Biological and behavioral description and analysis of human senses in ecologically relevant circumstances
Optatianus Porfyrius early in the 4th century used word, image, & scale of address in a carmen cancellatum (gridded poem) to bring enlightenment to Roman men. … Read the post carmen cancellatum of Optatianus Porfyrius: words weren’t enough
The travel account of Antoninus of Piacenza is factual in ways completely inconsistent with modern practices of distinguishing between fact and fiction. … Read the post Antoninus of Piacenza's strange sense in the Holy Land
Shipwreck beggars in ancient Rome used pictures. Pictures might have identified a beggar cross-linguistically as being particularly worthy of sympathy. … Read the post shipwreck beggars: popular pictorial communication in ancient Rome
The Smithsonian Museum of American History holds the piece of rock that Lewis Bradford at 4:15 pm on Tuesday, Dec. 28, 1830, chipped off the Plymouth Rock. … Read the post Smithsonian Museum: the matter of history
In addition to producing the Vulgate, Saint Jerome should be more widely recognized for his vituperative skill and use of an obscene gesture. … Read the post Saint Jerome's obscene gesture for fellow theologian Jovinian
Communication between organisms is best understood as ongoing behavioral interactions of a particular formal type within a particular time frame. … Read the post system, not signals, for biological analysis of communication
Through its theatrically enacted bi-narrative, al-Farazdaq’s story of the girls overturns biographical reading of Imruʼ al-Qays’s Muʻallaqah. … Read the post al-Farazdaq realized Imruʼ al-Qays' poetic revelation
In al-Harizi’s Tahkemoni, a go-between promised Heber the Kenite a beautiful, young woman. She tricked him into marrying an ugly, old, poor woman. … Read the post Heber the Kenite sped to the marriage bed
Amid their learned classical references, cleric-scholars’ 12th-century Latin lyrics from the Carmina Burana show carnal love trumping reason. … Read the post cleric-scholars’ Latin lyrics long for bodily action
Christian icons were used spiritually before Islam, continued to be used through Byzantine iconoclasm, and were prevalent in the 9th-century Islamic world. … Read the post Christian icons in Islamic world during Byzantine iconoclasm