Bloomsbury Cultural History - Cultural History Series

A CULTURAL HISTORY SERIES

The Cultural Histories Series offers an authoritative survey of a wide range of subjects throughout history. Each subject is looked at in Antiquity, the Medieval Age, the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, the Age of Empire and the Modern Age. Thematic coverage is consistent across all periods so that users can either gain a broad overview of a period or follow a theme through the ages.

This page is subscription-sensitive, ensuring that users will only see collections which they have access to. This ensures that users only see content which is most relevant to their institution's subscription(s).

A Cultural History of Animals

A Cultural History of Animals is a multi-volume project on the history of human-animal relations from ancient times to the present. The set of six volumes covers 4500 years of human-animal interaction.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume explores: the sacred and the symbolic (totem, sacrifice, status and popular beliefs), hunting; domestication (taming, breeding, labour and companionship); entertainment and exhibitions (the menagerie, zoos, circuses and carnivals); science and specimens (research, education, collections and museums); philosophical beliefs; and artistic representations.

A Cultural History of Animals

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Chemistry

A Cultural History of Chemistry presents the first detailed and authoritative survey from antiquity to today, focusing on the West but integrating key developments in Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the Arabic-Islamic and Byzantine empires.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The themes (and chapter titles) are: Theory and Concepts; Practice and Experiment; Sites and Technology; Culture and Knowledge; Society and Environment; Trade and Industry; Learning and Institutions; Art and Representation.

A Cultural History of Chemistry

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Childhood and Family

A Cultural History of Childhood and Family presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. This set of six volumes covers 2800 years of history, charting the cultural, social, economic, religious, medical and political changes in domestic life.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: 1. Family Relationships; 2; Community; 3. Economy; 4. Geography and the Environment; 5. Education; 6. Life Cycle; 7. The State; 8. Faith and Religion; 9. Health and Science; 10. World Contexts.

A Cultural History of Childhood and Family

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Color

A Cultural History of Color presents a history of 5000 years of color in western culture. The work examines how color has been perceived, developed, produced and traded, and how it has been used in all aspects of performance and how it shapes all we see, from food and nature to interiors and architecture, to objects and art, to fashion and adornment, to the color of the naked human body, and to the way our minds work and our languages are created.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Form; Theory; Praxis; Identities; The Body; Politics and Power; Laughter; and Ethics.

A Cultural History of Color

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Form; Theory; Praxis; Identities; The Body; Politics and Power; Laughter; and Ethics.

A Cultural History of Comedy

How has our expression, use and reception of comedy developed from antiquity to the present day? What role has it occupied in Western culture, and what can it tell us about how society has changed? The volumes describe various manifestations of comedy, its use in religion, theatre and literature, and its historical and philosophical significance.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Form; Theory; Praxis; Identities; The Body; Politics and Power; Laughter; and Ethics.

A Cultural History of Comedy

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Form; Theory; Praxis; Identities; The Body; Politics and Power; Laughter; and Ethics.

A Cultural History of Death

How has our understanding of death evolved over the course of 2,500 years? What can recorded history tell us about how different cultures and societies have felt about, experienced, responded to and marked the occasion of death across different periods and lands? These are the questions pursued by 54 experts in this landmark work that explores the way past societies thought, behaved and developed as they wrestled with enormity of their own mortality.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Dead and Dying Bodies; The Sensory Aesthetics of Death; Emotions, Mortality and Vitality; Death's Ritual-Symbolic Performance; Sites, Power and Politics of Death; Gender, Age and Identity; Explaining Death; and The Undead and Eternal.

A Cultural History of Death

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Democracy

How has the concept of democracy been understood, manifested, reimagined and represented through the ages? In a work that spans 2,500 years these fundamental questions are addressed by 66 experts, each contributing their overview of a theme applied to a period in history. With the help of a broad range of case material they illustrate the physical, social and cultural contexts of democracy in Western culture from antiquity to the present.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age;

The ten themes are: Sovereignty; Liberty and the Rule of Law; The 'Common Good'; Economic and Social Democracy; Religion and the Principles of Political Obligation; Citizenship and Gender; Ethnicity, Race and Nationalism; Democratic Crises, Revolutions and Civil Resistance; International Relations; Beyond the Polis.

