Open Access Books

Procopius of Caesarea was one of the last authors of classical antique historiography. His major volume on Justinian’s wars is the most important historical source on the sixth century. This new interpretation of, above all, his manifold explorations reveals Procopius to have been a versatile author who was familiar with all facets of contemporary Roman society and served the various interests of his audience.

This study provides a fundamental new reading of numerous commonplace positions in Germanic medieval studies relating to the physical beauty of literary figures. It looks at both canonic and more marginal Middle High German poems ("Erec," "Parzival," "Welscher Gast" [The Romance Stranger]) as well as their Medieval Latin context (poetorhetorics) and their discursive matrix, which is based in theology.

Passé l’élan victorieux de la première croisade, les Latins se heurtent en Orient à des difficultés toujours plus grandes. La perte de Jérusalem, conquise par Saladin en 1187, puis celle d’Acre, qui tombe en 1291, puis encore l’irrésistible avancée ottomane et la chute de Constantinople, en 1453, suscitent la rédaction de nombreux projets de croisade : devant l’accumulation des échecs, il apparaît désormais évident que l’organisation de nouvelles expéditions nécessite un effort de prévision et de gestion des moyens afin de mettre toutes les chances du côté des puissances chrétiennes. Parfois, c’est un prince ou le pape qui commande un rapport ; plus souvent, les auteurs de ces projets de croisade agissent spontanément, parce qu’ils sont sincèrement préoccupés par le sort de la chrétienté ou pour faire progresser leur carrière en attirant l’attention d’un puissant. D’une façon ou d’une autre, ces textes illustrent le développement d’une pensée prospective qui, sans écarter les références aux Écritures et aux prophéties, se caractérise par sa visée pratique : il s’agit d’évaluer les forces et les faiblesses de l’adversaire, d’élaborer une stratégie et des tactiques de conquête, de susciter une coalition des forces chrétiennes et de trouver les moyens financiers, matériels et humains du succès. Parce qu’ils n’ont, pour la plupart, jamais été suivis d’effets, ces textes ont été longtemps négligés par les historiens. Le présent volume participe d’un regain d’intérêt pour une source susceptible de beaucoup nous apprendre, en particulier sur les visions géostratégiques dominantes à la fin du Moyen Âge et sur l’évolution des rapports de force entre les puissances européennes.

Johann Heinrich Gottlob von Justi (1717–1771) zählt zu den Inauguratoren der Polizei-, Verwaltungs- und Wirtschaftswissenschaften im Zeitalter der Aufklärung. In einer Reihe von Grundlagenwerken hat er diese politische Theorie entworfen und weiter entwickelt. Darüber hinaus publizierte Justi als Philosoph, als Literat und als politischer Publizist. Im Zentrum seiner Überlegungen steht dabei die Annahme, dass sich sowohl Herrscher als auch Untertanen eines Staates um die Beförderung „gemeinschaftliche Glückseligkeit“ des Gemeinwesens und der Individuen zu bekümmern hätten. Auf der Grundlage naturrechtlicher Prinzipien soll dieser „Endzweck des Staates“ durch dessen Institutionen, wie Gerichte, Polizei, Verwaltung, vor allem aber die staatliche Wirtschaftsförderung verfolgt werden. Um diese Aufgabe zu erfüllen, müssen nach Justi jene Institutionen wissenschaftlich erfasst und deren Ergebnisse in der universitären Lehre zukünftigen Staatsbeamten vermittelt werden. Dieses politische Grundkonzept hat Justi nicht nur als Wissenschaftler in der Forschung und Lehre sowie als Polizeidirektor in Göttingen und hoher Verwaltungsbeamter in Berlin zu realisieren unternommen, sondern auch in einer Vielzahl von Satiren und politischen Flugschriften der aufgeklärten Öffentlichkeit näherzubringen versucht.

This eBook is a collection of articles from a Frontiers Research Topic. Frontiers Research Topics are very popular trademarks of the Frontiers Journals Series: they are collections of at least ten articles, all centered on a particular subject. With their unique mix of varied contributions from Original Research to Review Articles, Frontiers Research Topics unify the most influential researchers, the latest key findings and historical advances in a hot research area! Find out more on how to host your own Frontiers Research Topic or contribute to one as an author by contacting the Frontiers Editorial Office: frontiersin.org/about/contact

This Special Issue offers a collection of original contributions and scientific reviews on the following topics: cellular and molecular aspects of phytochemicals and other natural compounds and their therapeutic effects (with an emphasis on the innovative plant-based therapeutic approaches based on ancient medical heritage), the pharmacokinetics of herbal medicines, and the use of technology for expanding traditional medical knowledge.

