Walking Corpses: Leprosy in Byzantium and the Medieval West [Hardcover]
Author: Timothy S. Miller | Language: English | ISBN: 0801451353 | Format: PDF, EPUB
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Leprosy has afflicted humans for thousands of years. It wasn't until the twelfth century, however, that the dreaded disease entered the collective psyche of Western society, thanks to a frightening epidemic that ravaged Catholic Europe. The Church responded by constructing charitable institutions called leprosariums to treat the rapidly expanding number of victims. As important as these events were, Timothy Miller and John Nesbitt remind us that the history of leprosy in the West is incomplete without also considering the Byzantine Empire, which confronted leprosy and its effects well before the Latin West. In Walking Corpses, they offer the first account of medieval leprosy that integrates the history of East and West.
In their informative and engaging account, Miller and Nesbitt challenge a number of misperceptions and myths about medieval attitudes toward leprosy (known today as Hansen’s disease). They argue that ethical writings from the Byzantine world and from Catholic Europe never branded leprosy as punishment for sin; rather, theologians and moralists saw the disease as a mark of God’s favor on those chosen for heaven. The stimulus to ban lepers from society and ultimately to persecute them came not from Christian influence but from Germanic customary law. Leprosariums were not prisons to punish lepers but were centers of care to offer them support; some even provided both male and female residents the opportunity to govern their own communities under a form of written constitution. Informed by recent bioarchaeological research that has vastly expanded knowledge of the disease and its treatment by medieval society, Walking Corpses also includes three key Greek texts regarding leprosy (one of which has never been translated into English before).
- Hardcover: 264 pages
- Publisher: Cornell University Press; 1 edition (April 29, 2014)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0801451353
- ISBN-13: 978-0801451355
- Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #939,558 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
This is an important scholarly work on the treatment of lepers in the Middle Ages. It covers everything from theories on the causes of leprosy to the administration of leper colonies. The book is well researched and the theses are well presented, argued and documented.
Given the subject matter, this is not an “easy” read and is intended more for academics than for the general public. At times it is somewhat repetitive (probably due to two authors covering similar topics), and it provides more detail than many readers may find necessary. Yet it also provides very valuable insights into medieval society that would benefit more casual students of the Middle Ages.
For one thing, Miller and Nesbitt effectively debunk the notion that leper colonies were places of punishment or that lepers were consistently and cruelly expelled from society out of moral revulsion. On the contrary, they convincingly argue Christian “spiritual leaders [shaped] a new ethical imperative to accept lepers as suffering brothers in Christ, not to reject them as ritually impure or as objects of divine punishment.” In Byzantium, leprosy even came to be called “the Holy Disease” and a number of legends associated lepers with Christ, while service to lepers was viewed as particularly holy.
Nevertheless, the fear of contagion was — understandably — enormous and so civil and ecclesiastical leaders nevertheless sought to separate lepers from society at large. Leper colonies were thus generally located outside city walls — but close enough for lepers to engage in trade and receive alms and visits from relatives, friends and patrons.
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