A Cultural History of Democracy

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age;

A Cultural History of Disability

How has our understanding and treatment of disability evolved in Western culture? How has it been represented and perceived in different social and cultural conditions? In a work that spans 2,500 years, these ambitious questions are addressed by over 50 experts, each contributing their overview of a theme applied to a period in history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Long Eighteenth Century

Volume 5: The Long Nineteenth Century, Revolution, and Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The volumes describe different kinds of physical and mental disabilities, their representations and receptions, and what impact they have had on society and everyday life.

A Cultural History of Disability

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Long Eighteenth Century

Volume 5: The Long Nineteenth Century, Revolution, and Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The volumes describe different kinds of physical and mental disabilities, their representations and receptions, and what impact they have had on society and everyday life.

A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion

A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. This set of six volumes covers over 2,500 years of dress and fashion.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: 1. Textiles 2. Production and Distribution 3. The Body 4. Belief 5. Gender and Sexuality 6. Status 7. Ethnicity 8. Visual Representations 9. Literary Representations

A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion

A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. This set of six volumes covers over 2,500 years of dress and fashion.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Education

A Cultural History of Education is the first comprehensive and interdisciplinary overview of the cultural history of education from ancient times to the present day. With six illustrated volumes covering 2800 years of human history, this is the definitive reference work on the subject, comprising:

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Late Medieval, Reformation, and Renaissance Age

Volume 4: The Baroque and Enlightenment Age

Volume 5: The Age of Romanticism, Revolution, and Empire

Volume 6: The Modern and Post-Modern Age

Each volume adopts the same thematic structure, covering: church, religion and morality; knowledge, media and communications; children and childhood; family, community and sociability; learners and learning; teachers and teaching; literacies; life-histories. This enables readers to trace one theme throughout history, as well as providing them with a thorough overview of each individual period.

A Cultural History of Education

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Late Medieval, Reformation, and Renaissance Age

Volume 4: The Baroque and Enlightenment Age

Volume 5: The Age of Romanticism, Revolution, and Empire

Volume 6: The Modern and Post-Modern Age

A Cultural History of Emotions

Across 6 Volumes, A Cultural History of the Emotions explores how emotions have changed over the course of human history, but also how emotions have themselves created and changed history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Late Medieval, Reformation, and Renaissance Age

Volume 4: The Baroque and Enlightenment Age;

Volume 5: The Age of Romanticism, Revolution, and Empire

Volume 6: The Modern and Post-Modern Age

Each volume in the series encompasses interdisciplinary work on the emotions, covering: medical, scientific, religious and intellectual history, how they have been performed and represented and how they were enacted in social practices on both a personal and public level.

A Cultural History of Emotions

Across 6 Volumes, A Cultural History of the Emotions explores how emotions have changed over the course of human history, but also how emotions have themselves created and changed history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Late Medieval, Reformation, and Renaissance Age

Volume 4: The Baroque and Enlightenment Age;

Volume 5: The Age of Romanticism, Revolution, and Empire

Volume 6: The Modern and Post-Modern Age

A Cultural History of Exploration

In a work that spans more than 5,000 years, these questions are addressed by 40 experts, each contributing their overview of a theme applied to a period in history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Expansion and Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Industrial Age

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: technologies of exploration; motivations and methodologies for exploration; ideal and idealized explorer typologies; the explored and their explorations; verbalizing exploration; visualizing exploration; and authority, finance, and exploration.

A Cultural History of Exploration

In a work that spans more than 5,000 years, these questions are addressed by 40 experts, each contributing their overview of a theme applied to a period in history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Expansion and Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Industrial Age

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Fairy Tales

In a work that spans 2,500 years these ambitious questions are addressed by over 50 experts, each contributing their overview of a theme applied to a period in history. With the help of a broad range of case material they illustrate broad trends and nuances of the fairy tale in Western culture from antiquity to the present.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Early Modern Age

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Forms of the Marvelous; Adaptation; Gender and Sexuality; Humans and Non-Humans; Monsters and the Monstrous; Spaces; Socialization; and Power.

A Cultural History of Fairy Tales

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Early Modern Age

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Forms of the Marvelous; Adaptation; Gender and Sexuality; Humans and Non-Humans; Monsters and the Monstrous; Spaces; Socialization; and Power.

