Isolated Islands in Medieval Nature, Culture and Mind (CEU Medievalia)

Focuses specifically on the concept and role of islands in the medieval world. The main characteristic of an island is, of course, that of being isolated from the rest of the world; in geography by waters, in more abstract and symbolic meanings by other kinds of separating borders. Islands were the place 'on the other side', of difference, otherness and remoteness. As one of the articles in this volume puts it, islands are often depicted as sites for extraordinary events and happeningsA". The contributions cluster around the concept of islands under the following perspectives: \* search for undiscovered and paradise islands in literature and cartography \* idea of fictional islands in Old Norse texts \* quality of islands in literary texts \* monasteries as islands and monasteries on islands \* human body as an island of religious achievements \* seasonal islandisation of certain lands. Paradise Islands In The East And West : Tradition And Meaning In Some Cartographical Places On The Medieval Rim Of The World / Felicitas Schmeider -- The Powers And Purposes Of An Insular Setting : On Some Motifs In Old-norse Literature / Kristel Zilmer -- Monastic Islands In Medieval Denmark : Insular Isolation In Ideal And Practice / Johnny Grandjean Gogsig Jacobsen -- Religious Athletes : On The Perception Of The Body In Medieval Asceticism / Torben Kjersgaard Nielsen -- Holy Islands And The Otherworld : Places Beyond Water / Eldar Heide -- Hvitramannaland And Other Fictional Islands In The Sea / Else Mundal -- The Unknown Island / Margaret Elphinstone -- Will The Son Of The Nine Sisters Rule The Sea-kidney? / Bernt Oyvind Thorvaldsen -- The Quality Of Islands In Middle High German Literature / Gerhard Jaritz -- Seasonal Isolation In The Communication In Livonia / Juhan Kreem -- Utstein Monastery : An Island On An Island -- Or Not? / Torstein Jorgensten. Edited By Torstein Jørgensen And Gerhard Jaritz. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. The volume contains selected papers from an international workshop in 2005, at the Hungarian Academy in Rome. They aim at investigating the registers of fifteenth-century supplications to the Apostolic Penitentiary of the Holy See and to analyze the multiplicity of issues in which a context of the local needs of Western Christians and the central power of the Pope had been occurring. The contributions make clear that local and individual factors and practice of Christian faith and religion must not be seen as separated from the global power of the Roman curia. The latter's influence could become directly important for any individual in any local space, also ... et usque ad ultimum terrae (Acts 1:8), in the utmost peripheries of the Christian world. The assistance by the Apostolic Penitentiary was indispensable in a large variety of cases. The occupation with such cases happened in the local and regional space as well as in the globalized centre of the Holy See. Cover Title page Copyright page TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Illustrations Preface Paradise Islands in the East and West –Tradition and Meaning in Some Cartographical Places on the Medieval Rim of the World The Powers and Purposes of an Insular Setting –on Some Motifs in Old-Norse Literature Monastic “Islands” in Medieval Denmark: Insular Isolation in Ideal and Practice Religious Athletes – on the Perception of the Body in Medieval Asceticism Holy Islands and the Otherworld: Places beyond Water Hvítramannaland and Other Fictional Islands in the Sea The Unknown Island Will the Son of Nine Sisters Rule the Sea-Kidney? The Quality of Islands in Middle High German Literature Seasonal Isolation in the Communication in Livonia Utstein Monastery: An Island on an Island – or not? List of Contributors Index Back cover "Since its publication in 1981, this book has established itself as the major new interpretation of the historical concept of Ibn Khaldun, the great figure of Arab-Islamic letters and of historical thought overall - a figure generally thought to be on a par with Thucydides, Vico, Herder and others of similar stature. The author has eschewed the ahistorical interpretations to which Ibn Khaldun has normally been subjected, both by authors who have sought unduly to modernise his thought, and by those who sought to freeze it in stereotypical models of Islamic philosophy."--Jacket Starting with an interpretation of Ibn Khaldun's narration of history in the context of classical Arabic historical writing, the author's interpretation then moves on to a reconstruction of Ibn Khaldun's conception of history. The book then goes on to sketch the content and structure of Ibn Khaldun's most celebrated work, 'The Muqaddima'.