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This volume is the result of a conference at University College London in 2007 which addressed the scale and form of civil defences in early medieval Europe, c. 800-1000. Previous work has largely focussed on individual sites or specific categories of evidence. These papers offer new interdisciplinary perspectives driven by a landscape approach. Several contributions focus on civil defence in England around the time of King Alfred the Great, and together provide a new agenda for the study of Anglo-Saxon military landscapes. European case-studies facilitate a comparative approach to local and regional defensive structures and interpretive paradigms. Topics and themes covered include civil defence landscapes, the organization and form of defensive structures, and the relationships and dynamics between social complexity, militarization, and external threats. With papers ranging from England to Spain and Germany to Scandinavia the volume is of relevance to a range of disciplines including archaeology, history, onomastics, geography, and anthropology

In medieval legal transactions the use of the written word was only one of many ways of conducting business. Important roles were played by the spoken word and by the 'action' of ritual. The relationship between 'rituals' and literacy has been the focus of much recent research. Medieval societies which made extensive use of written instruments in legal transactions have been shown to employ rituals as well. This has ledto investigation of the respective functions of written instruments and legal rituals. What is the nature of legal rituals? If they included oral verbalization, how did the spoken words relate to those of the written instruments that played a role in the same legal transactions? Usually, we only have the written documents to answer these questions, and they are often silent about the rituals and oral elements of the transactions they document

During the last couple of years, sociological approaches in European studies have gained increasing attention from scholars. The 'usages of Europe' approach looks at the opportunities and resources that the EU provides for national actors to advance their interests, from a bottom-up perspective. As European rules on cross-border healthcare have been threatening the principle of the territoriality of healthcare services, the article analyses two cross-border healthcare projects in Austrian border regions to determine if and how actors' strategies have been Europeanised, and whether their actions could destructure national welfare boundaries. In order to explain how these regional actors incorporate European resources into their strategies a combination of the 'usages of Europe' approach with Historical Institutionalism is suggested. Adapted from the source document.

During the last couple of years, sociological approaches in European studies have gained increasing attention from scholars. The 'usages of Europe' approach looks at the opportunities and resources that the EU provides for national actors to advance their interests, from a bottom-up perspective. As European rules on cross-border healthcare have been threatening the principle of the territoriality of healthcare services, the article analyses two cross-border healthcare projects in Austrian border regions to determine if and how actors' strategies have been Europeanised, and whether their actions could destructure national welfare boundaries. In order to explain how these regional actors incorporate European resources into their strategies a combination of the 'usages of Europe' approach with Historical Institutionalism is suggested. Adapted from the source document.

Lange tijd werd het zo voorgesteld dat middeleeuwse kooplieden verdoemd waren omdat zij winst nastreefden. Pas met de Italiaanse Renaissance en het protestantisme zou er bevrijding gekomen zijn en zou men volop winst hebben mogen maken zonder zich schuldig te moeten voelen. In werkelijkheid hadden theologen al tijdens de volle middeleeuwen alles in het werk gesteld om de rol van handelaars positief te herwaarderen en het winststreven uit de sfeer van het turpe lucrum te halen. Voorwaarde was enkel dat er eerlijke prijzen tot stand kwamen die - bij afwezigheid van bedrog en marktmanipulatie - w