{"title":"Book review: Noëlle-Laetitia Perret and Stéphane Péquignot, eds., A Critical Companion to the ‘Mirrors for Princes’","authors":"Enrico Boccaccini","doi":"10.1177/09719458231186362","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458231186362","url":null,"abstract":"Noëlle-Laetitia Perret and Stéphane Péquignot, eds., A Critical Companion to the ‘Mirrors for Princes’. Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2023, 568 pp. ISBN: 9789004518759.","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"21 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135959279","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book review: Lorenz Böninger, Niccolò di Lorenzo della Magna and the Social World of Florentine Printing, ca. 1470–1493","authors":"P. Dover","doi":"10.1177/09719458221103383","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458221103383","url":null,"abstract":"Lorenz Böninger, Niccolò di Lorenzo della Magna and the Social World of Florentine Printing, ca. 1470–1493. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2021, pp. 209. ISBN: 9780674251137.","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"26 1","pages":"164 - 167"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47781716","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A New Focus on Cityscapes in Late Medieval German Literature: Rudolf von Ems and Heinrich Kaufringer","authors":"A. Classen","doi":"10.1177/09719458221113126","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458221113126","url":null,"abstract":"Historians have studied the medieval city from many different perspectives already, and even literary historians have endeavoured to identify the evidence in fictional texts pertaining to urban spaces and figures. In many cases, however, the cities as they emerge before our eyes are rather imaginary or dream-like, and lack in historical specificity. This situation changed, as this article demonstrates, with the case of Rudolf von Ems’s Der guote Gêrhart (ca. 1220) and the verse narratives by Heinrich Kaufringer (ca. 1400). This study examines the data we can cull from both sides and presents it as the crucial indicator for the emergence of a new literary discourse dedicated to the world of late medieval cities. We begin to discover, though not yet in any consistent way, the formation of urban protagonists and of narrative contexts that are predicated on urban settings.","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"26 1","pages":"113 - 136"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42794563","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Writing on the Wall: Chronicles Written for Public Display at St Paul’s Cathedral, London","authors":"David Mason","doi":"10.1177/09719458221080344","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458221080344","url":null,"abstract":"Not all chronicles were written in books. This article examines a widespread alternative, the tablet (table, tabula), which was a display board typically made of wood and parchment. They were once ubiquitous in churches, but today there are few extant examples. This article offers a ‘textual archaeology’, using manuscripts and antiquarian literature to reconstruct lost texts. It presents a case study at St Paul’s Cathedral, London. It examines the functions and audiences of the London historical tablets, and places them in their spatial, textual and manuscript contexts. Tablets displayed a variety of historiographical genres: chronicles, institutional histories, miracle and saint narratives, and lives and deeds of benefactors. Their spatial location indicates particular concentrations around the main pilgrimage sites of the church. Surviving witnesses hint at a broad audience for these texts in London, including local laymen, clergy and pilgrims. Tablets were used to assert the institutional claims and identity of the church, to inform tourists and pilgrims, and to assist in the creation of public memory through ceremonies and rituals. Tablet chronicles point towards medieval uses of the past that were public-facing, accessible, and engaged with the institutional and cultural life of London.","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"26 1","pages":"23 - 56"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41675319","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Revisiting the Mirzanama: Class Consciousness and the Mughal Middle Classes","authors":"Riya Gupta","doi":"10.1177/09719458221113129","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458221113129","url":null,"abstract":"Drawing on earlier scholarship that argues for the existence of the middle classes in the Mughal Indian society, this article aims to render their sociocultural history more visible through a re-examination of the Mirzanama. The text, often associated with the elite, on the contrary, addresses the middling petty officialdom, advising them on micro-aspects of their sociocultural lives such as the etiquette of dining. Read imaginatively, the advisory reveals class consciousness—in terms of being distinct from both the nobility and the common populace—to be an important factor defining the middle-class way of life. Significantly, a micro-historical reflection, macro-historically helps us challenge the recently created dichotomy, in historical scholarship, between the elite and the non-elite, by reasserting the presence of sufficiently conscious middle strata.","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"26 1","pages":"137 - 160"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47988652","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Overland Route Between Bild Al-hm and Istanbul During the Ottoman Era: Evidence from Arabic Travelogues","authors":"Almahdi Alrawadieh","doi":"10.1177/09719458221083377","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458221083377","url":null,"abstract":"Drawing on Arabic travelogues, this study traces the overland routes that were used by travellers between Bilād Al-S̲hām and Istanbul during the Ottoman era. The study also identifies the key towns and villages located along these routes and delves into how Arab voyagers documented these towns and villages’ names as