Articles

Monasteries were an ever-present feature of the Medieval landscape and perhaps more than half were devoted solely to women. The rules and lifestyle within a nunnery were very similar to those in a male monastery. Nuns took vows of chastity...

The first comprehensive survey of Sri Lankan art organized by an American museum, The Jeweled Isle: Art from Sri Lanka, on show now at the LACMA in Los Angeles, California, presents some 250 works addressing nearly two millennia of Sri Lankan...

The nude figure is a universal visual theme, deeply rooted in the history of art, and it is seemingly ubiquitous in the art of the ancient civilizations of the Near East and Mediterranean. The Antikenmuseum, in Basel, Switzerland, recently...

The Viking Age (c. 790-1100 CE) transformed every aspect of the cultures the Norse came in contact with. The Vikings usually struck without warning and, in the early years, left with their plunder and slaves to be sold as quickly as they...

Life for monks in a medieval monastery, just like in any profession or calling, had its pros and cons. While they were expected to live simply with few possessions, attend services at all hours of the day and night, and perhaps even take...

In Norse belief, the soul of the deceased might wind up in any one of a number of afterlife realms. There was Valhalla, the realm of Odin where the dead warriors drank, fought, and told stories, Folkvangr ('the Field of the People'), the...

For how long do we build a household? For how long do we seal a document? For how long do brothers share the inheritance? For how long is there to be jealousy in the land(?)? The Epic of Gilgamesh, chapter 10, Tablet X. I have always...

The best-known vision of the Norse afterlife is that of Valhalla, the hall of the heroes where warriors chosen by the Valkyries feast with the god Odin, tell stories from their lives, and fight each other in preparation for the final battle...

Christmas was one of the highlights of the medieval calendar, not only for the rich but also for the peasantry. For the longest holiday of the year, typically the full twelve days of Christmas, people stopped work, homes were decorated and...

Sometimes it is the smallest discoveries that have the largest impact. When Alexandra Kleinerman and Alhena Gadotti found a new fragment of the Epic of Gilgamesh in 2015 CE, it did not seem to be particularly impressive. The broken tablet...