Duelling with the Past English: Medieval Authors and the Problem of the Christian Era (c. 990-1135): 21 (Studies in the Early Middle Ages, 21) - Tapa dura

Verbist, Peter

 
9782503520735: Duelling with the Past English: Medieval Authors and the Problem of the Christian Era (c. 990-1135): 21 (Studies in the Early Middle Ages, 21)

Sinopsis

Verbist (faculty of arts, Leuven Catholic University) combines mathematical and medieval scholarship in this study of the attempts of eight medieval authors from 990-1135 to correct the Christian calendar. From Heriger of Lobbes (d. 1007) to Heimo of Bamberg (d. 1139) these men struggled with inconsistencies in earlier chronologic calculations. These centered on the Jewish lunar calendar, the date for Jesus' crucifixion, and the day the world was created. The eight men not only had to recompute the date from Biblical and symbolic angles, but also fight the overwhelming power of the authority of Church Fathers. In this the book is as much about the men's sense of their own individual ability as it is about the complex manner in which dating was assigned. The fact that we still adhere to a calendar based on uncertain information demonstrates how difficult it is to correct an error that has entered common belief. Distributed in North America by The David Brown Book Co. Annotation ©2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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Reseña del editor

This volume discusses the controversy surrounding the dating of the Christian Era in the Middle Ages and its effect on the 'emergence' of the individual in medieval society. It focuses on eight medieval authors (Heriger of Lobbes, Abbo of Fleury, Marianus Scottus, Gerland the Computist, Hezelo of Cluny, an anonymous author in Limoges, Sigebert of Gembloux, and Heimo of Bamberg), all of whom attempted to correct the date of Christ's incarnation according to the Easter tables of the Scythian monk Dionysius Exiguus (c. 540). As this volume argues, these authors entered into a duel with the past, attempting to reassign the year of Christ's birth and in the process negotiating contradictory authoritative traditions. On a superficial level these scholars appeared to be unsuccessful in their attempts to reconstruct history, as none of their proposed corrections replaced the existing (erroneous) Christian era that had been established in the Latin West. On a practical level, however, this defeat can be counterbalanced by the conclusion that the corrections provided by these authors acted as an important step in the increasing movement of medieval authors towards intellectual autonomy. In Duelling with the Past, Verbist's analysis explores the links between computistical sources and the 'emergence' of the individual in the Middle Ages.

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