Pictorial space in relationship to beliefs and cognitive structures : the Ixion room, the Bardi chapel, the Nymphéas

Ma recherche consiste à examiner l'espace pictural de trois œuvres provenant de trois périodes distinctes de l'histoire de l'art afin de démontrer que l'art participe, d'une part, d'un modèle culturel spécifique et, d'autre part, de données perceptivo-spatiales universellement partagées qui relient entre eux des individus soumis à des expériences historiquement très distinctes. Le corpus se compose de la salle dédiée à Ixion datant de la fin de l'empire romain, vers le premier siècle après Jésus-Christ; des fresques de Giotto exécutées pour la chapelle Bardi au début du XIVe siècle, donc à la fin du Moyen-Âge et au début de la Renaissance; et des Nymphéas de Monet, œuvre commencée à la fin du XIXe et terminée au début du XXe siècle. La méthodologie utilisée dans la présente thèse pourrait être qualifiée d'analyse multiple niveau des éléments suivants de la perception : 1) les catégories de croyances de premier ordre, ou croyances primaires, qui sont sous-jacentes à toutes les autres croyances et jouent un rôle important dans la production de toutes les œuvres d'art. Les croyances primaires comprennent les croyances physiologiques et perceptuelles, et la sous-catégorie des croyances multi-sensorielles; 2) les catégories de croyances de second ordre ou croyances conceptuelles; les croyances philosophiques, spirituelles et religieuses, les croyances scientifiques (relativement au système optique), les croyances mathématiques et les croyances médicales (relativement au corps humain) sont des croyances conceptuelles. Les croyances conceptuelles peuvent englober un domaine de la connaissance, ce qui est le cas pour les cinq croyances qui servent ici d'arrière-plan à l'analyse des trois œuvres d'art choisies. J'avance que la production et la réception des œuvres d'art, et dans ce cas particulier de l'espace pictural, supposent non seulement un rapport multi-sensoriel, mais qu'elles sont également liées à l'acquisition de croyances qui influent sur la formation et la réception des représentations de l'espace pictural qui s'opèrent conjointement avec la navigation du corps humain dans l'espace du réel. Les représentations étudiées ici ont été intentionnellement choisies parce qu'elles étreignent de façon manifeste la structure architecturale qui les soutient, et à cause de leur intégration dans cette structure de soutien aux fins d'étendre la dimension spatiale et les processus par lesquels nous nous situons dans cette dimension. La présente thèse vise à démontrer que perception et conception sont, dans un sens, le miroir l'une de l'autre, un miroir qui existe chez l'artiste et chez le spectateur. C'est la base même de leur cohérence, ou commensurabilité, et le moyen par lequel la signification que nous pouvons attribuer à une œuvre donnée réussit à nous convaincre de son autorité. J'ai cherché à démontrer que la représentation de l'espace pictural n'est pas une simple affaire de conventions, ni une histoire quelconque de progrès, et certainement pas une question de style. Elle repose en fait sur les croyances, ces fragiles mais tenaces éléments qui s'associent à l'occasion à ce que nous considérons comme un savoir convaincant. L'artiste et le spectateur fusionnent sur l'axe de la croyance, et un acte de persuasion devient un acte d'interprétation.\ud ______________________________________________________________________________ \ud MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : histoire de l'art, peinture, espace pictural, perception, conception, croyances

Local Landscapes of Pastoral Nomads in Southeastern Turkey

The important historical role of pastoral nomads in Mesopotamia stands in stark contrast to the dearth of archaeological data on pastoral nomadic groups of any pre-modern period. Archaeological models neglect not just a significant segment of past populations; they also lack data on a substantial portion of the past food and textile production systems. Historical records and excavation have demonstrated that the resilience of Mesopotamian economy depended in part on pastoralism, but archaeologists know very little about the long-term management of the pastoral landscapes beyond core agricultural areas. This study examines empirical evidence for pastoral nomadic modes of inhabiting and transforming the landscape over the last 500 years in the upland fringes of the Upper Tigris River Valley in southeastern Turkey. Four seasons of archaeological survey mapped diachronic patterns in pastoral nomadic winter land-use, including patterns of campsites and spatially associated landscape features such as cisterns, corrals, caves, cairns, and check dams. Ethnographic and historical data as well as satellite imagery aided in archaeological interpretation. Three main conclusions about pastoral nomads are drawn from the characteristics and spatial distributions of the surveyed features. 1) Pastoral nomads altered their local landscapes for the purposes of sheltering humans and animals, collecting water, and improving pastures. Areas surrounding campsites contained abundant evidence of landscape management and capital investments in the herding potential of the area. 2) These investments were fixed, re-usable, and encouraged seasonal re-inhabitation of certain areas. Over time, these features became “landscape anchors”—geographic foci that structured the spatial organization of local landscapes. 3) The topographical position of domestic and herding features would have resulted in vertical daily movement patterns for humans and animals. These results force a reassessment of widely-held assumptions about the invisibility of campsites and the role of pastoral nomads in the transformation of Near Eastern landscapes. Although limited in time and space, this study presents grounds for optimism for a robust landscape archaeology of pastoral nomads. Intensive surveys, targeted excavations, and radiometric dating programs have enormous potential to provide more complex diachronic understandings of pastoral nomadic land-use strategies, sustainability, quotidian movement, and senses of place.Anthropolog

Learned Physicians and Everyday Medical Practice in the Renaissance

Michael Stolberg offers the first comprehensive presentation of medical training and day-to-day medical practice during the Renaissance. Drawing on previously unknown manuscript sources, he describes the prevailing notions of illness in the era, diagnostic and therapeutic procedures, the doctor–patient relationship, and home and lay medicine

Social crises and religious change in pre-medieval Japan.

