Breaking and Shaping Beastly Bodies

Animals as Material Culture in the Middle Ages

Exploring how animals were not only sources of food and labour in the Middle Ages, but also vital raw materials that shaped medieval life in creative, symbolic and practical ways

The 16 chapters in this book examines how animal bodies were transformed into objects such as clothing, tools, devotional items, household goods, and works of art, and how these processes of cutting, crafting, preserving and reshaping gave animal materials new meanings. It looks at everything from bone, horn, skin and fur to more unusual materials, showing how deeply embedded animals were in medieval economies, technologies and belief systems.

By focusing on animals as “material culture,” the book highlights the skill of medieval craftspeople, the movement of materials through trade networks, and the cultural and religious ideas attached to animal products. It also encourages readers to think about the ethical, symbolic and emotional dimensions of using animal bodies in everyday and sacred contexts. The contributors offer a vivid picture of how human-animal relationships in the Middle Ages were expressed not only in texts and images, but in the very objects people made, used and valued.

Published by Oxbow in 2007.

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