-Index-
Preface
Introduction: The Power of Images. Ideas and functions of artistic representations
José María SALVADOR GONZÁLEZ
Original title: Presentación: El Poder de la Imagen. Ideas y funciones de las representaciones artísticas
Special Issue
Two fragments of marmoreal sculpture in the archeological site of El Pozuelo (Llano de Olmedo, Valladolid)
Víctor Manuel CABAÑERO MARTÍN
Original title: Dos fragmentos de escultura marmórea procedentes del yacimiento de El Pozuelo (Llano de Olmedo, Valladolid)
Keywords: Cauca, Faunus, Marble, Pan, Satyrs, Sculpture.
This paper offers a couple of sculpture fragments, found in El Pozuelo site (Llano de Olmedo, Valladolid). This place offers a wide chronology, supported by the pottery found on it, among all roman sites located into the Cauca city territory (Coca, Segovia, Hispania Citerior).
Greek Fathers of the 4th-5th centuries and the secular education. Their acceptance in Greek thinking while rejecting pagan cults
Eirini ARTEMI
Original title: Greek Fathers of the 4th-5th centuries and the secular education. Their acceptance in Greek thinking while rejecting pagan cults
Keywords: Christian Philosophy, Christian Theology, Pagan cults, Philosophy, Secular Education.
The Fathers were neither implacable enemies of Greek thought nor did they hate the works of the ancient Greek poets and writers. Great Basilius did not hesitate to show ancient people as examples of virtue who were referred to in the works of secular literature. He like others emphasized, however, that not everything within ancient literature is acceptable but that one should only keep what is useful for Christianity! The rest constituted sinister men’s acts and should therefore be avoided. No one must imitate their actions. Cyril of Alexandria did not reject the ancient Greek thought as philosophy but as theology. The motive was obvious. The contrast between Christian theology and Greek philosophy existed only when the latter was presented as theology. It was a feud between a presupposed common area which each claimed for herself. The rejection of the Greek “false worship as totally useless” took place as a theological crisis. When the Fathers condemned the “Greek and avid ... malice” and exercised “control of the Greek fraud” they essentially failed on Greek philosophy, while targeting ancient Greek religiosity. Hence, Greek Fathers honoured Greek thinking, Greek language and used both in their writings but tried to avoid ideas of Greek pagan practice and cult and fought against these with all their powers.
Yungang: a Chinese Buddha to the Romans
André BUENO
Original title: Yungang: um Buda Chinês para os Romanos
Keywords: Ancient China, Buddhism, Buddhist Iconography, Intercultural Dialogue, Roman Empire.
The aim of this paper is to analyze the Akshobhya Buddha statue (in Chinese, Achurulai 阿閦如来), located in the cave 16 in Yungang Complex (Yungang Shiku 雲崗石窟), which is situated in northern China, and is built in 5th century CE. Our proposal is that this statue was sculpted to receive foreigners, especially the Romans, using an in Buddhist iconographic experience that incorporated elements Greco-Roman, Indian and Chinese.
The Choir Books of the monastery of St. Benedict of Cátris: codicological analyses of an Antiphonarium
Antónia Fialho CONDE, Isabel Maria Botelho de Gusmão Dias Sarreira Cid da SILVA
Original title: Os Livros de Coro do mosteiro cisterciense de S. Bento de Cástris: análise codicológica de um Antifonário
Keywords: Ancient bookmaking, Ancient religious libraries, Antiphonarium, Cistercian feminine Monastery.
Study of an Antiphonarium (materials, structure, techniques, pagination, decorated alphabets, biding) trying to identify its main characteristics to be possible to connect it to other books of the same type (Choir Books) belonging to the ancient library of the Cistercian Monastery of S. Bento de Cástris of the city of Évora, Portugal.
Goodness, Justice and Truth. Three Marian virtues in the Cantigas de Santa Maria and in the Book of Santa Maria, by Ramon Llull
Ricardo da COSTA, Bárbara DANTAS
Original title: Bondade, Justiça e Verdade. Três virtudes marianas nas Cantigas de Santa Maria e no Livro de Santa Maria, de Ramon Llull
Keywords: Alfonso X, Cantigas de Santa Maria, Enluminures, Libre de Sancta Maria, Medieval Art, Ramon Llull.
The Cantigas de Santa Maria is a cultural landmark in medieval Spain. This magnific work of the thirteenth century is composed of 420 praises and narratives of miracles of the Virgin Mary and written in galician-portuguese language. Furthermore, have hundreds of miniatures. Sponsored by King Alfonso X (1221-1284), is not great only for its artistic value, but, specially, for its historical value. Each song registry differents aspects of medieval sensibility. Thus, the objective of this study is to make a comparative analysis (textual and imagistic) of three philosophical-theological virtues of the Virgin Mary – Goodness, Truth and Justice – present in the praise 140 of the Cantigas de Santa María and in the Libre de Sancta Maria (c. 1290) from the Catalan philosopher Ramon Llull (1232-1316), to analyze the symbolic structures from marian spirituality, typical religious and artistic manifestation of the thirteenth century in the Medieval West.
The Hispano-Islamisms of Juan Guas. The fabrication of a Historiographical Stereotype
Roberto GONZÁLEZ RAMOS
Original title: The Hispano-Islamisms of Juan Guas. The fabrication of a Historiographical Stereotype
Keywords: Historiographical nationalism, Historiography, Islamic influence, Juan Guas, Late Gothic Architecture.
