Medicine and the Seven Deadly Sins in Late Medieval Literature and Culture

This book considers howscientists, theologians, priests, and poets approached the relationship of thehuman body and ethics in the later Middle Ages. Is medicine merely a metaphorfor sin? Or can certain kinds of bodies physiologically dispose people to beangry, sad, or greedy? If so, then is it their fault? Virginia Langum offers anaccount of the medical imagery used to describe feelings and actions inreligious and literary contexts, referencing a variety of behavioraldiscussions within medical contexts. The study draws upon medical andtheological writing for its philosophical basis, and upon more popular works ofreligion, as well as poetry, to show how these themes were articulated,explored, and questioned more widely in medieval culture.

Virginia Langum is Associate Professor of English at Umea University, Sweden and Pro Futura Scientia Fellow at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study. She recently edited Words and Matter: The Virgin Mary in Late Medieval and Early Modern Parish Life.

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