By Andrea M. Gáldy – At the moment several exhibitions explore the many ways, in which the art and artists of the North influenced the production and style of particular works and collections as well as the direction of patronage. While the Duchy of Burgundy had played a major role in […]
Author: patrick
Roero Piedmont: History, Legends and Ancient Viticulture
By Patrizia Passerini – A land surrounded by woods and hills, composed of vineyards and lush fruit trees, overlooked by beautiful and imposing castles, embellished by ancient churches. It’s Roero, in the heart of the Piedmont wine region, in northern Italy. Roero is situated between Langhe and Monferrato, in the […]
The Lanzi: Bodyguards in Sixteenth-Century Florence
By Andrea Gáldy – In sixteenth-century Florence, Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici succeeded his murdered predecessor Alessandro in 1537 and, even though the murderer was a close relative, knew very well what he needed to do to stay alive and in office. He had inherited a guard staffed by Italians […]
No Pain, No Gain: On Reading Sappho and Beyond
By Malia Maxwell – To read the poet Sappho (Archaic Greek, 7th-6th c. BCE) is to embrace painful incompletion. Little of her work remains, and what we do have left carries with it the stain of absence. While no amount of longing for a “completed†text can fill in her […]
Gehenna: Hell as Metaphor? What and Where was it?
By Patrick Hunt – Gehenna is an old Hebrew toponym (place name) that began as a literal, physical location – the Valley of Hinnom – and gradually transformed into a metaphor for hell through various processes including religious defilement. One of the immediate problems of any hermeneutics about Gehenna is […]
Light, Blood and Monumentality–Caravaggisti up North
By Andrea M. Gáldy - Around the mid 1610s, Hendrick ter Brugghen (1588–1629), Gerard van Honthorst (1592–1656) and Dirck van Baburen (c.1592/93–1624) spent time in Italy, particularly in Rome, where they came face to face with Caravaggio’s work. Similar to what happened to Caravaggisti from other parts of Europe, the […]
Paleopathology and the Destruction of Sennacherib’s Army Besieging Jerusalem in II Chronicles 32, II Kings 19
By Patrick Hunt – Historians know disease often stalks armies in history. [1] The specter of invisible pathogens haunting ancient warfare may have at times seemed instead like a punitive deity taking sides. Sometimes it’s merely a much simpler question of contagion and the inability to protect against it. While […]
Verrocchio: Where Leonardo Obtained His Skills
By Andrea M. Gáldy – The art world likes to regard Leonardo as someone born a genius with pen and brush in his hands and plans for superlative works of art already forming in his brain. Nonetheless, Leonardo like everyone else had to learn his trade. He was apprenticed to a […]
Medieval Stave Churches of Norway
By P. F. Sommerfeldt – In the 10th-11th century when Norway was transitioning from a pagan Viking land to embrace early Christianity, churches were built out of wood in much the same way ships were constructed. I was recently in Norway (June 2019) on a National Geographic Expedition and marveled […]
Otzi the Iceman’s Medicine Kit Included Sloe Berries (Prunus Spinosa)
By Patrick Hunt – Otzi the Iceman from the Alpine Tyrol, found at the Similaun-Tisjoch summit of the Otztal Alps in 1991, is now the most famous mummy of all time, eclipsing the mummy of Ramses II from New Kingdom Egypt (circa 1300 BCE) not only in what science can […]