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The article constitutes a collection of remarks concerning military aspects of the construction and functioning of the Teutonic castle in Bezławki (Bayselauken, Bäslack) in the last decades of the 14th century. Speculations included in the article refer to opinions expressed by the authors of the collective monograph about the late medieval settlement complex in Bäslack published in 2013. It presents the findings of archeological research in the castle and the village in the years 2008-2012. Remarks presented in the article concern three out of six problems which are considered the most essential. While it goes beyond doubt that the castle played an important defensive role, the hypothesis of it being a “fortified camp” for the army during military actions of the Teutonic Order against the Lithuanians and Ruthenians has been undermined. It is not possible to consider it to play a military role on a significant strategic level, as do the authors of the monograph of 2013. In the second part of the article the author undermines the hypothesis about the “systematic” character of the complex of fortifications situated on the eastern Prussian border. If the castle in Bäslack was indeed part of some defensive system, it could operate on the local level and consist of an insignificant number of elements including longitudinal fortifications constituting the so called “Landwehr”. The next issue addressed by the author was a problem of the typology of the term “wildhaus”. As in the 14th century the term connoted the location of the fortification on the border of the forest, the author shows a far-reaching morphological diversity of fortifications on the eastern outskirts of the Prussian state, which were or could be classified as “wildhauses”. Thus, a “wildhaus” cannot be classified as a morphological type of a fortification. The typology of fortifications based on the morphological criteria cannot be connected with the typology based on the administrative and terminological criteria. Archeological examination of the Bäslack fortification evinces its major cognitive potential and makes us aware of how little is known about the functioning of minor fortifications in late medieval Prussia. Further research in this field belongs to one of the most important elements of historical science in the Prussian regional dimension and related branches of science.
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The edition presents the sources concerning the borders between the Duchy of Słupsk and the Monastic State of the Teutonic Order in Prussia of the 14th and 15th century. The basis for the edition are records included in the boundary book – the so called Grenzbuch B with the entry number OF 270a preserved in XX. Hauptabteilung in the Secret State Archive in Berlin-Dahlem. Among the published sources, texts no. 3, 6, 7 were edited by Reinhold Cramer, but they fail to include the dates (no. 6, 7) and the explanations of topographic names appearing in them. The remaining texts were not published (no. 1–2, 4–5, 8–12). The first group of sources (no. 1–4) was written in the period from the second half of the 14th century to the beginning of the 15th century. The second group of descriptions (no. 507) resulted from the circuit [Polish: ujazd] around the boundary by the Gdańsk commander Albrecht, earl von Schwarzburg of the end of 1405. They were included in the introductory Pomeranian-Teutonic border agreement of 14 October 1407, next in the sealed agreement of 23 September 1408. The creation of the third group of descriptions (8–9) should be associated with Teutonic preparations to the arbitration agreement in front of the Roman and Hungarian king Sigismund of Luxembourg, and with the activity of the sub-arbiter Benedict Makrai in the years 1412–1413. The last group of descriptions (no. 10–12) was created in the situation of the conflict concerning the establishment of the border between the Człuchów commandry and the Szczecinek land in the vicinity of Dołgie Lake in 1417. None of the published sources presents the whole Pomeranian-Teutonic border from the estuary of the river Łeba to the Baltic Sea in the north to Lędyczek in the south, but its individual fragments. Description no. 1 includes the description of the border between the Człuchów commandry / the Tuchola commandry and the Kingdom of Poland. In source no. 2 there is a list of arbitrators from the Pomeranian party and the Teutonic party negotiating the border between the villages of Oskowo and Siemirowice / Unieszyno. The information about informer and arbitrators may be found in source no. 3 (both the Pomeranian and Teutonic parties) and no. 4 (the Teutonic party). Each of the published descriptions is characterized by precision and plethora of topographic names. They should be used for the analysis of the problem of shaping and functioning of the border between the Duchy of Słupsk and the Monastic State of the Teutonic Order in Prussia in the context of the political and economic situation on the Pomeranian-Teutonic borderland in the Late Middle Ages.