A Cultural History of Food

A Cultural History of Food presents a comprehensive, authoritative overview of food from ancient times to the present. Together, the six volumes cover almost 3,000 years of food and its physical, spiritual, social and cultural dimensions. The periods covered are:

Volume 1: Antiquity;

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Early Modern Age

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: 1. Food Production 2. Food Systems 3. Food Security, Safety and Crises 4. Food and Politics 5. Eating Out 6. Professional Cooking, Kitchens and Service Work 7. Family and Domesticity 8.Body and Soul 9. Food Representations 10. World Developments.

A Cultural History of Food

Volume 1: Antiquity;

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Early Modern Age

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Furniture

Furniture is an artifact so what can it tell us about culture? What social, religious, political and economic factors have shaped its form and functions? How does furniture demonstrate the transformations in private and public life across time and cultures? In a work that spans 4,500 years, 70 experts chart across six volumes the changing cultural framework within which furniture was designed, produced, and used in Western Europe.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages and Renaissance

Volume 3: The Age of Exploration

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire and Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Design and Motifs; Makers, Making, and Materials; Types and Uses; The Domestic Setting; The Public Setting; Exhibition and Display; Furniture and Architecture; Visual Representations; and Verbal Representations..

A Cultural History of Furniture

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages and Renaissance

Volume 3: The Age of Exploration

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire and Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Gardens

A Cultural History of Gardens presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. This set of six volumes covers over 2500 years of gardens as physical, social and artistic spaces.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

1. Design 2. Types of Gardens 3. Planting 4. Use and Reception 5. Meaning 6. Verbal Representations 7. Visual Representations 8. Gardens and the Larger Landscape.

A Cultural History of Gardens

A Cultural History of Gardens presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. This set of six volumes covers over 2500 years of gardens as physical, social and artistic spaces.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

1. Design 2. Types of Gardens 3. Planting 4. Use and Reception 5. Meaning 6. Verbal Representations 7. Visual Representations 8. Gardens and the Larger Landscape.

A Cultural History of Genocide

How has human response to genocide evolved over time? What effect has it had on our understanding of the cause and consequences of genocide? Spanning 2,800 years of human history, A Cultural History of Genocide offers the first comprehensive, interdisciplinary overview of genocide from ancient times to the present day. With six highly illustrated volumes all written by leading scholars, this is the definitive reference work on the subject of genocide.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Responses to Genocide; Motivations and Justifications for Genocide; Genocide Perpetrators; Genocide Victims; Genocide and Memory; Consequences of Genocide; Representations of Genocide; Causes of Genocide..

A Cultural History of Genocide

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Hair

How have our attitudes to hair changed over time? In what ways have new technologies influenced hair-related practices and beliefs? Is hair just about fashion or does it express social, spiritual, and cultural meanings? With the help of a broad range of case material they illustrate trends and nuances of the culture of hair in Western societies from ancient times to the present.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: Religion and Ritualized Belief; Self and Society; Fashion and Adornment; Production and Practice; Health and Hygiene; Gender and Sexuality; Race and Ethnicity; Class and Social Status; and Cultural Representations.

A Cultural History of Hair

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Hinduism

Spanning over 4,000 years, A Cultural History of Hinduism provides an authoritative survey of one of the world’s oldest religious traditions in its social and cultural contexts, from ancient times to the present. With 55 experts from academic disciplines such as history, religion studies, art history, anthropology and philosophy, the work represents inclusive narratives and aims to generate new cultural history questions,

Volume 1: Pre-Classical Age

Volume 2: The Classical Age

Volume 3: The Post-Classical Age

Volume 4: The Age of Empires

Volume 5: The Age of Late Colonialism

Volume 6: The Age of Independence

Themes (and chapter titles are): sources of authority; defining body and mind; social organization and everyday norms; identity, difference and dialogue; politics and power; visual Culture; lineages and emerging exemplars and movements; and hinduism in global context.

A Cultural History of Hinduism

Volume 1: Pre-Classical Age

Volume 2: The Classical Age

Volume 3: The Post-Classical Age

Volume 4: The Age of Empires

Volume 5: The Age of Late Colonialism

Volume 6: The Age of Independence

A Cultural History of the Home

A Cultural History of the Home provides a comprehensive survey of the domestic space from ancient times to the present. Spanning 2800 years, the six volumes explore how different cultures and societies have established, developed and used the home. It reveals a great deal about how people have lived day-to-day in a range of regions and epochs by providing a historical focus on the location in which they will have spent much of their time: the domestic space.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Generously illustrated, the full six-volume set combines to present the most detailed survey available on the home in history.

