Author : Thomas Arentzen
Release : 2021-07-11
Genre : History
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 024/5 ( reviews)
Book Synopsis Byzantine Tree Life by : Thomas Arentzen
Download or read book Byzantine Tree Life written by Thomas Arentzen. This book was released on 2021-07-11. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the many ways Byzantines lived with their trees. It takes seriously theological and hagiographic tree engagement as expressions of that culture’s deep involvement—and even fascination—with the arboreal. These pages tap into the current attention paid to plants in a wide range of scholarship, an attention that involves the philosophy of plant life as well as scientific discoveries of how communicative trees may be, and how they defend themselves. Considering writings on and images of trees from Late Antiquity and medieval Byzantium sympathetically, the book argues for an arboreal imagination at the root of human aspirations to know and draw close to the divine.