Guests, Strangers, Aliens, Enemies
Ambiguities of Hospitality in the Middle Ages, c. 1000-1350
Edited by Wojtek Jezierski Edited by Lars Kjaer
The case studies in this volume show how in many contexts hospitality served as ambiguous means of interplay between lofty ideals and complex social practice and a way of conceptualizing political and cultural conflict.
Many of our oldest and best-loved stories are about killing guests and betraying hosts. Hospitality is celebrated, in medieval texts and in medieval studies, as a way of binding individuals together and strengthening social cohesion, but both the practice and narration of hospitality was shot through with ambiguity and ambivalence. This volume shifts the scholarly gaze from the high table – where kings, queens, and honoured guests are graciously served by skilled servants – to the shadowy corners of the hall, the places where gossip and complaint are exchanged, where outlaws hide under the guise of hospitality, where hostages and troublesome strangers are benched, where the light from the hall-fire reflects on drawn blades: prompting difficult reflections on the processes of extraction and predation that provided the material foundations for the feast. The chapters in Guests, Strangers, Aliens, Enemies range from Silk Road caravanserais in Armenia and crusader relations in the Latin East, through ambassadorial and papal receptions in the Mediterranean, treatment of merchants and the poor in Scandinavia, elite feasts in Latin Europe, to hosting of outlaws and hostages in Eurasia. The authors explore ambiguities of hospitality in the Middle Ages through a wide range of sources and methodological approaches.
- Edited by Wojtek Jezierski
- Edited by Lars Kjaer
Other Titles in this Series
Visions of Medieval History in North America and Europe
Studies on Cultural Identity and Power
Volume 41
King John’s Delegation to the Almohad Court (1212)
Medieval Interreligious Interactions and Modern Historiography
Volume 23
A Renaissance Baron and his Possessions
Paolo Giordano I Orsini, Duke of Bracciano (1541-1585)
Volume 15
Victorine Restoration
Essays on Hugh of St Victor, Richard of St Victor, and Thomas Gallus
Volume 39
Writing History in Medieval Poland
Bishop Vincentius of Cracow and the 'Chronica Polonorum'
Volume 28
From Tyrant to Philosopher-King
A Literary History of Alexander the Great in Medieval and Early Modern England
Volume 19
Order into Action
How Large-Scale Concepts of World-Order determine Practices in the Premodern World
Volume 40
Luigi Pulci in Renaissance Florence and Beyond
New Perspectives on his Poetry and Influence
Volume 29
Dreams, Medicine, and Literary Practice
Exploring the Western Literary Tradition Through Chaucer
Volume 18
Andreas Vesalius and the ‘Fabrica’ in the Age of Printing
Art, Anatomy, and Printing in the Italian Renaissance
Volume 33
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