Registration for in person participation are now closed. To participate online, please register at events@roma.uio.no before 31 October at 12 hrs.
Abstract:
Was the distinction of genders part of the original perfection? Were Adam and Eve meant to have sex in the Garden Eden? Were they married in paradise? Is sex a gift from God or a temptation from the devil? Was forbidden fruit sexuality? During the Middle Ages these questions were highly significant. To attempt to answer them meant to clarify the role of sexuality in God’s plan and shape the concept of the sacrament of marriage. During the 16th century, the European religious landscape had radically changed, and the discussion of sex in paradise became part of the controversies that divided Latin Christianity. The tensions and ambiguities of medieval attitudes towards human sexuality emerged in different forms.
About the lecturer: 
Since 2007 Alessandro Scafi has lectured on Medieval and Renaissance Cultural history at the Warburg Institute, University of London (after eight years of teaching at Bologna University). He is the author of several books on the mapping of the biblical Garden of Eden in the Western tradition (including Mapping Paradise: A History of Heaven on Earth, London and Chicago, 2006, Italian ed.: Milan, 2007; Maps of Paradise, London and Chicago, 2013, German ed.: Darmstadt, 2015), and on various aspects of the history of cartography and the history of pilgrimage. His research interests include Aby Warburg, the relationship between the Italian and Hungarian Renaissances, Italian art and literature, in particular Dante and Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini. He has also authored publications intended for a wider readership, for example on the design of the European single currency (Milan, 2009), a survey on journeys to paradise and visions of the otherworld (Palermo, 2011), and an autobiographical novel (Milan 2022). Since 2011 he has run a series of Dante public readings aimed at a general public.