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The authors analyze, what is in the personal opinion, two of the most important sources for the study of the character of the medieval Bosnian state, the first international treaty for the study of medieval Bosnian history, The Charter of Ban Kulin to Dubrovnik from 1189. and the Charter of the Bosnian King Tvrtko I to the Republic of Dubrovnik from 1378.A comparative method will give an overview of the contents of the Charter of Ban Kulin to Dubrovnik from 1189. and the content of the Charter of the Bosnian Ban TvrtkoI to the Republic of Dubrovnik from 1378, which is the first charter with a royal title.The development of the medieval Bosnian state and law during the time of Kulin’s rule will be monitored, followed by an overview of the most important institutes mentioned in the Charter of King Tvrtko I, which are important for the state-law development of the medieval Bosnian state. Using the histroriographic literature, the authors will strive for an objective analysis of charters, the legal system, political institutions and international circumstances, and make a scientific contribution tothe study of the medieval Bosnian state without national ideological implications.
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This paper emphasizes the specific qualities of Lastovo as a bioregional community which found their legal regulation in the provisions of the Lastovo Statute. The inhabitants of Lastovo knew very well how to interpret, recognise and preserve thelocal customs, culture and tradition of their island. The Lastovo Statute stipulates a number of communal-police and ecological rules which were at the very frontline of technical and sanitary achievements of the time. The rules recognized and protected local ecosystems, their specific cultural fabric, bioregional economy and its cultural production, which gave a strong impulse to the development of economic freedoms and common rights. Among other similar documents, the Lastovo Statute by virtue of its wording and spirit testifies to the exceptionally high ideo protean potential of the Mediterranean cultural area.
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The paper tried to fit the Trogir revolts at the beginning of the 14th century (1310. – 1328.) into a broader European, and particularly Italian context. The paper showed that Venice and the Bribirski noble kindred crucially influenced the dynamic political situation in Trogir, which escalated into an open conflict between the feuding Trogir parties because of the opposed Venetian and Bribir interests. The paper gives an overview of the Trogir conflicts and of the later conciliation brought up by the Venetian authorities.
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During the Mongolian invasion of 1241—1242, parts of the territory of present-day Republic of Serbia have suffered its consequences in different ways. The worst situation was in the region north of the Sava and Danube rivers (Banat, Bačka and Srem), which were part of medieval Hungary at the time. These regions were stricken by Mongols already in the spring of 1241. As for the central parts of Serbia, the Mongolian army passed through it while returning back from the Adriatic coast. The details of Mongol actions and manoeuvres are not well known from the written sources. This lack of information is possible to reconstruct partially through archaeological indicators from the regions which were affected by the invasion. The most reliable evidence comes from coin hoards and combustion and destruction layers, as well as other evidence showing that life has completely stopped in some settlements. Apart from the settlements, churches were also researched, and it was confirmed that they were abandoned, as well as burying practice in the surrounding graveyards. The aim of this research is to present an overview of available archaeological information about both the devastations and their consequences of the Mongol invasion. This can be seen in some changes in material culture, evidence of depopulation of certain regions, or colonisation of new population within provisions brought by Hungarian king in order to start the renewal of the country.
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Book review: Владимиров Г. 2019. Обеци с форма на въпросителен знак от средновековна България (XIII—XIV в.). За материални следи от куманите и Златната Орда в културата на Второто Българско царство. 2 изд. — София: «Уникарт» ЕООД. — 86 с.
