The English Vernacular Afterlife of Benvenutus Grassus, Ophthalmologist1

1999 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 149-163 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurence M. Eldredge

AbstractThis paper traces the history in print of a treatise on ophthalmology by Benvenutus Grassus, De probatissima arte oculorum, originally written in Latin in the late thirteenth century and translated into English in the fifteenth century. It presents evidence of the appearance in print of the English translation as a section of Philip Barrough's The Method of Phisicke in 1583, a book that went through ten subsequent reprintings, the last appearing in 1652. Other evidence is presented on the influence of Benvenutus' treatise in ophthalmological works published in the earlier half of the seventeenth century, and both greater and lesser traces are shown to exist. The last appearance of the treatise is in an auctioneer's catalogue of 1713, where apparently the book failed to find a buyer.

X ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xeni Simou

Old Navarino fortification (Palaiokastro) is located on the promontory supervising the naturally endowed Navarino-bay at the south-western foot of Peloponnese peninsula, near the contemporary city of Pylos. The cliff where it is built and where ancient relics lie, was fortified by Frankish in the thirteenth century. The fortification though knows significant alterations firstly by Serenissima Republic of Venice from the fifteenth century that aims to dominate the naval routes of Eastern Mediterranean by establishing a system of coastal fortifications and later by the Ottomans after the conquest of Venice’s possessions at Messenia in 1500. Between fifteenth and seventeenth century, apart from important modifications at the initial enceinte of the northern Upper City, the most notable transformation of Old Navarino is the construction of the new Lower fortification area at the south and the southern outwork ending up to the coastline. Especially the Lower fortification is a sample of multiple and large-scale successive alterations for the adjustment to technological advances of artillery (fortification walls reinforcement, modification of tower-bastions, early casemates, gate complex enforcements). The current essay focuses on the study of these specific elements of the early artillery period and the examination of Old Navarino’s strategic role at the time of transition before the adaptation of “bastion-front” fortification patterns, such as those experimented in the design of the fortified city of New Navarino, constructed at the opposite side of the Navarino gulf by the Ottomans (1573).


Author(s):  
Antonio Urquízar-Herrera

Chapter 3 approaches the notion of trophy through historical accounts of the Christianization of the Córdoba and Seville Islamic temples in the thirteenth-century and the late-fifteenth-century conquest of Granada. The first two examples on Córdoba and Seville are relevant to explore the way in which medieval chronicles (mainly Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada and his entourage) turned the narrative of the Christianization of mosques into one of the central topics of the restoration myth. The sixteenth-century narratives about the taking of the Alhambra in Granada explain the continuity of this triumphal reading within the humanist model of chorography and urban eulogy (Lucius Marineus Siculus, Luis de Mármol Carvajal, and Francisco Bermúdez de Pedraza).


Author(s):  
Steven N. Dworkin

This short anthology contains extracts from three Castilian prose texts, one from the second half of the thirteenth century (General estoria IV of Alfonso X the Wise), one from the first half of the fourteenth century (El conde Lucanor of don Juan Manuel), and one from near the mid-point of the fifteenth century (Atalaya de las corónicas of Alfonso Martínez de Toledo, Arcipreste de Talavera). These passages illustrate in context many of the phonological, orthographic, morphological, syntactic, and lexical features of medieval Hispano-Romance described in the body of this book. A linguistic commentary discussing relevant forms and constructions, as well as the meaning of lexical items no longer used or employed with different meanings in modern Spanish, with cross references to the appropriate sections in the five main chapters, accompanies each selection.


2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (4-5) ◽  
pp. 363-382
Author(s):  
Mária Pakucs-Willcocks

Abstract This paper analyzes data from customs accounts in Transylvania from the middle of the sixteenth century to the end of the seventeenth on traffic in textiles and textile products from the Ottoman Empire. Cotton was known and commercialized in Transylvania from the fifteenth century; serial data will show that traffic in Ottoman cotton and silk textiles as well as in textile objects such as carpets grew considerably during the second half of the seventeenth century. Customs registers from that period also indicate that Poland and Hungary were destinations for Ottoman imports, but Transylvania was a consumer’s market for cotton textiles.


Author(s):  
Sherry D. Fowler

Painted and printed sets of Thirty-three Kannon transported from China in the fifteenth century inspired the shift to Thirty-three Kannon worship. This new theme in Japan is exemplified by the celebrated set from 1412 attributed to Minchō. Another area of transition between the Six and Thirty-three Kannon cults is in the fact that the main temple icons of the major Thirty-three Kannon pilgrimage routes all feature one of the Six Kannon rather than any of the thirty-three images described in the Lotus sūtra or those imported from China. Within the context of pilgrimage, one surprising area of transition between the cults is found in the imagery cast into large bronze bells used at Buddhist temples. Finally, beginning in the seventeenth century, boundaries of the distribution of multiple Kannon imagery were pushed even further as publications of the printed iconographic manual Butsuzō zui, which clearly organized illustrations of groups of Seven and Thirty-three Kannon, rapidly proliferated throughout Japan and then abroad, giving Kannon worldwide exposure.


Author(s):  
Sherry D. Fowler

Two wooden sculpture sets of Six Kannon, the thirteenth-century set from Daihōonji in Kyoto attributed to the artist Higō Jōkei and the fourteenth-century set from Tōmyōji in the Minami Yamashiro district of Kyoto, are well-documented sets that show the history, modifications, and movement of the cult. Copious inscriptions inside images in the respective sets reveal diverse sponsorship, from an elite female patron in the former to a huge group of patrons from a variety of backgrounds in the latter. Extant thirteenth- to fifteenth-century written records on ritual procedures, such as Roku Kannon gōgyōki, which focused on Six Kannon, contribute to the knowledge of how the rituals related to Six Kannon were performed as well as how the Six Kannon functioned in response to different needs, such as assisting with the six paths, protecting the dharma, or bolstering sectarian heritage, throughout their changing circumstances and movement over time.


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