Bell on Trial: The Struggle for Sound after Savonarola

2019 ◽  
Vol 72 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-96
Author(s):  
Daniel M. Zolli ◽  
Christopher Brown

In June 1498, the Florentine government publicly punished and exiled the Piagnona, the lone bell of the church of San Marco, for its role in defending Girolamo Savonarola during the April siege that led to the preacher's execution. Drawing on new evidence, this essay offers the most complete account of this still poorly understood chapter in Renaissance history, examining its complex and conflicting motives. At the same time, the punishment of the Piagnona, and struggle for its return, affords uncommon insight into the culture's deepest structures of thinking about what bells were, and who had the legal authority to adjudicate their fate.

2018 ◽  
pp. 306-312
Author(s):  
Veniamin F. Zima ◽  

The reviewed work is devoted to a significant, and yet little-studied in both national and foreign scholarship, issue of the clergy interactions with German occupational authorities on the territory of the USSR in the days of the Great Patriotic War. It introduces into scientific use historically significant complex of documents (1941-1945) from the archive of the Office of the Metropolitan Sergius (Voskresensky) of Vilnius and Lithuania, patriarchal exarch in Latvia and Estonia, and also records from the investigatory records on charges against clergy and employees concerned in the activities of the Pskov Orthodox Mission (1944-1990). Documents included in the publication are stored in the archives of Moscow, St. Petersburg, Estonia, Lithuania, Leningrad, Novgorod, and Pskov regions. They allow some insight into nature, forms, and methods of the Nazi occupational regime policies in the conquered territories (including policies towards the Church). The documents capture religious policies of the Nazis and inner life of the exarchate, describe actual situation of population and clergy, management activities and counterinsurgency on the occupied territories. The documents bring to light connections between the exarchate and German counterintelligence and reveal the nature of political police work with informants. They capture the political mood of population and prisoners of war. There is information on participants of partisan movement and underground resistance, on communication net between the patriarchal exarchate in the Baltic states and the German counterintelligence. Reports and dispatches of the clergy in the pay of the Nazis addressed to the Metropolitan Sergius (Voskresensky) contain detailed activity reports. Investigatory records contain important biographical information and personal data on the collaborators. Most of the documents, being classified, have never been published before.


2020 ◽  
pp. 128-138
Author(s):  
A. S. Bik-Bulatov

The article uses little known letters of M. Gorky, many of which were published for the first time in 1997, as well as findings of Samara-based experts in local history to shed light on the writer’s work as editor-in-chief of the Samarskaya Gazeta newspaper in 1895. The researcher introduces hitherto unstudied reminiscences of the journalist D. Linyov (Dalin) about this period, which reference a letter by Gorky, now lost. The paper details a newly discovered episode of Gorky’s professional biography as a journalist: it concerns his campaign against a Samara ‘she-wolf,’ the madam of a local brothel A. Neucheva. Linyov’s reminiscences turn out to be an important and interesting source, offering an insight into the daily grind of the young editor Gorky, providing new evidence of his excellent organizational skills, and describing his moral and social stance. The author presents his work in the context of a recently initiated broader discussion about the need to map out all Russian periodicals for the period until 1917, as well as all research devoted to individual publications.


1998 ◽  
Vol 112 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 104-126
Author(s):  
Frank Van Der Ploeg

