The Pope's Body. Translated by David S. Peterson

PARAVICINI-BAGLIANI, Agostino

ISBN 10: 0226034372 / ISBN 13: 9780226034379

Published by University of Chicago Press, 2000

About this Item

Robust packaging. Tracking is always added to USA orders. It can be added to other overseas orders on request. Used books are exempt from USA tariffs. No ownership marks. Binding sound, text unmarked. Size: xxii, 396pp, many colour and black and white illus.

Seller Inventory # ZZ4902

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Pope's Body. Translated by David S. Peterson
• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication Date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0226034372
• ISBN 13: 9780226034379
• Binding: Binding sound, text unmarked
• Condition: Near Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Near Fine
• Signed: No ownership marks
• Seller catalogs:
  • Church History: 1500-1800

About this title

Synopsis

In contrast to the role traditionally fulfilled by secular rulers, the pope has been perceived as an individual person existing in a body subject to decay and death, yet at the same time a corporeal representation of Christ and the Church, eternity and salvation. Using an array of evidence from the eleventh through the fifteenth centuries, Agostino Paravicini- Bagliani addresses this paradox. He studies the rituals, metaphors, and images of the pope's body as they developed over time and shows how they resulted in the expectation that the pope's body be simultaneously physical and metaphorical. Also included is a particular emphasis on the thirteenth century when, during the pontificate of Boniface VIII (1294-1303), the papal court became the focus of medicine and the natural sciences as physicians devised ways to protect the pope's health and prolong his life.

Masterfully translated from the Italian, this engaging history of the pope's body provides a new perspective for readers to understand the papacy, both historically and in our own time.

Review

For years now, journalists have engaged in feverish speculation about the health of Pope John Paul II. There is at least as much at stake in his death as in his life, because he is not only himself, he is also the incarnation of the universal church. This paradoxical quality of a pope's life was first widely discussed in the early Middle Ages. By the 13th century, resolving the tension between the pope's actual and metaphorical body--by prolonging his life and preserving his health--was so important that the papal court became Europe's leading laboratory for the natural sciences. This development is the subject of The Pope's Body, a quirky, intelligent book by Agostino Paravicini- Bagliani, a professor of medieval history at the University of Lausanne. Burial customs, medieval optics, and a host of motley subjects are harnessed in service to the book's primary argument: "Once the pope as an institutional figure became ... the incarnation of the universal church as well, the physical aspect of his private person had to be subjected to ever more rigorous ritual and symbolic analysis and control." This is not easy reading: straightforward arguments lie in thickets of allusions to medieval science and theology. Nevertheless, it's worth the work. --Michael Joseph Gross