The middle ages remain a prize to be fought for and a territory to control. From early modern times rulers and politicians have sought to ground their legitimacy in ancient tradition - which they have often invented or rewritten for their own purposes. This issue of Studies in Medievalism presents a number of such cases, ranging from the rewriting of Mozart, and Merovingian history, for the King of Bavaria, to the anglicization of the medieval Welsh Mabinogion by the wife of an English ironmaster. Other articles consider the involvement of scholarship with national and professional...

The middle ages provide the material for mass-market films, for historical and fantasy fiction, for political propaganda and claims of legitimacy, and these in their turn exert a force well outside academia. The phenomenon is too important to be left unscrutinised: these essays show the continuing power and applicability of medieval images - and also, it must be said, their dangerousness and often their falsity. Of the ten essays in this volume, several examine modern movies, including the highly-successful A Knight's Tale (Chaucer as a PR agent) and the much-derided First Knight (the Round...

Bringing together significant statements on postmodern qualities of the invocation of the medieval, Postmodern Medievalisms is a cross-disciplinary and international collection. The volume also effects a critically celebratory appreciation of the intellectual and political possibilities of the many inchoate modes implicit in various acts of -postmodern- scholarship. The essays treat texts from the late middle ages to the contemporary moment, and together they indicate, broadly, what is happening both in postmodern studies and studies in medievalism. The fourteen essays of the collection are...

The 19th century was a time of fierce national competition for the -ownership- of medieval documents and the legitimation of national histories. This volume contains papers dealing with the attempts of French scholars to claim English documents (and vice versa), as also of disputes between Scandinavian and British scholars, and Dutch, German and Italian scholars. Regionalism is also a repeated topic, with claims made for the autonomy of Frisia within the Netherlands, and Languedoc within France. Other papers deal with the rediscovery of medieval music, with early American attempts to redirect...

Medievalism has been attracting considerable scholarly attention in recent years. But it is also suffering from something of an identity crisis. Where are its chronological and geographical boundaries? How does it relate to the Middle Ages? Does it comprise neomedievalism, pseudomedievalism, and other -medievalisms-? Studies in Medievalism XVII directly addresses these and related questions via a series of specially-commissioned essays from some of the most well-known scholars in the field; they explore its origins, survey the growth of the subject, and attempt various definitions. The volume...

Eleven essays, by scholars from America, Australia and the United Kingdom, investigate reinventions of the middle ages in English culture from the end of sixteenth century to the present day. Topics addressed include medievalism in English popular literature; Sir Walter Scott's Sir Tristrem; Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Chaucer; George Stephens and Old Northern philology; Anglo-Saxonism and the Franco-Prussian War; Dante and the Victorian historical sense; the Grail paintings of G.F. Watts; heterogeneity and the Kelmscott Chaucer; revivals of the Chester Mystery plays; and the cinematic art...

This volume further explores definitions in the field. Essays by seven leading medievalists seek to determine precisely how to characterize the subjects of study, their relationship to new and related fields, and their relevance to the Middle Ages.

The impact of cultural studies on contemporary medieval studies is investigated in this latest volume of Studies in Medievalism, which also offers an account of the developing interest of contemporary cultural theorists in the medieval period. Rather than dismissing the connection between medieval studies and cultural criticism as an expression of academic self-interest, the essays identify specific questions which engage both, such as race, history, women, religion, and literature. Topics include the use of Augustine by postcolonial theorists; the influence of studies in medieval mysticism...

An engagement with the huge growth in neomedievalism forms the core of this volume, with other essays testing its conclusions.

How have the middle ages been constructed in modern European culture? How have these constructions both reflected and refashioned national and political ideology? What has characterised the interplay between literary and artistic medievalism and the rise of formal medieval studies in the academy? This international collection addresses medievalism in Germany, France, Scandinavia, and postcolonial South America. Contributors: RICHARD J. UTZ, ALBRECHT CLASSEN, OTFRID EHRISMANN, NILS HOLGER PETERSEN, ROBERT E. BJORK, MARTHA L. MACFARLANE, ADAM KNOBLER, WILLIAM CHESTER JORDAN, SUZY BEEMER,...