Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

This work investigates the theoretical and personal understanding of death, and its implicit relationship with birth, as perceived in medieval society. It studies the work of one specific illuminator, reniet, whose pictures embody medieval attitudes towards death.

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CHOICE Review

This is a fascinating analysis of the relationship between the making of images and concepts of mortality in the second half of the 14th century. Although the book ostensibly focuses on the work of the Parisian illuminator Pierre Remiet, it really provides a wide-ranging discussion of the late medieval world's obsession with death and how representations of death helped to form medieval attitudes toward the historical past. Each chapter begins with a brief, imagined account of the illuminator's last days. Although well written, this account seems an unfortunate inclusion in which late-20th-century concepts of history and human psychology are conflated with the meager historical documentation of the period. Nevertheless, this book makes valuable contributions to one's understanding of both late medieval society's attitude toward the meaning of death and late 14th-century manuscript illumination. Discussions of workshop practices in Paris provide valuable insights into the creative methodologies of the illuminator's craft. The ways in which text, image, and society interrelate are discussed with subtlety, giving the reader many insights into the life of the period. Useful index; helpful footnotes and bibliography; 192 illustrations, most in black and white; appendix listing manuscripts containing miniatures by Remiet. Recommended. Undergraduate; graduate; faculty. E. Kosmer Worcester State College