Award-winning, The Word in Action. Art, Ritual, and Civic Identity in Medieval South Italy, Published

James Huemoeller helped illustrate a new book by Princeton professor Nino Zchomelidse. The following is a description provided by the publisher, Penn State University Press (link):

In Art, Ritual, and Civic Identity in Medieval Southern Italy, Nino Zchomelidse examines the complex and dynamic roles played by the monumental ambo, the Easter candlestick, and the liturgical scroll in southern Italy and Sicily from the second half of the tenth century, when the first such liturgical scrolls emerged, until the first decades of the fourteenth century, when the last monumental Easter candlestick was made. Through the use of these objects, the interior of the church was transformed into the place of the story of salvation, making the events of the Bible manifest. By linking rites and setting, liturgical furnishings could be used to stage a variety of biblical events, in accordance with specific feast days. Examining the interaction of liturgical performance and the ecclesiastical stage, this book explores the creation, function, and evolution of church furnishings and manuscripts.

Reconstruction of the Various Churches

The book was a 2015 winner of the Howard R. Marraro prize from the American Catholic Historical Association. Click here for more information on the prize. Some comments from the jury:

This beautifully-produced book offers an in-depth and fascinating portrait of the Easter liturgical celebration in medieval southern Italy, based on a study of ecclesiastical furnishings and manuscripts produced between the 10th-14th centuries.  Zchomelidse’s interdisciplinary analysis focused on ambos, monumental candlestick holders, and exultet rolls brings to life the theatrical reenactment of Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection during Easter week, as well as the changes brought to the liturgical practices in the Norman and Angevin eras.

Studies of the plan representations.