Overview

'It is impossible to over-praise this book. It works on every level: here is scholarship made accessible to the learned and the beginner, to the devout and the profane. It is hard to estimate whether it will be more treasured by those who know little of Christianity or by those who try to live by its teachings.' Sister Wendy Beckett Previously published with illustrations as the Oxford Companion to Christian Art and Architecture and now available for the first time in the Oxford Paperback Reference series, the Dictionary of Christian Art is a unique and fascinating exploration of the art and architecture that has been influenced and inspired by biblical stories and Christian history and beliefs. The Dictionary combines general essays on the periods and styles important in the history of Christian art with lots of shorter entries that describe specific works, artists, themes, and visual images, and which give the reader practical guidance on where in Europe to locate the works described. Included in the Dictionary are: Detailed essays on periods and styles in art and architecture: Early Christian, Byzantine, Carolingian, Ottonian, Romanesque, Anglo-Saxon, Irish, Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque General background to the Old and New Testaments, and to Christian tradition and beliefs: Adam & Eve, Abraham, Moses, the Exodus, the major Old Testament prophets; the Annunciation; Life of Christ, the Passion; the Assumption; the mission of the Apostles; major martyrs and saints; religious Orders and their founders; parables Forms of art influenced by Christianity: church plans, illuminated manuscripts, mosaics, frescoes, tombs, stained glass, sculpture Artists and architects and their works: Duccio, Fra Angelico, Brunelleschi; Masaccio, Donatello, Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, Bernini, Wren, Gibbs, Poussin, El Greco, Chagall, Spencer, Pugin, and many others Places and buildings: Ravenna, Assisi, Rome, Venice, and Sicily; St Peter's, St Paul's, the Sistine Chapel; baptistery, chapter house, centrally planned churches, monastery planning Descriptions and explanations of features of Christian churches, sculpture, and painting: icons, symbols, attributes, the Signs of the Zodiac, labyrinth, bestiaries; liturgical books, vestments, and colours; rose windows, frontals, and altarpieces Significant saints, popes, rulers, and preachers: saints Agnes, Agatha, and Catherine of Siena, Peter, Paul, Jerome, Francis, and Ignatius; Charlemagne and Emperor Constantine the Great; popes Julius II, Leo X, Clement VII; Savonarola, Luther, and Erasmus Glossary of Architectural Terms and detailed Bibliography

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9780198604235

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The late Peter Murray FSA was Professor of the History of Art at Birkbeck College, in the University of London, from 1967 until his retirement in 1980. Linda Murray taught art history in the University of London Extra-Mural Department from 1949 to 1979.

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