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Medieval Robots : Mechanism, Magic, Nature, and Art / E. R. Truitt.

By: Material type: TextTextSeries: The Middle Ages SeriesPublisher: Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, [2015]Copyright date: ©2015Description: 1 online resource (296 p.) : 36 color illusContent type:
Media type:
Carrier type:
ISBN:
  • 9780812246971
  • 9780812291407
Subject(s): DDC classification:
  • 629.8 23
LOC classification:
  • TJ211 .T74 2015
Other classification:
  • online - DeGruyter
Online resources: Available additional physical forms:
  • Issued also in print.
Contents:
Frontmatter -- Contents -- Abbreviations -- Introduction. The Persistence of Robots: An Archaeology of Automata -- Chapter 1. Rare Devices: Geography and Technology -- Chapter 2. Between Art and Nature: Natura artifex, Neoplatonism, and Literary Automata -- Chapter 3. Talking Heads: Astral Science, Divination, and Legends of Medieval Philosophers -- Chapter 4. The Quick and the Dead: Corpses, Memorial Statues, and Automata -- Chapter 5. From Texts to Technology: Mechanical Marvels in Courtly and Public Pageantry -- Chapter 6. The Clockwork Universe: Keeping Sacred and Secular Time -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index -- Acknowledgments
Summary: A thousand years before Isaac Asimov set down his Three Laws of Robotics, real and imagined automata appeared in European courts, liturgies, and literary texts. Medieval robots took such forms as talking statues, mechanical animals, and silent metal guardians; some served to entertain or instruct while others performed disciplinary or surveillance functions. Variously ascribed to artisanal genius, inexplicable cosmic forces, or demonic powers, these marvelous fabrications raised fundamental questions about knowledge, nature, and divine purpose in the Middle Ages.Medieval Robots recovers the forgotten history of fantastical, aspirational, and terrifying machines that captivated Europe in imagination and reality between the ninth and fourteenth centuries. E. R. Truitt traces the different forms of self-moving or self-sustaining manufactured objects from their earliest appearances in the Latin West through centuries of mechanical and literary invention. Chronicled in romances and song as well as histories and encyclopedias, medieval automata were powerful cultural objects that probed the limits of natural philosophy, illuminated and challenged definitions of life and death, and epitomized the transformative and threatening potential of foreign knowledge and culture. This original and wide-ranging study reveals the convergence of science, technology, and imagination in medieval culture and demonstrates the striking similarities between medieval and modern robotic and cybernetic visions.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number URL Status Notes Barcode
eBook eBook Biblioteca "Angelicum" Pont. Univ. S.Tommaso d'Aquino Nuvola online online - DeGruyter (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Online access Not for loan (Accesso limitato) Accesso per gli utenti autorizzati / Access for authorized users (dgr)9780812291407

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Abbreviations -- Introduction. The Persistence of Robots: An Archaeology of Automata -- Chapter 1. Rare Devices: Geography and Technology -- Chapter 2. Between Art and Nature: Natura artifex, Neoplatonism, and Literary Automata -- Chapter 3. Talking Heads: Astral Science, Divination, and Legends of Medieval Philosophers -- Chapter 4. The Quick and the Dead: Corpses, Memorial Statues, and Automata -- Chapter 5. From Texts to Technology: Mechanical Marvels in Courtly and Public Pageantry -- Chapter 6. The Clockwork Universe: Keeping Sacred and Secular Time -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index -- Acknowledgments

restricted access online access with authorization star

http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_16ec

A thousand years before Isaac Asimov set down his Three Laws of Robotics, real and imagined automata appeared in European courts, liturgies, and literary texts. Medieval robots took such forms as talking statues, mechanical animals, and silent metal guardians; some served to entertain or instruct while others performed disciplinary or surveillance functions. Variously ascribed to artisanal genius, inexplicable cosmic forces, or demonic powers, these marvelous fabrications raised fundamental questions about knowledge, nature, and divine purpose in the Middle Ages.Medieval Robots recovers the forgotten history of fantastical, aspirational, and terrifying machines that captivated Europe in imagination and reality between the ninth and fourteenth centuries. E. R. Truitt traces the different forms of self-moving or self-sustaining manufactured objects from their earliest appearances in the Latin West through centuries of mechanical and literary invention. Chronicled in romances and song as well as histories and encyclopedias, medieval automata were powerful cultural objects that probed the limits of natural philosophy, illuminated and challenged definitions of life and death, and epitomized the transformative and threatening potential of foreign knowledge and culture. This original and wide-ranging study reveals the convergence of science, technology, and imagination in medieval culture and demonstrates the striking similarities between medieval and modern robotic and cybernetic visions.

Issued also in print.

Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.

In English.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 30. Aug 2021)