Quali altre parole vi aspettate che aggiunga? (What more words am I supposed to say?) is a collection of essays dedicated to the memory of Alfredo Cadonna (1948-2020), philologist, translator and scholar of religions in China. The eleven chapters of this volume, authored by scholars who studied under Alfredo Cadonna, offer annotated translations of excerpts of texts belonging to different historical periods and religious and cosmological traditions. They are representative of a variety of literary genres and linguistic styles. Texts collected here include writings from archaic China, religious-themed literature composed by literati of the Empire, various types of medieval and late imperial Daoist and Buddhist works, as well as corresponding modern and contemporary examples. More precisely, the reader will find in this volume translations from the Buddhist meditation manual Shi chan boluomi cidi famen 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門 by Tiantai master Zhiyi 智顗 (538-97); religious instructions on the kan huatou 看話頭 method of meditation by Chan master Laiguo 來果 (1881-1953); one passage of the Guoyu 國語 (5th-4th centuries B.C.) dealing with the role of ‘shamans’, the relationship between spirits and human and the final ‘separation of Earth and Sky’; nineteen poems by Tang dynasty poet Wei Qumou 韋渠牟 (749-801) containing a description of the poet’s journey beyond the world of mortals; passages from the Taishang Lingbao zhicao pin 太上靈寶芝草品 and from Ge Hong 葛洪’s Baopuzi 抱樸子 (4th century) on the Daoist tradition of natural drugs zhi 芝; two chapters of the Hanlongjing 撼龍經, a fengshui classical text belonging to the School of Forms (10th century); passages from the Xiuzhen biannan 修真辨難 by Daoist master Liu Yiming 劉一明 (1734-1821); part of the Daoist text Tianxian xinchuan 天仙心傳 attributed to Min Yide 閔一得 (1758-1836) and dealing with self-cultivation and ritual practice; the Baojing sanmei 寶鏡三昧, a liturgical chant of the Chan Caodong Buddhist school attributed to the Dongshan Liangjie 洞山良价 (807- 869); a key section of the influential Buddhist Mahāyāna scripture Dasheng qixin lun 大乘起信論, an indigenous Chinese composition dating from the 6th century; and, finally, works of Liu Yiming on the specific topic of female alchemy.

Situating Sustainability reframes our understanding of sustainability through an emerging international terrain of concepts and case studies. These approaches include material practices, such as extraction and disaster recovery, and extend into the domains of human rights and education. This volume addresses the need in sustainability science to recognize the deep and diverse cultural histories that define environmental politics. It brings together scholars from cultural studies, anthropology, literature, law, behavioral science, urban studies, design, and development to argue that it is no longer possible to talk about sustainability in general without thinking through the contexts of research and action. These contributors are joined by artists whose public-facing work provides a mobile platform to conduct research at the edges of performance, knowledge production, and socio-ecological infrastructures. Situating Sustainability calls for a truly transdisciplinary research that is guided by the humanities and social sciences in collaboration with local actors informed by histories of place. Designed for students, scholars, and interested readers, the volume introduces the conceptual practices that inform the leading edge of engaged research in sustainability.

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. Is it possible to create a better world? Can this be done without the image of an ideal world to guide us? What would such a world be like? There has been a marked renewal of interest in utopian thought, as the exposed economic, social and political dysfunctions of modern society have forced us to re-examine our visions of the future. Yet the wealth of utopian literature on which we could draw remains inaccessible or poorly understood. This book readdresses this imbalance, with a collection of essays, each centred on a key passage in a canonical utopian work that challenges the commonly accepted interpretation of that work and allows us to examine it with fresh insight. At the same time, by contextualising each passage within the text as a whole, readers are enabled to reflect on the meaning and reception of the work and on its significance in the history of utopian thought. Broad in scope and original in approach, this textbook is an encouragement to students and scholars alike to read the utopian classics afresh.

