CITIES AND TOWN The medieval city.pdf
CITIES AND TOWN The medieval city.pdf
CITIES AND TOWN The medieval city.pdf
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xviii<br />
Series Foreword<br />
the <strong>medieval</strong> <strong>city</strong> in the flight from the dangers or difficulties found in<br />
the country, whether economic, physically threatening, or cultural. Identifying<br />
the attraction of the <strong>city</strong> in its urbanitas, its “urbanity,” or the way<br />
of living in a <strong>city</strong>, Pounds discusses first its origins in prehistoric and classical<br />
Greek urban revolutions. During the Middle Ages, the <strong>city</strong> grew<br />
primarily between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, remaining essentially<br />
the same until the Industrial Revolution. Pounds provides chapters<br />
on the <strong>medieval</strong> <strong>city</strong>’s planning, in terms of streets and structures;<br />
life in the <strong>medieval</strong> <strong>city</strong>; the roles of the Church and the <strong>city</strong> government<br />
in its operation; the development of crafts and trade in the <strong>city</strong>;<br />
and the issues of urban health, wealth, and welfare. Concluding with<br />
the role of the <strong>city</strong> in history, Pounds suggests that the value of the <strong>city</strong><br />
depended upon its balance of social classes, its need for trade and profit<br />
to satisfy personal desires through the accumulation of wealth and its<br />
consequent economic power, its political power as a representative body<br />
within the kingdom, and its social role in the rise of literacy and education<br />
and in nationalism. Indeed, the concept of a middle class, a bourgeoisie,<br />
derives from the <strong>city</strong>—from the bourg, or “borough.” According<br />
to Pounds, the rise of modern civilization would not have taken place<br />
without the growth of the <strong>city</strong> in the Middle Ages and its concomitant<br />
artistic and cultural contribution.<br />
Medieval Science and Technology, by Elspeth Whitney, examines science<br />
and technology from the early Middle Ages to 1500 within the context<br />
of the classical learning that so influenced it. She looks at institutional<br />
history, both early and late, and what was taught in the <strong>medieval</strong> schools<br />
and, later, the universities (both of which were overseen by the Catholic<br />
Church). Her discussion of Aristotelian natural philosophy illustrates its<br />
impact on the <strong>medieval</strong> scientific worldview. She presents chapters on<br />
the exact sciences, meaning mathematics, astronomy, cosmology, astrology,<br />
statics, kinematics, dynamics, and optics; the biological and earth<br />
sciences, meaning chemistry and alchemy, medicine, zoology, botany, geology<br />
and meteorology, and geography; and technology. In an interpretive<br />
conclusion, Whitney demonstrates the impact of <strong>medieval</strong> science<br />
on the preconditions and structure that permitted the emergence of the<br />
modern world. Most especially, technology transformed an agricultural<br />
society into a more commercial and engine-driven society: waterpower<br />
and inventions like the blast furnace and horizontal loom turned iron<br />
working and cloth making into manufacturing operations. <strong>The</strong> invention