La médecine et les sept péchés capitaux

Medicine and the Seven Deadly Sins in Late Medieval Literature and Culture

Virginia Langum

Series: The New Middle Ages

Hardcover: 236 pages

Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan; 1st ed. 2016 edition (September 16, 2016)

Language: English

ISBN-13: 978-1137465580

This book considers how scientists, theologians, priests, and poets approached the relationship of the human body and ethics in the later Middle Ages. Is medicine merely a metaphor for sin? Or can certain kinds of bodies physiologically dispose people to be angry, sad, or greedy? If so, then is it their fault? Virginia Langum offers an account of the medical imagery used to describe feelings and actions in religious and literary contexts, referencing a variety of behavioral discussions within medical contexts. The study draws upon medical and theological writing for its philosophical basis, and upon more popular works of religion, as well as poetry, to show how these themes were articulated, explored, and questioned more widely in medieval culture.