Description
A striking commonality of both Chinese and Byzantine societies from the 10th to the 14th centuries was a renewed interest in embodying and emulating the ideas, values and civilisation of classical antiquity. This volume of contributions from leading scholars of middle period China and Byzantium investigates the broad transcultural phenomenon of classicising engagement that goes beyond particular genres and disciplines. It examines a broad range of textual practices as well as considering classicising learning as practices that involved visual and material culture, and that took place in such diverse domains as the transmission and teaching of scientific knowledge, the education of women, religious ritual and rites of healing, burial practices and landscape painting. Through these investigations, the collection enhances our understanding of the imaginative power of antiquity in diverse spheres of intellectual and cultural life in both China and Byzantium.