A discussion of the virtues and vices in the Physiologus, with a list of the animals associated with them. "The Physiologus is not an allegorical treatise on virture and vice; nowhere do virtues and vices actually appear appear as personifications either in the text or in the miniatures of any illustrated Physiologus or bestiary. ...the Physiologus uses examples from the natural world to convey lessons in Christian behaviour. The point, of course, is not that birds, beasts, and stones are more virtuous than humans, but that God has provided them as lessons and as warnings for the attentive human to read. ... Of the thirty-six chapters of the Physiologus B-text, most deal, some broadly, some more specifically, with virtue and vice." - Baxter

Language: English

ISBN: 0-691-05036-8