Formalist currents tinged with nationalism in twentieth century historiography developed the idea of Toledo’s late Gothic architecture being imbued with elements and features from Hispano-Islamic architecture, especially in the case of one of its leading lights, the architect Juan Guas. This gave rise to descriptions of a specific, hispanicized style, which had modified its essentially Northern European characteristics. This essay analyses the gradual construction of the aforementioned historiographical viewpoint, its champions, and their arguments and methodological approach. The process can then be reconstructed, with a view to revisiting it and critically analysing underlying assumptions.
Álvaro de Luna and the political discourses of the Chapel of Saint James
Cinthia ROCHA
Original title: Álvaro de Luna e os discursos políticos da Capela de Santiago
Keywords: 15th century, Crown of Castile, Funerary chapels, Nobility, Álvaro de Luna.
The Chapel of Saint James, built in the Cathedral of Toledo during the fifteenth century to become the burial place of Alvaro de Luna and his lineage, is one of the leading exponents of Spanish Late Gothic. The construction process had two phases: during the life of the Constable, when he took charge of the work, and a few decades after the tragic death of the former Favorite, when the Chapel elements were completed and his body transferred under the responsibility of his daughter, María de Luna y Pimentel, II Duchess of the Infantado. As the building occurred at different moments of a broad process of transformations, the structure also indicates changes in the representations and strategies used by the noblemen within conflicts of intra-nobility nature. The objective of this paper is analyze the Chapel of Saint James, understanding it as a complex form of political action, whose examination may contribute to the comprehension of the transformations that marked the fifteenth century in Castile, as the conflicts that involved the representation of groups and/or individuals were active agents of the changes that engendered the consolidation of high-nobility ideology.
The Beauty and Love in Ibn Sīnā (980-1037)
Ricardo da COSTA, Evandro Santana PEREIRA
Original title: O Belo e o Amor em Ibn Sīnā (980-1037)
Keywords: Aesthetics, Beauty., Ibn Sīnā, Love.
This paper analyses the subjects of Love and Beauty in the Risalah fi’l- ‘ishq (A Treatise on Love) of the philosopher Ibn Sīnā (980-1037).
Byzantine iconography of The Nativity of the Virgin Mary in the light of a homily of St. John Damascene
José María SALVADOR GONZÁLEZ
Original title: Byzantine iconography of The Nativity of the Virgin Mary in the light of a homily of St. John Damascene
Keywords: Byzantine Iconography, Medieval Art, Nativity of the Virgin, St. John of Damascus, Virgin Mary.
As a result of the fact that the New Testament mentions little episodes and provides very few details of the real life of the Virgin Mary, several pious apocryphal legends emerged during the first centuries between the eastern Christian communities, which tried by all means to solve this hermetic silence surrounding the birth, childhood, youth, adulthood and death of the Mother of Jesus. These apocryphal accounts were then assumed and interpreted by numerous Church Fathers, theologians and sacral orators. These reflections of such prestigious thinkers structured a solid corpus of doctrine from which several devotions and Marian liturgical feasts of great importance would arise shortly after. The supernatural birth of Mary, after her miraculous conception in the womb of her elderly and sterile mother Anne, is a primary milestone in her “imaginary” life. As natural fruit of these heterogeneous literary and theological sources, the European medieval art and, in a very special way, the Byzantine one, addressed with remarkable enthusiasm the iconographic theme of The Nativity of the Virgin Mary, especially since the 10th-11th centuries, as one of the most significant episodes in the life of the Theotókos. On this basis, our paper proposes a triple complementary objective. First and foremost, it will highlight the content of the apocryphal sources and some thoughts or patristic exegesis on the subject, with particular emphasis in the homilies of St. John Damascene. Secondly, it will look at some Byzantine paintings on The Nativity of Mary, to determine to what extent the apocryphal accounts and the exegetical or doctrinal reflections on this Marian event are reflected in the characters, situations, attitudes, accessories and scenic items represented in these paintings. Finally, it will suggest some author’s interpretations which seem plausible on the possible symbolic meanings underlying in this relevant, dogmatic core and in its corresponding iconographic theme.
Humanism and medieval narrative in Max Weber´s iron cage: the case of Hayden White
Miguel Ángel SANZ LOROÑO
Original title: Humanismo y narrativas medievales en la jaula de hierro de Max Weber: el caso de Hayden White
Keywords: Cold War, Philosophy of History, Weber, White.
This paper attempts to read the “content of the form” of the medievalist work published by Hayden White in his early academic career. Taking Max Weber as the main guide, White plotted the history of papal schism of 1130 with typical tools of social science: Weberian typology and narrative. Also, White began, from the contradictions and limits of the German sociologist, to develop a personal vision of the humanistic and moral function of historiography. The limits to his humanism that he found in Weber's quasi dystopian narrative of modernization, strongly embodied by the realities of the Cold War, were equally important for this development. Over time, these limitations (from political prohibition to antihumanism) led White from Max Weber to Benedetto Croce. Finally, the neo-Kantian dualism of Weber's epistemology, which dramatically embodied the ontological gap opened up by modernity, had developed by the humanist idealism of the Neapolitan philosopher.
