The Incorruptible Flesh
Bodily Mutation and Mortification in Religion and Folklore

Professor Camporesi examines what significance the body had for the obsessively religious, superstitious, yet materially bound minds of the pre-industrial age?

Piero Camporesi (Author), Tania Croft-Murray (Translated by)

9780521108829, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 12 February 2009

300 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.7 cm, 0.44 kg

What significance did the body have for the obsessively religious, superstitious, yet materially bound minds of the pre-industrial age? The human body was a constant prey to disease, plague, unhealthy living conditions, the evil effects of druggery and nutritional deficiency, yet the saints seemed to testify to the existence of life beyond this, to a tangible Garden of Eden where all suffering was reversed. The right to entry to this haven was also seen in corporeal terms. The practice of abstemiousness, self-inflicted torture, even the courting of humiliation could trigger visions of beatitude, of the longed-for paradise. In this extraordinary and often astounding book, Professor Camporesi traces these experiences back to various documents across the centuries and explores the juxtaposition of medicine and sorcery, cookery and surgery, pharmacy and alchemy. He opens the window on a fascinating and colourful, if at times violent, world: of levitating and gyrating saints, gardens full of candied fruits and crystalline fountains, amazing exorcisms and arcane medical practices.

Foreword
Translators Notes
Part I: 1. The 'prodigious manna'
2. The 'impassible' saint
3. The dust of Death
4. Superhuman and heavenly life
Part II: 5. Decay and rebirth
6. Entomata
7. Hypercatharsis
8. The 'clock of health'. Bertoldo changes diet and dies
Part II: 9. Food for heroes
10. 'Cock's broth'. The cook and the exorcist
11. 'Everlasting perfumers'
12. Forbidden games
Part IV: 13. The 'flesh of God'
14. 'Paradisus voluptatis'
15. Food sanctuaries
16. The 'plagues of Africa'. 'Darkness over Egypt'
Index.

Subject Areas: Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 [HBLH], European history [HBJD]