Medievalism
Medievalism is a system of belief and practice inspired by the
Renaissance to Enlightenment
In the 1330s,
During the
In the
Gothic revival
The Gothic Revival was an
In English literature, the architectural Gothic Revival and classical Romanticism gave rise to the
Romanticism
Romanticism was a complex artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the eighteenth century in Western Europe, and gained strength during and after the Industrial and French Revolutions.[24] It was partly a revolt against the political norms of the Age of Enlightenment which rationalised nature, and was embodied most strongly in the visual arts, music, and literature.[24] Romanticism has been seen as "the revival of the life and thought of the Middle Ages",[25] reaching beyond rational and Classicist models to elevate medievalism and elements of art and narrative perceived to be authentically medieval, in an attempt to escape the confines of population growth, urban sprawl and industrialism, embracing the exotic, unfamiliar and distant.[25][26]
The name "Romanticism" itself was derived from the medieval genre
The Nazarenes
The name Nazarene was adopted by a group of early nineteenth-century
Social commentary
Eventually, medievalism moved from the confines of fiction into the immediate realm of social commentary as a means of critiquing life in the
In Carlyle's
Along with medievalist writers
Ruskin connected the quality of a nation's architecture with its spiritual health, comparing the originality and freedom of medieval art with the mechanistic sterility of modernism in such works as
The Pre-Raphaelites
The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was a group of
The arts and crafts movement
The arts and crafts movement was an aesthetic movement, directly influenced by the Gothic revival and the Pre-Raphaelites, but moving away from aristocratic, nationalist and high Gothic influences to an emphasis on the idealised peasantry and medieval community, particularly of the fourteenth century, often with
Romantic nationalism
In England, the Middle Ages were trumpeted as the birthplace of democracy because of the
Twentieth and twenty-first centuries
Popular culture
Depictions of the Middle Ages can be found in different cultural media, including advertising.[64]
Film
Film has been one of the most significant creators of images of the Middle Ages since the early twentieth century. The first medieval film was also one of the earliest films ever made, about
Fantasy
While the folklore that fantasy drew on for its magic and monsters was not exclusively medieval, elves, dragons, and unicorns, among many other creatures, were drawn from medieval folklore and
Living history
In the second half of the twentieth century interest in the medieval was increasingly expressed through form of re-enactment, including combat reenactment, re-creating historical conflict, armour, arms and skill, as well as living history which re-creates the social and cultural life of the past, in areas such as clothing, food and crafts. The movement has led to the creation of medieval markets and Renaissance fairs, from the late 1980s, particularly in Germany and the United States of America.[74]
Neo-medievalism
Neo-medievalism (or neomedievalism) is a
The study of medievalism
Leslie J. Workman, Kathleen Verduin and David Metzger noted in their introduction to Studies in Medievalism IX "Medievalism and the Academy, Vol I" (1997) their sense that medievalism had been perceived by some medievalists as a "poor and somewhat whimsical relation of (presumably more serious) medieval studies".[80] In The Cambridge Companion to Medievalism (2016), editor Louise D'Arcens noted that some of the earliest medievalism scholarship (that is, study of the phenomenon of medievalism) was by Victorian specialists including Alice Chandler (with her monograph A Dream of Order: The Medieval Ideal in Nineteenth Century England (London: Taylor and Francis, 1971), and Florence Boos, with her edited volume History and Community: Essays in Victorian Medievalism (London: Garland Publishing, 1992)).[2] D'Arcens proposed that the 1970s saw the discipline of medievalism become an academic area of research in its own right, with the International Society for the Study of Medievalism formalised in 1979 with the publication of its Studies In Medievalism journal, organised by Leslie J. Workman.[2] D'Arcens notes that by 2016 medievalism was taught as a subject on "hundreds" of university courses around the world, and there were "at least two" scholarly journals dedicated to medievalism studies: Studies in Medievalism and postmedieval.[2]