AbstractThis article examines the relationship between the Brussels painter Jan 11 van Coninxloo (ca. 1489-1561 or later) and the Benedictine convent of Groot-Bijgaarden. In earlier publications by J. Maquet-Tombu the link between certain members of the Van Coninxloo family and the Vorst convent have already been pointed out. A new chapter can now be added. In the archive of Groot-Bijgaarden convent are two books in which payments made by the prioresses Françoise and Catherine van Straten for the dccoration of the convent and the church are recorded. The books list a separate item for painting and polychrome work. Here, for the first time, the name Jan van Coninxloo crops up in connection with a sum paid for painting the side panels of the main altar. Van Coninxloo was also paid for painting organ doors, a vaulted ceiling and for 'rough painting'. Four triptychs by Van Coninxloo have also been preserved; they were commissions from women of noble birth who had taken the veil. The names of three of these nuns are known: Anthonine de Locquenghien, Berbel van dcr Noot and Marie Brant. The fourth was called Barbara (Berbel). In view of all this material it may be concluded that Van Coninxloo played a significant part in the decorative appearance of the convent church. He was responsible for triptychs on altars dedicated to St. Anne, St. John and St. Benedict. He also painted the smaller triptych with the Seven Sorrows of the Virgin, the panels of the high altar, doors for an organ and (part of) the ceiling decorations. The article offers a new insight into the context of a group of paintings and adds a number of works to Jan 11 van Coninxloo's oeuvre.


This is the first occasion on which I have had the great honour of addressing the Royal Society on this anniversary of its foundation. According to custom, I begin with brief mention of those whom death has taken from our Fellowship during the past year, and whose memories we honour. Alfred Young (1873-1940), distinguished for his contributions to pure mathematics, was half brother to another of our Fellows, Sydney Young, a chemist of eminence. Alfred Young had an insight into the symbolic structure and manipulation of algebra, which gave him a special place among his mathematical contemporaries. After a successful career at Cambridge he entered the Church, and passed his later years in the country rectory of Birdbrook, Essex. His devotion to mathematics continued, however, throughout his life, and he published a steady stream of work in the branch of algebra which he had invented, and named ‘quantitative substitutional analysis’. He lived to see his methods adopted by Weyl in his quantum mechanics and spectroscopy. He was elected to our Fellowship in 1934. With the death of Miles Walker (1868-1941) the Society loses a pioneer in large-scale electrical engineering. Walker was a man of wide interests. He was trained first for the law, and even followed its practice for a period. Later he studied electrical engineering under Sylvanus Thompson at the Finsbury Technical College and became his assistant for several years. Thereafter, encouraged by Thompson, he entered St John’s College, Cambridge, with a scholarship, and graduated with 1st Class Honours in both the Natural Sciences and the Engineering Tripos. Having entered the service of the British Westinghouse Company, he was sent by them to the United States of America to study electrical engineering with the parent company in Pittsburgh. On his return to England he became their leading designer of high-speed electrical generators


Author(s):  
Sigrún Dögg Eddudóttir ◽  
Eva Svensson ◽  
Stefan Nilsson ◽  
Anneli Ekblom ◽  
Karl-Johan Lindholm ◽  
...  

AbstractShielings are the historically known form of transhumance in Scandinavia, where livestock were moved from the farmstead to sites in the outlands for summer grazing. Pollen analysis has provided a valuable insight into the history of shielings. This paper presents a vegetation reconstruction and archaeological survey from the shieling Kårebolssätern in northern Värmland, western Sweden, a renovated shieling that is still operating today. The first evidence of human activities in the area near Kårebolssätern are Hordeum- and Cannabis-type pollen grains occurring from ca. 100 bc. Further signs of human impact are charcoal and sporadic occurrences of apophyte pollen from ca. ad 250 and pollen indicating opening of the canopy ca. ad 570, probably a result of modification of the forest for grazing. A decrease in land use is seen between ad 1000 and 1250, possibly in response to a shift in emphasis towards large scale commodity production in the outlands. Emphasis on bloomery iron production and pitfall hunting may have caused a shift from agrarian shieling activity. The clearest changes in the pollen assemblage indicating grazing and cultivation occur from the mid-thirteenth century, coinciding with wetter climate at the beginning of the Little Ice Age. The earliest occurrences of anthropochores in the record predate those of other shieling sites in Sweden. The pollen analysis reveals evidence of land use that predates the results of the archaeological survey. The study highlights how pollen analysis can reveal vegetation changes where early archaeological remains are obscure.