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The purpose of the article is to show the nature of the interaction to Mоzаrt and Bеrтhоvеn style tradition in the piano play of their ambiguous joint presence and interactions in inheritance cultural-artistic life lengths to the past century. The methodology of the work is the culturology approach in science about art, presented including the school of B. Asafiev in Ukraine, begin which are fixed French Ars nova begin XIV century and are turned in riverbed theatrical mimеsis of J.-J. Rousseau. The base place occupies the method of the genre-style benchmark analysis, hermeneutic, historian-descriptive methods, allowing within fix the semantic parallels of the formation of the humanitarian sphere and expressiveness of art. The scientific novelty of the work is concluded in that for the first time in science about culture to Ukraine are brought forth of the style contradiction of pianism in inheritance piano ways Mozart style type and Beethoven style type as paradigm sign of piano cultures to contemporaneity. Conclusions. Appeared and acts "hеtеrоphony" principle in general cultural position of piano play: Beethoven and Mozart forming of style paradigm to the piano culture, there is a phenomenon of universal planetary importance. Its disjunctive principle that is unbalanced qualitative correlation artistic entering of Beethoven character and broadly covering out-art horizon of Mozart character play has determined uniquely, noted national "waviness" world-outlook in Ukraine, which gives birth ambiguous, but productive and exciting intersection specified typology, which have a sincere central to the further development of the music thinking. The disjunctive approach to the study of the stylistic paradigm of one or another century brings to the cultural perspective the knowledge of epochal styles, which are unknowable in their entirety in the art of science since it is not the artistic sphere that constitutes the source and the impetus for their existence. Moreover, even the styles, which are the expression of creative differentiation of thinking, do not always feed in their origins specifically in the creative sphere - this is the reason for the long neglect in the second half of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries such artistic and, at the same time, all-culturally encompassing phenomena such as the Rococo, the Biedermeier, and the center of modernity on the eve of the twentieth century - symbolism.
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Review of: Klaus Unterburger - Franz Machilek: Jan Hus (um 1372–1415). Prediger, Theologe, Reformator. (Katholisches Leben und Kirchenreform im Zeitalter der Glaubensspaltung, Bd. 78/79.) Aschendorff Verlag. Münster 2019. 271 S. ISBN 978-3-402-11099-7. (€ 29,90.)
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The text entitled as above analyses essential distinctions of Ibn ‘Arabi’s epistemology with a particular emphasis on its mystic consideration. The essence of his epistemology was put forward in accordance with the rules of metaphysical preference for the sources of cognition and cognitive process that a spiritual traveler has to go through on his way towards the Truth. Ibn ‘Arabi bases his theory of cognition first of all on those sources of cognition that elude the epistemological field at a historical level, but he does not neglect the latest sources of cognition either, from whose perspective derived is that ascending cognitive evolution of human genius that tries to observe the whole Truth in the perspective of the historical level too. This means that Ibn ‘Arabi, when perceiving the Truth, exposes himself equally to metacosmic Grace and cosmo-historical Wisdom. After defining the essential sources of Ibn ‘ Arabi’s epistemology, the author classified the basic patterns of cognition that the spiritual traveler (Sâlik) reaches in an ascending-cognitive order, starting from the knowledge taken from the world (al- ‘Ilm), via theosophical wisdom which is specifıcally Sophia divina or Sophia perennis (al-Hikma al-Lâduniyyâ), finding peace in the pure wisdom of the Divine Spirit, which is (the wisdom) fundamental glory, living gnosis of the Divine Essence (al-Ma ‘rifa). With each new spiritual phase, the spiritual traveler (Sâlik) acquires a new profile of his spiritual feature that is identical to the internal nature of the acquired cognitive form.
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The lords of Lučenec probably founded the castle sometime at the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries. It belonged to their descendants until the end of the 15th century, when the Ongor family became the new owners. After 1512, the Balassa family became the new owners. Throughout the middle ages, Divín remained a small aristocratic castle called mantle type with simple fortification. Its significant expansion and improvement of the fortifications was associated only with Sigismund and John Balassa, when due to the Ottoman danger, the population of the Novohrad region had to participate in the modernization of Divín, according to the adopted laws. Despite this effort, the castle fell into the hands of the Ottomans in the years 1575–1593 and became the northernmost occupied castle in Hungary. After the conquest of the castle by Habsburg troops, Divín returned to the hands of the Balassa family, who in the 17th century took care of the expansion of the living space and planned further improvements of the fortifications.