Clare Monagle has argued that political medievalism has caused medieval scholars to repeatedly reconsider whether medievalism is a part of the study of the Middle Ages as a historical period. Monagle explains how in 1977 the International Relations scholar Hedley Bull coined the term "New Medievalism" to describe the world as a result of the rising powers of non-state actors in society (such as terrorist groups, corporations, or supra-state organisations such as the European Economic Community) which, due to new technologies, boundaries of jurisdiction that cross national borders, and shifts in private wealth challenged the exclusive authority of the state.[81] Monagle explained that in 2007 medieval scholar Bruce Holsinger published Neomedievalism, Conservativism and the War on Terror, which identified how George W. Bush's administration relied on medievalising rhetoric to identify al-Qaeda as "dangerously fluid, elusive, and stateless".[81] Monagle documents how Gabrielle Spiegel, then president of the American Historical Society "expressed concern at the idea that scholars of the historical medieval period might consider themselves licensed to in some way to intervene in contemporary medievalism", as to do so "conflates two very different historical periods".[81] Eileen Joy (co-founder and co-editor of the postmedieval journal),[82] responded to Spiegel that "the idea of a medieval past itself, as something that can be demarcated and cordoned off from other historical time periods, was and is of itself [...] a form of medievalism. Therefore, practising medievalists should absolutely pay heed to the use and abuse of the Middle Ages in contemporary discourse".[81]
Medievalism topics are now annual features at the major medieval conferences the International Medieval Congress hosted at the University of Leeds, UK, and the International Congress on Medieval Studies at Kalamazoo, Michigan.[2]
Exhibitions about medievalism
- 30 January - 22 May 2013. New Medievalist visions, King's College London, Maughan Library.[83]
- October 16, 2018 - March 3, 2019. Juggling the Middle Ages, Dumbarton Oaks, Washington DC. Juggling the Middle Ages "explores the influence of the medieval world by focusing on this single story with a long-lasting impact", Le Jongleur de Notre Dame or Our Lady’s Tumbler.[84][85][86]
Further reading
- Kegel, Paul L. (1970). "Henry Adams and Mark Twain: Two Views of Medievalism". Mark Twain Journal. 15 (3): 11–21. ISSN 0025-3499.
Bibliography
- Chandler, Alice (1970). A Dream of Order: The Medieval Ideal in Nineteenth-Century English Literature. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 9780803207042.
Notes
- ^ J. Simpson; E. Weiner, eds. (1989). "Medievalism". Oxford English Dictionary (2nd ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-316-54620-8.
- ^ Kathleen Davis and Nadia Altschul, eds. Medievalisms in the Postcolonial World: The Idea of "the Middle Ages" Outside Europe (2009)
- S2CID 161360211.
- ^ C. Rudolph, A companion to medieval art: Romanesque and Gothic in Northern Europe (Wiley-Blackwell, 2006), p. 4.
- ^ a b Albrow, Martin, The global age: state and society beyond modernity (1997), p. 205.
- ^ Random House Dictionary (2010), "Mediaeval"
- ^ F. Oakley, The medieval experience: foundations of Western cultural singularity (University of Toronto Press, 1988), pp. 1-4.
- ^ R. D. Linder, The Reformation Era (Greenwood, 2008), p. 124.
- ^ K. J. Christiano, W. H. Swatos and P. Kivisto, Sociology of Religion: Contemporary Developments (Rowman Altamira, 2002), p. 77.
- ^ a b R. Bartlett, Medieval Panorama (Getty Trust Publications, 2001), p. 12.
- ^ S. J. Barnett, The Enlightenment and Religion: the Myths of Modernity (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2003), p. 213.
- ^ a b N. Yates, Liturgical Space: Christian Worship and Church Buildings in Western Europe 1500-2000 (Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing, 2008), p. 114,
- ^ A. Chandler, A Dream of Order: the Medieval Ideal in Nineteenth-Century English Literature (London: Taylor & Francis, 1971), p. 184.
- ^ a b c M. Moffett, M. W. Fazio, L. Wodehouse, A World History of Architecture (2nd edn., Laurence King, 2003), pp. 429-41.
- ^ M. Alexander, Medievalism: the Middle Ages in Modern England (Yale University Press, 2007), pp. 71-3.
- ^ D. D. Volo, The Antebellum Period American popular culture Through History (Greenwood, 2004), p. 131.
- ^ F. Botting, Gothic (CRC Press, 1996), pp. 1-2.
