Noeli Dutra ROSSATTO

Original title: Um escrito polêmico de Arnaldo de Vilanova (1242-1311)

Published in The Medieval Aesthetics

Keywords: Arnold of Vilanova, Crown of Aragon, Franciscans, Joachim of Fiore, Middle Ages.

I present to the reader the translation of the text De gladius iugulans thomatistas (The sword that slaughters the thomatists) of the Catalan philosopher, doctor and alchemist Arnold of Vilanova (1242-1311). The text teaches the tension between the ideas of the Spiritual Franciscans of the Late Middle Ages, usually linked to the thought of the Calabrian Abbot Joachim of Fiore (12th century) and the scholasticism of the Dominicans. From the contact of Arnold of Vilanova with the Aragonese Court, we have the link between three important themes for the current studies of the presence of medieval political ideas in Latin-American colonial: the Feasts of the Empire of the Divine of Luso-Brazilian tradition, the Franciscans and the Joachimites. In terms of content, the translated text summarizes the main topics covered in the works of the Catalan philosopher, including: the figurative interpretation of writing and its application to the reading of history, evangelical poverty in Franciscan discussion of using poverty (usus pauper) and the biblical prophecies about the end of time and the coming of the Antichrist.

Rita de Cássia Fucci Amato

Published in The Philosophical Tradition in the Ancient and Medieval World

Keywords: De musica dialogue, musica aesthetics, patristical philosophy.

Marica COSTIGLIOLO

Original title: Uno sguardo sull’alterità tra Medioevo ed Età Moderna. La percezione dell’altro in alcuni testi medievali e moderni (1200-1600)

Published in Mirabilia Journal 34

Keywords: Alterity, Colonialism, Diversity, Islam, Middle Ages, New World, Renaissance.

The concept of otherness is complex and layered. To understand how the Western world has received, rejected, or dominated the Other is crucial for the understanding of the construction of the Western cultural identity and for trying to find the motivations that have brought Europe to a politics of colonialism that has characterized social, economic, and political relations up to modern times. In this short essay I analyse some medieval and modern works to trace the textual strategies that testify the passage from the perception of difference as a possible source of threat, of danger, to its delegitimization to existence and consequently to the “justified” dominion over the other.

Giovanni PATRIARCA

Original title: Escuelas de ábaco. La invención de un lenguaje

Published in Mirabilia Journal 

Keywords: Abacus Schools, Accounting, Economic History, History of Education, History of Mathematics, Linguistic Evolution.

Abacus schools are fundamental for mathematical, geometric and economic literacy as well as for the scientific development of these disciplines with their own sectorial language and style. The Abacus treatises constitute the basis of a solid administrative, accounting and commercial training. In a fruitful exchange with all expressions of society, they become the main engine for the consolidation of a new linguistic koiné.