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The subject of the article is the relationship between contemplation and creation seen through the lens of Thomistic philosophy. For our research, we used not just the original works of Thomas Aquinas, but also the works of Thomistic philosophers, primarily of J. Pieper, but also of classic contemporary Thomistic philosophers – É. Gilson and J. Maritain. Alongside these authors, we also used the works and ideas of Plato and Aristotle who represent the very peak of Greek thought and invaluable inspiration for Aquinas himself. This paper has three chapters: the first focuses on contemplation, and the second focuses on creation bringing it into comparison with creation understood as an act proper of God. The third chapter focuses on the relationship between contemplation and creation. Between these two activities, there is a double connection: on the one hand, creation has its inception in the contemplative act of the creator, and on the other, it also has its outcome in the contemplative act of the one encountering the work of creation.
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The glazed ceramics manufacturing in Crimea in the last third of the 13th and 14th centuries is one of the handicraft industries to reflect most clearly the complex of ethno-political and demographic processes of those times. Even the coming of this technology to the Crimea was largely due to the different new immigrants who traditionally used it. Therefore, the Crimean glazed pottery had Anatolian, Iranian-Caucasian, Central Asian, Byzantine-Balkan, and East Mediterranean features, which appeared variably in the local ceramic wares at the beginning of activity of the workshops. So the goal of the study is to analyze the complexes of innovations that were introduced and to specify their possible origin and the ways of ingression. Particular attention is paid to options that could be directly related to potters migrations. The results of physicochemical studies of ceramics are employed in addition to ethnoarchaeological, formal-typological, and comparative methods of analysis. This approach allows us to confidently distinguish between local products and imports sometimes very similar visually.
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The paper is a voice in the discussion on the founders of the Dominican monastic complex in Sandomierz. As a consequence of dating its 13th-century construction phases, the hypothesis popular in literature on the subject has been refuted, namely the claim that the alleged founder of the monastery Bishop Iwo Odrowąż brought a construction workshop responsible for raising the walls and executing a rich ceramic decoration. The involvement in the founding of the first stage of works has been attributed to Duchess Adelaide, daughter of Casimir the Just, buried in the Church of St James ‘in medio ecclesiae’, and venerated by the Sandomierz Dominicans as the ‘fundatrix istius conventus’. Furthermore, attention has been drawn to the fact that the date of the Duchess’s death provided in her tomb inscription has been to-date erroneously identified as 1211, while it should be read as 1240. It has also been suggested that the construction stage connected with the ceramic decoration of the nave body and the Monastery’s eastern wing should be associated with Bishop Prandota, while the raising of the belfry with Duke Leszek the Black.
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The charter of King Stephen Dabiša to the Semković brothers issued on 17 May 1395 is kept today at the British Library in London. The paper presents data not used so far in our historiography, which help better understand the destiny of Dabiša’s charter and the way it came to the institution where it is held today.
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The paper provides a detailed overview of the real estate owned by the Mençe family in the burgus of Dubrovnik during the 13th and the first half of the 14th century. In this period, this very branched noble family played a very important role in the social, economic, and political life of the city, as well as the formation of the burgus. The author genealogically follows the estates of all those for whom we have data on real estate in the preserved documents. The expansion of the family shows that marriage strategy was crucial, namely marrying wealthy girls, who brought significant valuable assets in dowry and even real estate in the late 13th century. Another relevant factor for strengthening the family was the number of male descendants, and in case of widowhood, noblemen sought to remarry to a young girl from a family of affiliate interests. These were regularly families that were in some kind of relations – economic, neighbourly, clan, or all three. One can only speculate that the division of land in the burgus, outside the old city walls, had (among other things) to do with the political affiliation of those who largely stayed in Pustijerna and later, with the expansion of the city to the north, moved to a new zone near Pile. During the researched period, the spatially and functionally different suburbs of Dubrovnik – both new and old – were reshaped and unified to form a new city centre. This long and complex process was accompanied by the construction of city walls (in different phases) and changing the old lines of communications in relation to the key points of the city. The transformation of the suburban area into an urban one included, in addition to creating new streets, the division of large blocks into plots for building houses, which resulted in a change in the relationship between the centre and the periphery, as well as the residential mobility of the population. Some of the old noble families, including the Mençe, took advantage of these changes and spread from the old town area to the former suburban gardens. The new estates had multiple functions – they were used for housing, for rent, or to store merchandize they traded in. These functions were subject to change over time and followed the process of urbanization, i.e. the conversion of the burgus into a construction area and an increase in population. The city became the economic centre towards which a wider area gravitated, and not only within the territory of Dubrovnik. Looking at the estates of an elite family and the social topography of the suburbs, as well as the distribution of the estates such an elite family owned, allows us to understand family ties, political orientations, economic activities, marriage strategies, and the way in which the building area in Dubrovnik was structured and used in the period when the city experienced one of the most extensive urban transformations in its history.
