A vivid new history of how medieval people around the world perceived the moon
When they gazed at the moon, medieval people around the globe saw an object that was at once powerful and fragile, distant and intimate—and sometimes all this at once. The moon could convey love, beauty, and gentleness; but it could also be about pain, hatred, and violence. In its circularity the moon was associated with fullness and fertility. Yet in its crescent and other shifting forms, the moon could seem broken, even wounded.
In this beautifully illustrated history, Ayoush Lazikani reveals the many ways medieval people felt and wrote about the moon. Ranging across the world, from China to South America, Korea to Wales, Lazikani explores how different cultures interacted with the moon. From the idea that the Black Death was caused by a lunar eclipse to the wealth of Persian love poetry inspired by the moon's beauty, this is a truly global account of our closest celestial neighbour.
About the Author
Ayoush Lazikani is a lecturer at the University of Oxford. A specialist in medieval literature, she is the author of Cultivating the Heart and Emotion in Christian and Islamic Contemplative Texts, 1100-1250, and an associate editor for the Palgrave Encyclopedia of Medieval Women's Writing in the Global Middle Ages.
Industry Reviews
"We might not consider the moon a planet anymore, but we still feel the pull of its tender gaze and a sense of kinship with its magic, the many forms of which illuminate Lazikani's book."-Mathew Lyons, Literary Review
"This book tells the extraordinary global story of the imaginative power of the medieval moon, via Sufi poetry and Zodiac men, Old English riddles and Inca statues, Andalusian medicine and Old Norse theology. The Medieval Moon is a beautiful and innovative book, accessibly written, rigorously researched, and touched by the transformative potential of its subject."-Marion Turner, author of The Wife of Bath
"Ayoush Lazikani triumphs again-this time with a deeply thoughtful and lyrically sublime book. This sensitive, dreamscape of a study offers alluring new insights and confirms Lazikani's position at the very forefront of her field."-Liz Herbert McAvoy, author of The Enclosed Garden and the Medieval Religious Imaginary
"The Medieval Moon presents not a moon, but the moons of poets and natural philosophers, astrologers and travellers from areas as far apart from one another as Japan, China, the Abbasid Caliphate, and the kingdoms of Christendom. Lazikani's approach is as cross-cultural as it is interdisciplinary, written in a style that is both entertaining and erudite, filled with wonderful stories from a broad array of traditions."-Scott E. Hendrix, Carroll University
"Ayoush Lazikani's wonderful and beautifully-written book of the moon surveys the nights and enchantments of the middle ages, ranging widely in place, time and culture. Seldom has so much learning, and so much magic, been contained in one elegant and readable volume."-Peter Davidson, author of The Last of the Light
