Suicide in the Middle Ages: Volume 2
Subtitle: The Curse on Self-Murder
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Published: July 17, 2000
Language: eng
Number of pages: 644
ISBN-13: 9780198207313
Description: A group of men dig a tunnel under the threshold of a house.   then they go and fetch a heavy, sagging object from inside the house, pull it out through the tunnel, and put it on a cow-hide to be dragged off and thrown into the offal-pit.   Why should the corpse of a suicide - for that is what it was - have earned this unusual treatment?   In this second volume of Alexander Murray's  'Suicide in the Middle Ages', the author explores the origin of the condemnation of suicide.  The  quest leads along the byways of medieval theology, law, mythology, and folklore - indeed, in some instances far beyond them.  At an epoch when there might be plenty of ostensible reasons for not wanting to live, the ways used to block the suicidal escape route give a unique perspective on medieval religion.
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