A Cultural History of the Home

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Generously illustrated, the full six-volume set combines to present the most detailed survey available on the home in history.

A Cultural History of the Human Body

A Cultural History of the Human Body presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. This set of six volumes covers 2800 years of the human body as a physical, social, spiritual and cultural object.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: 1. Birth and Death 2. Health and Disease 3. Sex & Sexuality 4. Medical Knowledge and Technology 5. Popular Beliefs 6. Beauty and Concepts of the Ideal 7. Marked Bodies I: Gender, Race, Class, Age, Disability and Disease 8. Marked Bodies II: the Bestial, the Divine and the Natural 9. Cultural Representations of the Body 10. The Self and Society.

A Cultural History of the Human Body

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Ideas

How has the nature of ideas evolved over time? How have ideas been shaped, employed and received in different social and cultural contexts? In a work that spans 2,800 years, these ambitious questions are addressed by 62 experts, each contributing an overview of a particular theme in a specific period in history. The volumes explore the development of ideas , primarily in the West, from a range of disciplinary angles.

Volume 1: Classical Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Knowledge; The Human Self; Ethics and Social Relations; Politics and Economies; Nature; Religion and the Divine; Language, Poetry and Rhetoric; The Arts; History.

A Cultural History of Ideas

Volume 1: Classical Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Knowledge; The Human Self; Ethics and Social Relations; Politics and Economies; Nature; Religion and the Divine; Language, Poetry and Rhetoric; The Arts; History.

A Cultural History of Insects

Insects are the form of life most alien to us. Across millennia, insects have been providers and sources of food as well as feared vectors of infection. Particular insect types have come to be associated with beauty, diligence, and social and divine order, whilst others have become symbols of invasion, disease, and social decay. Today, insects are used to create luxury goods, to pollinate crops, to color political rhetoric, and to contribute to modern-day logistics, genetics, and forensics. A Cultural History of Insects reveals how our relationship with insects – in life and in death – is one of our most productive and intimate.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: insect knowledge; insects and disease; insects and food; insect products; insects in mythology and religion; insects as symbols; insects in literature and language; insects in art.

A Cultural History of Insects

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Law

How have legal ideas and institutions affected Western culture? And how has the law itself been shaped by its cultural context? In a work spanning 4,500 years, these questions are addressed by 57 experts, each contributing an authoritative study of a theme applied to a period in history. Supported by detailed case material and over 230 illustrations, the volumes examine trends and nuances of the culture of law in Western societies from antiquity to the present.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Reform

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: Justice; Constitution; Codes; Agreements; Arguments; Property and Possession; Wrongs; and the Legal Profession.

A Cultural History of Law

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Reform

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: Justice; Constitution; Codes; Agreements; Arguments; Property and Possession; Wrongs; and the Legal Profession.

A Cultural History of Leisure

A Cultural History of Leisure presents historians, and scholars and students of related fields, with the first comprehensive and interdisciplinary overview of the cultural history of leisure from ancient times to modernity. With six highly illustrated volumes covering 2,500 years, this is the definitive reference work on the subject.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume adopts the same thematic structure, covering: the idea of leisure; the performing arts and their audiences; the cerebral arts and their publics; sports and games; holydays, holidays and tourism; the world of conviviality; the world of goods; the world of nature and representations of leisure, enabling readers to trace one theme throughout history, as well as gaining a thorough overview of each individual period.

A Cultural History of Leisure

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Love

In a work spanning 2,500 years, 55 experts examine the meaning of love: what it feels like, how it should be expressed on the body and in language, its representation in art and literature, its explanation by theology and by science, and who should experience it (and towards whom).

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The six volumes cover: 1 - Antiquity (500 BCE - 400 CE); 2 - Middle Ages (400 - 1400); 3 - Early Modern Age (1400 - 1700); 4 - Age of Enlightenment (1700 - 1800); 5 - Age of Empire (1800 - 1900); 6 - Modern Age (1900 - present).

A Cultural History of Love

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Marriage

How have ideas of marriage evolved in Western culture? How has its influence changed, and been shaped by its social and cultural conditions? In a work that spans 2,500 years, these ambitious questions are addressed by 52 experts, each contributing their overview of a theme applied to a period in history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance and Early Modern

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The volumes describe the role of marriage, its contributions to society, and how it engages with matters of religion, law, society and love.

