The Goddess Fortuna In Mediaeval Literature

by Howard Rollin Patch

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

252 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1927

About the author

1889-1963

Reviews

[Angela Boord · Rating 4 out of 5]

Utterly unsure how to rate this book, which I read for research. It’s well-written, though dated. Apparently in 1915 many, many more people could read both German and Latin, as he rarely translates anything. The way he connects the ancient worship of Fortune to the continued acceptance of Fortune as an idea, almost an entity, in the Christian Middle Ages is interesting.

[Grzegorz · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you ever read medieval works and think "Fortuna sure shows up a lot" as I did, then this book might be interesting. This book covers all aspects of her many appearances in medieval stories from the pagan leftover, to a servant of demons, or a servant of God, or some kind of in-between. It also really makes clear how important Boethius was to the medieval mind.

Minus one star because if you can't read Latin, French, and Italian then the sources that Patch quotes won't make much sense to you.

[Ally · Rating 5 out of 5]

Patch is the goattttt!!

Would’ve liked some translations tho not everyone knows German, Latin, French, Italian, and Oromo.

[Edelweiss · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really don't know how to review this book. While I did find it interesting, and I learned alot about fortune, the conclusion that her cult still exits today, even though he does not mean it so, sounds a little paranoid. I would also say that if you are reading closely, you should be able to read or translate Latin, French, old/middle English (I could understand it by sounding it out and thinking about the Canterbury Tales), German (mainly footnotes), and Italian. Patch cites well and very often, but rarely in English, so though I feel I learned, I also think that I missed a couple main points.

[Zaheer Khan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is lucidly written. It brilliantly and passionately explains the story of the Goddess Fortuna.