The End of Time in the Order of Things: Science and Eschatology in Early Medieval Art

8vo (24.5 cm), 288 pp, 184 plates. Publisher's cloth and dust jacket. The end of time preoccupied medieval artists particularly around the portentous dates of 800 and 1000. This detailed and annotated study of early medieval art, especially Carolingian, Ottonian and Anglo-Saxon illuminated manuscripts and carvings, searches for this expectation of the Apocalypse in motifs and symbols. Kuehnel reveals examples of scientific diagrams in Biblical art and identifies other meanings for the cross, circles and squares. The study, which is fully-referenced to the colour and black and white photographs that can be found at the end, also explores the links between early medieval Christianity, mathematics and science.