experience of falling asleep, dreaming, and waking, and the story is often an allegory. The dream, which forms the subject of the poem, is prompted by events in his life that are referred to early in the poem. The ‘vision’ addresses these concerns through the possibilities of the imaginative landscapes offered by the dream-state. In the course of the dream, the narrator, often with the aid of a guide, is offered perspectives that provide potential resolutions to his waking concerns, the poem concludes with the narrator waking, determined to record the dream – thus producing the poem. The dream-vision convention was used in European literature from late Latin times until the 15th century. He is chaperoned in the dream briefly by Scipio the Elder himself and it is written in unrhymed alliterative verse divided into sections called passus
7.
Courtly love
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Courtly love was a medieval European literary conception of love that emphasized nobility and chivalry. Medieval literature is filled with examples of knights setting out on adventures and this kind of love is originally a literary fiction created for the entertainment of the nobility, but as time passed, these ideas about love changed and attracted a larger audience. In the high Middle Ages, a game of love developed around these ideas as a set of social practices, loving nobly was considered to be an enriching and improving practice. Courtly love began in the ducal and princely courts of Aquitaine, Provence, Champagne, ducal Burgundy, the term courtly love was first popularized by Gaston Paris and has since come under a wide variety of definitions and uses. Its interpretation, origins and influences continue to be a matter of critical debate, Paris said amour courtois was an idolization and ennobling discipline. Sexual satisfaction, Paris said, may not have been a goal or even end result, the term and Pariss definition were soon widely accepted and adopted. In addition, other terms and phrases associated with courtliness and love are common throughout the Middle Ages and this presents a clear problem in the understanding of courtliness. The practice of love was developed in the castle life of four regions, Aquitaine, Provence, Champagne and ducal Burgundy. Eleanor of Aquitaine brought ideals of love from Aquitaine first to the court of France, then to England. Her daughter Marie, Countess of Champagne brought courtly behavior to the Count of Champagnes court, Courtly love found its expression in the lyric poems written by troubadours, such as William IX, Duke of Aquitaine, one of the first troubadour poets. The troubadours model of the lady was the wife of his employer or lord. When her husband was away on Crusade or other business she dominated the household and cultural affairs, the lady was rich and powerful and the poet gave voice to the aspirations of the courtier class, for only those who were noble could engage in courtly love. This new kind of love saw nobility not based on wealth and family history, lovers in the context of courtly love need not refer to sex, but rather the act of emotional loving. These lovers had short trysts in secret, which escalated mentally, the rules of courtly love were codified by the late 12th century in Andreas Capellanus highly influential work De Amore. De amore lists such rules as Marriage is no excuse for not loving, He who is not jealous cannot love, No one can be bound by a double love. Much of its structure and its sentiments were derived from Ovids Ars amatoria, given that practices similar to courtly love were already prevalent in Al-Andalus and elsewhere in the Islamic world, it is very likely that Islamic practices influenced the Christian Europeans. William of Aquitane, for example, was involved in the First Crusade, the notions of love for loves sake and exaltation of the beloved lady have been traced back to Arabic literature of the 9th and 10th centuries. The notion of the power of love was developed in the early 11th century by the Persian psychologist and philosopher, Ibn Sina
8.
Romance (love)
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Romance is the expressive and pleasurable feeling from an emotional attraction towards another person often associated with sexual attraction. It is eros rather than agape, philia, or storge, historically, the term romance originates with the medieval ideal of chivalry as set out in its chivalric romance literature. Humans have an inclination to form bonds with one another through social interactions. The debate over an exact definition of love may be found in literature as well as in the works of psychologists, philosophers, biochemists and other professionals. The addition of drama to relationships of close, deep and strong love, psychologist Charles Lindholm defined love to be. an intense attraction that involves the idealization of the other, within an erotic context, with expectation of enduring sometime into the future. The word was originally an adverb of the Latin origin Romanicus, the connecting notion is that European medieval vernacular tales were usually about chivalric adventure, not combining the idea of love until late into the seventeenth century. In primitive societies, tension existed between marriage and the erotic, but this was expressed in taboo regarding the menstrual cycle. Anthropologists such as Claude Lévi-Strauss show that there were forms of courtship in ancient as well as contemporary primitive societies. There may not be evidence, however, that members of such societies formed loving relationships distinct from their established customs in a way that would parallel modern romance, before the 18th century, many marriages were not arranged, but rather developed out of more or less spontaneous relationships. After the 18th century, illicit relationships took on an independent role. In bourgeois marriage, illicitness may have become more formidable and likely to cause tension, in Ladies of the Leisure Class, Rutgers University professor Bonnie G. Smith depicts courtship and marriage rituals that may be viewed as oppressive to modern people. She writes When the young women of the Nord married, they did so without illusions of love and they acted within a framework of concern for the reproduction of bloodlines according to financial, professional, and sometimes political interests. Subsequent sexual revolution has lessened the conflicts arising out of liberalism, anthony Giddens, in his book The Transformation of Intimacy, Sexuality, Love and Eroticism in Modern Society, states that romantic love introduced the idea of a narrative into an individuals life. He adds that telling a story was one of the meanings of romance, according to Giddens, the rise of romantic love more or less coincided with the emergence of the novel. It was then that romantic love, associated with freedom and therefore the ideals of romantic love, for the discourse of intimacy emotional closeness was much more important than passion. This does not mean by any means that intimacy is to replace romance, on the contrary, intimacy and romance coexist. The 21st century has seen the growth of globalization and people now live in a world of transformations that affect almost every aspect of our lives, one example of the changes experienced in relationships was explored by Giddens regarding homosexual relationships. According to Giddens since homosexuals were not able to marry they were forced to more open
9.
Affair
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An affair is a sexual relationship, romantic friendship, or passionate attachment between two people without the attached persons significant other knowing. A romantic affair, also called an affair of the heart, may refer to sexual liaisons among unwed or wedded parties, extramarital affairs are relationships outside of marriage where an illicit romantic or sexual relationship or a romantic friendship or passionate attachment occurs. This may be serial polygamy or other forms of nonmonogamy, even to hide one affair requires a degree of skill or malicious gaslighting. All these behaviors are more usually called lying, deception can be defined as the covert manipulation of perception to alter thoughts, feelings, or beliefs. The presence of deception may indicate the degree to which the deceiver has breached fundamental conditions of fidelity, of reciprocal vulnerability, sometimes these are explicit or assumed pre-conditions of a committed intimate relationship. As of 2009, eight U. S. states permitted such alienation of affections lawsuits, the appearance of computer-mediated communication introduces a new type of communication and consequently a new type of affair. Online affairs combine features of close and remote relationships, like direct, face-to-face affairs, online affairs can be spontaneous and casual and show intensive personal involvement. People participating in online affairs may be strangers to each other in the sense that they have never met each other. However, they are close to each other since they share intimate information. In online affairs, people try to enjoy the benefits of close and remote affairs, while avoiding their flaws. People enjoy the highly valued products of affairs while paying the low cost of remote affairs. As one woman wrote, He constantly told me that he can not provide me with what I would want and I would always respond with, Im not asking anything from you, but simply enjoy your company. Patterns and universals of mate poaching across 53 nations, The effects of sex, culture, journal of Personality and Social Psychology,86, 560–584. United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Infidelity
10.
Courtier
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A courtier is a person who is often in attendance at the court of a king or other royal personage. The earliest historical examples of courtiers were part of the retinues of rulers, historically the court was the centre of government as well as the residence of the monarch, and the social and political life were often completely mixed together. Monarchs very often expected the more important nobles to spend much of the year in attendance on them at court, not all courtiers were noble, as they included clergy, soldiers, clerks, secretaries, and agents and middlemen of all sorts with regular business at court. All those who held a court appointment could be called courtiers and those personal favorites without business around the monarch, sometimes called the camarilla, were also considered courtiers. Promotion to important positions could be very rapid at court, the key commodities for a courtier were access and information, and a large court operated at many levels - many successful careers at court involved no direct contact with the monarch. The largest and most famous European court was that of the Palace of Versailles at its peak, although the Forbidden City of Beijing was even larger and more isolated from national life. Very similar features marked the courts of all very large monarchies, whether in Delhi, Topkapı Palace in Istanbul, Ancient Rome, Byzantium, early medieval European courts frequently traveled from place to place following the monarch as he traveled. This was particularly the case in the early French court, but, the European nobility generally had independent power and was less controlled by the monarch until roughly the 18th century, which gave European court life a more complex flavour. The earliest courtiers coincide with the development of definable courts beyond the rudimentary entourages or retinues of rulers, two of the earliest titles referring to the general concept of a courtier were likely the ša rēsi and mazzāz pāni of the Neo-Assyrian Empire. The imperial court of the Byzantine Empire at Constantinople would eventually contain at least a thousand courtiers, the courts systems became prevalent in other courts such as those in the Balkan states, the Ottoman Empire, and Russia. Byzantinism is a term that was coined for this spread of the Byzantine system in the 19th century, in modern literature, courtiers are often depicted as insincere, skilled at flattery and intrigue, ambitious and lacking regard for the national interest. More positive representations of the stereotype might include the role played by members of the court in the development of politeness, in modern English, the term is often used metaphorically for contemporary political favourites or hangers-on. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern from William Shakespeares Hamlet Sir Lancelot from Arthurian legend Gríma Wormtongue from J. R. R, Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington from J. K.36, No
11.