This thesis explores the dynamic interaction of social crises and early Japanese religion from the end of the Jomon period to the rise of Kamakura New Buddhism. It does this believing that no history of religion can be fully understood in isolation from the effects of social crises, and that existing studies have not thoroughly examined this mutual interaction. Both natural and social scientists have demonstrated that complex systems are abundant in most social phenomena. The methodology adopted in my research draws on this insight. In order to explore the autocatalytic growth of Japanese religion in the wake of social crises, I apply such new perspectives as the complexity paradigm, the natural lifecycle model, the impact of climate, and the psychological theory of altered states of consciousness (ASCs). In exploring these relationships, this thesis identifies four forms of religious system in the evolution of early Japanese religion. What I have called prototypical Japanese religion prepared the ground for the emergence of archaic religion in the Late Yayoi Archaic religion continued to develop in the form of a politico-religious system, as the so-called keyhole tomb system, but from the end of the Kofun period another new religious system, monastic religion, began to emerge. Monastic religion became the most dominant mode of Japanese religion from the Nara period until it was superseded by a new religious system, which I call confraternal religion, from the late Heian period. The natural lifecycle of each religious system led to the development of the subsequent one. Finally, this thesis presents a conceptual model called passage of consciousness. This suggests that nonequilibrium states of consciousness (NSCs), which are involuntary induced by social crises, created fluid states of consciousness and led not only to the evolution of religion, but also to the evolution of human thought

Learned Physicians and Everyday Medical Practice in the Renaissance

Michael Stolberg offers the first comprehensive presentation of medical training and day-to-day medical practice during the Renaissance. Drawing on previously unknown manuscript sources, he describes the prevailing notions of illness in the era, diagnostic and therapeutic procedures, the doctor–patient relationship, and home and lay medicine

Spatial Periodicity Analysis of Urban Elements Application to the Ancient City of Amida (Short Paper)

The characterization of urban structures using morphological indicators is the subject of many applications in the domains of urban planning and transport, but also in less traditional disciplines, such as urban archeology. When reading actual urban plans, it may be possible to identify relics of ancient cities, and to characterize them with the help of appropriate indicators. In this context, we propose a method for the characterization of the spacing between urban elements based on the analysis of their spatial periodicity. The purpose of this method is to detect specific distances in the actual urban structure, potentially characteristic of ancient measurement units. This method is implemented in a GIS software, to facilitate its use by historians and archeologists, and is illustrated by an application on the ancient roman city of Amida (Diyarbakir, Turkey)

Civilisations from East to West

The present volume introduces the world’s great civilisations from the beginning of their formation to the first half of the twentieth century. The authors’ purpose was to go beyond the events and write a book on the history of cultures and civilisations that also elucidates the background of contemporary events which might sometimes be difficult to grasp. The importance of this endeavour lies in that it comprises in one volume all the significant civilisations still existing in our days. At the same time, the aim was to present regions, rather than modern-day countries in a complex way. It is true even if today three of these civilisations occupy a country each (China, Japan and India). On the other hand, the three monotheistic religions which evolved in the Middle East (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) influenced the civilisations of two regions, i.e. the Middle East and Europe to such an extent that it necessitated an approach via these religions. Although each civilisation is presented according to uniform principles, certain differences due to the specific characteristics of the topics and the approaches of the authors occur. Where relevant, each region is introduced by its geographical and climatic features, followed by the emergence and development of social, cultural and religious characteristics described within the given historical context. This, although briefly, may include the description of major literary, artistic trends, and e.g. religious law (in the Islamic world, for example, law permeates every aspect of social and political life). In addition, the geopolitical significance of the specific region or civilisation is also presented in each chapter. The illustrations, maps and chronological tables, as well as the glossary form an integral part of the chapters and the whole book. A short bibliography accompanies every chapter. The book authored by subject specialists from the Corvinus University of Budapest and other universities and research centres is primarily aimed at students of international relations; researchers and members of the general public, however, may also find some areas of the topics stimulating

Greek ‘cultural translation’ of Chaldean learning

The investigation into the relationship between Greek and Babylonian systems of learning has overwhelmingly focused on determining the elements that the former borrowed from the latter, while the fundamental questions relating to the process of transmission of these elements are still largely ignored. This thesis, therefore, offers a preliminary theoretical framework within which the movement of ideas should be analysed. The framework is based on the understanding that all ideas from one culture, when they are to enter another thought and belief system, must be ’translated’ into the concepts and terminology prevalent in their new context. An approach is developed which exploits the concept of ’cultural translation’ as put forward within various modern disciplines. The thesis examines how the ’translatability’ of the material from the perspective of the receiving culture influences its inclusion into the new ’home repertoire’ and determines the changes it undergoes as part of this process. A number of case studies in astronomy, astrology and mathematics are presented to help explain what parts of ’Chaldean knowledge’ were utilised by Greek and Hellenistic scholars, how these were interpreted according to the existing Greek intellectual network into which the new material was inserted and how it was influenced by the ’cultural grid’, a construct reflecting patterns of expectation about a foreign culture

11th International Coral Reef Symposium Abstracts

https://nsuworks.nova.edu/occ_icrs/1001/thumbnail.jp