![]() Like another one of these heroes, Dante, Cahill consigns certain of his own contemporaries into a rhetorical hell, notably George W. Especially important to these trends were “enveloping, energizing” misfits such as Peter Abelard, Thomas Aquinas, Francis of Assisi, the painter Giotto, the friar-scientist Roger Bacon and the mystic/nun Hildegard. ![]() But he reminds us that the period also saw Greek natural philosophy intertwine with Christian “incarnationalism,” which, by seeking God’s truth in human form, revived natural science and produced greater artistic realism in depicting the body. To be sure, he criticizes the period’s kings and most popes for spreading authoritarianism and corruption. ![]() In this fourth of a projected seven-volume series, “Hinges of History,” Cahill ( Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea, 2003, etc.) takes issue with the stereotypical depiction of the 12th to early-14th centuries as the superstitious Dark Ages. A prodigiously gifted popularizer of Western philosophical and religious thought spotlights exemplary Christians in the High Middle Ages. ![]()
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