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The Dominican and Augustinian missionary orders penetrating into the Safavid lands, got special privileges from the Safavid kings and managed to build churches and monasteries here. These priests played an important role in translating the Bible and compiling dictionaries. Bartholomew of Podio and John of Florence who came to Azerbaijan in the 14th century, learned Turkish and Persian while in Italy. Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, who visited Nakhchivan in 1650, describes in his travelogue that Latinization had so thoroughly penetrated this remote corner of Christianity that the Eastern Community of the Safavid Empire chanted the Dominican songs in Latin and offered the Latin Mass. Relacao Verdadeira (True Connection), a valuable source on the activities of the Augustinians in the territory of the Safavid Empire of Azerbaijan describes the visit of Shah Abbas I to the Church of St.Augustine in December 1608 together with the courtiers: “The beautifully decorated floor is covered with carpets and various aromatic substances (incenses) are burnt in church. The church is equipped with organs and other musical instruments. There are various divine paintings depicted on the altar of the Church: Paintings of the Virgin Mary and Jesus Christ – Our Savior. The choir plays local Portuguese music.” The main purpose of this research is to study the role of the Dominican and Augustinian Churches in intercultural and interreligious relations. On the other hand, the presence of Catholics among the Muslim population changed the attitude of Shah Abbas I to the churches. The Shia clerics complained about missionaries that the Augustinians sent about 5,000-7,000 people to Hormuz to become Catholic. The Englishman Thomas Herbert visited the Safavid lands in 1627. His travelogue describes the churches and the espionage activities of the clergy. It is important to note that there were also priests who converted to Islam among Augustinians. One of the purposes of our study is to shed light on the causes of the conflict between Catholic missionaries and the Safavid population based on the sources of the period.
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Not many primary sources document the lives of ordinary Teutonic Knights who were not among the highest officials of the Order. Therefore, the preserved mentions from the town of Burgdorf, modern-day Switzerland, prove to be of great importance. These refer to two Teutonic Knights, Konrad and Rudolf von Kyburg, who returned to their homeland during the summer of 1383. It is all the more interesting due to the fact that the older of the two – Konrad – was referred to in a document of 1375 as an ordinary Teutonic Knight staying in Balga. His younger brother is also likely to have served in the Teutonic Order in Prussia. The reason for their journey home was the Burgdorf War, which was started in November of 1382 by their nephew Rudolf II von Kyburg, who made an unsuccessful attempt at capturing the town of Solothurn. It resulted in a conflict with Bern, which was the most powerful city in that region. The return of Konrad and Rudolf to their homeland would not have been possible without the approval of their superiors, including the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order. The scarce primary sources that were preserved indicate that the two Teutonic Knights tried to alleviate the conflict by diplomatic means, however, without success. They were given a certain amount of time before they were obliged to return to Prussia. The issue of financing the journey is really interesting. Even though the presence of the two Teutonic Knights was certainly beneficial for the von Kyburg family, it is highly unlikely that the relatives covered their travel expenses, as the family had been impoverished long before the war even began, and it needed to allocate all the available resources for the defense of the ancestral castle. Thus, the Teutonic Order was forced, against its thirteenth-century rules, not only to approve but also finance the purely private journey of its two longtime members to their homeland.
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