Overview

The practice and the representation of flaying in the middle ages and after are considered in this provocative collection. Skin is the parchment upon which identity is written; class, race, ethnicity, and gender are all legible upon the human surface. Removing skin tears away identity, and leaves a blank slate upon which law, punishment, sanctity, ormonstrosity can be inscribed; whether as an act of penal brutality, as a comic device, or as a sign of spiritual sacrifice, it leaves a lasting impression about the qualities and nature of humanity. Flaying often functioned as animaginative resource for medieval and early modern artists and writers, even though it seems to have been rarely practiced in reality. From images of Saint Bartholomew holding his skin in his arms, to scenes of execution in Havelok the Dane, to laws that prescribed it as a punishment for treason, this volume explores the idea and the reality of skin removal - flaying - in the Middle Ages. It interrogates the connection between reality and imagination in depictions of literal skin removal, rather than figurative or theoretical interpretations of flaying, and offers a multilayered view of medieval and early modern perceptions of flaying and its representations in Europeanculture. Its two parts consider practice and representation, capturing the evolution of flaying as both an idea and a practice in the premodern world. Larissa Tracy is Associate Professor, Longwood University. Contributors: Frederika Bain, Peter Dent, Kelly DeVries, Valerie Gramling, Perry Neil Harrison, Jack Hartnell, Emily Leverett, Michael Livingston, Sherry C.M. Lindquist, Asa Mittman, Mary Rambaran-Olm, William Sayers, Christine Sciacca, Susan Small, Larissa Tracy, Renée Ward

Full Product Details

Author:   Larissa Tracy (Royalty Account) ,  Asa Mittman (Author) ,  Christine Sciacca (Royalty Account) ,  Emily Leverett (Customer)
Publisher:   Boydell & Brewer Ltd
Imprint:   D.S. Brewer
Dimensions:   Width: 15.60cm , Height: 2.90cm , Length: 23.40cm
Weight:   0.001kg
ISBN:  

9781843844525

ISBN 10:   1843844524
Pages:   424
Publication Date:   17 February 2017
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Out of stock  
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Table of Contents

Introduction: Rending and Reading the Flesh - Larissa Tracy Tools of the Puncture: Skin, Knife, Bone, Hand - Jack Hartnell A Tale of Venetian Skin: The Flaying of Marcoantonio Bragadin - Kelly DeVries Flesh and Death in Early Modern Bedburg - Susan Small Medievalism and the 'Flayed-Dane' Myth: English Perspectives between the Seventeenth and Nineteenth Centuries - Mary R. Rambaran-Olm Skin on Skin: Wearing Flayed Remains - Frederika Bain Robed in Martyrdom: The Flaying of Saint Bartholomew in the Laudario of Sant'Agnese - Asa Simon Mittman Robed in Martyrdom: The Flaying of Saint Bartholomew in the Laudario of Sant'Agnese - Christine Sciacca Masculinist Devotion: Flaying and Flagellation in the Belles Heures - Sherry C.M. Lindquist A Window for the Pain: Surface, Interiority and Christ's Flagellated Skin in Late Medieval Culture - Peter Dent 'Flesche withowtyn hyde': The Removal and Transformation of Jesus' Skin in the English Cycle Passion Plays - Valerie Gramling No Skin in the Game: Flaying and Early Irish Law and Epic - William Sayers Reading the Consumed: Flayed and Cannibalized Bodies in The Siege of Jerusalem and Richard Coer de Lyon - Emily Leverett Losing Face: Flayed Beards and Gendered Power in Arthurian Literature - Michael Livingston Face Off: Flaying and Identity in Medieval Romance - Larissa Tracy Thou shalt have the better cloathe': Reading Second Skins in Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne - Renée Ward Epilogue: Anthropodermic Bibliopegy in the Early Modern Period - Perry Neil Harrison Select Bibliography

Reviews

An engaging and nuanced overview of a topic that has recently gained new critical attention. * MEDIUM AEVUM * A valuable resource for scholars and students seeking to understand the pre-modern practice of flaying, and for those working on histories of the body more broadly construed. * HISTORY * This book will find its way onto the shelves of those interested in pre-modern violence and how it was represented in text and art. * ENGLISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY *

This book will find its way onto the shelves of those interested in pre-modern violence and how it was represented in text and art, but it will probably be mined for specific chapters rather than read as a whole, and ultimately it is a matter of opinion how convincing the individual readings are. ENGLISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY

This book will find its way onto the shelves of those interested in pre-modern violence and how it was represented in text and art. ENGLISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY

Author Information

Larissa Tracy is Professor of Medieval Literature at Longwood University. She has published extensively on medieval violence and its intersections with literature, law, medicine, and social identity. Larissa Tracy is Professor of Medieval Literature at Longwood University. She has published extensively on medieval violence and its intersections with literature, law, medicine, and social identity.

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