‘Davidson is one of the most diversely learned scholars writing today. His global scholarship connects exiles and visionaries across continents, centuries, languages and religions. To read is to explore unfamiliar libraries and secret gardens. With astonishing erudition and warm sympathy, Davidson reveals submerged codes and contexts that have kept major works half hidden. Exceptionally lucid on matters of great complexity, these essays gleam among the shadows of dangerous and defiant arts.’
—Prof Alexandra Harris, author of Weatherland, The Rising Down

‘A truly fascinating book. There can be few scholars in the world capable of leading us on such an extraordinary journey through Baroque art, religion and culture from Aberdeen to the Andes, taking in an Italian garden, a Slovak castle and a Japanese crucifix along the way.’
—Sir Noel Malcolm, All Souls College, Oxford

‘The fine threads and variegated colors of this bright tapestry of case studies combine in considerable luxury to make a resounding case for a universal “Catholic Baroque” that encompassed centuries and crossed the ocean seas.’
—Earle Havens, Director of the Stern Center for the History of the Book, Johns Hopkins University

Prologue: The Gestures of the Skeletons, reticulations of the baroque world
Part I: Centres and peripheries
1 James Fraser: experiencing the arts of Italy in the mid seventeenth century
2 The Jesuits and the languages of Britain: the case of Robert Corbie SJ
3 Gentileschi and the ancestors
4 Pope’s recusancy
5 Mr Gibbon’s shadow, or ‘the parent of the arts’
Part II: Materialities
6 The solemnity of the Madonna Vulnerata, Valladolid, 1600
7 Opposing Elizabeth
8 Relics and memorials of Mary Stuart in the Low Countries
9 Viper wine
10 The Assassin’s new Castles: frescoes and textiles for the Leslies at Nové Mesto nad Metují and Ptui
11 A Jesuit reliquary Crucifix from Japan
12 The Jesuit Garden
Part III: Designs of the imagination
13 The dream of Raphael
14 Alexander Seton, his house, his library, his world
15 Paper gardens
16 Imaginary Baroque cities: the Chearnley circle and the Earl of Mar
17 Artificial Islands
Afterword
Bibliography
Index