Books about Late medieval from Amazon.com

Storm of Arrows, designed and developed as an army list companion to the new Ancient and Medieval wargame rule set Field of Glory, is a lavishly illustrated, factually accurate and detailed gaming guide that provides comprehensive army listings and detailed historical overviews of each army - complete with supporting maps and artwork. Essential to gaming one of the most engaging periods of history, this title covers the forces involved in the major conflicts of the late Medieval period, from the Hundred Years' War to the Wars of the Roses.

.
Price: $12.61 [Notify me when price goes down.]

A major new history of Western political thought as it evolved through conflict and communities

In this groundbreaking work, Ellen Meiksins Wood lays out her innovative approach to the history of political theory and traces the development of the Western tradition from classical antiquity through the late Middle Ages. Her "social history" is a significant departure from other contextual interpretations. Treating canonical thinkers as passionately engaged human beings, Wood examines their ideas not simply in the context of political languages but as creative responses to the social relations and conflicts of their time and place. From the Ancient Greek polis of Plato and Aristotle, through the Roman Republic of Cicero and the Empire of St. Paul and St. Augustine, to the medieval world of Averroes, Thomas Aquinas and William of Ockham, Citizens to Lord offers a rich, dynamic exploration of thinkers and ideas that have indelibly stamped our modern world..
Price: $18.69 [Notify me when price goes down.]

This study of 120 pages is a bible of leather holders, especially money holders Every purse that has been found in an archaeological context in the Netherlands is published in this book. All the techniques are discussed and many iconographical references are presented. Because leather objects from this period do not varie very much in North Western Europe and North America, you will find what you need to know about all the different manifestations of purses..
Price: $34.20 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The quiet market town of Wilsnack in northeastern Germany is unfamiliar to most English-speakers and even to many modern Germans Yet in the fifteenth century it was a European pilgrimage site surpassed in importance only by Rome and Santiago de Compostela. The goal of pilgrimage was three miraculous hosts, supposedly discovered in the charred remains of the village church several days after it had been torched by a marauding knight in August 1383. Although the church had been burned and the spot soaked with rain, the hosts were found intact and dry, with a drop of Christ's blood at the center of each.

In Wonderful Blood, Caroline Walker Bynum studies the saving power attributed to Christ's blood at north German cult sites such as Wilsnack, the theological controversy such sites generated, and the hundreds of devotional paintings, poems, and prayers dedicated to Christ's wounds, scourging, and bloody crucifixion. She argues that Christ's blood as both object and symbol was central to late medieval art, literature, pious practice, and theology. As object of veneration, blood provided a focus of intense debate about the nature of matter, body, and God and an occasion for Jewish persecution; as motif, blood became a prominent subject of northern art and a central symbol in the visions of mystics and the prayers of ordinary people.

.
Price: $23.78 [Notify me when price goes down.]

In tenth- and eleventh-century England, Anglo-Saxon Christians retained an old folk belief in elves as extremely dangerous creatures capable of harming unwary humans. To ward off the afflictions caused by these invisible beings, Christian priests modified traditional elf charms by adding liturgical chants to herbal remedies. In Popular Religion in Late Saxon England, Karen Jolly traces this cultural intermingling of Christian liturgy and indigenous Germanic customs and argues that elf charms and similar practices represent the successful Christianization of native folklore. Jolly describes a dual process of conversion in which Anglo-Saxon culture became Christianized but at the same time left its own distinct imprint on Christianity. Illuminating the creative aspects of this dynamic relationship, she identifies liturgical folk medicine as a middle ground between popular and elite, pagan and Christian, magic and miracle. Her analysis, drawing on the model of popular religion to redefine folklore and magic, reveals the richness and diversity of late Saxon Christianity..
Price: $18.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Douglas Wile translates and analyzes four collections of recently released nineteenth-century manuscripts on T'ai-chi ch'uan. These writings of Wu's older brothers Ch'eng-ch'ing and Ju-ch'ing, and his nephew Li I-yu, together with the transmissions of Yang Pan-hou, represent a significant addition to the seminal literature. The rich new texts allow us to make a fresh survey of longstanding issues in T'ai-chi history: the origins of the art; the authorship of the "classics;" the differences between Wu, Yang, and Li; and the roles of Chang San-feng, Wang Tsung-yueh, Chiang Fa, and the formerly missing link, Ch'ang Nai-chou. The original Chinese texts of the four new sets of classics have been appended for the convenience of Chinese readers and scholars.