Epic poetry
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An epic poem, epic, epos, or epopee is a lengthy narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation. Milman Parry and Albert Lord have argued that the Homeric epics and these works form the basis of the epic genre in Western literature. Nearly all Western epic self-consciously presents itself as a continuation of the tradition begun by these poems, classical epic employs dactylic hexameter and recounts a journey, either physical or mental or both. Epics also tend to highlight cultural norms and to define or call into question cultural values, another type of epic poetry is epyllion, which is a brief narrative poem with a romantic or mythological theme. The term, which means little epic, came into use in the nineteenth century, the most famous example of classical epyllion is perhaps Catullus 64. The first epics were products of preliterate societies and oral history poetic traditions, in these traditions, poetry is transmitted to the audience and from performer to performer by purely oral means. Early twentieth-century study of living oral traditions in the Balkans by Milman Parry. What they demonstrated was that oral epics tend to be constructed in short episodes, each of equal status, interest and this facilitates memorization, as the poet is recalling each episode in turn and using the completed episodes to recreate the entire epic as he performs it. Parry and Lord also contend that the most likely source for written texts of the epics of Homer was dictation from an oral performance, poets in literate societies have sometimes copied the epic format. The earliest surviving European examples are the Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes and Virgils Aeneid, other obvious examples are Nonnus Dionysiaca, Tulsidas Sri Ramacharit Manas. In his work Poetics, Aristotle defines an epic as one of the forms of poetry, contrasted with lyric poetry, an attempt to delineate ten main characteristics of an epic, Begins in medias res. The setting is vast, covering many nations, the world or the universe, Begins with an invocation to a muse. Begins with a statement of the theme, contains long lists, called an epic catalogue. Shows divine intervention on human affairs, features heroes that embody the values of the civilization. Often features the tragic heros descent into the Underworld or hell, the hero generally participates in a cyclical journey or quest, faces adversaries that try to defeat him in his journey and returns home significantly transformed by his journey. The epic hero illustrates traits, performs deeds, and exemplifies certain morals that are valued by the society the epic originates from, many epic heroes are recurring characters in the legends of their native culture. Conventions of epics, Preposition, Opens by stating the theme or cause of the epic and this may take the form of a purpose, of a question, or of a situation. Invocation, Writer invokes a Muse, one of the nine daughters of Zeus, the poet prays to the Muses to provide him with divine inspiration to tell the story of a great hero
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Chivalric romance
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As a literary genre of high culture, romance or chivalric romance is a type of prose and verse narrative that was popular in the aristocratic circles of High Medieval and Early Modern Europe. Popular literature also drew on themes of romance, but with ironic, satiric or burlesque intent. Still, the image of medieval is more influenced by the romance than by any other medieval genre, and the word medieval evokes knights, distressed damsels, dragons. Originally, romance literature was written in Old French, Anglo-Norman, Occitan, and Provençal, during the early 13th century, romances were increasingly written as prose. In later romances, particularly those of French origin, there is a tendency to emphasize themes of courtly love. Unlike the later form of the novel and like the chansons de geste, the earliest forms were invariably in verse, but the 15th century saw many in prose, often retelling the old, rhymed versions. Many influences are clear in the forms of chivalric romance, the epics of Charlemagne, unlike such ones as Beowulf, already had feudalism rather than the tribal loyalties, this was to continue in romances. The romance form is distinguished from the epics of the Middle Ages by the changes of the 12th century. This occurred regardless of congruity to the material, Alexander the Great featured as a fully feudal king. Chivalry was treated as continuous from Roman times, historical figures reappeared, reworked, in romance. The entire Matter of France derived from known figures, and suffered somewhat because their descendents had an interest in the tales that were told of their ancestors, unlike the Matter of Britain. Hereward the Wakes early life appeared in chronicles as the embellished, romantic adventures of an exile, complete with rescuing princess, fulk Fitzwarin, an outlaw in King Johns day, has his historical background a minor thread in the episodic stream of romantic adventures. The earliest medieval romances dealt heavily with themes from folklore, which diminished over time, morgan le Fay never loses her name, but in Le Morte dArthur, she studies magic rather than being inherently magical. Still, fairies never completely vanished from the tradition, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a late tale, but the Green Knight himself is an otherworldly being. In Italy there is the story called Il Bel Gherardino and it is the most ancient prototype of an Italian singing fairy tale by an anonymous Tuscan author. It tells the story of a young Italian knight, depleted for its magnanimitas, other examples of Italian poetry tales are Antonio Puccis literature, Gismirante, Il Brutto di Bretagna or Brito di Bretagna and Madonna Lionessa. Another work of a second anonymous Italian author that is worth mentioning is Istoria di Tre Giovani Disperati e di Tre Fate, some romances, such as Apollonius of Tyre, show classical pagan origins. Tales of the Matter of Rome in particular may be derived from such works as the Alexander Romance
13.
Coda (music)
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Coda is a term used in music primarily to designate a passage that brings a piece to an end. Technically, it is an expanded cadence and it may be as simple as a few measures, or as complex as an entire section. The presence of a coda as an element in a movement is especially clear in works written in particular musical forms. Codas were commonly used in both form and variation movements during the Classical era. In a sonata movement, the recapitulation section will, in general, follow the exposition in its thematic content. In works in form, the coda occurs following the last variation. For one famous example, see Symphony No.8, codetta has a similar purpose to the coda, but on a smaller scale, concluding a section of a work instead of the work as a whole. A typical codetta concludes the exposition and recapitulation sections of a work in sonata form, following the second theme, thus, in the exposition, it usually appears in the secondary key, but, in the recapitulation, in the primary key. The codetta ordinarily closes with a cadence in the appropriate key. If the exposition is repeated, the codetta is also, but sometimes it has its ending slightly changed, cauda, a Latin word meaning tail, edge or trail is the root of coda and is used in the study of conductus of the 12th and 13th centuries. The cauda was a long melisma on one of the last syllables of the text, conducti were traditionally divided into two groups, conductus cum cauda and conductus sine cauda, based on the presence of the melisma. Thus, the cauda provided a role, also similar to the modern coda. Many songs in rock and other genres of music have sections identifiable as codas. A coda in these genres is sometimes referred to as an outro, while in jazz, modern church music, in music notation, the coda symbol, which resembles a set of crosshairs, is used as a navigation marker, similar to the dal Segno sign. It is used where the exit from a section is within that section rather than at the end. The instruction To Coda indicates that, upon reaching that point during the final repetition, for example, this can be used to provide a special ending for the final verse of a song. Coda Da capo Epilogue Repeat sign Transition Fade This article incorporates text from a now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh
14.
Jean Gerson
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Aged fourteen, he left Gerson-lès-Barby to study at the college of Navarre in Paris under Gilles Deschamps, and Pierre dAilly, who became his life-long friend. Gerson was born at Gerson-lès-Barby, Gerson a hamlet in the present municipality of Barby, young Gerson was sent to Paris to the famous college of Navarre when fourteen years of age. Pierre dAilly remained his friend, and in later life the pupil seems to have become the teacher. Gerson very soon attracted the notice of the university and he was elected procurator for the French nation in 1383, and again in 1384, in which year he graduated bachelor of theology. Three years later a higher honour was bestowed upon him, he was sent along with the chancellor. Gersons biographers have compared his journey to Avignon with Luthers visit to Rome, Gersons writings bear witness to his deep sense of the responsibilities, anxieties and troubles of his position. He was all his days a man of letters, and an analysis of his writings is his best biography. His work has three periods, in which he was engaged in reforming the university studies, maturing plans for overcoming the schism, and in the evening of his life writing books of devotion. Gerson wished to banish scholastic subtleties from the studies of the university and he was called at this period of his life Doctor Christianissimus, later his devotional and pastoral writings brought him the title Doctor Consolatorius. His plan was to make theology plain and simple by founding it on the principles of nominalism. His method was an exposition of the principles of theology where clearness was possible. He thought that in this way he would guard against the folly of the old scholasticism. His plans for the reformation of university studies may be learned from his Epistolae de reform, the study of the Bible and of the fathers was to supersede the idle questions of the schools, and in his Tract. Contra romantiam de rosa he warns against the irreverent Roman de la rose of Guillaume de Lorris and he was often weary of the chancellorship—it involved him in strife and in money difficulties, he grew tired of public life, and longed for learned leisure. To obtain it he accepted the deanery of Bruges from the duke of Burgundy, Gersons 1402 treatise De Vita Spirituali Animae was one of the first attempts at developing natural rights theory. He thought that freedom could be exchanged in the way as property. Gersons chief work was toward reconciling the great schism and this caused great confusion, as the Church could, at one time, only have one legitimate successor of St. Peter— and one faith, one Lord, one baptism, one seamless garment of Christ. The schism had practically been brought about by France, hence the melancholy piety of Gerson, Pierre dAilly and their companions, and the energy with which they strove to bring the schism to an end
15.
