Joan
Taylor
Writer and
Historian
Joan Taylor is an Anglo-Danish New Zealander who has
lived in Wivenhoe since 2000. She has written many articles and a number
of books on her specialty subjects of ancient religion (particularly early
Judaism and Christianity) and archaeology, and sometimes appears on
television or radio talking about such topics.
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She was filmed in 2005 in St. Mary’s Church,
Wivenhoe, for In Search of John the Baptist (MPH Entertainment,
History Channel), with the main stained glass window shown as a feature.
Her first book, Christians and the Holy Places (Oxford: Clarendon,
1993) won a prestigious Irene Levi-Sala Prize from Ben
Gurion
University
for a work on Israel’s archaeology, and she continues to write and speak on related subjects
for both academic and popular audiences. She is also a published writer of
poetry and fiction and is part of the organising support
team for poetrywivenhoe (click here
for more information about poetrywivenhoe).
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Joan Taylor’s first novel Conversations with Mr.
Prain, came out in May 2006 (Melville House Publishing/Hardie
Grant). It is a
literary mystery story that explores the relationship between writers and
publishers, art and commerce, as it follows the drama of a young writer,
Stella, who is invited to the country mansion of a wealthy publisher,
Edward Prain, for reasons other than she had supposed (which are stranger
than anyone might think). She is currently writing another novel entitled This Jerusalem, a love story that examines
the fraught situation of the modern city and the ambiguous roles of
foreigners there, past and present.
Her latest book The Englishman, The Moor
and the Holy City: The True Adventures of an Elizabethan Traveller
was published in October 2006 - see below. As the story has a
connection with sea faring, Wivenhoe residents and leading Nottage
Maritime Institute members, Mike Downes and Ian Ward get an
acknowledgment from Joan for their help. Click here
to see her book launch at the Wivenhoe Bookshop.
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Books
- All available for ordering at the Wivenhoe Bookshop (www.
wivenhoebooks.co.uk) or from catalogues under Joan Taylor or Joan E. Taylor |
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To contact Joan:
You can
contact Joan through her myspace site: http://www.myspace.com/joantaylor
or by e-mail:
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****Latest
Title****
Available from October 2006
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The
Englishman, The Moor and the Holy City: The True Adventures of
an Elizabethan Traveller
Hardcover: 264 pages
Publisher: Tempus Publishing Ltd
ISBN: 0752440098
Available from: Amazon and the Wivenhoe Bookshop
Click here
for more about the book
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In 1601, an English traveller sets off into the
unknown to discover the East. Leaving behind a wife and
children, he journeys to Alexandria, overland to Cairo and
then to Gaza, encountering plots against his life and racing
camels along the way. But Henry Timberlake then meets a
companion who will change his life. A Moroccan Moor on his way
to Mecca saves Timberlake's life, not once, but twice, and
they become friends and travelling companions as the Moor
detours to join the explorer in his voyage of discovery. In
this fascinating true story of a seventeenth-century
adventurer, Joan Taylor explores the relationship between East
and West, Islam and Christianity at the foundation of the
modern world. She provides a vivid picture of Jerusalem and
the old Middle East at the time of the Ottoman Empire, and
brings to life the true tale of friendship between two very
different people whose paths happened to cross on the road to
adventure...
Click here
for an article by Peter Kennedy about Joan and the book
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Conversations with
Mr. Prain
Paperback, 236 pages
Melville House Publishing (May 1, 2006)
ISBN: 1933633026
Note: This book has also
been published by Hardie Grant in Australia
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A young New Zealand
writer, Stella, visits an English publisher, Edward Prain, in
his country mansion near Banbury, apparently to talk about her
work. As conversation progresses, Stella discovers that Mr.
Prain has other reasons for inviting her to his house. Stella
is soon embroiled in a strange game in which she must use her
wits – and her imagination - if she is to win. In this
literary mystery that explores art and commerce, the world of
Mr. Prain is – for true poetry - a dangerous place.
