Isidore of Seville and his Reception in the Early Middle Ages

Transmitting and Transforming Knowledge

Jamie Wood Andy Fear Paul Fouracre Mary Beagon Michael Kelly Claudia Sciacca Christopher Heath Melissa Markauskas Laura Carlson

9789089648280

236 pages

Amsterdam University Press

Hardback $131.00

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Overview

Isidore of Seville (560—636) was a crucial figure in the preservation and sharing of classical and early Christian knowledge. His compilations of the works of earlier authorities formed an essential part of monastic education for centuries. Due to the vast amount of information he gathered and its wide dissemination in the Middle Ages, Pope John Paul II even named Isidore the patron saint of the Internet in 1997. This volume represents a cross section of the various approaches scholars have taken toward Isidore’s writings. The essays explore his sources, how he selected and arranged them for posterity, and how his legacy was reflected in later generations’ work across the early medieval West. Rich in archival detail, this collection provides a wealth of interdisciplinary expertise on one of history’s greatest intellectuals.

Author Bio

Jamie Wood is Professor of History and Education at the University of Lincoln. He has published extensively on Isidore of Seville’s historiography, bishops in Visigothic Hispania, and the social functions of violence. His current project explores political, economic, and religious connections between the Iberian Peninsula and the Byzantine world in late antiquity. Andrew Fear is Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History at the University of Manchester and author of Rome and Baetica (Oxford, 1996), The Lives of the Visigothic Fathers (Liverpool, 1997) and Orosius: Seven Books of History against the Pagans (Liverpool, 2010).