Christine de Pizan
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Christine de Pizan was an Italian French late medieval author. She served as a writer for several dukes and the French royal court during the reign of Charles VI. She wrote both poetry and prose works such as biographies and books containing practical advice for women and she completed forty-one works during her 30-year career from 1399 to 1429. She married in 1380 at the age of 15, and was widowed 10 years later, much of the impetus for her writing came from her need to earn a living to support her mother, a niece and her two surviving children. She spent most of her childhood and all of her life in Paris and then the abbey at Poissy. Her early courtly poetry is marked by her knowledge of aristocratic custom and fashion of the day, particularly involving women, supported and encouraged by important royal French and English patrons, she influenced 15th-century English poetry. In recent decades, Christine de Pizans work has returned to prominence by the efforts of scholars such as Charity Cannon Willard, Earl Jeffrey Richards. Certain scholars have argued that she should be seen as an early feminist who efficiently used language to convey that women could play an important role within society. This characterization has been challenged by critics, who say that it is either an anachronistic use of the word or a misinterpretation of her writing. Christine de Pizan was born in 1364 in Venice, Italy and she was the daughter of Tommaso di Benvenuto da Pizzano, a physician, court astrologer, and Councillor of the Republic of Venice. Following her birth, Thomas de Pizan accepted an appointment to the court of Charles V of France, as the astrologer, alchemist. In this atmosphere, Christine was able to pursue her intellectual interests, but she did not assert her intellectual abilities, or establish her authority as a writer until she was widowed at the age of 25. She married Etienne du Castel, a secretary to the court. She had three children, a daughter, a son Jean, and another child who died in childhood, Christines family life was threatened in 1387 when her husband, while in Beauvais on a mission with the king, suddenly died in an epidemic. Following Castels death, she was left to support her mother, a niece, when she tried to collect money from her husbands estate, she faced complicated lawsuits regarding the recovery of salary due her husband. Note that in letters he signed as secretary of the king in 1381 and 1382 the signature of Etienne was Ste de Castel. The abbreviation of his first name could be both as a phonetic abbreviation of Estienne and as the first letters of his name in Latin. In order to support herself and her family, Christine turned to writing, by 1393, she was writing love ballads, which caught the attention of wealthy patrons within the court
16.
Johan Huizinga
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Johan Huizinga was a Dutch historian and one of the founders of modern cultural history. He then studied linguistics, gaining a good command of Sanskrit. He wrote his thesis on the role of the jester in Indian drama in 1897. It was not until 1902 that his interest turned towards medieval and he continued teaching as an Orientalist until he became a Professor of General and Dutch History at Groningen University in 1905. In 1915, he was made Professor of General History at Leiden University, in 1916 he became member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1942, he spoke critically of his countrys German occupiers, from then until his death in 1945, he was held in detention by the Nazis. He died in De Steeg in Gelderland, near Arnhem, just a few weeks before Nazi rule ended, Huizinga had an aesthetic approach to history, where art and spectacle played an important part. His most famous work is The Autumn of the Middle Ages and he here reinterpreted the Late Middle Ages as a period of pessimism and decadence rather than rebirth. Worthy of mentioning are also Erasmus and Homo Ludens, in the latter book he discussed the possibility that play is the primary formative element in human culture. Huizinga also published books on American history and Dutch history in the 17th century, alarmed by the rise of National Socialism in Germany, Huizinga wrote several works of cultural criticism. Many similarities can be noted between his analysis and that of critics such as Ortega y Gasset and Oswald Spengler. Huizinga argued that the spirit of technical and mechanical organisation had replaced spontaneous, the Huizinga Lecture is a prestigious annual lecture in the Netherlands about a subject in the domains of cultural history or philosophy in honour of Johan Huizinga. Huizingas son Leonhard Huizinga became a writer in the Netherlands, especially renowned for his series of tongue-in-cheek fiction novels on the Dutch aristocratic twins Adrian. Proeve eener bepaling van het spel-element der cultuur, translated as Homo Ludens, translated by Arnold Pomerans as Dutch civilisation in the seventeenth century “Patriotism and Nationalism in European History”. History, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, transl. by James S. Holmes and Hans van Marle. History, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, translations by James S. Holmes and Hans van Marle of parts of Huizingas Collected Works Courtly love C. S. Lewis and his The Allegory of Love D. W. Robertson, Jr. Willem Otterspeer, Reading Huizinga. Historical inquiry from Herder to Huizinga, new Haven, Yale University Press,2003. Papers delivered to the Johan Huizinga Conference Groningen 11-15 december 1972, online version Exhibition Johan Huizinga in University Library Leiden,1998 Portraits of Huizinga in database of Netherlands institute for art history
17.
Encyclopedia
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An encyclopedia or encyclopaedia is a type of reference work or compendium holding a comprehensive summary of information from either all branches of knowledge or a particular branch of knowledge. Encyclopedias are divided into articles or entries, which are usually accessed alphabetically by article name, Encyclopedia entries are longer and more detailed than those in most dictionaries. Encyclopedias have existed for around 2,000 years, the oldest still in existence, AD77 by Pliny the Elder and was not fully revised at the time of his death in AD79. The modern encyclopedia evolved out of dictionaries around the 17th century, some modern encyclopedias, such as Wikipedia, are often electronic and freely available. Together, the phrase literally translates as complete instruction or complete knowledge, one of the oldest vernacular uses was by François Rabelais in his Pantagruel in 1532. Several encyclopedias have names that include the suffix -pedia, e. g. Banglapedia, in British usage, the spellings encyclopedia and encyclopaedia are both current. In American usage, only the former is commonly used, the spelling encyclopædia—with the æ ligature—was frequently used in the 19th century and is increasingly rare, although it is retained in product titles such as Encyclopædia Britannica and others. The Oxford English Dictionary records encyclopædia and encyclopaedia as equal alternatives, websters Third New International Dictionary features encyclopedia as the main headword and encyclopaedia as a minor variant. In addition, cyclopedia and cyclopaedia are now rarely used shortened forms of the word originating in the 17th century, the modern encyclopedia was developed from the dictionary in the 18th century. Historically, both encyclopedias and dictionaries have been researched and written by well-educated, well-informed content experts, a dictionary is a linguistic work which primarily focuses on alphabetical listing of words and their definitions. Synonymous words and those related by the matter are to be found scattered around the dictionary. Thus, a dictionary typically provides limited information, analysis or background for the word defined. While it may offer a definition, it may leave the reader lacking in understanding the meaning, significance or limitations of a term, and how the term relates to a broader field of knowledge. An encyclopedia is, allegedly, not written in order to convince, an encyclopedia article also often includes many maps and illustrations, as well as bibliography and statistics. General encyclopedias often contain guides on how to do a variety of things, as well as embedded dictionaries and gazetteers. There are also encyclopedias that cover a variety of topics but from a particular cultural, ethnic, or national perspective. Works of encyclopedic scope aim to convey the important accumulated knowledge for their domain, such as an encyclopedia of medicine, philosophy. Works vary in the breadth of material and the depth of discussion, some systematic method of organization is essential to making an encyclopedia usable as a work of reference
18.
Gaston Paris
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Bruno Paulin Gaston Paris was a French writer and scholar. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1901,1902 and 1903, Paris was born at Avenay, the son of Paulin Paris, an important scholar of medieval French literature. He won a European reputation as a Romance scholar and his Vie de Saint-Alexis broke new ground and provided a model for future editors of medieval texts. It included the text and the variations of it dating from the 12th, 13th and 14th centuries. He contributed largely to the Histoire littéraire de la France, and with Paul Meyer published Romania, in 1877 Gaston Paris was invited to Sweden for the 400th anniversary of the Upsala University, where he was made an honorary doctor. Before returning home he also visited Kristiania to take part in a celebration of the Norwegian philosopher Marcus Jacob Monrad, Paris died in Cannes in 1903. La Poésie du Moyen Âge Penseurs et poètes Poèmes et légendes du moyen âge François Villon, summary of medieval French literature forms a volume of the Temple Primers. Paris endeared himself to a circle of scholars outside his own country by his unfailing urbanity and generosity. In France he trained a band of disciples at the École des Chartes, attribution This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Paris, Bruno Paulin Gaston
19.