A Cultural History of Marriage

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance and Early Modern

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The volumes describe the role of marriage, its contributions to society, and how it engages with matters of religion, law, society and love.

A Cultural History of Mathematics

Numeracy has shaped human history as much as literacy: mathematics has enabled us to measure the cosmos, control the Earth, and create all technological change. A Cultural History of Mathematics presents the first comprehensive and global history from antiquity to today.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Eighteenth Century

Volume 5: The Nineteenth Century

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: everyday numeracy; practice & profession; inventing mathematics; mathematics & worldviews; describing & understanding the world; mathematics & technological change; representing mathematics.

A Cultural History of Mathematics

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Eighteenth Century

Volume 5: The Nineteenth Century

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Medicine

How has our understanding of medicine evolved over the past 2,500 years? A Cultural History of Medicine, as the first comprehensive and interdisciplinary overview of the cultural history of medicine from ancient times to modernity, discusses this. With six highly illustrated volumes covering 2500 years of human history, this is the definitive reference work on the subject.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Environment; Food; Disease; Animals; Objects; Experiences; the Mind; Authority.

A Cultural History of Medicine

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Environment; Food; Disease; Animals; Objects; Experiences; the Mind; Authority.

A Cultural History of Memory

How has understanding of memory evolved over the past 2,500 years? How has our collective memory been influenced and expressed by politics, culture, philosophy and science? In a work that spans over 2,500 years, these ambitious questions are addressed by 64 experts, each contributing their overview of a theme applied to a period in history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: the Eighteenth Century

Volume 5: The Nineteenth Century

Volume 6: The Long Twentieth Century

The volumes situate our understanding of memory within a variety of historical contexts, looking to art and science alike to determine how it has changed in Western society since Antiquity.

A Cultural History of Memory

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: the Eighteenth Century

Volume 5: The Nineteenth Century

Volume 6: The Long Twentieth Century

The volumes situate our understanding of memory within a variety of historical contexts, looking to art and science alike to determine how it has changed in Western society since Antiquity.

A Cultural History of Money

In a work that spans 4,500 years, 54 experts capture money's complexities in both substance and form.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes (and chapter titles) are: Money and its Technologies; Money and its Ideas; Money, Ritual, and Religion; Money and the Everyday; Money, Art, and Representation; Money and its Interpretation; Money and the Issues of the Age.

A Cultural History of Money

In a work that spans 4,500 years, 54 experts capture money's complexities in both substance and form.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Objects

How have objects have been created, used, interpreted and set loose in the world over the last 2500 years? Over this time, the West has developed particular attitudes to the material world, at the centre of which is the idea of the object. This set brings together over 50 scholars, in 1776 pages, to examine how the world of human subjects shapes and is shaped by the world of material objects.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The themes (and chapter titles) are: Objecthood; Technology; Economic Objects; Everyday Objects; Art; Architecture; Bodily Objects; Object Worlds. The six volumes cover: 1 – Antiquity (500 BCE to 500 CE); 2 – Medieval Age (500 to 1400); 3 – Renaissance (1400 to 1600); 4 – Age of Enlightenment (1600 to 1760); 5 – Age of Industry (1760 to 1900); 6 – Modern Age (1900 to the present).

A Cultural History of Objects

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Peace

A Cultural History of Peace presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. The set of six volumes covers a span of 2500 years, tracing how different cultures and societies have thought about, struggled for, developed and sustained peace in different ways and at different times.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: Definitions of Peace, Human Nature, Peace and War, Peace, War and Gender,Peace, Pacifism and Religion, Representations of Peace, Peace as Integration, Peace Movements, Peace, Security and Deterrence.

A Cultural History of Peace

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Plants

A Cultural History of Plants presents a global exploration of how plants have shaped human culture. Covering the last 12,000 years, it is the definitive history of how we have cultivated, traded, classified, and altered plants and how, in turn, plants have influenced our ideas of luxury and wealth, health and well-being, art and architecture.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The themes (and chapter titles) are: Plants as Staple Foods; Plants as Luxury Foods; Trade and Exploration; Plant Technology and Science; Plants and Medicine; Plants in Culture; Plants as Natural Ornaments; The Representation of Plants.