- ^ S. T. Joshi, Icons of Horror and the Supernatural: an Encyclopedia of our Worst Nightmares (Greenwood, 2007), p. 250.
- ^ S. T. Joshi, Icons of Horror and the Supernatural: an Encyclopedia of our Worst Nightmares, Volume 1 (Greenwood, 2007), p. 350.
- ^ A. L. Smith, American Gothic Fiction: an Introduction (Continuum, 2004), p. 79.
- ^ D. David, The Cambridge Companion to the Victorian Novel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), p. 186.
- ^ S. Arata, Fictions of Loss in the Victorian Fin de Siècle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 111.
- ^ a b A. Chandler, A Dream of Order: the Medieval Ideal in Nineteenth-Century English Literature (London: Taylor & Francis, 1971), p. 4.
- ^ ISBN 978-8170172628
- ISBN 978-3-8325-3794-4
- ISBN 0-521-47735-2, p. 9.
- ^ A. Chandler, A Dream of Order: the Medieval Ideal in Nineteenth-century English Literature (London: Taylor & Francis, 1971), pp. 54-7.
- ^ W. P. Gerritsen, A. G. Van Melle and T. Guest, A Dictionary of Medieval Heroes: Characters in Medieval Narrative Traditions and Their Afterlife in Literature, Theatre and the Visual Arts (Boydell & Brewer, 2000), p. 256.
- ^ R. E. Chandler and K. Schwart, A New History of Spanish Literature (LSU Press, 2nd edn., 1991), p. 29.
- ^ M. Alexander, Beowulf: a Verse Translation (London: Penguin Classics, 2nd edn., 2004), p. xviii.
- ^ G. S. Burgess, The Song of Roland (London: Penguin Classics, 1990), p. 7.
- ^ S. P. Sondrup and G. E. P. Gillespie, Nonfictional Romantic Prose: Expanding Borders (John Benjamins, 2004), p. 8.
- ^ a b c d e K. F. Reinhardt, Germany: 2000 years, Volume 2 (Continuum, 1981), p. 491.
- ^ A. Chandler, A Dream of Order: the Medieval Ideal in Nineteenth-Century English Literature (London: Taylor & Francis, 1971), p. 191.
- ^ K. Curran, The Romanesque Revival: Religion, Politics, and Transnational Exchange (Penn State Press, 2003), p. 4.
- ^ Chandler 1970, pp. 65–68.
- ^ "medievalism". Oxford Reference. Retrieved 2022-08-08.
- ^ Chandler 1970, p. 138.
- ISSN 0950-3129.
- ISSN 0043-4078.
- ^ Chandler 1970, p. 153.
- ^ Chandler 1970, pp. 198–203.
- ^ Cook and Wedderburn, 17.lxx.
- ^ Cook and Wedderbun, 35:13
- ^ Cook and Wedderbun, 27:116
- JSTOR 27527781.
- ^ a b R. Cronin, A. Chapman and A. H. Harrison, A Companion to Victorian Poetry (Wiley-Blackwell, 2002), p. 305.
- ^ J. Rothenstein, An Introduction to English Painting (I.B.Tauris, 2001), p. 115.
- ^ S. Andres, The pre-Raphaelite art of the Victorian novel: narrative challenges to visual gendered boundaries (Ohio State University Press, 2004), p. 247.
- ^ a b F. S. Kleiner, 'Gardner's Art Through the Ages: A Global History (13th edn., Cengage Learning EMEA, 2008), p. 846.
- ^ C. Harvey and J. Press, William Morris: Design and Enterprise in Victorian Britain (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1991), pp. 77-8.
- ^ D. Shand-Tucci, and R. A. Cram, Boston Bohemia, 1881-1900: Ralph Adams Cram Life and Literature (University of Massachusetts Press, 1996), p. 174.
- ^ V. B. Canizaro, Architectural Regionalism: Collected Writings on Place, Identity, Modernity, and Tradition (Princeton Architectural Press, 2007), p. 196.
- ^ John F. Pile, A History of Interior Design (2nd edn., Laurence King, 2005), p. 267.
- ^ R. A. Etlin, Art, Culture, and Media Under the Third Reich (University of Chicago Press, 2002), p. 118.
