The Shrine of St. Peter and its Twelve Spiral Columns

1952 ◽  
Vol 42 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 21-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. B. Ward Perkins

Among the individual objects of antiquity that have been seen and copied by the artists of later generations, few have had a stranger history than the columns that once formed a screen in old St. Peter's, around the site of the tomb of the apostle. Their singular and distinctive form was in itself enough to attract attention; and the fact that, since the later Middle Ages, they were universally believed to have come from the Temple of Solomon, secured them an important place in the art and iconography of the Renaissance. Their character and early history, however, have never been adequately discussed; and now that the publication of a part of the results of the excavations undertaken since 1940 underneath St. Peter's has cleared up several important points that were previously obscure, the time seems to be ripe for such a discussion. It is the purpose of this article to try to determine their place in the history of classical art, and to say something of their significance in the history of the art of later times.

Author(s):  
Elisabeth van Houts

This book contains an analysis of the experience of married life by men and women in Christian medieval Europe c. 900–1300. The focus will be on the social and emotional life of the married couple rather than on the institutional history of marriage. The book consists of three parts: the first part (Getting Married) is devoted to the process of getting married and wedding celebrations, the second part (Married Life) discusses the married life of lay couples and clergy, their sexuality, and any remarriage, while the third part (Alternative Living) explores concubinage and polygyny as well as the single life in contrast to monogamous sexual unions. Four main themes are central to the book. First, the tension between patriarchal family strategies and the individual family member’s freedom of choice to marry and, if so, to what partner; second, the role played by the married priesthood in their quest to have individual agency and self-determination accepted in their own lives in the face of the growing imposition of clerical celibacy; third, the role played by women in helping society accept some degree of gender equality and self-determination to marry and in shaping the norms for married life incorporating these principles; fourth, the role played by emotion in the establishment of marriage and in married life at a time when sexual and spiritual love feature prominently in medieval literature.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Senad Mrahorović

The very first verse revealed to the Prophet of Islam ﷺ, namely ﴾ Read in the name of your Lord ﴿ implied the concept of knowledge that corresponds with the intellectual attestation of the first article of Islamic faith, that is, the belief in the unity of God, which for its part requires a specific kind of knowledge related to the Divine. With the same token, the Revelation continued to provide the Prophet ﷺ with the intellectual and spiritual insights that he ﷺ perfectly transformed into the nucleus based on which the first Islamic state known as the Madīnian polity was firmly established. Hence, in this paper, the analysis will cover the intellectual dimensions of the Madīnian polity portrayed here in three essential aspects: the revelation as the principal source of knowledge, the affirmation as the intellectual and practical application of knowledge, and the manifestation as the individual and communal reflection of knowledge. I will argue that the said aspects as they were displayed in the Madīnian polity are the core factors that underpin the Islamic governance as such.


2021 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 352-365
Author(s):  
Evgeny I. Zelenev ◽  
Milana Iliushina

This article is devoted to the study of the development of the theory and practice of jihad during the rule of the Circassian sultans in Egypt and Syria (1382–1517). The purpose of the study is to trace the development of key aspects of jihad, to identify features of its perception in the Mamluk state. An essential feature of the theory of jihad in the Mamluk period is the interpretation of jihad as farḍ al-ʿayn (the individual duty of every Muslim). While studying the theory of jihad, the authors rely on a holistic and balanced approach justified in the papers of M. Bonner and D. Cook and their interpretation of the concept of jihad, which has a centuries-old history of development and a sophisticated, multi-layered set of meanings. Another methodological basis of the present paper was the concept of minimalism and maximalism, developed by Yusef Waghid. The source base for the study of jihad theory is the works of Ibn al-Nahhas (d. 1411), a prominent philosopher of the Mamluk era. The interpretation of jihad as an individual duty of every Muslim, substantiated by Ibn al-Nahhas, was the foundation of the volunteer movement that developed in Egypt and Syria in the 15th century. The doctrine of jihad where the concepts of justice (al-‘adl) and truth (al-ḥaqq) play a key role, was used by the Mamluks and then by the Ottomans as a powerful ideological tool to manipulate the minds of Muslims. The relevance of the study is that the findings are not only true for the Middle Ages but are directly related to the present.


1981 ◽  
Vol 76 ◽  
pp. 323-328
Author(s):  
Carlos Arturo Picón

A fruitful combination of excavation, fieldwork, and research has in recent years increased our knowledge of the Temple of Apollo Epikourios at Bassai. In particular, the sculptured frieze which encircled the interior of the cella has been the subject of numerous studies, the most recent being the monograph by C. Hofkes-Brukker and A. Mallwitz published in 1975. The investigations made at Bassai by N. Yalouris and F. A. Cooper have produced important new evidence. As a result of the excavations conducted by Yalouris since 1959, the early history of the sanctuary and of the structures preceding the classical (‘Iktinian’) temple are reasonably clear. Furthermore, Cooper has shown that the ‘Iktinian’ building, the fourth in a series of temples to Apollo on the site, was not designed to receive pedimental sculpture, and that some, if not all, of this temple's akroteria were floral. The traditional attributions of pedimental and akroterial statues must be discarded, along with the theory that the ‘Iktinian’ building was started as early as the middle of the fifth century B.C.Yet, despite this progress, and the fact that the temple is one of the best-preserved monuments from antiquity, many issues remain controversial. Scholars postulate several building phases for the Classical temple. The chronology of the sculptures is still debated, as is the order of the twenty-three frieze-slabs within the cella.