A Cultural History of Plants

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Race

How have definitions of race varied and changed over time? What impact have religion, science and politics had on race throughout history, and how has our concept of it been changed as a result? These ambitious questions are answered by 61 experts who - drawing on perspectives from history, sociology, anthropology, literature and medical humanities - deepen our understanding of how race has developed conceptually and in reality between antiquity and the present day.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Individual volume editors ensure the cohesion of the whole, and to make it as easy as possible to use, chapter titles are identical across each of the volumes.

A Cultural History of Race

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Individual volume editors ensure the cohesion of the whole, and to make it as easy as possible to use, chapter titles are identical across each of the volumes.

A Cultural History of the Sea

Throughout history, how has the sea served as a site for cross-cultural exchange, trade and migration? As historians, how do the fields of naval history, maritime history and oceanic history intersect? 56 experts, 48 chapters and over 1,700 pages explore how representation and understanding of the sea has developed over 2,500 years of cultural and natural history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Global Age

Each volumes adopts the same thematic structure, covering: Knowledges, Practices, Networks, Islands and Shores, Travelers, Representation, Imaginary Worlds, and Conflicts, enabling readers to trace one theme throughout history, as well as gaining a thorough overview of each individual period.

A Cultural History of the Sea

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Global Age

A Cultural History of the Senses

What did the past sound like, taste like, smell like? How did it look and feel? How did people make sense of the world through their senses? A Cultural History of the Senses delves into the sensory foundations of Western civilization and provides a broad understanding of the life of the senses from antiquity to the modern day.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: The Social Life of the Senses; Urban Sensations; The Senses in the Marketplace; The Senses in Religion; The Senses in Philosophy and Science; Medicine and the Senses; The Senses in Literature; Art and the Senses; and Sensory Media.

A Cultural History of the Senses

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Sexuality

A Cultural History of Sexuality presents an overarching survey from ancient times to the present. With six volumes covering 2800 years, this is the most authoritative history of sexuality in all its many forms across Western cultures.

Volume 1: The Classical World

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: 1. Heterosexuality; 2. Homosexuality; 3. Sexual Variations; 4. Sex Religion, and the Law; 5. Sex, Medicine and Disease; 6. Sex, Popular Beliefs and Culture; 7. Prostitution; 8. Erotica. This means readers can either have a broad overview of a period by reading a volume or follow a theme through history by reading the relevant chapter in each volume.

A Cultural History of Sexuality

Volume 1: The Classical World

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Shopping

How has the activity of shopping changed over the centuries? And what does it tell us about the lives and interests of people living within different cultures? In a work that spans 2,500 years, these questions are addressed by 55 experts, each contributing an overview of a theme applied to a period in history. With the help of a broad range of case material they illustrate broad trends and nuances of the culture of shopping from antiquity to the present.

Volume 1: The Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Revolution And Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Themes and chapter titles are: Practices and Processes; Spaces and Places; Shoppers and Identities; Luxury and Everyday; Home and Family; Visual and Literary Representations; Reputation, Trust and Credit; and Governance, Regulation and the State.

A Cultural History of Shopping

Volume 1: The Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Revolution And Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Slavery and Human Trafficking

With coverage extending from prehistory to the modern day these six highly illustrated, interdisciplinary volumes are the first definitive reference work covering the cultural history of slavery and human trafficking.

Volume 1: Ancient World

Volume 2: Pre-Modern Era

Volume 3: Age of Encounters

Volume 4: Age of Empire

Volume 5: Age of Global Conflict

Volume 6: Age of Globalization

Bringing together an international cast of over 60 contributors, each volume adopts the same thematic structure, covering: definitions and ideologies of slavery and trafficking; slavery, trafficking, and the law; political cultures; coercive laboring economies; social organization, culture, and ritual; gender, enslavement, and trafficking; age, enslavement, and trafficking; and anti-slavery, anti-trafficking, and abolition outcomes. This model supports readers in tracing one theme throughout history, as well as providing them with a thorough overview of each individual period.