C. S. Lewis
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Clive Staples Lewis was a British novelist, poet, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian, broadcaster, lecturer, and Christian apologist. He held academic positions at both Oxford University and Cambridge University, Lewis and fellow novelist J. R. R. Tolkien were close friends. They both served on the English faculty at Oxford University, and were active in the informal Oxford literary group known as the Inklings, according to Lewiss memoir Surprised by Joy, he was baptised in the Church of Ireland, but fell away from his faith during adolescence. Lewis returned to Anglicanism at the age of 32, owing to the influence of Tolkien and other friends and his faith profoundly affected his work, and his wartime radio broadcasts on the subject of Christianity brought him wide acclaim. In 1956, he married American writer Joy Davidman, she died of cancer four years later at the age of 45, Lewis died on 22 November 1963 from renal failure, one week before his 65th birthday. In 2013, on the 50th anniversary of his death, Lewis was honoured with a memorial in Poets Corner in Westminster Abbey, Lewiss works have been translated into more than 30 languages and have sold millions of copies. The books that make up The Chronicles of Narnia have sold the most and have been popularised on stage, TV, radio and his works entered the public domain in 2014 in countries where copyright expires 50 years after the death of the creator, such as Canada. Clive Staples Lewis was born in Belfast, Ireland, on 29 November 1898 and his father was Albert James Lewis, a solicitor whose father Richard had come to Ireland from Wales during the mid-19th century. His mother was Florence Augusta Lewis, née Hamilton, known as Flora and he had an elder brother, Warren Hamilton Lewis. When he was four, his dog Jacksie was killed by a car, at first, he would answer to no other name, but later accepted Jack, the name by which he was known to friends and family for the rest of his life. When he was seven, his family moved into Little Lea, as a boy, Lewis was fascinated with anthropomorphic animals, he fell in love with Beatrix Potters stories and often wrote and illustrated his own animal stories. He and his brother Warnie created the world of Boxen, inhabited, Lewis loved to read, his fathers house was filled with books, and he felt that finding a book to read was as easy as walking into a field and finding a new blade of grass. Lewis was schooled by tutors before being sent to the Wynyard School in Watford, Hertfordshire, in 1908. Lewiss brother had enrolled there three years previously, the school was closed not long afterwards due to a lack of pupils, the headmaster Robert Oldie Capron was soon after committed to a psychiatric hospital. Lewis then attended Campbell College in the east of Belfast about a mile from his home and he was then sent to the health-resort town of Malvern, Worcestershire, where he attended the preparatory school Cherbourg House, which Lewis calls Chartres in his autobiography. It was during this time that Lewis abandoned his childhood Christian faith and became an atheist, becoming interested in mythology, in September 1913, Lewis enrolled at Malvern College, where he remained until the following June. He found the school socially competitive, after leaving Malvern, he studied privately with William T. Kirkpatrick, his fathers old tutor and former headmaster of Lurgan College. As a teenager, Lewis was wonder-struck by the songs and legends of what he called Northernness and these legends intensified an inner longing he later called joy
20.
National Library of Wales
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The National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth, is the national legal deposit library of Wales and is one of the Welsh Government sponsored bodies. It is the biggest library in Wales, holding over 6.5 million books and periodicals, Welsh is the Librarys main medium of communication but it does, however, aim to deliver all public services in Welsh and English. In 1873, a committee was set up to collect Welsh material and house it at University College, Sir John Williams, physician and book collector, had also said he would present his collection to the library if it were established in Aberystwyth. He also eventually gave £20,000 to build and establish the library, cardiff was eventually selected as the location of the National Museum of Wales. Funds for both the National Library and the National Museum were contributed by the subscriptions of the working classes, in a Prefatory Note to A List of Subscribers to the Building Fund, the first librarian, John Ballinger, estimates that there were almost 110,000 contributors. The Library and Museum were established by Royal Charter on 19 March 1907, the Charter stipulated that if the National Library of Wales should be removed from Aberystwyth then the manuscripts donated by Sir John Williams will become the property of the University College. A new Royal Charter was granted in 2006, the National Library of Wales was granted the privilege of legal deposit under the 1911 Copyright Act. Initially, however, the Library could only claim material deemed to be of Welsh, the first use of the Library of Congress Classification by a library in Britain was at the National Library of Wales in 1913. On 15 July 1911 King George V and Queen Mary laid the stone of the National Library of Wales. The central block, or corps de logis, was added by Charles Holden to a version of Greenslades design. It was completed in 1937 and is a Grade II* listed building, the Library is faced with Portland stone on the upper storeys which contrasts with the Cornish granite below it. Restoration work was necessary in 1969 and 1983 due to the effects of weathering on the Portland stone, in recent years many changes have been made to the front part of the building. The large North Reading Room, where printed books are consulted, has the proportions of a Gothic Cathedral, there are galleries at three levels above the floor. The feasibility of installing a mezzanine floor to better use of the space has been considered on two occasions. The South Reading Room is used for consulting archives, manuscripts, maps, carved above the entrance is the rooms original name the Print and Maps Room. Above it on the floor of the south wing is the Gregynog Gallery where temporary. A six-storey bookstack, which was completed in 1931, was built to increase space for the rapidly expanding book collection. A second bookstack was officially opened in March 1982, in 1996, the Third Library Building was opened, doubling the storage capacity of the Library
21.
Duchy of Burgundy
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Upon the extinction of the line with the death of Duke Philip I in 1361, the duchy fell back to King John II of France and the royal House of Valois. The Burgundian duchy rose to a complex of a European scale after in 1363 King John II of France ceded the duchy to his younger son Philip of Valois. By his marriage with Countess Margaret of Flanders, he laid the foundation for a Burgundian realm further north in the Low Countries collectively known as the Burgundian Netherlands. The Burgundian sphere, in its own right, was one of the largest ducal territories that existed at the time of the emergence of Early Modern Europe. Including the thriving regions of Flanders and Brabant, it was a centre of trade. After about one hundred years of Valois-Burgundy rule, however, the last duke Charles the Bold rushed to the Burgundian Wars and was killed in the 1477 Battle of Nancy. With the abdication of the Habsburg emperor Charles V in 1556, the Burgundians settled in the area around Dijon, Chalon-sur-Saône, Mâcon, Autun and Châtillon-sur-Seine, and gave the name to the region. The Kingdom of the Burgundians was annexed by the Merovingian Kings of the Franks Childebert I in 534 following their defeat by the Franks and it was recreated, however, on several occasions when Frankish territories were redivided between the sons on the death of a Frankish king. As part of the Kingdom of the Franks, Burgundy maintained a semi-autonomous existence, with the Burgundians maintaining their own law code, however, southern Burgundy was pillaged by the Saracen invasion of the 8th century. When Charles Martel drove the invaders out, he divided Burgundy into four commands, Arles-Burgundy, Vienne-Burgundy, Alamanic Burgundy and he appointed his brother Childebrand governor of Frankish Burgundy. Under the Carolingians, Burgundian separatism lessened and Burgundy became a geographical term. As a vital military defender of the West Frankish border, Guerin was sometimes known by the Latin term for leader – Dux or Duke, by the time of Richard the Justiciar, the Duchy of Burgundy was beginning to emerge. Richard was officially recognised by the king as a duke, he stood as individual count of each county he held. As Duke of Burgundy, he was able to wield an increasing amount of power over his territory, to the collective body of his territory there came to be applied the term ducatus. Included in the ducatus of Richard were the regions of Autunais, Beaunois, Avalois, Lassois, Dijonais, Memontois, Attuyer, Oscheret, under Richard, these territories were given law and order, protected from the Normans, and served as a haven for persecuted monks. It was from his territories in Burgundy that he drew the resources needed to fight those who challenged his right to rule, under Hugh the Black came the beginning of what would be a long and troubled saga for Burgundy. His neighbours were the Robertian family, who held the title of Duke of Francia and this family, wanting to improve their standing in France and against the Carolingian kings, attempted to subject the duchy to the suzerainty of their own duchy. They failed, eventually, when they appeared close to success, they were forced to scrap the scheme, two brothers of Hugh Capet, the first Capetian King of France, took up the rule of Burgundy as duke
22.
British Library
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The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and the second largest library in the world by number of items catalogued. It holds well over 150 million items from many countries, as a legal deposit library, the British Library receives copies of all books produced in the United Kingdom and Ireland, including a significant proportion of overseas titles distributed in the UK. The Library is a public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media. The Librarys collections include around 14 million books, along with holdings of manuscripts. In addition to receiving a copy of every publication produced in the UK and Ireland, the Library adds some three million items every year occupying 9.6 kilometres of new shelf space. Prior to 1973, the Library was part of the British Museum, the Euston Road building is classified as a Grade I listed building, of exceptional interest for its architecture and history. The British Library was created on 1 July 1973 as a result of the British Library Act 1972. Prior to this, the library was part of the British Museum. In 1983, the Library absorbed the National Sound Archive, which holds many sound and video recordings, with over a million discs, the core of the Librarys historical collections is based on a series of donations and acquisitions from the 18th century, known as the foundation collections. From 1997 to 2009 the main collection was housed in this new building. Construction work on the Newspaper Storage Building was completed in 2013, the collection has now been split between the St Pancras and Boston Spa sites. The British Library Document Supply Service and the Librarys Document Supply Collection is based on the site in Boston Spa. Collections housed in Yorkshire, comprising low-use material and the newspaper and Document Supply collections, the Library previously had a book storage depot in Woolwich, south-east London, which is no longer in use. The new library was designed specially for the purpose by the architect Colin St John Wilson, facing Euston Road is a large piazza that includes pieces of public art, such as large sculptures by Eduardo Paolozzi and Antony Gormley. It is the largest public building constructed in the United Kingdom in the 20th century, in December 2009 a new storage building at Boston Spa was opened by Rosie Winterton. The building was Grade I listed on 1 August 2015, in England, Legal Deposit can be traced back to at least 1610. The other five libraries are, the Bodleian Library at Oxford, the University Library at Cambridge, the Trinity College Library at Dublin, in 2003 the Ipswich MP Chris Mole introduced a Private Members Bill which became the Legal Deposit Libraries Act 2003. The Act extends United Kingdom legal deposit requirements to electronic documents, such as CD-ROMs, the Library also holds the Asia, Pacific and Africa Collections which include the India Office Records and materials in the languages of Asia and of north and north-east Africa
23.