Author(s):  
Thomas Bauman

This chapter focuses on the “Little Pekin,” a theater opened by Robert T. Motts in Chicago in 1904. Chicago's black population around 1900 could not be called segregated in the modern sense of the term. It first provides an overview of the Black Belt, a neighborhood predominated by blacks, before discussing the role of social divisions among Chicago's black populace in the early history of Motts's theatrical venture. It then discusses the Pekin Theater, which Motts called “Temple of Music,” and its three elements that were to remain fundamental to its character: music, family, and vaudeville. It also considers the Pekin's strategy for racial uplift as part of Motts's commitment to his positive philosophy of economic activism. Finally, the chapter describes the entertainment that various performers offered at the Pekin on a nightly basis during its first seventeen months of operations, including bands playing ragtime as well as musical acts, comedians, dancers, acrobats, and other novelties.


Discourse ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (6) ◽  
pp. 28-41
Author(s):  
L. A. Pafomova

Introduction. Evolution of views on the value of scientific knowledge in various directions of Western philosophy, from the ancient period to the 20th century is analyzed in the article. The relevance of the article is due to the fact that the view of scientific knowledge as the value of scientific reality is a fairly new phenomenon.Methodology and sources. The methodological basis of the work is the cultural and philosophical analysis of various points of view in the works of both ancient philosophers, philosophers of the Renaissance and the New times (Plato, Aristotle, Pythagoras, F. Aquinas, Leonard da Vinci, F. Bacon, Locke, Hobbes, Descartes, Spinoza), as well as in the works of O. Comte, Spencer, Mach, Poincare, Pierce, James, Dewey, Jaspers, B. Russell, etc. (i.e. representatives of positivism, existentialism, neo-Thomism).Results and discussion. Today two directions could be distinguished in the relation to science: either its absolutization, that we name scientism, or the cult of an abstract person opposed to science – anthropologism. This is a consequence of the changes in the views on scientific knowledge that have taken place throughout the history of science. Thus, in the ancient period, the value of science was determined, firstly, not in relation to the practical activity of a human being, but only in relation to science to knowledge and cognition, and secondly, as a way of self-development of the individual. In the Middle Ages, science was the “handmaid” of theology. In the Renaissance science faced new challenges: the first was an anti-religious understanding of the essence of a person, the second was the justification of the role of scientific knowledge both for practice and for the worldview as a whole. It was on this understanding of the meaning of scientific knowledge that the concepts of the philosophers of the XVII–XVIII centuries were built, and they dominated until the middle of the XIX century. From this period, a one-sided approach begins to dominate – the ideological role of the value of science was denied and only its pragmatic value is taken. Along with this, there is also a critical attitude towards science, which then develops into anti-scientism. Today, a pessimistic approach (postmodernism, for example) the approach to the consideration of the value of scientific knowledge is characteristic of modern philosophical trends that deny not only the value of scientific knowledge, but also deny knowledge itself.Conclusion. The evaluation of scientific knowledge in Western philosophy has undergone significant changes. If in classical philosophy, with a few exceptions, the recognition of the comprehensive value of science prevailed, i.e. its ideological, humanistic and practical value, then in the future all these three main aspects of the value of scientific knowledge are analyzed. In the extreme forms, this leads to the emergence of antiscientism, for which it is the development of scientific knowledge is perceived as a source of human misery and suffering.


Asian Studies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 141-166
Author(s):  
Tina Berdajs

The paper presents preliminary research into the original scope of the Skušek Collection, based on four lists and an old museum inventory entry of the collection of Asian art collected by Ivan Skušek Jr. during his six-year stay in China between 1914 and 1920. Furthermore, it presents the cross-referencing of the mentioned documents with the first inventory record when it was formally taken over by the National Museum of Slovenia in an attempt to recreate the original scope of the collection. Through analysis and comparison of these records and with support of photographic sources this research attempts to put objects of the Skušeks’ original collection into four different groups based on provenance research. Through several case studies it gives new insights into the dynamics of the largely unknown parts of history of the collection, and the paths some of the individual objects travelled over several decades in the first half of the 20th century.


2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 204-227
Author(s):  
Chiara Martinelli

Abstract This essay aims at giving an account of some pedagogical and syntactical aspects of Francesco da buti’s (1324–1406) Regule grammaticales, a Latin grammar written in Central Italy in the second half of the 14th century. It occupies an important place in the history of positive grammar, providing an excellent example of Latin teaching in late medieval Italy. In fact, da Buti treatise deals not only with grammar, but also with rhetoric and Ars dictaminis, as was customary in the Italian tradition in the final centuries of the Middle Ages. This article analyzes the sections devoted to nouns and verbs, while also pointing out some pedagogical features, such as the exercises of the thèmata and the use of the vernacular as a tool for learning Latin composition.


2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 140
Author(s):  
Halil Kayikci

Phrases such as inner-man, inner-self, inner-vision and inner-hearing occupy an important place in the philosophy of Saint Augustine (AD 354-430). Inner-man phrases are dominant to the Augustin ’ s explanations relating to knowledge. Besides function as a means to explain thoughts of Augustine relating to knowledge, these phrases also function as a means to connect his explanations relating to knowledge to other areas of Augustine ’ s philosophy. Before Augustine tazhere was internality also. For example in Jewishness it was thought as conscience which speaks to the individual from his inside. Saint Paul used it as the intelligent part of the soul, but Paul was influenced by Plato. But the person who uses inner-man phrases systematically and who develops an epistemology directed to subject ’ s understanding himself and who in this way starts the tradition of internality of the West is Saint Augustine.


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