David Ganz - Böcker

Einhard's Life of Charlemagne is an absorbing chronicle of one of the most powerful and dynamic of all medieval rulers, written by a close friend and adviser. In elegant prose it describes Charlemagne's personal life, details his achievements in reviving learning and the arts, recounts his military successes and depicts one of the defining moments in European history: Charlemagne's coronation as emperor in Rome on Christmas Day 800AD. By contrast, Notker's account, written some decades after Charlemagne's death, is a collection of anecdotes rather than a presentation of historical facts.

Lisa Fagin Davis offers the first photographic reconstruction of the extant leaves of the Gottschalk Antiphonary, an important twelfth-century manuscript from the Austrian monastery in Lambach. The Gottschalk Antiphonary, which was dismantled for binding scrap in the fifteenth century, is examined from various angles - art historical, liturgical, and musical - and its contributions to the study of medieval drama and the long-term ramifications of the investiture controversy are explored. The manuscript is studied within the historical and political context within which it was created, in order to better understand the decisions which went into its production. In addition to a black-and-white facsimile of the recovered portion of the manuscript, the book includes a survey of the twelfth-century Lambach scriptorium and a detailed codicological reconstruction of the codex. Appendices of charts and tables demonstrate how the Gottschalk Antiphonary compares to other liturgical manuscripts from the same period.

This book, first published in 2003, presents a detailed survey of all book scripts in use in western and central Europe from c.1100 to c.1530 (with the exception of Humanistic script). This period has been poorly served in almost all other palaeographical handbooks. By adopting a largely new classification of scripts based on objective criteria, which incorporates many of the terms currently in use, this book aims to end the confusion which has hitherto obscured the study of late-medieval handwriting. It is based upon an examination of a very large number of dated specimens, and is thus the first survey to take full advantage of the incomparable palaeographical resource provided by the Catalogues of Dated Manuscripts. The text is illustrated throughout with 600 drawings of letters and symbols. There are 160 actual-size reproductions providing datable specimens of all the scripts discussed, accompanied by partial transcriptions and palaeographical commentary.

This collection of highly original essays by leading early medieval historians honours the work and career of Dame Janet (Jinty) Nelson, one of the most respected and influential scholars of her generation. The essays build on the spirit of Janet Nelson’s work by linking the study of Francia with at least one other area or general theme of early medieval history. The papers range across all of the regions of Europe affected by Frankish culture and explore themes which reflect the cutting edge of the work she inspired: memory, queenship, the treatment of prisoners of war, penance, the use of property, historiography, palaeography, prosopography, religious organization. The volume includes an appreciation of her career, and is rounded off by a topical index to highlight its thematic aspects.

This issue of Clinics in Geriatric Medicine, Guest Edited by Laurence Rubenstein, MD, MPH, and David Ganz, MD, PhD, features topics such as:

Epidemiology of Falls in Older Adults Exercise for Fall Prevention Cardiac Causes of Falls and their Treatment Medications and Falls Vision and Fall Prevention Preventing Falls in the Hospital Public Health Approach to Falls on a State and National Level

According to a longstanding interpretation, book religions are agents of textuality and logocentrism. This volume inverts the traditional perspective: its focus is on the strong dependency between scripture and aesthetics, holy books and material artworks, sacred texts and ritual performances. The contributions, written by a group of international specialists in Western, Byzantine, Islamic and Jewish Art, are committed to a comparative and transcultural approach. The authors reflect upon the different strategies of »clothing« sacred texts with precious materials and elaborate forms. They show how the pretypographic cultures of the Middle Ages used book ornaments as media for building a close relation between the divine words and their human audience. By exploring how art shapes the religious practice of books, and how the religious use of books shapes the evolution of artistic practices this book contributes to a new understanding of the deep nexus between sacred scripture and art.

Medieval book ornament is a rapidly developing field of research. In the last decade, the various materials and techniques used to decorate medieval books, their different spaces and textures, their sensory qualities and semantics, and their significance in ritual or other performative contexts have reignited the interest of all disciplines concerned with the medieval book as a material object. Nevertheless, a comprehensive overview of the entire field is lacking. The Handbook of Medieval Book Ornament, creates a reference work, for both students and specialists, discussing the most important terms, topics, and currently discussed concepts related to ornament (in the broadest Middle Latin sense of "ornatus") in medieval book cultures. The focus is on book cultures in the Latin speaking world of Europe from 700 to 1500, including perspectives on Jewish, Islamic, Byzantine and vernacular book cultures and transcultural phenomena. It consists of 200 articles arranged in general themes such as Materials and Techniques, Topology, Sensory Effects, Usage and Pragmatics, Script, and Iconicity. All articles are written by the most renowned experts in the field and include a brief research bibliography, making the handbook an indispensable reference for anyone studying medieval books.