Master of the Prayer Books of around 1500
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The Master of the Prayer Books of around 1500 was a Flemish painter of illuminated manuscripts and miniatures active in Bruges from about 1485 until around 1520. His name is derived from a collection of manuscripts from the same artist dating to about the start of the 16th century. The name notwithstanding, the Master is best known for the work he did painting secular images and his interest in courtly life, as well as the daily activities of the lower classes, may be seen as well in his paintings for calendars. Unlike other artists of his time, he didnt show interest in painting landscapes and his exceptional Roman de la Rose British Library Harley MS4425 has 92 large and high quality miniatures, with a date around 1500. Master of the Prayer Books of around 1500 at the Getty Museum
24.
Engelbert II of Nassau
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Engelbert II of Nassau, Engelbrecht in Dutch, was count of Nassau and Vianden and lord of Breda, Lek, Diest, Roosendaal, Nispen and Wouw. He was a soldier and courtier, for some time leader of the Privy council of the Duchy of Burgundy, Engelbert was born in Breda on 17 May 1451, the son of Jan IV of Nassau and his wife Maria of Loon-Heinsberg. On 19 December 1468 he married Cimburga van Baden in Koblenz, Engelbert was lord of Breda between 1475 and 1504. In 1472 he concluded a treaty with his brother Jan V of Nassau-Vianden-Diez in which he received the possessions West of the Rhine, Charles the Bold made him a knight in the Order of the Golden Fleece, at the age of 22, in 1473. After the death of Charles the Bold, Engelbert entered in the service of Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, in 1479, he commanded troops during the Battle of Guinegate and during the suppression of a rebellion at Bruges. In 1487, he was captured by the French during the Battle of Béthune, in 1496 he was appointed stadtholder of Flanders and by 1498 he had been named President of the Grand Conseil. In 1501, Maximilian named him Lieutenant-General of the Low Countries, from that point forward Engelbert was the principal representative of the Habsburg Empire to the region. Engelbert died on 31 May 1504 in Brussels and is buried in the Grote kerk in Breda and he had no legitimate children and appointed his nephew Henry III of Nassau-Breda as his successor. Engelbert had two children, Engelbrecht and Barbara. Engelberts portrait by the Master of the Portraits of Princes, can be found in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam and these are by the artist known as the Master of the Prayer Books of around 1500. The Book of Hours of Engelbert of Nassau, of the 1470s or 1480s is another well-known manuscript and it has been suggested that he commissioned The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymous Bosch
25.
Incunable
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An incunable, or sometimes incunabulum, is a book, pamphlet, or broadside that was printed—not handwritten—before the year 1501 in Europe. Incunable is the singular form of incunabula, Latin for swaddling clothes or cradle. A former term for incunable is fifteener, referring to the 15th century, but since 2009 we know that this lexical invention should no more be assigned to Mallinckrodt, dated 1569, it has to be credited to the Dutch Physician Hadrianus Junius. The term came to denote the printed books themselves in the late 17th century, post-incunable typically refers to books printed after 1500 up to another arbitrary end date such as 1520 or 1540. As of 2014, there are about 30,000 distinct incunable editions known to be extant, many authors reserve the term incunabula for the typographic ones only. The spread of printing to cities both in the north and in Italy ensured that there was great variety in the chosen for printing. Printers congregated in urban centres where there were scholars, ecclesiastics, lawyers, nobles, standard works in Latin inherited from the medieval tradition formed the bulk of the earliest printing, but as books became cheaper, works in the various local vernaculars began to appear. Other printers of incunabula were Günther Zainer of Augsburg, Johannes Mentelin and Heinrich Eggestein of Strasbourg, Heinrich Gran of Haguenau and William Caxton of Bruges, the first incunable to have woodcut illustrations was Ulrich Boners Der Edelstein, printed by Albrecht Pfister in Bamberg in 1461. The data in this section were derived from the Incunabula Short-Title Catalogue, printing towns, The number of printing towns and cities stands at 282. These are situated in some 18 countries in terms of present-day boundaries, illustrations, Only about one edition in ten has any illustrations, woodcuts or metalcuts. Survival, The commonest incunable is Schedels Nuremberg Chronicle of 1493, very many incunabula are unique, but on average about 18 copies survive of each. This makes the Gutenberg Bible, at 48 or 49 known copies, a complete incunable may consist of a slip, or up to ten volumes. Formats, In terms of format, the 29, 000-odd editions comprise,2,000 broadsides,9,000 folios,15,000 quartos,3,000 octavos,18 12mos,230 16mos,20 32mos, and 3 64mos. Caxton, ISTC at present cites 528 extant copies of books printed by Caxton, dispersal, Apart from migration to mainly North American and Japanese universities, there has been remarkably little movement of incunabula in the last five centuries. None were printed in the Southern Hemisphere, and the latter appears to less than 2,000 copies – i. e. about 97. 75% remain north of the equator. However many incunabula are sold at auction or through the book trade every year. The British Librarys Incunabula Short Title Catalogue now records over 29,000 titles, studies of incunabula began in the 17th century. Hain was expanded in subsequent editions, by Walter A, North American holdings were listed by Frederick R. Goff and a worldwide union catalogue is provided by the Incunabula Short Title Catalogue
26.
Geneva
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Geneva is the second most populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaking part of Switzerland. Situated where the Rhône exits Lake Geneva, it is the capital of the Republic, the municipality has a population of 198,072, and the canton has 484,736 residents. In 2014, the compact agglomération du Grand Genève had 946,000 inhabitants in 212 communities in both Switzerland and France, within Swiss territory, the commuter area named Métropole lémanique contains a population of 1.25 million. This area is essentially spread east from Geneva towards the Riviera area and north-east towards Yverdon-les-Bains, Geneva is the city that hosts the highest number of international organizations in the world. It is also the place where the Geneva Conventions were signed, Geneva was ranked as the worlds ninth most important financial centre for competitiveness by the Global Financial Centres Index, ahead of Frankfurt, and third in Europe behind London and Zürich. A2009 survey by Mercer found that Geneva has the third-highest quality of life of any city in the world, the city has been referred to as the worlds most compact metropolis and the Peace Capital. In 2009 and 2011, Geneva was ranked as, respectively, the city was mentioned in Latin texts, by Caesar, with the spelling Genava, probably from a Celtic toponym *genawa- from the stem *genu-, in the sense of a bending river or estuary. The medieval county of Geneva in Middle Latin was known as pagus major Genevensis or Comitatus Genevensis, the name takes various forms in modern languages, Geneva /dʒᵻˈniːvə/ in English, French, Genève, German, Genf, Italian, Ginevra, and Romansh, Genevra. The city in origin shares its name, *genawa estuary, with the Italian port city of Genoa, Geneva was an Allobrogian border town, fortified against the Helvetii tribe, when the Romans took it in 121 BC. It became Christian under the Late Roman Empire, and acquired its first bishop in the 5th century, having been connected to the bishopric of Vienne in the 4th. In the Middle Ages, Geneva was ruled by a count under the Holy Roman Empire until the late 14th century, around this time the House of Savoy came to dominate the city. In the 15th century, a republican government emerged with the creation of the Grand Council. In 1541, with Protestantism in the ascendancy, John Calvin, by the 18th century, however, Geneva had come under the influence of Catholic France, which cultivated the city as its own. France also tended to be at odds with the ordinary townsfolk, in 1798, revolutionary France under the Directory annexed Geneva. At the end of the Napoleonic Wars, on 1 June 1814, in 1907, the separation of Church and State was adopted. Geneva flourished in the 19th and 20th centuries, becoming the seat of international organizations. Geneva is located at 46°12 North, 6°09 East, at the end of Lake Geneva. It is surrounded by two chains, the Alps and the Jura
27.
Lyon
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Lyon or Lyons is a city in east-central France, in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, about 470 km from Paris and 320 km from Marseille. Inhabitants of the city are called Lyonnais, Lyon had a population of 506,615 in 2014 and is Frances third-largest city after Paris and Marseille. Lyon is the capital of the Metropolis of Lyon and the region of Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, the metropolitan area of Lyon had a population of 2,237,676 in 2013, the second-largest in France after Paris. The city is known for its cuisine and gastronomy and historical and architectural landmarks and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, Lyon was historically an important area for the production and weaving of silk. It played a significant role in the history of cinema, Auguste, the city is also known for its famous light festival, Fête des Lumières, which occurs every 8 December and lasts for four days, earning Lyon the title of Capital of Lights. Economically, Lyon is a centre for banking, as well as for the chemical, pharmaceutical. The city contains a significant software industry with a focus on video games. Lyon hosts the headquarters of Interpol, Euronews, and International Agency for Research on Cancer. Lyon was ranked 19th globally and second in France for innovation in 2014 and it ranked second in France and 39th globally in Mercers 2015 liveability rankings. These refugees had been expelled from Vienne by the Allobroges and were now encamped at the confluence of the Saône and Rhône rivers, dio Cassius says this task was to keep the two men from joining Mark Antony and bringing their armies into the developing conflict. The Roman foundation was at Fourvière hill and was officially called Colonia Copia Felix Munatia, a name invoking prosperity, the city became increasingly referred to as Lugdunum. The earliest translation of this Gaulish place-name as Desired Mountain is offered by the 9th-century Endlicher Glossary, in contrast, some modern scholars have proposed a Gaulish hill-fort named Lugdunon, after the Celtic god Lugus, and dúnon. It then became the capital of Gaul, partly due to its convenient location at the convergence of two rivers, and quickly became the main city of Gaul. Two emperors were born in city, Claudius, whose speech is preserved in the Lyon Tablet in which he justifies the nomination of Gallic senators. Today, the archbishop of Lyon is still referred to as Primat des Gaules, the Christians in Lyon were martyred for their beliefs under the reigns of various Roman emperors, most notably Marcus Aurelius and Septimus Severus. Local saints from this period include Blandina, Pothinus, and Epipodius, in the second century AD, the great Christian bishop of Lyon was the Easterner, Irenaeus. Burgundian refugees fleeing the destruction of Worms by the Huns in 437 were re-settled by the commander of the west, Aëtius. This became the capital of the new Burgundian kingdom in 461, in 843, by the Treaty of Verdun, Lyon, with the country beyond the Saône, went to Lothair I
28.
