Writers have previously placed the action of kissing into categories: kisses of love, affection, peace, respect and friendship. Each of the essays in this fascinating book takes a single kind of kiss and uses it as an index to the past. For rather than offering a simple history of the kiss, this book is about the kiss in history. In this collection, an eminent group of cultural historians explore the kiss through sources as diverse as religious texts, popular prints, court depositions, periodicals, diaries and poetry. This collection shows that by analyzing the kiss and its position--embedded as it is as part of our culture--history can use small gestures to take us to big issues concerning ourselves and others, the past and the present.