The book reconsiders the world of the Wu, Yang, and Li families of Yung-nien and reconstructs it against the background of the Opium Wars, the Taiping Rebellion, and the decline of the Manchu dynasty. New biographical sources illuminate the domestic and political lives of the Yung-nien circle and their orientation to the late imperial intellectual trends. The development of T'ai-chi ch'uan in the nineteenth century is explored in the context of China's cultural response to the challenge of the West and the role of body-centered arts in Asia during the drive for independence and the ongoing search for national identity..
Price: $14.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Since it was first published in Hebrew in 2000, this provocative book has been garnering acclaim and stirring controversy for its bold reinterpretation of the relationship between Judaism and Christianity in the Middle Ages, especially in medieval Europe. Looking at a remarkably wide array of source material, Israel Jacob Yuval argues that the inter-religious polemic between Judaism and Christianity served as a substantial component in the mutual formation of each of the two religions. He investigates ancient Jewish Passover rituals; Jewish martyrs in the Rhineland who in 1096 killed their own children; Christian perceptions of those ritual killings; and events of the year 1240, when Jews in northern France and Germany expected the Messiah to arrive. Looking below the surface of these key moments, Yuval finds that, among other things, the impact of Christianity on Talmudic and medieval Judaism was much stronger than previously assumed and that a "rejection of Christianity" became a focal point of early Jewish identity. Two Nations in Your Womb will reshape our understanding of Jewish and Christian life in late antiquity and over the centuries..
Price: $16.47 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Medieval Europe and the World: From Late Antiquity to Modernity, 400-1500 examines the development of western European social, political, economic, and cultural institutions during one of the most complex and creative periods the world has ever known. The book looks at the history of Medieval Europe in relation to its links with the rest of the world, exploring the interaction of western Europe with Islam, the Far East, Africa, and such outlying areas as Scandinavia, Iberia, and Eastern Europe. It considers the genesis and shaping of distinct western ideals, social affairs, economic patterns, and new cultural forms in relation to Islam and Byzantium--two other great civilizations that deeply influenced the growth of western Europe's unique history. Placing emphasis on medieval Europe's social and economic transformations and the diversity of social orders, the book analyzes the ways in which these elements interconnected during the formation of medieval society. It also gives special consideration to the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, an era that serves as a bridge between the cultural developments of the early and central Middle Ages and the emergence of new patterns of thought and social organization in the late medieval period.
Featuring nine maps, numerous illustrations, a chronological table, and a detailed list of suggested further readings, this brief but comprehensive narrative is an ideal text for undergraduate courses in medieval history..
Price: $30.22 [Notify me when price goes down.]

War in Late Antiquity is the first book to focus on the social impact of warfare and the Roman army from the third to the early seventh century AD. Drawing on the rich and varied source materials for the period, Doug Lee investigates how the prominence of the army and of military affairs in Late Antiquity affected the broader political, economic, and social life of the Roman Empire.

From the third century onwards, the Roman Empire was exposed to much more serious military threats than it had faced for centuries. This social history explores the implications of these changed circumstances for all aspects of Roman life, and assesses the experience of war by both combatants and non-combatants. Lee also examines the interplay between the military and the religious upheavals of the period, with special reference to the Christianisation of the Roman army and its role in implementing religious policy.

Approaching familiar subjects from new perspectives, War in Late Antiquity offers novel insights into many facets of late Roman history..
Price: $29.35 [Notify me when price goes down.]