Woodcut
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Woodcut is a relief printing technique in printmaking. An artist carves an image into the surface of a block of wood—typically with gouges—leaving the printing parts level with the surface while removing the non-printing parts. Areas that the artist cuts away carry no ink, while characters or images at surface level carry the ink to produce the print, the block is cut along the wood grain. The surface is covered with ink by rolling over the surface with a roller, leaving ink upon the flat surface. Multiple colors can be printed by keying the paper to a frame around the woodblocks, single-leaf woodcut is a term for a woodcut presented as a single image or print, as opposed to a book illustration. Among these the best known are the 16th century Hieronymus Andreae, Hans Lützelburger and Jost de Negker, all of whom ran workshops, the formschneider in turn handed the block on to specialist printers. There were further specialists who made the blank blocks and this is why woodcuts are sometimes described by museums or books as designed by rather than by an artist, but most authorities do not use this distinction. The division of labour had the advantage that a trained artist could adapt to the medium relatively easily, there were various methods of transferring the artists drawn design onto the block for the cutter to follow. Either the drawing would be made directly onto the block, or a drawing on paper was glued to the block, either way, the artists drawing was destroyed during the cutting process. Other methods were used, including tracing, in both Europe and the Far East in the early 20th century, some artists began to do the whole process themselves. In Japan, this movement was called sōsaku-hanga, as opposed to shin-hanga, in the West, many artists used the easier technique of linocut instead. Compared to intaglio techniques like etching and engraving, only low pressure is required to print, as a relief method, it is only necessary to ink the block and bring it into firm and even contact with the paper or cloth to achieve an acceptable print. In Europe a variety of woods including boxwood and several nut and fruit woods like pear or cherry were commonly used, in Japan, there are three methods of printing to consider, Stamping, Used for many fabrics and most early European woodcuts. Used for European woodcuts and block-books later in the fifteenth century, also used for many Western woodcuts from about 1910 to the present. The block goes face up on a table, with the paper or fabric on top, the back is rubbed with a hard pad, a flat piece of wood, a burnisher, or a leather frotton. A traditional Japanese tool used for this is called a baren, later in Japan, complex wooden mechanisms were used to help hold the woodblock perfectly still and to apply proper pressure in the printing process. This was especially helpful once multiple colors were introduced and had to be applied with precision atop previous ink layers, printing in a press, presses only seem to have been used in Asia in relatively recent times. Printing-presses were used from about 1480 for European prints and block-books, simple weighted presses may have been used in Europe before the print-press, but firm evidence is lacking
29.
Old French
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Old French was the Gallo-Romance dialect continuum spoken from the 9th century to the 14th century. In the 14th century, these came to be collectively known as the langues doïl. The mid-14th century is taken as the period to Middle French. The areal of Old French in contemporary terms corresponded to the parts of the Kingdom of France, Upper Burgundy. As part of the emerging Gallo-Romance dialect continuum, the langues doïl were contrasted with the langue doc, in these examples, we notice a clear consequence of bilingualism, that sometimes even changed the first syllable of the Latin words. Pope estimated that perhaps still 15% of the vocabulary of modern French derives from Germanic sources, at the third Council of Tours in 813, priests were ordered to preach in the vernacular language, since the common people could no longer understand formal Latin. The second-oldest document in Old French is the Eulalia sequence, which is important for reconstruction of Old French pronunciation due to its consistent spelling. The Capetians langue doïl, the forerunner of modern standard French, did not begin to become the common speech of all of France, however, until after the French Revolution. In the Late Middle Ages, the Old French dialects diverged into a number of distinct langues doïl, during the Early Modern period, French now becomes established as the official language of the Kingdom of France throughout the realm, also including the langue doc-speaking territories in the south. Old French gives way to Middle French in the mid-14th century, the earliest extant French literary texts date from the ninth century, but very few texts before the 11th century have survived. The first literary works written in Old French were saints lives, the Canticle of Saint Eulalie, written in the second half of the 9th century, is generally accepted as the first such text. The first of these is the area of the chansons de geste. More than one hundred chansons de geste have survived in three hundred manuscripts. The oldest and most celebrated of the chansons de geste is The Song of Roland, a fourth grouping, not listed by Bertrand, is the Crusade cycle, dealing with the First Crusade and its immediate aftermath. Jean Bodels other two categories—the Matter of Rome and the Matter of Britain—concern the French romance or roman, around a hundred verse romances survive from the period 1150–1220. From around 1200 on, the tendency was increasingly to write the romances in prose, the most important romance of the 13th century is the Romance of the Rose which breaks considerably from the conventions of the chivalric adventure story. The Occitan or Provençal poets were called troubadours, from the word trobar to find, lyric poets in Old French are called trouvères. By the late 13th century, the tradition in France had begun to develop in ways that differed significantly from the troubadour poets
30.
Middle English
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This stage of the development of the English language roughly followed the High to the Late Middle Ages. Middle English developed out of Late Old English, seeing many dramatic changes in its grammar, pronunciation and this largely forms the basis for Modern English spelling, although pronunciation has changed considerably since that time. Middle English was succeeded in England by the era of Early Modern English, by that time, a variant of the Northumbrian dialect was developing into the Scots language. During the Middle English period many Old English grammatical features were simplified or disappeared, noun, adjective and verb inflections were simplified, a process that included the reduction of most grammatical case distinctions. Middle English also saw an adoption of Norman French vocabulary, especially in areas such as politics, law. Everyday English vocabulary remained mostly Germanic, with Old Norse influence becoming apparent, significant changes in pronunciation took place, especially for long vowels and diphthongs, which in the later Middle English period began to undergo the Great Vowel Shift. Little survives of early Middle English literature, most likely due to the Norman domination, poets wrote both in the vernacular and courtly English. It is popularly believed that William Shakespeare wrote in Middle English, the latter part of the 11th century was a period of transition from Late Old English to Early Middle English. The influence of Old Norse certainly helped move English from a synthetic language towards a more analytic or isolating word order and it was, after all, a salutary influence. The gain was greater than the loss, there was a gain in directness, in clarity, and in strength. The change to Old English from Old Norse was substantive, pervasive and it is most important to recognise that in many words the English and Scandinavian language differed chiefly in their inflectional elements. The body of the word was so nearly the same in the two languages only the endings would put obstacles in the way of mutual understanding. In the mixed population which existed in the Danelaw these endings must have led to confusion, tending gradually to become obscured. This blending of peoples and languages resulted in simplifying English grammar. There are also many Norman-derived terms relating to the cultures that arose in the 12th century. Sometimes, and particularly later, words were taken from Latin, giving such sets as kingly, later French borrowings came from standard rather than Norman French, this leads to such cognate pairs as warden, guardian. The end of Anglo-Saxon rule did not, of course, change the language immediately, the general population would have spoken the same dialects as before the Conquest, these changed slowly until written records of them became available for study, which varies in different regions. Once the writing of Old English came to an end, Middle English had no standard language, Early Middle English has a largely Anglo-Saxon vocabulary, but a greatly simplified inflectional system
31.
The Romaunt of the Rose
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The Romaunt of the Rose is a partial translation into Middle English of the French allegorical poem, le Roman de la Rose. Originally believed to be the work of Chaucer, the Romaunt inspired controversy among 19th-century scholars when parts of the text were found to differ in style from Chaucers other works, also the text was found to contain three distinct fragments of translation. Together, the fragments—A, B, and C--provide a translation of approximately one-third of Le Roman. There is little doubt that Chaucer did translate Le Roman de la Rose under the title The Romaunt of the Rose, in The Legend of Good Women, the question is whether the surviving text is the same one that Chaucer wrote. The authorship question has been a topic of research and controversy, as such, scholarly discussion of the Romaunt has tended toward linguistic rather than literary analysis. Scholars today generally agree that only fragment A is attributable to Chaucer, although fragment C closely resembles Chaucers style in language, Fragment C differs mainly in the way that rhymes are constructed. And where fragments A and C adhere to a London dialect of the 1370s, guillaume de Lorris completed the first 4058 lines of le Roman de la Rose circa 1230. Written in Old French, in octosyllabic, iambic tetrameter couplets, about 40 years later, Jean de Meun continued the poem with 17,724 additional lines. In contrasting the two poets, C. S. Lewis noted that Lorris allegory focused on aspects of love and supplied a subjective element to the literature, Lewis believed that Meun provided little more than a lengthy series of digressions. Geoffrey Chaucer began translating Le Roman into Middle English early in his career, Chaucer may have selected this particular work because it was highly popular both among Parisians and among French-speaking nobles in England. He might have intended to introduce the poem to an English audience as a way of revising or extending written English, moreover, Le Roman was controversial in its treatment of women and sex, especially in the verses written by Meun. Chaucer may even have believed that English literature would benefit from this variety of literature, Chaucers experience in translating Le Roman helped to define much of his later work. Russell Peck noted that Chaucer not only drew upon the poem for subject matter, Le Roman enabled Chaucer to introduce a stylish wit and literary manner to his English audience and then to claim these attributes as his own. The Romaunt is written in octosyllabic, iambic tetrameter couplets in the meter as le Roman. The translation is one of change from the original. Raymond Preston noted that a poem in English would have meant a lesser translation. An early fifteenth-century manuscript of the Romaunt of the Rose was included in the library William Hunter donated to the University of Glasgow in 1807, in 1532, William Thynne published the first collected edition of Chaucers work. Commissioned by Henry VIII to search for copies of Chaucers manuscripts in the libraries and monasteries of England, by 1870, Henry Bradshaw had applied his method of studying rhymes to Chaucers poetry
32.
