Kathryn L. Smithies, Introducing the Medieval Ass. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2020, xv, 163 pp., 7 b/w ill.

Abstract

Even if we might not think much about the ass within the spectrum of medieval culture and nature, it was closely associated already with Jesus, being one of the animals in the shed where he was born. And later, when the savior rode into Jerusalem, he used an ass as a symbol of his humility. Agriculture and the transportation system during antiquity and the Middle Ages, and actually far beyond, cannot be imagined without this beast, and in times of need, such as in crusades, the ass was also eaten. Not surprisingly, the ass also appears almost ubiquitously in fable literature and in the visual arts serving as a symbolic animal. We find some references to the ass in the Lexikon des Mittelalters or in dictionaries of symbols (Hans Biedermann, Knaur Lexikon der Symbole, 1989; Christoph Wetzel, Das grosse Lexikon der Symbole, 2008), but it proves difficult to identify any major study on this animal. However, it’s use in Christianity, in fairy tales, symbolism, and elsewhere is quite well covered in the German online article at <uri href="https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hausesel">https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hausesel</uri> (last accessed on Feb. 2, 2021). But all this is now, more or less, superseded by Kathryn L. Smithies’s at first sight quite pleasant, unpretentious, but informative study. As she points out right away, the ass appeared as a rather ambiguous animal, being mocked at, despised, praised, idealized, and ridiculed again, all depending on the context and the intention of the artist or narrator.