Newhauser R. The Early History of Greed: The Sin of Avarice in Early Medieval Thought and Literature

New York, "Cambridge University Press", 2004, -264 p.The history of avarice as the deadliest vice in western Europe has been said to begin in earnest only with the rise of capitalism or, earlier, the rise of a money economy. In this first full-length study of the early history of greed, Richard Newhauser shows that avaritia, the sin of greed for possessions, has a much longer history, and is more important for an understanding of the Middle Ages, than has previously been allowed. His examination of theological and literary texts composed between the first century C.E. and the tenth century reveals new significance in the portrayal of various kinds of greed, to the extent that by the early Middle Ages avarice was available to head the list of vices for authors engaged in the task of converting others frompagan materialism to Christian spirituality.RICHARD NEWHAUSER is Professor of English at Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas. He is author of The Treatise on Vices and Virtues in Latin and the Vernacular (1993) and A Catalogue of Latin Texts with Material on the Vices and Virtues in Manuscripts in Hungary (1996). He was recently awarded fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation/American Council of Learned Societies, the National Humanities Center (through the Lilly Endowment), and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to continue his work on the history of avarice.