New perspectives on early globalisms from objects and images
Tales Things Tell offers new perspectives on histories of connectivity
between Africa, Asia, and Europe in the period before the Mongol
conquests of the thirteenth century. Reflected in objects and materials
whose circulation and reception defined aesthetic, economic, and
technological networks that existed outside established political and
sectarian boundaries, many of these histories are not documented in the
written sources on which historians usually rely. Tales Things Tell
charts bold new directions in art history, making a compelling case for
the archival value of mobile artifacts and images in reconstructing the
past.
In this beautifully illustrated book, Finbarr Barry Flood and Beate
Fricke present six illuminating case studies from the sixth to the
thirteenth centuries to show how portable objects mediated the mobility
of concepts, iconographies, and techniques. The case studies range from
metalwork to stone reliefs, manuscript paintings, and objects using
natural materials such as coconut and rock crystal. Whether as booty,
commodities, gifts, or souvenirs, many of the objects discussed in
Tales Things Tell functioned as sources of aesthetic, iconographic, or
technical knowledge in the lands in which they came to rest. Remapping
the histories of exchange between medieval Islam and Christendom, from
Europe to the Indian Ocean, Tales Things Tell ventures beyond standard
narratives drawn from written archival records to demonstrate the value
of objects and images as documents of early globalisms.