Geoffrey Chaucer
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Geoffrey Chaucer, known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages. He was the first poet to be buried in Poets Corner of Westminster Abbey, among his many works are The Book of the Duchess, The House of Fame, The Legend of Good Women and Troilus and Criseyde. He is best known today for The Canterbury Tales, Chaucers work was crucial in legitimizing the literary use of the Middle English vernacular at a time when the dominant literary languages in England were French and Latin. Geoffrey Chaucer was born in London sometime around 1343, though the precise date and his father and grandfather were both London vintners, several previous generations had been merchants in Ipswich. In 1324 John Chaucer, Geoffreys father, was kidnapped by an aunt in the hope of marrying the boy to her daughter in an attempt to keep property in Ipswich. The aunt was imprisoned and the fine levied suggests that the family was financially secure. In the City Hustings Roll 110,5, Ric II, dated June 1380, Geoffrey Chaucer refers to himself as me Galfridum Chaucer, filium Johannis Chaucer, Vinetarii, Londonie. He also worked as a courtier, a diplomat, and a civil servant, as well as working for the king from 1389 to 1391 as Clerk of the Kings Works. In 1359, in the stages of the Hundred Years War, Edward III invaded France and Chaucer travelled with Lionel of Antwerp, 1st Duke of Clarence, Elizabeths husband. In 1360, he was captured during the siege of Rheims, Edward paid £16 for his ransom, a considerable sum, and Chaucer was released. After this, Chaucers life is uncertain, but he seems to have travelled in France, Spain, around 1366, Chaucer married Philippa Roet. She was a lady-in-waiting to Edward IIIs queen, Philippa of Hainault, and a sister of Katherine Swynford and it is uncertain how many children Chaucer and Philippa had, but three or four are most commonly cited. His son, Thomas Chaucer, had a career, as chief butler to four kings, envoy to France. Thomass daughter, Alice, married the Duke of Suffolk, thomass great-grandson, John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, was the heir to the throne designated by Richard III before he was deposed. Geoffreys other children probably included Elizabeth Chaucy, a nun at Barking Abbey, Agnes, an attendant at Henry IVs coronation, Chaucers Treatise on the Astrolabe was written for Lewis. According to tradition, Chaucer studied law in the Inner Temple at this time and he became a member of the royal court of Edward III as a valet de chambre, yeoman, or esquire on 20 June 1367, a position which could entail a wide variety of tasks. His wife also received a pension for court employment and he travelled abroad many times, at least some of them in his role as a valet. In 1368, he may have attended the wedding of Lionel of Antwerp to Violante Visconti, daughter of Galeazzo II Visconti, two other literary stars of the era were in attendance, Jean Froissart and Petrarch
33.
Sonnet
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A sonnet is a poem in a specific form which originated in Italy, Giacomo da Lentini is credited with its invention. The term sonnet is derived from the Italian word sonetto, by the thirteenth century it signified a poem of fourteen lines that follows a strict rhyme scheme and specific structure. Conventions associated with the sonnet have evolved over its history, writers of sonnets are sometimes called sonneteers, although the term can be used derisively. The sonnet was created by Giacomo da Lentini, head of the Sicilian School under Emperor Frederick II, guittone dArezzo rediscovered it and brought it to Tuscany where he adapted it to his language when he founded the Siculo-Tuscan School, or Guittonian school of poetry. Other Italian poets of the time, including Dante Alighieri and Guido Cavalcanti, wrote sonnets, other fine examples were written by Michelangelo. The structure of a typical Italian sonnet of the included two parts that together formed a compact form of argument. First, the octave, forms the proposition, which describes a problem, or question, followed by a sestet, typically, the ninth line initiates what is called the turn, or volta, which signals the move from proposition to resolution. Even in sonnets that dont strictly follow the structure, the ninth line still often marks a turn by signaling a change in the tone, mood. Later, the abba, abba pattern became the standard for Italian sonnets, for the sestet there were two different possibilities, cde, cde and cdc, cdc. In time, other variants on this scheme were introduced. Petrarch typically used an abba, abba pattern for the octave, in English, both the English or Shakespearean sonnet, and the Italian Petrarchan sonnet are traditionally written in iambic pentameter. Early twentieth-century American poet Edna St. Vincent Millay also wrote mostly Petrarchan sonnets, on His Blindness by Milton, gives a sense of the Petrarchan rhyme scheme, Most Sonnets in Dantes La Vita Nuova are Petrarchan. Chapter VII gives sonnet O voi che per la via, with two sestets and two quatrains, and Ch. VIII, Morte villana, with two sestets and two quatrains and it was written by Paolo Lanfranchi da Pistoia and is addressed to Peter III of Aragon. It employs the rhyme scheme a-b-a-b, a-b-a-b, c-d-c-d-c-d and this poem is historically interesting for its information on north Italian perspectives concerning the War of the Sicilian Vespers, the conflict between the Angevins and Aragonese for Sicily. It congratulates Robert of Naples on his recent victory, there are also two poorly regarded sonnets by the Italian Dante de Maiano. By the late 17th century poets on increasingly relied on stanza forms incorporating rhymed couplets, and by the 18th century fixed-form poems – and, in particular, the resulting versification – less constrained by meter and rhyme patterns than Renaissance poetry – more closely mirrored prose. The Romantics were responsible for a return to many of the poems used during the 15th and 16th centuries. The sonnet however was used until the Parnassians brought it back into favor
34.
Dante Alighieri
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Durante degli Alighieri, simply called Dante, was a major Italian poet of the Late Middle Ages. In the late Middle Ages, the majority of poetry was written in Latin. In De vulgari eloquentia, however, Dante defended use of the vernacular in literature, as a result, Dante played an instrumental role in establishing the national language of Italy. In addition, the first use of the interlocking three-line rhyme scheme, Dante has been called the Father of the Italian language and one of the greatest poets of world literature. In Italy, Dante is often referred to as il Sommo Poeta and il Poeta, he, Petrarch, Dante was born in Florence, Republic of Florence, present-day Italy. The exact date of his birth is unknown, although it is believed to be around 1265. This can be deduced from autobiographic allusions in the Divine Comedy, in 1265, the sun was in Gemini between approximately May 11 and June 11. Dante claimed that his family descended from the ancient Romans, but the earliest relative he could mention by name was Cacciaguida degli Elisei, born no earlier than about 1100. Dantes father, Alaghiero or Alighiero di Bellincione, was a White Guelph who suffered no reprisals after the Ghibellines won the Battle of Montaperti in the middle of the 13th century. Dantes family had loyalties to the Guelphs, an alliance that supported the Papacy and which was involved in complex opposition to the Ghibellines. The poets mother was Bella, likely a member of the Abati family and she died when Dante was not yet ten years old, and Alighiero soon married again, to Lapa di Chiarissimo Cialuffi. When Dante was 12, he was promised in marriage to Gemma di Manetto Donati, daughter of Manetto Donati, contracting marriages at this early age was quite common and involved a formal ceremony, including contracts signed before a notary. But by this time Dante had fallen in love with another, Beatrice Portinari, years after his marriage to Gemma he claims to have met Beatrice again, he wrote several sonnets to Beatrice but never mentioned Gemma in any of his poems. The exact date of his marriage is not known, the certain information is that, before his exile in 1301. Dante fought with the Guelph cavalry at the Battle of Campaldino and this victory brought about a reformation of the Florentine constitution. To take any part in life, one had to enroll in one of the citys many commercial or artisan guilds, so Dante entered the Physicians. In the following years, his name is recorded as speaking or voting in the various councils of the republic. A substantial portion of minutes from meetings in the years 1298–1300 was lost, however
35.
