Medieval and Modern Philologies

Series | Medieval and Modern Philologies
Volume 7 | Edited book | The Bible in Medieval Germanic Literatures

The Bible in Medieval Germanic Literatures

open access

Abstract
It is certainly a cliché to state that the Bible is the fundamental text of Western culture. The fact that it is a cliché, however, does not make the assertion any less true: throughout the medieval era, the biblical text is the indispensable foundation of socially accepted beliefs, it is a model of ethical behaviour, it is a repertoire of exemplary stories that allow us to assign meaning to historical events as well as to everyday life. The participation of the Germanic peoples in the construction of the European cultural system, from late antiquity to the modern age, is traversed and pervaded by the processes of translation, reworking and reuse of the books of the Old and New Testaments. The contributions collected in this volume offer interesting and often original contributions to the many areas of discussion on the biblical text, thus inserting the reflections of Italian Germanic philologists into the broader international debate and contributing significantly to its development and deepening.

Permalink http://doi.org/10.14277/978-88-6969-021-1 | e-ISBN 978-88-6969-021-1 | ISBN (PRINT) 978-88-6969-021-1 | Published May 27, 2015 | Language it