Mutilation and the law in early medieval Europe and India: a comparative study

This article compares the diverse legal traditions of Europe and India from the 1st to 11th centuries CE, asking whether the two cultures had a shared understanding of the meanings of facial disfigurement as injury and as punishment. It surveys the evidence, and concludes that whilst there are superficial similarities, the different contexts within which 'law' was made and understood mitigate against assuming influences in either direction. It challenges the often-assumed link between India's early surgical expertise and the prevalence of disfiguring mutilation as a punishment, arguing that the latter was more often threatened than carried out

Linking decision support systems for ducks with relative abundance of other grassland bird species

Decision support systems (DSS) that integrate long-term duck population and land use data are currently being used to develop conservation programs on the Canadian prairies. However, understanding inter-relationships between ducks and other grassland bird species would greatly enhance program planning and delivery among various bird conservation initiatives. Therefore, to achieve these goals, grassland bird species richness and relative abundance were compared between areas of low, moderate and high predicted waterfowl breeding densities (strata) in the southern Missouri Coteau, Saskatchewan. Roadside point counts were conducted during spring 2001 and 2002, and habitats were delineated within 400 m radius of each point. More birds of more species were encountered in the high density waterfowl stratum when compared with low but species that tended to co-occur with ducks were primarily wetland-associated. Overall, duck and other grassland bird species richness and abundance were moderately correlated (0.69 > r > 0.37, all Ps < 0.05); strong positive correlations between priority species of conservation concern and northern pintails were not found. No difference in mean number of priority grassland species occurred among strata, but differences were found for both number of species and total birds detected among routes within strata. High duck density stratum was more heterogeneous, consisting of greater areas of forage, shrub, wetlands, and open water bodies whereas low stratum contained larger, more uniformly-shaped habitat patches and greater proportion of cropland. Ordination analyses revealed that most priority species occurred in grassland-dominated sites with lower shrub area and wetland density whereas most wetland-associated species, including ducks and 2 priority species (Wilson’s phalarope and marbled godwit) inhabited cultivated areas with higher wetland density. Ducks and priority species generally did not co-occur at the stop-level in highly heterogeneous landscapes but suitable habitats for both groups may exist in near proximity. In homogeneous landscapes, ducks and other wetland-associated common species were less abundant because of limited number of suitable wetlands. To achieve these dual goals, conservation efforts should be focused in areas containing wetlands adjacent to contiguous tracts of native pasture

'Family, Feud and Fertility at Manorbier Castle Pembs. 1200-1400'

This article explores the links between a significantly understudied early fourteenth-century manuscript miscellany housed in Trinity College Library in Cambridge (Cambridge, Trinity College MS O.2.5 [1109]), the family of Gerald of Wales (d. 1223) and the medieval castle of Manorbier in Pembrokeshire. It argues both that this manuscript was produced by and for members of the de Barri family, and that the compilation, described as a 'mathematical miscellany' in James' catalogue, in fact contains a rich selection of medical and other texts that provides new insights into the troubled history of the castle and its owners during this period

Strange Fruits: Grafting, Foreigners, and the Garden Imaginary in Northern France and Germany, 1250–1350

This article explores the medieval uses of the horticultural practice of grafting, inserting a shoot of one plant into the rootstock of another in order to benefit from the latter's established strength and growth. It provided a rich metaphor for use in religious sermons and didactic literature from antiquity to the medieval period. Yet grafting was acknowledged to be 'contrary to nature', and a tension was thus set up between metaphor and practice that remained present and unresolved in medieval texts. This article explores one moment of that tension, reading the mystical works of Mechtild of Hackeborn (d.1298) and Gertrude of Helfta (d. 1302) in a northern European context where grafting was undergoing a transformation from a practice simply used for beneficial purposes - production of better fruit – to one that created pleasure and amusement for a growing aristocratic elite for whom controlling nature on their landed estates was simply another manifestation of their power, as exemplified by the pleasure park at Hesdin in Picardy

Sexuality

Explores the question of medieval sexuality against the framework of 'empire', as Europeans engaged with non-European cultures. Considers recent postcolonial turn in medieval studies, and asks whether there is any evidence of medieval subject peoples 'writing back'

Corpora and cultural transmission? Political uses of the body in Norman texts, 1050-1150

This chapter explores how Norman texts presented the masculine human body as a tool for commentary, focusing on three intersecting themes - representation of the royal or ruling body, bodily qualities read as signs of inner qualities, and the significance of the wounded or broken body in Norman society

The gendered nose and its lack:'medieval' nose-cutting and its modern manifestations.

Time magazine's cover photograph in August 2010 of a noseless Afghan woman beside the emotive strap line, "What happens if we leave Afghanistan," fuelled debate about the "medieval" practices of the Taliban, whose local commander had instructed her husband to take her nose and ears. Press reports attributed the violence to the Pashtun tradition that a dishonored husband "lost his nose." This equation of nose-cutting with tradition begs questions not only about the Orientalist lens of the western press when viewing Afghanistan, but also about the assumption that the word "medieval" can function as a label for such practices. A study of medieval nose-cutting suggests that its identification as an "eastern" practice should be challenged. Rather clearer is its connection with patriarchal values of authority and honor: the victims of such punishment have not always been women, but this is nevertheless a gendered punishment of the powerless by the powerful