close as possible to their original Ottoman names. Moreover, the means of transportation that were used were also identified. The study draws a comprehensive table with the names of the places that the Arab voyagers documented either on their way to Istanbul or on the way back home. By drawing on Arabic travelogues, the study makes a significant contribution to historical geography during the Ottoman Empire.","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"26 1","pages":"57 - 83"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44520967","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book review: Audrey Truschke, The Language of History: Sanskrit Narratives of Indo-Muslim Rule","authors":"M. Bednar","doi":"10.1177/09719458221103386","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458221103386","url":null,"abstract":"Audrey Truschke, The Language of History: Sanskrit Narratives of Indo-Muslim Rule. New York: Columbia University Press, 2021, pp. 351. ISBN: 978-0-231-19705-2 (Paperback).","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"26 1","pages":"161 - 164"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42114140","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book review: Farhat Hasan, Paper, Performance, and the State: Social Change and Political Culture in Mughal India","authors":"Dipanjan Mazumder","doi":"10.1177/09719458221113132","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458221113132","url":null,"abstract":"Farhat Hasan, Paper, Performance, and the State: Social Change and Political Culture in Mughal India. Cambridge University Press, 2021, pp. 155. ISBN: 9781009025256.","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"26 1","pages":"167 - 172"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41461788","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Depreciation of Military Service Costs in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries in Central-Eastern Europe","authors":"K. Lopatecki, Aleksander Bołdyrew","doi":"10.1177/09719458221103910","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458221103910","url":null,"abstract":"The article presents the depreciation of soldiers’ equipment in the fifteenth–sixteenth centuries in Central-Eastern Europe based on the data from a dedicated financial institution existing in the Polish Kingdom until the 1560s. Soldiers received their pay, and the king additionally paid them compensation for any war damage. Owing to meticulous records, data were collected on 9,371 individuals. Based on the collected data, it has been established that the average losses in cavalry were equivalent to 40% of the pay and in infantry, the corresponding ratio was 13.7%. This formation was not only cheaper to equip, it was also less cost-intensive. The article elaborates on the background of the liquidation of this institution in the Polish Crown, combined with an increase in soldiers’ pay, who gained only seemingly. It was mainly a profitable operation for the state. It improved the budgeting process, increased the combat value of the soldiers, facilitated military bureaucratisation and prevented extorted compensation. After the reform, the depreciation in the cost of the soldier’s pay is estimated to have been about 1/3. The percentage chance of losing a horse, arms and armour was also calculated, demonstrating a huge equine mortality rate of 48.2% over three months of fighting.","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"26 1","pages":"84 - 112"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48752321","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Reason vs. Religion in Medieval India: Mainly from Evidence in Persian","authors":"I. Habib","doi":"10.1177/09719458231159489","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09719458231159489","url":null,"abstract":"The pursuit of reason may be defined as the drawing of logical deductions from a study of actual phenomena, and thus be essentially confined to the results gained from access to the various branches of science. It was in Greece where, from the fifth century BCE onward, rational thought was deemed to have developed most. Greek texts exercised undeniable influence on early thought in the Islamic world, Alberūnī’s Kitabu’l Hind being a remarkable product of that influence. Muslim theologians mounted a tirade against rationality (‘aql), in which the ṣūfīs joined; but since ṣūfic moral thought often tended to override Muslim theology, there could arise figures (even if partly imaginary) like Rābi‘a of Basra, who stood up against theology and its fictions. The conflict between ma‘qūlāt (reason) and manqūlāt (theology) was duly imported into India, along with the arrival of the Arabic–Persian sciences in the 13th and 14th centuries. Here poetry in Persian also became a major vehicle undermining theology. The tendency is partly present in Amīr Khusrau of Delhi (extolling love above theology!), but especially in the Iranian poet Ḥāfiz Shīrāzī, where the sāqī and ale-house constituted the major alternative to the pulpit and the mosque. In Indo-Persian poetry the same role is often ascribed to the but (idol) and the butkhāna (temple). It was under Akbar (r. 1556–1605) that a detailed inquiry (1574 onward) into Islamic beliefs and the doctrines of other religions led to disquiet about their validity. Abū’l Faẓl (d. 1602) became the leading light of a revival of rationality. Akbar’s own critique of Islam was similarly extended to aspects of Hinduism. ‘Urfī represents best the shift to reason, by the boldness of his poetry, rejecting religion for its inadequacy and looking forward to a just world. The seventeenth century did not fulfil the promise of the 16th. There was continuing interest in religion, shown by Jahāngīr’s formula: Tasawwuf = Vedānta; Dārā Shukoh’s translation of the Upanishads; and Mobad’s unique work Dabistān. But there was no corresponding assertion of rationality, whose votaries were reduced to a small band, last described, c. 1655.","PeriodicalId":42683,"journal":{"name":"MEDIEVAL HISTORY JOURNAL","volume":"26 1","pages":"7 - 22"},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42901589","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}