Middle Ages Books

Francisco is famous for the ways that he reconsidered doctrine with respect to the world and the way we should live in it and APPRECIATE it. This book describes certain aspects of his new viewpoint, and compares it, as the title says, to nature mysticism, but it actually goes beyond that - and tries to understand in exactly what manner Francis really viewed the natural world. And it does this in a very organized and thoughtful way - and very well.

This book was the first in a series of about eight books I read in a single month on religion and theology. The purpose of my reading such an extensive list in a short amount of time was for me to be drawn closer to God through inspirational reading. St. Mary of Egypt, the main character in the three long poems in the book, is a Saint popular in the East, especially in Eastern Orthodoxy but in Eastern Catholicism as well. She spent most of her life in a state of sin, but finally did great penance to become one of the greatest Saints of Christendom. The story is marvelously amazing since it taught me that no matter how sinful one may feel, God extends mercy to those who seem furthest away from him. The book gets extra props from me since it is a collection of three medieval verses from the West about a Saint little known in the West. Hopefully, one day we in the West will learn to share in the wisdom of the Christian East and the East will share in the theological nature of the West and the Church will breathe, as Pope John Paul II said, with two lungs again East (mystical and contemplative) and West (rational). The book is rather short and makes an entertaining light read. It serves as a good introduction into the Cistercian Studies series which brings the mystical and little known to a popular audience. Good work :)

SALADIN is an excellent biography for ages 11 and older, holding over 150 pages packed with historical and biographical facts and adding to the 'Rules of the Middle Ages' series. From a chronology of events and lively biography background to chapter notes and Internet resources for further stud, SALADIN follows the ruler's influence on Egypt, Syria and the entire region.

This book is great!!! It's full of logical and practical advice for anyone who is feeling overwhelmed by thoughts about having to care for their aging parents and still having a life at the same time. This isn't a book of instructions - the authors actually "talk" to you and share experiences that you can relate to and apply to your own situation. My own mother's aging has been of concern to me lately and I feel much better and far more prepared since I read this book.

I highly recommend it!

Half a world away, are children really all that different? "Santa Claus in Baghdad: And Other Stories about Teens in the Arab World" is a collection of stories that although fictional, express the real thoughts and beliefs of many Arabic Teens in the modern world. Showing the issues that Arabic students face, American readers will learn to empathize with these teens and not be scared of something they don't understand. "Santa Claus in Baghdad" is a unique anthology of stories, highly recommended to young adult readers everywhere.

The Saudi Royal Family was well presented for younger children. Reed wrote this in a way that enables young kids to understand not only the Saudi Royal Family but the religion of Islam. She remains objective throughout but as an American questions whether or not the Sauds are our friends. She raises this question in a way that would allow kids to think it through and come to their own conlcusion. The photos are wonderful and I liked the color, layout and presentation of the book.

If you can find a copy of this book -- reprinted or otherwise -- buy it. It's the grand daddy of fencing histories. It contains a wealth of information covering fencing's long and bloody development from the fifteenth century to the nineteenth (when the book was written). Most fencing reference works quote THE SCHOOLS AND MASTERS OF FENCE liberally. It is one of my favorite books

The modern theory of mechanics, due essentially to Isaac Newton, is usually presented in textbooks as a large seventeenth perturbation that was a totally new outlook on physical motion, as one that was opposed to the Aristotelian conception that dominated before Newton's time. This view is completely refuted in this book, as the author gives a detailed overview of the struggles of the medieval physicists to understand the nature of motion. Clearly their thinking on mechanics influenced greatly the work of Galileo and Descartes, and consequently that of Newton. Even though some of their ideas of the medieval scientists were based on mistaken notions, many of them had just enough truth to allow the correct formulations to be accomplished later. The author gives a fascinating discussion of how medieval mechanics, which was predominantly Aristotelian with "some traces of Archimedean character" was subjected to so many changes that it eventually was undermined, forcing a new outlook.