- ^ Lisa Trumbauer, King Ludwig's Castle: Germany's Neuschwanstein (Bearport, 2005).
- ^ V. Ortenberg, In Search of the Holy Grail: the Quest for the Middle Ages (Continuum, 2006), p. 114.
- ^ R. Chapman, The Sense of the Past in Victorian Literature (London: Taylor & Francis, 1986), pp. 36-7.
- ^ I. Anstruther, The Knight and the Umbrella: An Account of the Eglinton Tournament - 1839 (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1963), pp. 122-3.
- ^ J. Banham and J. Harris, William Morris and the Middle Ages: a Collection of Essays, together with a Catalogue of Works Exhibited at the Whitworth Art Gallery, 28 September-8 December 1984 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1984), p. 76.
- ^ R. Cronin, A. Chapman and A. H. Harrison, A Companion to Victorian Poetry (Wiley-Blackwell, 2002), p. 247.
- ^ I. Bryden, Reinventing King Arthur: the Arthurian Legends in Victorian Culture (Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2005), p. 79.
- ^ Examples for the depiction of the Middle Ages in advertising (including gender stereotypes): Megan Arnott (2019-01-31): “Viking Tough”: How Ads Sell Us Medieval Manhood. The Public Medievalist. Retrieved 2024-01-15.
- ^ T. G. Hahn, Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice (Boydell & Brewer, 2000), p. 87.
- ^ Norris J. Lacy, A History of Arthurian Scholarship (Boydell & Brewer Ltd, 2006), p. 87.
- ^ S. J. Umland, The Use of Arthurian Legend in Hollywood Film: from Connecticut Yankees to Fisher Kings (Greenwood, 1996), p. 105.
- ^ N. Haydock and E. L. Risden, Hollywood in the Holy Land: Essays on Film Depictions of the Crusades and Christian-Muslim Clashes (McFarland, 2009), p. 187.
- ^ R. C. Schlobin, The Aesthetics of Fantasy Literature and Art (University of Notre Dame Press, 1982), p. 236.
- ^ J. A. Tucker, A Sense of Wonder: Samuel R. Delany, Race, Identity and Difference (Wesleyan University Press, 2004), p. 91.
- ISBN 0-312-85175-8.
- ISBN 978-0786450473, p. 27.
- ISBN 978-0415969420, p. 380.
- ^ M. C. C. Adams, Echoes of War: A Thousand Years of Military History in Popular Culture (University Press of Kentucky, 2002), p. 2.
- ^ Umberto Eco, "Dreaming of the Middle Ages," in Travels in Hyperreality, transl. by W. Weaver (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1986), pp. 61–72. Eco wrote, "Thus we are at present witnessing, both in Europe and America, a period of renewed interest in the Middle Ages, with a curious oscillation between fantastic neomedievalism and responsible philological examination."
- ^ M. W. Driver and S. Ray, eds, The medieval hero on screen: representations from Beowulf to Buffy (McFarland, 2004).
- ^ J. Tolmie, "Medievalism and the Fantasy Heroine", Journal of Gender Studies, vol. 15, No. 2 July 2006, pp. 145–58
- ^ Cary John Lenehan."Postmodern Medievalism", University of Tasmania, November 1994.
- ^ K. Alderson and A. Hurrell, eds, Hedley Bull on International Society (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2000), p. 56.
- ISBN 978-0-85991-532-8.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-60497-864-3.
- ^ "A word from the co-editor of postmedieval, Eileen A. Joy". www.palgrave.com. Retrieved 2020-11-08.
- ^ "New Medievalist visions Exhibition at the Maughan Library | Website archive | King's College London". www.kcl.ac.uk. Retrieved 2020-10-24.
- ^ Wilson, Lain. "Juggling the Middle Ages". Dumbarton Oaks. Retrieved 2020-10-24.
- ^ Nguyen, Sophia (2018-10-18). "The Juggler's Tale". Harvard Magazine. Retrieved 2020-10-24.
- ^ Dame, Marketing Communications: Web | University of Notre. "D.C. museum tells an old Notre Dame story | Stories | Notre Dame Magazine | University of Notre Dame". Notre Dame Magazine. Retrieved 2020-10-24.