For a great review see: http://www.eclectica.org/v10n2/gray.html
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Non-Fiction:
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Jewish
Women Philosophers of First-Century
Alexandria
Paperback, 440 pages (January, 2006)
Oxford
University
Press
ISBN 0199291411
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The first-century ascetic Jewish philosophers
known as the 'Therapeutae', described in Philo's contemporaneous
treatise De Vita Contemplativa, have often been considered in
comparison with early Christians, the Essenes, and the Dead Sea
Scrolls. This study, which includes the author’s translation of De
Vita Contemplativa, focuses particularly on issues of historical
method, rhetoric, women, and gender, and comes to new conclusions
about the nature of the group and its relationship with the
allegorical school of exegesis in
Alexandria
. It is argued that the group represents the tip of an iceberg in
terms of ascetic practices and allegorical exegesis, and that the
women described point to the presence of other Jewish women
philosophers in
Alexandria
in the first century CE. Members of the group were 'extreme
allegorizers' in following a distinctive calendar, not maintaining
usual Jewish praxis, and concentrating their focus on attaining a
trance-like state in which a vision of God's light was experienced.
Their special 'feast' was configured mystically in terms of service
at a
Temple
, in which both men and women were priestly attendants of God. |
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The Onomasticon by Eusebius of
Caesarea
translated by G. S.
P. Freeman-Grenville, indexed by Rupert
L. Chapman, edited and introduced by Joan E. Taylor
Hardcover, 214
pages (March 1, 2003)
Carta, Jerusalem
ISBN 9652205001
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This is the first-ever translation into English
of the Onomasticon by Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea in
Palestine
(ca. 260-339), in parallel with Jerome's Latin translation and
expansion of the same work, from the edition of Erich Klostermann.
By comparing the two works we can see how Christian Palestine
developed between the early 320s and the late 380s. Eusebius
endeavoured to list every place mentioned in the Bible (though
mainly the Old Testament) and locate each one in the lands he knew.
In this edition, appendices, indices and maps provide information
about the sites and their placement, in order to enable
archaeologists and historians to use Eusebius’ information as
easily as possible. |
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The Immerser: John the Baptist within
Second
Temple
Judaism
Paperback,
376 pages (April 19, 1997)
Eerdmans
Publishing Company
ISBN
0802842364
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Hardcover,
371 pages (October 30, 1997)
SPCK
ISBN
0281051267 |
An historical portrait of one of the most
fascinating figures of the Gospels: John the Baptist. Joan Taylor
brings the world and work of this strange wandering ascetic to life,
and seeks answers to some intriguing questions such as what was the
origin of baptism as a symbol for repentance. |
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Christians and the Holy Places
Hardcover, 406 pages (April 1, 1993)
Clarendon Press
ISBN 0198147856
Note:
Winner of an Irene-Levi Sala Book Prize (on the archaeology of
Israel), 1995
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The origins of Christian holy places in
Palestine
and the beginnings of Christian pilgrimage to these sites have
seemed obscure. From a detailed examination of literature and
archaeology Joan Taylor finds no evidence that Christians of any
kind venerated 'holy places' before the fourth century. While
scholarly Christians visited certain Biblical sites out of
historical and exegetical concerns, and there was veneration of the
bones of saints, specific sites were not considered holy, or the
visitors considered 'pilgrims'. Instead, the origins of Christian
pilgrimage and holy places rest with the emperor Constantine, who
established four basilicas in
Palestine
c. 325-30 and provided two imperial matrons, Helena and Eutropia, as
examples of a new kind of pious pilgrim. Pilgrimage to sacred
shrines had been a pagan practice, which was grafted on to
Christianity as a means of uniting the empire. Many Jewish,
Samaritan, and pagan sites were thereafter appropriated by the
church and turned into Christian holy places. This process helped to
destroy the widespread paganism of
Palestine
and mark the country as a 'holy land'.
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| Beneath the Church
of the Holy Sepulchre (Palestine Exploration Fund Monograph Series
Major, Volume 1)
Shimon Gibson and Joan E. Taylor
Paperback, 102 pages
(January 1, 1994)
Palestine
Exploration Fund
ISBN 0903526530
This book is
available directly from the Palestine Exploration Fund, 2 Hinde
Mews,
Marylebone Lane,
London
W1M 5RR
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This study explores the archaeology and
early history of traditional Golgotha, which is located beneath the
Church of the Holy Sepulchre in
Jerusalem
. Additionally, it questions whether the so-called ‘Jerusalem
ship’ painting, found in recent excavations, is an example of
early Christian pilgrim art and presents an alternative hypothesis
that situates the painting in the 2nd century
construction of Aelia Capitolina. |
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