The author explains that it was the work of the French scientist Pierre Duhem that first took a look at the contributions of the medieval scientists. Duhem's work though, according to the author, was flawed, in that it inputed too many modern viewpoints, such as a theory of inertia, to the medieval schoolmen, especially to the Oxford professor John Buridan via his impetus theory. The author admires greatly though the work of Anneliese Maier, who greatly scrutinized the work of Duhem, and the author draws greatly on her work. The translations of the Greek works due to Islamic scholars clearly allowed the medieval scholars to engage in their thinking on Greek mechanics.

Most interestingly, the mechanics of the inclined plane was, as the author shows, solved correctly in the Middle Ages. He also shows that the concept of virtual velocities had its origins in Aristotle's Mechanics and the Mechanics of Hero, and that this concept was applied in the Middle Ages to obtain mathematical proofs of the law of levers and theorems of the inclined plane, setting the stage he says for the latter work of Bernoulli and Lagrange. The thirteenth century saw the origin of the thinking of velocity as a magnitude.

The author attributes the real advances in kinematics in medieval times to the academicians Thomas Bradwardine, William Heytesbury, Richard Swineshead, and John Dumbleton of Merton College in Oxford, who developed concepts of instantaneous velocity and analyzed various concepts of acceleration. The author attributes these advances partly to philosophical discussion on the "intension and remission of forms", which led these scholars to differentiate between the "quality" of velocity from the "quantity" of velocity. These scholars proved the somewhat long-winded "Merton theorem of uniform acceleration", which gave an equality with respect to space traversed in a given time a uniformly accelerated movement and a uniform movement where the velocity is equal to the velocity at the middle instant of the time of acceleration. The author attributes a restatement of this theorem to Galileo and is fundamental to his theory of freely falling bodies. Galileo used a kind of two-dimensional geometric proof for his law of free fall that was similar to the proof of the Merton theorem by medieval scholars. Thomas Bradwardine also presented a kind of law of force that related velocity to force and resistance. This law, argues the author, related velocity to instantaneous changes, foreshadowing the use of differential equations in modern mechanics.

The impetus theory of John Buridan in the fourteenth century takes on a special status in the book, as he views it to a large extent as the origin of the modern view of inertia. Buridan's description was in terms of the quantity of matter in the projectile, similar to the Newtonian notion of momentum. Interestingly though, Buridan's thinking was abandoned, according to the author. Buridan's thinking though is definitely not Aristotelian, and was a symptom of the end of the latter.

The lesson to be learned from the book is that despite the errors of the medieval scholars, their efforts eventually brought about the correct view of physical motion. Researchers in all areas of science need to keep in mind that although their ideas may be shown to be weak and not compatible with experiment, as shown later, their research restricts what is possible, and insures the same mistakes will not be repeated. The discipline of thought required by the medieval scholars, and that of modern researchers, is certainly something that is to be admired and be grateful for.

Rick Lee gots the mad skillz when it comes to the late medieval theology and philosophy. Yo, I thought I understood William of Ockham before, but after Rick's suave presentation, I know it all! Buy this book, yo!

I had a little problem rating this book. As I layed my eyes upon it, I was realy impressed by the quality and quantity of reproductions. The book is of a pretty large format, and includes over 500 pages, and I have only read small portions of it. This is where the problem with rating begins. The texts I came across were pretty basic and general, but still I think they give a good and conclusive idea about the subject to someone with no or little prior knowledge.

The book deals with Greek art from the archaic period to the Hellenistic, Etruscan and Roman art. The middle ages section starts with a very short introduction of Pre-Romanesque sculpture and procedes through the Romanesque to Gothic and late Gothic sculpture.

I personally think, that when a book has such a variety of very very decent reproductions it's worth having, regardless whether you may approve of it's texts or not. That's why I rated it 5. The sculptures are truly remarkable, and looking at them is a pure joy.

I should mention there's a second part to the book - from Renaissance to Modern, which I don't own, and I don't know if it's selling on amazon, but those of you interested in sculpture might want to look it up.