La formation des doctorants aux problématiques de l'information scientifique et technique représente un enjeu particulièrement sensible pour l'enseignement supérieur et la recherche en France. Doublement affectée par de profondes transformations institutionnelles ainsi que par l'évolution accélérée des technologies numériques, la culture de l'information scientifique demeure l'un des piliers fondamentaux de la recherche et un élément incontournable dans la mise en œuvre d'une politique éclairée. La plupart des domaines d'activité du chercheur sont concernés : l'investigation, la propriété intellectuelle, la recherche documentaire, l'écriture scientifique, la publication, la communication scientifique, l'évaluation, les évolutions et les opportunités offertes par les outils numériques, la vulgarisation scientifique… Cet ouvrage se propose de poser quelques jalons afin d'alimenter la réflexion des divers protagonistes, universitaires, documentalistes, bibliothécaires, qui interviennent auprès du doctorant pour l'informer ou le guider tout au long de son parcours : quels seraient les attentes des doctorants et les besoins du monde académique ? Quelles connaissances et compétences les formateurs ont-ils à mobiliser ? Quels enseignements tirer des expériences et dispositifs mis en place ? Autant de questions pour approcher une thématique à la morphologie complexe. Le débat qu'elles suscitent met en lumière un bilan riche en interrogations et fécond pour l'avenir.

Digital media everyday inscribe new patterns of time, promising instant communication, synchronous collaboration, intricate time management, and profound new advantages in speed. The essays in this volume reconsider these outward interfaces of convenience by calling attention to their supporting infrastructures, the networks of digital time that exert pressures of conformity and standardization on the temporalities of lived experience and have important ramifications for social relations, stratifications of power, practices of cooperation, and ways of life. Interdisciplinary in method and international in scope, the volume draws together insights from media and communication studies, cultural studies, and science and technology studies while staging an important encounter between two distinct approaches to the temporal patterning of media infrastructures, a North American strain emphasizing the social and cultural experiences of lived time and a European tradition, prominent especially in Germany, focusing on technological time and time-critical processes.

Since 1648 and 1713, the government chancellery in Glückstadt for Holstein and the higher court in Gottorf for Schleswig formed the highest sovereign authorities in the duchies below the central administrative bodies in Copenhagen. In 1834 the separation of the justicial and the administrative authority took place at the middle level. A new administrative authority was established under the name "Schleswig-Holstein Government" (also known as Provincial government). When it was set up, the Schleswig-Holstein government took over parts of the Governorship's archives, as well as the majority of the administrative acts of the Gottorf Higher Court and the government chancellery in Glückstadt. The government left most of this writing untouched; only a small part of it was being continued. In order to facilitate the use of the important and thematically rich Dept. (Abt.) 49, the collection was completely reviewed in 2012/2013 and included in the archive database "AIDA". In this process, the information on the old means of finding the titles and terms of all archival material in the stock was checked.

"This book brings recent insights about sovereignty and citizen participation in the Belgian Constitution to scholars in the fields of public law, history, and political theory. Throughout the Western world, there are increasing calls for greater citizen participation. Referendums, citizen councils, and other forms of direct democracy are considered necessary antidotes to a growing hostility towards traditional party politics. This book focuses on the Belgian debate, where the introduction of participatory politics has stalled because of an ambiguity in the Constitution. Scholars and judges generally claim that the Belgian Constitution gives ultimate power to the Nation, which can only speak through representation in parliament. In light of this, direct democracy would be an unconstitutional power grab by the current generation of citizens. This book critically investigates this received interpretation of the Constitution and, by reaching back to the debates among Belgium's 1831 founding fathers, concludes that it is untenable. The spirit, if not the text, of the Belgian Constitution allows for more popular participation than present-day jurisprudence admits. Combining new insights from law, history, and political science, this book is a showcase for continental constitutional theory. The questions it asks reverberate far beyond Belgium. The book provides a rare source of information on Belgium's 1831 Constitution, which was in its time seen as modern constitutionalism’s greatest triumph which became a model for countless other constitutions. "

Why do people still write by hand today? Is typing by hand actually handwriting? And what have signatures got to do with identity? Andi Gredig explores these and many other questions about handwriting from a linguistic and cultural studies perspective. He organizes the complex terminology of writing and script, explores common notions of what handwriting is and can be, and traces current practices of handwriting on the basis of text types such as greeting cards, sketches, and notes. The systematic and precise linguistic analysis of the ideologically contested subject of handwriting reveals some surprising insights. Andi Gredig is a researcher and lecturer at the German Department of the University of Zurich. As a layouter and editor in the linguistics department, he also edits and designs texts in the humanities and deals intensively with typography. In the summer of 2020, he completed his doctorate at the University of Zurich on the topic of handwriting.

Tropical forage crops used to feed the livestock are of crucial important in the sustainable development of hot regions. The first part of this work is intended to guide the choice of forage plants and their crops (diversity of forage plants and their uses based on environments and livestock systems). The second focuses on the growing and management of forage crops (production techniques from planting to harvesting the crops). The challenges of woody forage, production of forage seed and the economics of forage production are also addressed. A CD-ROM presents case studies, illustrations and sheets for each plant.