Description
Book SynopsisThis book examines the relationship between humans and nature that evolved in medieval Europe over the course of a millennium. From the beginning, people lived in nature and discovered things about it. Ancient societies bequeathed to the Middle Ages both the Bible and a pagan conception of natural history. These conflicting legacies shaped medieval European ideas about the natural order and what economic, moral and biological lessons it might teach. This book analyzes five themes found in medieval views of nature grafting, breeding mules, original sin, property rights and disaster to understand what some medieval people found in nature and what their assumptions and beliefs kept them from seeing.
Trade Review"Recommened." -Choice
"Epstein is a deeply erudite scholar, at home in the main medieval canon of theology, natural philosophy, literature, and law, as well as in obscure but illuminating texts from later medieval Italy, especially Genoa." -Richard C. Hoffmann, Journal of Interdisciplinary History
Table of Contents1. The discovery of nature; 2. Mules; 3. Like produces like; 4. The nature of property; 5. Disaster; Conclusion.
