History of Old Age: From Antiquity to the RenaissanceUniversity of Chicago Press, 28 նոյ, 1989 թ. - 343 էջ History of Old Age is the first major study of the ways in which old age has been perceived in western culture throughout history. Georges Minois paints a vast fresco, starting with the first old man to relate his own story—an Egyptian scribe some 4500 years ago—and ending with the deaths of Elizabeth I and Henry IV in the sixteenth century. Tracing the changing conceptions of the nature, value, and burden of the old, Minois argues that western history during this period is marked by great fluctuation in the social and political role of the aged. Minois shows how, in ancient Greece, the cult of youth and beauty on the one hand, and the reverence for the figure of the Homeric sage, on the other, created an ambivalent attitude toward the aged. This ambiguity appears again in the contrast between the active role that older citizens played in Roman politics and their depiction in satirical literature of the period. Christian literature in the Middle Ages also played a large part in defining society's perception of the old, both in the image of the revered holy sage and in the total condemnation of the aged sinner. Drawing on literary texts throughout, Minois considers the interrelation of literary, religious, medical, and political factors in determining the social fate of the elderly and their relationship to society. This book will be of great interest to social and cultural historians, as well as to general readers interested in the subject of the aged in society today. |
Բովանդակություն
between Myth and History | 8 |
From Patriarch to Old Man | 25 |
Sad Old Age | 43 |
The Old Mans Grandeur and Decadence | 77 |
The Old Man as a Symbol | 113 |
Indifference to Age | 133 |
The Social | 156 |
Old People Assert | 209 |
Humanists and Courtiers versus | 249 |
The Real Weight of Old People | 288 |
Conclusion | 303 |
Bibliography | 330 |
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Common terms and phrases
according age of 60 ancient antiquity Antonio de Guevara appear beard beauty Bishop body cent century BC Cerf Charlemagne Christian Christine de Pisan Church comedy death decrepitude Dhuoda died aged early Middle Ages elderly elders enjoy father favour fifteenth Francis Bacon gerontocracy Greek growing old Harmondsworth Hilary of Arles Hippocrates Histoire honour human Ibid illness infirm J.C. Russell John king lived London longer man's married medieval Merovingian monastery monks Montaillou Moyen Age mths nature never Oeuvres complètes old age old woman oldest onwards Paris pater familias period persons Philippe Ariès physical Plautus play pleasures Plutarch political population prestige Renaissance respect retirement role Roman saint Salvian Simone de Beauvoir sixteenth century social society Sources chrétiennes St Bernard symbolic things thirteenth century traditional trans ugliness warrior weak white hair widows wife wisdom wise women wrinkled young younger youth