Keeping Record: The Materiality of Rulership and Administration in Early China and Medieval Europe (Materiale Textkulturen, 43)

Keeping Record: The Materiality of Rulership and Administration in Early China and Medieval Europe (Materiale Textkulturen, 43)
by: Abigail S. Armstrong (Editor),Matthias J. Kuhn (Editor),Jörg Peltzer (Editor),Chun Fung Tong (Editor)&1more
Publisher: De Gruyter
Publication Date: 2024/6/4
Language: English
Print Length: 312 pages
ISBN-10: 3111323625
ISBN-13: 9783111323626
Book Description
This volume is an attempt to redress this balance by taking a more holistic, material approach to a range of written records. Through a series of case studies, this volume explores questions regarding the material characteristics of various records and their use. It demonstrates that the material features of the records, including the size and shape, the hands that wrote them and the material substrate, can shed new light on the functioning of government and the declarations of power these records asserted. The ten contributions of this volume focus on records from a variety of rulers, political systems and administrations. With four case studies from early China and six from medieval Europe, this volume offers transcultural perspectives to demonstrate how different cultures expressed rulership and administration materially through the use of text-bearing artefacts.
About the Author
This volume is an attempt to redress this balance by taking a more holistic, material approach to a range of written records. Through a series of case studies, this volume explores questions regarding the material characteristics of various records and their use. It demonstrates that the material features of the records, including the size and shape, the hands that wrote them and the material substrate, can shed new light on the functioning of government and the declarations of power these records asserted. The ten contributions of this volume focus on records from a variety of rulers, political systems and administrations. With four case studies from early China and six from medieval Europe, this volume offers transcultural perspectives to demonstrate how different cultures expressed rulership and administration materially through the use of text-bearing artefacts. Read more