The Elements in the Medieval World / / edited by Marilina Cesario, Hugh Magennis and Elisa Ramazzina.

• Superior document: Elements, Nature, Environment ; 1
• TeilnehmendeR: Cesario, Marilina,; Magennis, Hugh,; Ramazzina, Elisa,
• Place / Publishing House: Leiden ;, Boston : : Brill,, 2024.; ©2024
• Year of Publication: 2024
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Language: English
• Series: Elements, Nature, Environment ; 1.; Late Antiquity and Medieval Studies E-Books Online, Collection 2024.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (466 pages)

The thirteen essays and the final poem contained in this volume reflect the fundamental importance of water across the whole breadth of medieval endeavour and understanding, as both source of life, and object of scholarly fascination, whose manifestations were the source of rich symbolism and imaginings. Ranging geographically from Ireland to the Arab world and from Iceland to Byzantium and chronologically from the fourth century CE to the sixteenth, the essays explore perceptions and theories of water through a wide range of approaches. Contributors are Michael Bintley, Tom Birkett, Laura Borghetti, Rafał Borysławski, Marilina Cesario, Marusca Francini, Kelly Grovier, Deborah Hayden, Simon Karstens, Andreas Lammer, David Livingstone, Luca Loschiavo, Hugh Magennis, Colin Fitzpatrick Murtha, François Quiviger, Elisa Ramazzina, and Karl Whittington.

Table of Contents

Front cover -- Half Title -- Series Information -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Contents -- Foreword: Water Power -- 1 Water, Weather and Wellbeing -- 2 Hydrotheology -- 3 Aqueous Bi-polarities -- 4 Artistry, Authority, Agency -- Bibliography -- Figures -- Notes on Contributors -- Introduction -- 1 Water in Natural Philosophy -- 2 Images of Seas and Rivers -- 3 Water in Theory and Practice -- 4 Romance, Religion, and Myth -- 5 The Present Volume -- 6 Chapters and Connections -- Bibliography -- Manuscripts -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- Part1: Water in Natural Philosophy and Medicine -- 1 What Goes Up Must Come Down: The Water Cycle in Early Arabic Meteorology -- Introduction -- 1 Rising Water -- 1.1 Reaching the Apex -- 1.2 Cloud Formation -- 2 Falling Water -- 2.1 The Role of Coldness -- 2.2 The Curious Case of Hail -- 3 Flowing Water -- 3.1 Reservoirs Explained -- 3.2 The Role of Mountains -- 4 Deep Water -- 4.1 Natural Explanations -- 4.2 Theological and 'Mixed' Explanations -- 5 Conclusion -- Bibliography -- Manuscripts -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- 2 From the 'King of the Waters' to Curative Manuscripts -- 1 The Christus medicus Metaphor and Saintly Healing in Medieval Irish Literature -- 2 Water and Healing in Medieval Irish Medical Texts -- 3 Conclusion -- Bibliography -- Manuscripts -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- 3 Bathing in Medieval Europe -- 1 Early Medieval Balneology -- 2 An Intermediate Phase in Medieval Balneology -- 3 Late Medieval Balneology -- 4 The Apogee of Balneology -- 5 Readership and Conclusion -- Bibliography -- Manuscripts -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- Part:2 Images of Seas and Rivers -- 4 Opicinus de Canistris's Demonic Seas -- 1 Stable Seas -- 2 Demonic Waters -- 3 Surfacing -- Bibliography -- Manuscripts -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources.

5 From Sign to Embodiment: the River Jordan and the Representation of Water -- 1 Shapes of Water -- 2 River Gods -- 3 Representing Water -- 3.1 Cocoons, Mounds and Ribbons -- 3.2 Thirteenth-Fourteenth Century: Transparencies -- 3.3 Fourteenth-Fifteenth Century: Hair Flow, Water Curls and Aquatic Auras -- 3.4 Water and Style -- 4 Towards a Conclusion: Imagination, Unconscious and Consciousness of Water -- Bibliography -- 6 Imagine Oceans: the Many Meanings -- Introduction: the One that is Many -- 1 Traditions of Knowledge and Knowledge of Practitioners: the Ocean until c. 1500 -- 2 A Sea of Profit and Violence -- 3 A Void to Cross -- 4 A Nautical, Mathematical or Cosmographical Challenge -- 5 Where the Devil Lurks and Spirits Roam -- 6 Oceans between Freedom and Possession -- 7 Imagine Oceans - Conclusion -- Bibliography -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- Part:3 Water in Thought and Practice -- 7 Fluid Dynamics: Aquatic Agency in the Poetic Edda of the -- 1 Extended Minds and Material Engagement -- 2 Codex Regius as Exogram -- 3 Rainfall, Dewfall -- 4 River -- 5 Sea -- 6 Ice -- 7 The Properties of Water in the Codex Regius -- Bibliography -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- 8 The Semantic Field of 'Water' in the Gothic Bible: the Letter -- 1 Religion, Landscape, and Language -- 2 The Letter: the Evidence of the Gothic Manuscripts -- 3 The Spirit: the Gothic Rendering of the Symbolic Water -- 4 Concluding Remarks -- Appendix: the Semantic Field of 'Water' in Gothic -- Bibliography -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- 9 Sweet and Salt Water in Medieval Law -- 1 A Preliminary Distinction -- 2 Roman Law -- 3 Water in the Transformation of the Ancient World -- 4 The Early Middle Ages -- 5 The Age of the Communes and the Renaissance -- 6 The Mediterranean and the Ancient Laws of the Sea.

7 The 'Explosion' of Maritime Trade in the Mediterranean: (a) the Coasts of the Adriatic Sea -- 8 The 'Explosion' of Maritime Trade in the Mediterranean: (b) the Coasts of the Tyrrhenian Sea -- 9 The Nautical Revolution of the Middle Ages and the North-Western Seas -- 10 Concluding Remarks -- Abbreviations for Law Codes -- Bibliography -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- Part:4 Romance, Religion, Myth -- 10 Water, Ubiquity and Multiplicity: Shapes of Water and their Narrative Power in a By -- Introduction -- 1 Water and the Middle-Byzantine Fictional Narrative -- 2 A Methodological Foreword -- 3 Ubiquitous Water within the Narrative Journey -- 4 Harmful and Beneficial Shapes of Water -- 5 Concluding Remarks -- Bibliography -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- 11 Marie de France's Writing on Water -- Introduction -- 1 The Sea, Death, and Love in the Tradition of Medieval Etymologising -- 2 The Aquatic Motifs in the Lais -- 3 Towards a Conclusion: Guigemar and the Etymological Implications of the Sea -- Bibliography -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- 12 Water in Saints' Lives: a Study of the Old English -- 1 The Bible -- 2 Saints' Lives in Old English -- 3 Water Themes -- 3.1 Miracles -- 3.2 Travel -- 3.3 Cleansing, Healing, Abstinence, Self-Mortification -- 4 Saint Mary of Egypt -- 5 Verse Saints' Lives -- 5.1 Guthlac A and Guthlac B -- 5.2 Elene and Juliana -- 5.3 Andreas -- 6 Conclusion -- Bibliography -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- 13 'Where Mighty Rivers Sprayed Poison': -- 1 Creation and the Cosmos -- 2 Water as Enclosure and Conduit -- 3 Water Personified -- 4 Thor as Water Queller -- 5 Conclusions -- Bibliography -- Primary Sources -- Secondary Sources -- Effusion on Affusion -- Index -- Back cover.