The ubiquity of references to dogs in medieval and early modern texts and images must at some level reflect their actual presence in those worlds, yet scholarly consideration of this material is rare and scattered across diverse sources. This volume addresses that gap, bringing together fifteen essays that examine the appearance, meaning, and significance of dogs in painting, sculpture, manuscripts, literature, and legal records of the period, reaching beyond Europe to include cultural material from medieval Japan and Islam. While primarily art historical in focus, the authors approach the subject from a range of disciplines and with varying methodology that ultimately reveals as much about dogs as about the societies in which they lived.
Contributors are Kathleen Ashley, Jane Carroll, Emily Cockayne, John Block Friedman, Karen M. Gerhart, Laura D. Gelfand, Craig A. Gibson, Walter S. Gibson, Nathan Hofer, Jane C. Long, Judith W. Mann, Sophie Oosterwijk, Elizabeth Carson Pastan, Donna L. Sadler, Alexa Sand, and Janet Snyder.
Laura D. Gelfand, Ph.D. (1994), Case Western Reserve University, is Professor of Art History at Utah State University. She has published widely on Northern Renaissance art and architecture and co-edits the series Art and Material Culture in Medieval and Renaissance Europe (Brill).
"Indeed, there is much to admire in this volume, including the passionate position the authors appear to take in relation to their subject matter." Pia F. Cuneo, University of Arizona, in Renaissance Quarterly 71, no. 1 (Spring 2018): 259-261.
Contents
Note to the Reader ix
Acknowledgments x
List of Figures xii
List of Contributors xviii
Abstracts xxv
Introduction: Our Dogs, Our Selves 1
Laura D. Gelfand
Part 1
Literal and Literary Dogs
1 In Praise of Dogs: An Encomium Theme from Classical Greece to
Renaissance Italy 19
Craig A. Gibson
2 Who Did Let the Dogs Out?—Nuisance Dogs in Late-Medieval and
Early Modern England 41
Emily Cockayne
3 Wolf Cubs, the Butchers, and the Beaune Town Council 68
Kathleen Ashley
4 Dogs in Medieval Egyptian Sufiji Literature 78
Nathan Hofer
Part 2
Signs, Symbols and Dogs
5 Fables, Bestiaries, and the Bayeux Embroidery: Man’s Best Friend
Meets the “Animal Turn” 97
Elizabeth Carson Pastan
6 Federico Barocci’s Faithful Fidos: A Study in the Efffijicacy of Counter-
Reformation Imagery 127
Judith W. Mann
Part 3
Love and Dogs
7 And Your Little Dog, Too: Michal’s Lapdog and the Romance of the
Old Testament 165
Alexa Sand
8 The Commedia of Joachim and Anna at the Scrovegni Chapel 187
Jane C. Long
9 Die Jagd nach der Treue, or When Desire Met Devotion 218
Jane Carroll
Part 4
Death and Dogs
10 From Biblical Beast to Faithful Friend: A Short Note on the
Iconography of Footrests on Tomb Monuments 243
Sophie Oosterwijk
11 The Canine Domain: At the Feet of Royal Tomb Efffijigies in
Saint-Denis 261
Donna L. Sadler
12 Eternal Devotion: The Stone Canine Companions of Gothic Castile y
León 279
Janet Snyder
Part 5
Good Dogs and Bad Dogs
13 Medieval Scavengers: Dogs in Japanese Handscrolls 303
Karen M. Gerhart
14 Dogs in the Identity Formation and Moral Teaching Offfered in Some
Fifteenth-Century Flemish Manuscript Miniatures 325
John Block Friedman
15 Metaphorical Dogs in the Later Middle Ages: The Dogs of God and the
Hounds of Hell 363
Walter S. Gibson
Bibliography 387
Index 418
All interested in the historical significance of dogs in medieval and early modern art, literature, and society, and the history of human/dog relationships from the 12th-17th centuries.