The Allegory of Love
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For the group of paintings known by this title, see The Allegory of Love. In the first chapter, Lewis traces the development of the idea of love from the Provençal troubadours to its full development in the works of Chrétien de Troyes. In the second chapter, Lewis discusses the evolution of the allegorical tradition in such writers as Bernard Silvestris. The remaining chapters, drawing on the points made in the first two, examine the use of allegory in the depiction of love in a selection of poetic works, beginning with the Roman de la Rose. The focus, however, is on English works, the poems of Chaucer, Gowers Confessio Amantis and Usks Testament of Love, the works of Chaucers epigones, and Spensers Faerie Queene. The book is ornamented with quotations from poems in many languages, including Classical and Medieval Latin, Middle English, the piquant English translations of many of these are Lewiss own work. Detailed summary of The Allegory of Love
36.
Peter Abelard
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Peter Abelard was a medieval French scholastic philosopher, theologian and preeminent logician. His love for, and affair with, Héloïse dArgenteuil have become legendary, the Chambers Biographical Dictionary describes him as the keenest thinker and boldest theologian of the 12th Century. Abelard, originally called Pierre le Pallet, was born c. 1079 in Le Pallet, about 10 miles east of Nantes, in Brittany, as a boy, he learned quickly. Instead of entering a career, as his father had done. During his early academic pursuits, Abelard wandered throughout France, debating and learning and he first studied in the Loire area, where the nominalist Roscellinus of Compiègne, who had been accused of heresy by Anselm, was his teacher during this period. Around 1100, Abelards travels finally brought him to Paris, in the great cathedral school of Notre-Dame de Paris, he was taught for a while by William of Champeaux, the disciple of Anselm of Laon, a leading proponent of Realism. During this time he changed his surname to Abelard, sometimes written Abailard or Abaelardus, and William thought Abelard was too arrogant. It was during this time that Abelard would provoke quarrels with both William and Roscellinus and his teaching was notably successful, though for a time he had to give it up and spend time in Brittany, the strain proving too great for his constitution. Abelard was once more victorious, and Abelard was almost able to hold the position of master at Notre Dame, for a short time, however, William was able to prevent Abelard from lecturing in Paris. Abelard accordingly was forced to resume his school at Melun, which he was able to move, from c. 1110-12, to Paris itself, on the heights of Montagne Sainte-Geneviève. From his success in dialectic, he turned to theology and in 1113 moved to Laon to attend the lectures of Anselm on biblical exegesis. Unimpressed by Anselms teaching, Abelard began to offer his own lectures on the Book of Ezekiel, Anselm forbade him to continue this teaching, and Abelard returned to Paris where, in around 1115, he became master of Notre Dame and a canon of Sens. Distinguished in figure and manners, Abelard was seen surrounded by crowds – it is thousands of students – drawn from all countries by the fame of his teaching. Enriched by the offerings of his pupils, and entertained with universal admiration, he came, as he says, but a change in his fortunes was at hand. In his devotion to science, he had lived a very regular life, enlivened only by philosophical debate, now, at the height of his fame. Héloïse dArgenteuil lived within the precincts of Notre-Dame, under the care of her uncle and she was remarkable for her knowledge of classical letters, which extended beyond Latin to Greek and Hebrew. Abelard sought a place in Fulberts house and, in 1115 or 1116, the affair interfered with his career, and Abelard himself boasted of his conquest. Once Fulbert found out, he separated them, but they continued to meet in secret, Héloïse became pregnant and was sent by Abelard to be looked after by his family in Brittany, where she gave birth to a son whom she named Astrolabe after the scientific instrument
37.
International Standard Book Number
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The International Standard Book Number is a unique numeric commercial book identifier. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an e-book, a paperback and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, the method of assigning an ISBN is nation-based and varies from country to country, often depending on how large the publishing industry is within a country. The initial ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 based upon the 9-digit Standard Book Numbering created in 1966, the 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108. Occasionally, a book may appear without a printed ISBN if it is printed privately or the author does not follow the usual ISBN procedure, however, this can be rectified later. Another identifier, the International Standard Serial Number, identifies periodical publications such as magazines, the ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 in the United Kingdom by David Whitaker and in 1968 in the US by Emery Koltay. The 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108, the United Kingdom continued to use the 9-digit SBN code until 1974. The ISO on-line facility only refers back to 1978, an SBN may be converted to an ISBN by prefixing the digit 0. For example, the edition of Mr. J. G. Reeder Returns, published by Hodder in 1965, has SBN340013818 -340 indicating the publisher,01381 their serial number. This can be converted to ISBN 0-340-01381-8, the check digit does not need to be re-calculated, since 1 January 2007, ISBNs have contained 13 digits, a format that is compatible with Bookland European Article Number EAN-13s. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an ebook, a paperback, and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, a 13-digit ISBN can be separated into its parts, and when this is done it is customary to separate the parts with hyphens or spaces. Separating the parts of a 10-digit ISBN is also done with either hyphens or spaces, figuring out how to correctly separate a given ISBN number is complicated, because most of the parts do not use a fixed number of digits. ISBN issuance is country-specific, in that ISBNs are issued by the ISBN registration agency that is responsible for country or territory regardless of the publication language. Some ISBN registration agencies are based in national libraries or within ministries of culture, in other cases, the ISBN registration service is provided by organisations such as bibliographic data providers that are not government funded. In Canada, ISBNs are issued at no cost with the purpose of encouraging Canadian culture. In the United Kingdom, United States, and some countries, where the service is provided by non-government-funded organisations. Australia, ISBNs are issued by the library services agency Thorpe-Bowker
38.
Ars Amatoria
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The Ars Amatoria is an instructional elegy series in three books by the ancient Roman poet Ovid. It teaches basic gentlemanly male and female relationship skills and techniques, book one of Ars Amatoria was written to show a man how to find a woman. In book two, Ovid shows how to keep her, the third book, written two years after the first books were published, gives women advice on how to win and keep the love of a man. The first two books, aimed at men, contain sections which cover topics as not forgetting her birthday, letting her miss you - but not for long. The third gives similar advice to women, sample themes include, making up, although the book was finished around 2 AD, much of the advice he gives is applicable to any day and age. His intent is more profound than the brilliance of the surface suggests. In connection with the revelation that the theatre is a place to meet girls, for instance, Ovid. The superficial brilliance, however, befuddles even scholars, the standard situations and cliches of the subject are treated in an entertainment-intended way, with details from Greek mythology, everyday Roman life and general human experience. Ovid likens love to military service, supposedly requiring the strictest obedience to the woman and he advises women to make their lovers artificially jealous so that they do not become neglectful through complacency. Perhaps accordingly, a slave should be instructed to interrupt the lovers tryst with the cry Perimus, the tension implicit in this uncommitted tone is reminiscent of a flirt, and in fact, the semi-serious, semi-ironic form is ideally suited to Ovids subject matter. It is striking that all his ironic discourse, Ovid never becomes ribald or obscene. Of course embarrassing matters can never be excluded, for praecipue nostrum est, quod pudet, inquit. Sexual matters in the narrower sense are only dealt with at the end of book, so here again, form. Things, so to speak, always end up in bed, but here, too, Ovid retains his style and his discretion, avoiding any pornographic tinge. The end of the book deals with the pleasures of simultaneous orgasm. Somewhat atypically for a Roman, the poet confesses, Odi concubitus, hoc est, cur pueri tangar amore minus. However, the word ars in the title is not to be translated coldly as technique, or as art in the sense of civilized refinement, but as textbook, the literal and antique definition of the word. Appropriately for its subject, the Ars Amatoria is composed in couplets, rather than the dactylic hexameters
39.
Incunabula Short Title Catalogue
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The Incunabula Short Title Catalogue is an electronic bibliographic database maintained by the British Library which seeks to catalogue all known incunabula. The database lists books by individual editions, recording standard bibliographic details for each edition as well as giving a brief census of known copies and it currently holds records of over 30,000 editions. Hains work was supplemented by Copingers Supplement and Reichlings Appendices. The ISTC was created to establish a system of incunable cataloging that was enough to be expanded quickly. Furthermore, the ISTC would use standardized entries that could be entered into a machine-searchable database, work on the ISTC began in 1980 under the leadership of the British Librarys Lotte Hellinga. Frederick R. Goffs Incunabula in American Libraries was the first pre-existing catalog to be keyed into ISTCs database, besides providing the catalogs first 12,900 entries, Goffs system for classifying information about incunables formed the basis for the structure of ISTCs records. Entries for all of the incunables in British Library and the Italian union catalog were added next, ISTC records retain many characteristics of the records from Goffs census. Each record represents one edition of a work, information such as author, title, printer, place of printing, year of printing, language, and format is entered into discrete fields to make the records searchable by a computer. Dates are reduced to conventional years where possible, the number of extant incunabula is estimated to be approximately 28,000 editions, which puts ISTC extraordinarily close to completing its goal of total coverage. While the ISTC is unsurpassed in coverage, it does not offer the level of detail as the Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke or the numerous collection catalogs that are available. Rather, the ISTC complements these resources by providing an index of editions, referring to other catalogs. ISTC does not include information about individual copies of a work as standard, though a brief census of confirmed locations is provided, and may contain brief notes. In general, the ISTC only covers extant editions, although records exist for some works that were sufficiently well-documented before being lost to fire or other calamities, an illustrated edition of the ISTC was made available on CD-ROM in 1998. The addition of illustrations offers important information about a books layout, format, the images represent samples of each text rather than the full text. English Short Title Catalogue Universal Short Title Catalogue VD16 VD17 Incunabula Short Title Catalogue at the British Library
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"Roman de la Rose". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
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