"Herfsttij der Middeluwen", or "The Autumn of the Middle Ages" - the original title - is a portrait of life thought, and art in 14th and 15th century France and the Netherlands. For Huizinga, this period marked not the birth of a dramatically new era in history, the Renaissance, but the fullest, ripest phase of medieval life and thought. Now, for the first time ever, the original version of this classic work has been translated into English. In the 1924 translation, Fritz Hopman adapted, reduced, and altered the Dutch edition - softening Huizinga's often passionate arguments, dulling his nuances, and eliminating passages. He also rearranged and redivided chapters, dropped references, and introduced mistranslations. This edition is free of such errors, recreating the second Dutch edition - which represents Huizinga's thinking at its most important stage - as closely as possible. Everything has been restored. Prose quotations appear in French, with translations printed at the bottom of the page. Mistranslations have been corrected. Payton and Mammitzsch also have added helpful material, including Huizinga's preface to the first and the second Dutch editions (1919 and 1921) and the one to the 1924 German translation. Several notes clarify Huizinga's references to things which would be common knowledge only to Dutch readers, Huizinga frequently refers to paintings, sculptures, and carvings, some little known; this edition also includes full range of illustrations.

赫伊津哈是荷兰历史学家，欧洲文化史权威。他擅长印欧语文学、欧洲文化史、比较语言学和比较文化，代表作有《中世纪的秋天》、《游戏的人》、《伊拉斯谟传》、《明天即将来临》、《文明复活的必要条件》、《愤怒的世界》、《17世纪的荷兰文明》、《文化史的任务》、《历史的魅力》、《痛苦的世界》等。他的著作经久不衰，《中世纪的秋天》、《伊拉斯谟传》和《游戏的人》均已在国内出版，而且《游戏的人》已经有三个译本问世。

译者介绍

何道宽，深圳大学英语及传播学教授，政府津贴专家，曾任中国跨文化交际研究会副会长，现任中国传播学会副理事长、深圳市翻译协会高级顾问，从事文化学、人类学、传播学20余年，著译近800万字。