I think I wasn't clear enough in my Tuesday post. Jean Gimpel, author of The Medieval Machine, discussed eyeglasses on page 149 in that book. He quoted from a sermon given in Florence, in 1306, praising the invention of eyeglasses some twenty years earlier. (He obtained this reference from another author listed in his notes.) [...]
I've been reading The Medieval Machine (The Industrial Revolution of the Middle Ages) by Jean Gimpel published by Penguin in 1975. I found it on my bookshelves during Christmas cleaning, a leftover from my Catholic scientists project. Dante lived in the middle of the period that Gimpel is describing, maybe 1100 to 1400. Gimpel basically [...]
Here is Saint Bernard encouraging Dante to look at Mary, the Queen of Heaven. Look now into the face that unto Christ Hath most resemblance; for its brightness only Is able to prepare thee to see Christ.” On her did I behold so great a gladness Rain down, borne onward in the holy minds Created through that altitude to [...]
I think that the Annunciation appears more often than anything else in the Divine Comedy. Here are just two examples... Purgatory Canto 10 The angel who came down to earth with tidings of the peace so many years wept for in vain, that op'd the heavenly gates from their long interdict, before us seem'd, in [...]
Last week I pointed out that Saint Lucy's feast day (December 13) is celebrated differently in Sweden and in Sicily. Sicily has processions and food, but Sweden has candles and breakfast in bed. Generally (meaning if you look it up on Google), this Swedish idea is attributed to the "fact" that Saint Lucy's feast day [...]
