This series draws on selections of papers from tightly knit themes or sessions at one

or more of the annual International Medieval Congresses, or from the special strand

that is a feature of each IMC. The IMC at the University of Leeds in July 2005 took

'Youth and Age' as its special thematic strand. This volume draws on a selection

of papers from a series of sessions within this special thematic strand and is

supplemented by commissioned papers. All papers are fully peer-reviewed.

The essays in this collection present new research into a variety of questions on

birth, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, middle age, and old age, ordered in a

more or less chronological manner according to the life cycle. The volume exposes

attitudes and representations of the life cycle from the Anglo-Saxon period to the

end of the Middle Ages as being full of inconsistencies as well as definitive

categories, and of variation and stasis. This attests to the fact that medieval

conceptions and representations of the stages of life and their interrelationships

are much more nuanced and less idealized than is usually credited. Medieval

conceptual, mental, artistic, cultural, and sociological processes are scrutinized using

various approaches and methods that cross disciplinary boundaries. What is emphasized

across the volume is that there were varying, context-dependent rhythms of

continuity and change in every stage of life in the medieval period. The volume's

selection of authors is international in scope and represents some of the leading current

scholarship in the field.