The Materiality of Devotion in Late Medieval Northern Europe

Book excerpt: This volume explores aspects of the devotional world of late medieval northern Europe, with a special emphasis on how people interacted with texts, images, artifacts, and other instruments of piety at the level of the senses. The book focuses on the materiality of medieval religion and the manner in which Christians were encouraged to engage their senses in their devotional practices: gazing, hearing, touching, tasting, and committing to memory. In so doing, it brings together the ideals of medieval mystical writing and the increasingly tangible and material practice of piety, which would become characteristic of the period. [Subject: History, Medieval Studies, European Studies, Religious Studies]