A Cultural History of Slavery and Human Trafficking

Volume 1: Ancient World

Volume 2: Pre-Modern Era

Volume 3: Age of Encounters

Volume 4: Age of Empire

Volume 5: Age of Global Conflict

Volume 6: Age of Globalization

A Cultural History of Sport

From gladiatorial combat to knightly tournaments and from hunting to games and gambling, sport has been central to human culture. A Cultural History of Sport presents the first extensive history from classical antiquity to today, covering all forms and aspects of sport.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Chapter titles are identical across each of the volumes. This gives the choice of reading about a specific period in one of the volumes, or following a theme across history by reading the relevant chapter in each of the six. The themes (and chapter titles) are: The Purpose of Sport; Sporting Time and Sporting Space; Products, Training and Technology; Rules and Order; Conflict and Accommodation; Inclusion, Exclusion and Segregation; Minds, Bodies and Identities; Representation.

A Cultural History of Sport

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Industry

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Theatre

A Cultural History of Theatre presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. The set of six volumes covers a span of 2,500 years, tracing the complexity of the interactions between theatre and culture.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: Institutional Frameworks; Social Functions; Sexuality and Gender; The Environment of Theatre; Circulation; Interpretations; Communities of Production; Repertoire and Genres; Technologies of Performance; Knowledge Transmission: Media and Memory.

A Cultural History of Theatre

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Tragedy

How have ideas of the tragic influenced Western culture? How has tragedy been shaped by its social and cultural conditions? In a work that spans 2,500 years, these ambitious questions are addressed by 55 experts, each contributing their overview of a theme applied to a period in history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Extending far beyond the established aesthetic tradition, the volumes describe the forms tragedy takes to represent human conflict and suffering, and how it engages with matters of philosophy, society, politics, religion and gender.

A Cultural History of Tragedy

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Western Empires

A Cultural History of Western Empires presents historians, and scholars and students of related fields, with the first comprehensive and interdisciplinary overview of the cultural history of empire from ancient times to modernity.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: War; Trade; Natural Worlds; Labor; Mobility; Sexuality; Resistance; and Race.

A Cultural History of Western Empires

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: War; Trade; Natural Worlds; Labor; Mobility; Sexuality; Resistance; and Race.

A Cultural History of Western Music

Music has been significant in social, religious, and political ritual, and in education, art, and entertainment in all human cultures from antiquity to today. The Cultural History of Western Music presents the first study of music in all its forms – ritual, classical, popular and commercial – from antiquity to today. The work is divided into 6 volumes, with each volume covering the same topics, so readers can either study a period/volume or follow a topic across history.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Industrial Age

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The topics are identity, communities and society; changing philosophies and ideas about music; politics and power; musical exchange and knowledge transfer between the West and the non-West; musical education; popular culture and musical entertainment; the places, practices, and experiences of performance; and the development of music technologies and media.

A Cultural History of Western Music

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Industrial Age

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Women

A Cultural History of Women presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. With six volumes covering 2500 years, this is the most authoritative history available of women in Western cultures.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: the Life Cycle; Bodies and Sexuality; Religion and Popular Beliefs; Medicine and Disease; Public and Private Worlds; Education and Work; Power; and Artistic Representation.

A Cultural History of Women

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Middle Ages

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Work

Winner of the 2020 PROSE Award for Multivolume Reference/Humanities

How has our relationship with ‘work’ changed for different cultures over the centuries? What effect has it had on politics, art and religion? In a work that spans 2,500 years these ambitious questions are addressed by 63 experts, each contributing their overview of a theme applied to a period in history. With the help of a broad range of case material they illustrate broad trends and nuances of the culture of work in Western culture from antiquity to the present.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

Each volume discusses the same themes in its chapters: The Economy of Work; Picturing Work; Work and Workplaces; Workplace Cultures; Work, Skill and Technology; Work and Mobility; The Political Culture of Work; and Work and Leisure.

A Cultural History of Work

Winner of the 2020 PROSE Award for Multivolume Reference/Humanities

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Early Modern Age

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

A Cultural History of Youth

These six highly-illustrated volumes provide the first truly global, interdisciplinary history of youth covering the last 2,500 years. Leading scholars from around the world have leant their expertise to create an innovative resource for historians, and scholars and students of related fields.

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age

The themes (and chapter titles) are: Concepts of Youth; Spaces and Places; Education and Work; Leisure and Play; Emotions; Gender, Sexuality and the Body; Belief and Ideology; Authority and Agency; War and Conflict; and Towards a Global History.

A Cultural History of Youth

Volume 1: Antiquity

Volume 2: The Medieval Age

Volume 3: The Renaissance

Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment

Volume 5: The Age of Empire

Volume 6: The Modern Age