The mineral and the visual: precious stones in medieval secular culture

Abstract

"Examines the social roles, cultural meanings, and active agency of precious stones in jeweled crowns, illustrated lapidaries, and illustrated travel accounts in the European Middle Ages"--

Contents

Jeweled crowns, mineralized kingship. The politics of precious stones ; Inventing mineral sovereignty ; Gothic regal materiality -- Lapidary knowledge in word and image. A royal pursuit ; Optical mineralogy and lithic magic ; Of stones, sigils, and stars -- Geographies of mineral marvels, economies of mineral assets. Edenic geology and surplus ; Mineral realism in the global thirteenth century ; Networks of gem trade.