Description
Book SynopsisSpace, Place, and Motion: Locating Confraternities in the Late Medieval and Early Modern City offers the first sustained comparative examination of the relationship between confraternal life and the spaces of the late medieval and early modern city. By considering cities large (Rome) and small (Aalst) in regions as disparate as Ireland and Mexico, the essays collected here seek to uncover the commonalities and differences in confraternal practice as they played out on the urban stage. From the candlelit oratory to the bustling piazza, from the hospital ward to the festal table, from the processional route to the execution grounds, late medieval and early modern cities, this interdisciplinary book contends, were made up of fluid and contested ‘confraternal spaces.’ Contributors are: Kira Maye Albinsky, Meryl Bailey, Cormac Begadon, Caroline Blondeau-Morizot, Danielle Carrabino, Andrew Chen, Ellen Decraene, Laura Dierksmeier, Ellen Alexandra Dooley, Douglas N. Dow, Anu Mänd, Rebekah Perry, Pamela A.V. Stewart, Arie van Steensel, and Barbara Wisch.
Trade Review"The protocols surrounding ceremonial – both public and private – have deep roots, reaching back for several centuries. Questions about the seniority of election or admission and the appropriate place of an individual in the formal life of an institution have a long history. Precedence and positions of seniority continue to regulate public events. Such questions are no less topical in corporate bodies, such as governmental, educational and religious institutions. In such an environment place is invested with a particular significance. A consideration of these topics is explored in this excellent collection of studies, ranging from the Middle Ages to the early modern period. Space, place and motion are considered in the context of religious fraternities, guilds and companies... This is a pleasing and fine collection of stimulating papers which will be warmly welcomed by students of urban and religious history." Michael Robson, University of Cambridge, in Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 69.4 (2018).
