Authors: Robert Bartlett
ISBN-13: 9780691126043, ISBN-10: 0691126046
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Date Published: March 2006
Edition: (Non-applicable)
Robert Bartlett is Wardlaw Professor of Medieval History at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland. He is the author of "The Making of Europe: Conquest, Coloniziaton and Cultural Change, 950-1350."
"Superb. Robert Bartlett takes an utterly unnoticed text from the canonization dossier and uses it as a window into the politics, society, culture, and devotional world of the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. I can think of no other book that gets as much of the Middle Ages into so small a compass."--Edward Peters, University of Pennsylvania
"The story of The Hanged Man is so good, so well written and so nicely inflected with wry humor that it makes Medieval history come alive."--William Jordan, Princeton University
It is . . . a complex look at history from the point of view of a particular, diverse set of subjects . . . that has the power to generate considerable interest in the medieval period.
The Hanged Man tells the story of this putative miracle--why it happened, what it meant, and how we know about it. The nine eyewitness accounts live on in the transcripts of de Cantilupe's canonization hearings, and these previously unexamined documents contribute not only to an enthralling mystery, but to an unprecedented glimpse into the day-to-day workings of medieval society.
While unraveling the haunting tale of the hanged man, Robert Bartlett leads us deeply into the world of lords, rebels, churchmen, papal inquisitors, and other individuals living at the time of conflict and conquest in Wales. In the process, he reconstructs voices that others have failed to find. We hear from the lady of the castle where the hanged man was imprisoned, the laborer who watched the execution, the French bishop charged with investigating the case, and scores of other members of the medieval citizenry. Brimming with the intrigue of a detective novel, The Hanged Man will appeal to both scholars of medieval history and general readers alike.