2021 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-141
Author(s):  
Helene Fisher ◽  
Elizabeth Lane Miller ◽  
Christof Sauer

Abstract Emerging understanding of gender-specific religious persecution in some of the world’s most difficult countries for Christians offers timely insight into complex dynamics in which the church and missions have too often been unwittingly complicit due to limited visibility of the components contributing to these wounds. Fresh research into these deeply wounding global phenomena stands as both a warning and a pointer towards an avenue for effective ministrations by churches and Christian ministries that are working in the most severely affected areas of the world. Drawing on the latest trends identified by World Watch Research, outcomes of the Consultation for Christian Women under Pressure for their Faith, a contemporary case study from Central African Republic, and a biblical narrative, we will explore practical opportunities for a holistic approach to bring preparedness, healing, and restoration for communities under severe pressure for their Christian faith.


2013 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 48-72
Author(s):  
Ahmad Eldridge Cleaver

This study analyzes what the Qur’an ascribes to the Sunnah of Muhammad and highlights the existence of indicators within the Qur’anic text as to the Sunnah’s significance, role, and legal authority. Insight into its place and role is researched according to the Qur’an, and answers are sought as to its significance in Islamic law and thought. The answers presented are the ones found in the Qur’anic discourse circulating around Muhammad. The analysis, which examines thirty-five Qur’anic verses that mention Muhammad, is organized according to several themes, among them obedience to God and to Muhammad and the latter’s judicial role.


2016 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 397-421
Author(s):  
Matko Matija Marušić

The paper discusses a group of monumental crucifixes from the 13th-century East Adriatic and Italy, pained or executed in low relief, that display a verse inscriptions on the transverse limb of the cross. The main scope of the paper is to examine the provenance of the text inscribed in order to yield clearer insight into their function, use and original location in the church interiors. The paper specifically aims at analyzing three monumental crucifixes from the East-Adriatic city of Zadar which, although have already been the subject of a respectable number of studies, have not attracted attention as objects of devotion. My interest, therefore, is turned towards verse inscription as their distinctive feature and, as I shall argue, a key aspect in understanding their function. Examining the nature of the text displayed, iconography and materiality of these crucifixes, my main argument is to demonstrate how these objects provoked a multi-faced response from their audience, since were experienced by seeing, hearing and touching respectively.


Zograf ◽  
2012 ◽  
pp. 65-74
Author(s):  
Angeliki Katsioti ◽  
Nikolaos Mastrochristos

The complex of the churches of Saint Constantine and Saint Mamas is located at Missochori, close to the capital of the island of Nissyros, Greece. The first church preserves wall-paintings dated to the end of the twelfth century, shared donation of two monasteries/churches. The paintings are partly repainted, probably in 1318/1319. Both the murals and the two inscriptions of the church provide new evidence concerning mediaeval Nissyros.


2017 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 174-196
Author(s):  
Sjoerd-Jeroen Moenandar ◽  
Krina Huisman

In this article the authors analyse a collection of essays written by young Dutch people who grew up in the Reformed Liberated Church, a small Christian denomination in the Netherlands. Traditionally, this church is characterised by its inwards nature: members strive to live their lives within the confinements that the church and its institutions stipulate. This has changed over the last few decades and the essays attest to the effects these changes have had on individual lives. We discuss the underlying narrative structure of their accounts and how the authors negotiate different lifestyles and interpretations of the Christian faith on either side of the borders that demarcate the Reformed Liberated tradition. We discuss if – and how – the essays work towards an outcome of ‘discordant concordance’ (Ricœur) where narrative identities remain whole, despite relatively drastic border crossings in the course of the lives that formed them. We address how these stories give insight into how people use the stories they tell to define what needs to be remembered and forgotten when we cross borders. Finally, we discuss the relevance of these essays and our analysis of them for our understanding of today’s globalised and multicultural societies in which many are in a permanent state of transition. This article was submitted to the European Journal of Life Writing on February 17th and published on August 28th 2017.


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