"An important trade center in the medieval Mediterranean, Amalfi and the surrounding region of southern Italy produced unusual types of art and patronage from the eleventh through the thirteenth centuries. Merchant patrons realized a wide variety of religious and residential complexes that were evocative of Byzantine, Islamic, Western, and local traditions." "This book evaluates Amalfitan art production in terms of moral, economic, and social structures, including investment strategies, anxieties about wealth and salvation, and southern Italy's diverse religious communities. Historiographical analyses and postcolonial models of interpretation offer further insight into Amalfitan art and its ever-shifting relations to the visual cultures of sovereign authorities in southern Italy."--Jacket.