The Medieval Discovery of Nature

This book examines the relationship between humans and nature that evolved in medieval Europe over the course of a millennium.

Steven A. Epstein (Author)

9781107026452, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 28 September 2012

217 pages, 1 b/w illus.
23.6 x 16 x 1.8 cm, 0.5 kg

"Epstein is a deeply erudite scholar, at home in the main medieval canon of theology, natural philosophy, literature, and law, as well as in obscure but illuminating texts from later medieval Italy, especially Genoa." -Richard C. Hoffmann, Journal of Interdisciplinary History

This book examines the relationship between humans and nature that evolved in medieval Europe over the course of a millennium. From the beginning, people lived in nature and discovered things about it. Ancient societies bequeathed to the Middle Ages both the Bible and a pagan conception of natural history. These conflicting legacies shaped medieval European ideas about the natural order and what economic, moral and biological lessons it might teach. This book analyzes five themes found in medieval views of nature – grafting, breeding mules, original sin, property rights and disaster – to understand what some medieval people found in nature and what their assumptions and beliefs kept them from seeing.

1. The discovery of nature
2. Mules
3. Like produces like
4. The nature of property
5. Disaster
Conclusion.

Subject Areas: History of ideas [JFCX], Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 [HBLH], European history [HBJD], History [HB]