A lively and magisterial popular history that refutes common misperceptions of the European Middle Ages, showing the beauty and communion that flourished alongside the dark brutality—a brilliant reflection of humanity itself.The word “medieval” conjures images of the “Dark Ages”—centuries of ignorance, superstition, stasis, savagery, and poor hygiene. But the myth of darkness obscures the truth; this was a remarkable period in human history. The Bright Ages recasts the European Middle Ages for what it was, capturing this 1,000-year era in all its complexity and fundamental humanity, bringing to light both its beauty and its horrors.  The Bright Ages takes us through ten centuries and crisscrosses Europe and the Mediterranean, Asia and Africa, revisiting familiar people and events with new light cast upon them. We look with fresh eyes on the Fall of Rome, Charlemagne, the Vikings, the Crusades, and the Black Death, but also to the multi-religious experience of Iberia, the rise of Byzantium, and the genius of Hildegard and the power of queens. We begin under a blanket of golden stars constructed by an empress with Germanic, Roman, Spanish, Byzantine, and Christian bloodlines and end nearly 1,000 years later with the poet Dante—inspired by that same twinkling celestial canopy—writing an epic saga of heaven and hell that endures as a masterpiece of literature today.   The Bright Ages reminds us just how permeable our manmade borders have always been and of what possible worlds the past has always made available to us. The Middle Ages may have been a world “lit only by fire” but it was one whose torches illuminated the magnificent rose windows of cathedrals, even as they stoked the pyres of accused heretics.   The Bright Ages is illustrated throughout with high-resolution images. 

In English. [xxxvi], 464, [2] p., index, bibliography, and map. Vol. XXIX of Cornell studies in Classical Philology. The Attalids of Pergamon. Of the large circle of scholars and writers who enjoyed the patron- age of the Attalids only a few seem to have directed their attention to the history of the dynasty. Lysimachus, the tutor of Attalus I, wrote an account of the education of his royal pupil (περί παιδείας Aттáλου), a work the historical value of which was, however, compromised by its strong tendency to adulation (Athen. VI 252c; FHG. III, p. 2 = F. Gr. Hist. II B, p. 895). Another member of the same literary group, Neanthes, who came from Cyzicus, the birthplace of the wife of Attalus... / Four main rivers drain the western slope of Asia Minor, the Caïcus, the Hermus, the Caÿster, and the Maeander. The Caïcus, the northernmost, now called the Bakir-Tschaï, is also the shortest, its total course measuring only about fifty miles. The fertile plain through which the river flows, forming the southwestern part of ancient Mysia, is enclosed on all sides by mountains. On the north rises the great massif of the Madaras-Dag, a spur from which, projecting to the southwest, was known in antiquity as the Pindasus. To the west of this ridge a broken mountain mass extends to the coast,... / Table of Contents.; List of Abbreviations (pp. xiv-xvi).; Introduction (pp. xvii-xxi).; [Illustrations] (pp. xxii-xxii).; CHAPTER I The Valley of the Caïcus.; CHAPTER II The Principate of Philetaerus and of Eumenes I.; CHAPTER III The Reign of Attalus I.; CHAPTER IV The Reign of Eumenes II.; CHAPTER V The Last Years of the Dynasty (pp. 130-165).; CHAPTER VI The Kingdom of the Attalids (pp. 166-233).; CHAPTER VII The Building Activity of the Attalids (pp. 234-298).;

Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandant finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading. Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future. Except the discovery of their bond would mean death for each of them. There's still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war.

From New York Times bestselling author and National Book Award finalist, Traci Chee, comes a Japanese-influenced fantasy brimming with demons, adventure, and plans gone awry. In the realm of Awara, where gods, monsters, and humans exist side by side, Miuko is an ordinary girl resigned to a safe, if uneventful, existence as an innkeeper’s daughter. But when Miuko is cursed and begins to transform into a demon with a deadly touch, she embarks on a quest to reverse the curse and return to her normal life. Aided by a thieving magpie spirit and continuously thwarted by a demon prince, Miuko must outfox tricksters, escape demon hunters, and negotiate with feral gods if she wants to make it home again. But with her transformation comes power and freedom she never even dreamed of, and she’ll have to decide if saving her soul is worth trying to cram herself back into an ordinary life that no longer fits her… and perhaps never did.