site.btaBulgarian Academy of Sciences Hosts Exhibition about Medieval Readings

An exhibition about reading during the Middle Ages was opened at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. The idea of ​​the show is to review the repertoire of reading materials between the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries, and see what these texts teach about the world, and about different areas of life, said Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nina Gagova at the opening.

The exhibition was prepared by a team of scholars, specialists in Old Bulgarian Literature from the Institute of Literature at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. The designer of the exhibition is Milena Valnarova.

The exhibition features posters and texts richly illustrated with documentary photographs, which reveal curious aspects of the functions and value of words in the context of Christian culture. It consists of twenty posters and contains information, little known to the non-initiated, about the creation and distribution of medieval books, individual authors and copyists, the personal library of Tsar Ivan-Alexander, the reading interests of educated women in the Middle Ages, and the story collections that were on the rise in the 18th century.

The authors of the exposition acquaint the visitors with the cosmographic and geographical-ethnographic ideas of the Middle Ages, with the medical knowledge and recommendations for prevention and healthy living, with the ideas of the people of that era about the afterlife, the miracles of the saints, the role and benefits of history, exotic zoology, predicting the future, etc. The thematic range of medieval readings for the laity was surprisingly wide and interesting, according to researchers.

The exhibition "Reading for the Laity in the Late Middle Ages (XIV-XVIII Centuries)" can be seen until April 15 at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.