Suchergebnisse

A collection which highlights 'the range and richness of scholarship on medieval warfare, military institutions, and cultures of conflict that characterize the field', 'History' 95 [2010]. The journal's hallmark of a broad chronological, geographic, and thematic coverage of the subject is underlined in this volume. It begins with an examination of the brief but fascinating career of an armed league of (mostly) commoners who fought to suppress mercenary bands and to impose a reign of peace in southern France in 1182-1184. This is followed by a thorough re-examination of Matilda of Tuscany's defeat of Henry IV in 1090-97. Two pieces on Hispanic topics - a substantial analysis of the remarkable military career of Jaime I 'the Conqueror' of Aragon (r. 1208-1276), and a case study of the campaigns of a single Spanish king, Enrique II of Castile (r. 1366-79), contributing to the active debate over the role of open battle in medieval strategy - come next. Shorter essays deal with the size of the Mongol armies that threatened Europe in the mid-thirteenth century, and with a surprising literary description, dating to 1210-1220, of a knight employing the advanced surgical technique of thoracentesis. Further contributions correct the common misunderstanding of the nature of deeds of arms 'à outrance' in the fifteenth century, and dissect the relevance of the 'infantry revolution' and 'artillery revolution' to the French successes at the end of the Hundred Years War. The final note explores what etymology can reveal about the origins of the trebuchet. Clifford Rogers is Professor of History, West Point Military Academy; Kelly DeVries is Professor of History, Loyola College, Maryland; John France is Professor of History at the University of Swansea. Contributors: John France, Valerie Eads, Don Kagay, Carl Sverdrup, Jolyon T. Hughes, L. J. Andrew Villalon, Will McLean, Anne Curry, Will Sayers

One of the problems of urban history is the fearsome range of expertise that the urban historian is supposed to appreciate, if not master. Belaboured, rightly, by archaeologists, geographers, and architectural historians, we have begun to open our eyes to the evidence of the physical environment of medieval towns, but that is not the half of it. In order to understand urban institutions one needs to be a religious historian, an economic historian, a legal historian; and if one were ever to make sense of everything that is included in the 'social history' of towns, then social anthropology, historical demography, and sociology are only three of the battery of foglamps that would be needed to penetrate our cloud of unknowing. The subject which I now wish to add to the list of those we are supposed to cover does not even have the attraction of sounding new and modish and exciting. The history of political thought has, after all, formed a part of undergraduate history courses in this country ever since they began, and it is traditionally one of the least popular and least satisfactory parts of them, especially for the sort of students who may go on to be interested in urban history: those who relish the exact, the local detail, the reality of topography, the ability to connect the documents of the past with visible phenomena in the present.

The broad topic of medieval warfare is here explored across the full chronological range of the Middle Ages, using a wide variety of approaches, including literary, prosopographical, technological, and narrative-based analysis. A key feature of the journal is its commitment to fostering debate on the most significant issues in medieval military history; that tradition is continued here with Bernard Bachrach's argument against the idea that early medieval military structures and practices were sharply different from Late Antique ones. Individual battles, the Hattin campaign of 1187 and Byzantine war against Bulgaria in 1254-1256, are the focus of two other chapters; an article by Richard Kaeuper (based on his De Re Militari special lecture at the International Congress of Medieval Studies) emphasizes the value of chansons de geste and other `romance' material for understanding the mentalité of the martial lay aristocracy of medieval Christendom; and there are further articles on the factors that motivated gentlemen to fight, in both open warfare, and individual combat. Weapons of warfare are not neglected, with chapters casting light on the development of the crossbow and the trebuchet. CONTRIBUTORS: BERNARD S. BACHRACH, MICHAEL EHRLICH, MICHAEL BASISTA, NICHOLAS S. KANELLOPOULOS, JOANNE K. LEKEA, RICHARD W. KAEUPER, MARK DUPUY, MALCOLM MERCER, STEVEN C. HUGHES

Volume III of 'De Re Militari's' annual journal once again ranges broadly in its chronological and geographic scope, from John France's article on the evidence which early medieval Saints' Lives provide concerning warfare to Sergio Mantovani's examination of the letters of an Italian captain at the very end of the middle ages, and from Spain [Nicolas Agrait's study of early-fourteenth-century Castilian military structures] to the eastern Danube [Carroll Gillmor's surprising explanation for one of Charlemagne's greatest setbacks]. Thematic approaches range from 'traditional', though revisionist in content, campaign analyses [of Sir Thomas Dagworth, by Clifford J. Rogers, and of Matilda of Tuscany, by Valerie Eads], to tightly focused studies of a single document [Kelly DeVries on militia logistics in the fifteenth century], to controversial, must-read assessments of the broadest topics in medieval military history [Stephen Morillo and Richard Abels on change vs. continuity from Roman times; J. F. Verbruggen on the importance of cavalry.] CONTRIBUTORS: RICHARD ABELS, NICOLAS AGRAIT, KELLY DEVRIES, VALERIE EADS, JOHN FRANCE, CARROLL GILLMOR, SERGIO MANTOVANI, STEPHEN MORILLO, CLIFFORD J. ROGERS

What is the difference between a stabbing in a tavern in London and one in a hostelry in the South of France? What happens when a spinster living in Paris finds knight in her bedroom wanting to marry her? Why was there a crime wave following the Black Death? From Aberdeen to Cracow and from Stockholm to Sardinia, Trevor Dean ranges widely throughout medieval Europe in this exiting and innovative history of lawlessness and criminal justice. Drawing on the real-life stories of ordinary men and women who often found themselves at the sharp end of the law, he shows how it was often one rule for th

The essays in this latest edition of the 'Journal., by leading experts in the field, are a witness to the flourishing state of the subject, and provide significant contributions to various important on-going debates and controversies. They include wide-ranging discussions of state formation and the role of women in medieval warfare, and an energetic argument against viewing medieval warfare as cavalry-dominated. A trio of articles dealing with issues of bravery and cowardice, though based on Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman evidence, advance our knowledge of one of the all-pervasive aspects of the military history of the middle ages. Similarly, an experimentally-based study of the effectiveness of arrows against mail armor reaches conclusions that will cast light on combat from Visigothic Spain to Crusader Outremer to fifteenth-century Bohemia. In addition, the Journal includes in-depth studies of Iberian war-dogs, the naval battle of Zierikzee at the start of the fourteenth century, and [reflecting the editors' broad understanding of the scope of the field] the war-related activities of Dutch magistrates at the turn of the sixteenth century. Contributors: STEPHEN MORILLO, BERNARD S. BACHRACH, RUSS MITCHELL, RICHARD ABELS, STEVEN ISAAC, WILLIAM SAYERS, JAMES P. WARD, J. F. VERBRUGGEN, ROBERT BURNS

Offering a broad exploration of the cultural history of democracy in the medieval age, this volume claims that, though not generally associated with the term, the Middle Ages deserve to be included in a general history of democracy. The term was never widely employed during this period, the dominant attitude towards democracy was outright hostility, and none of the medieval polities thought of itself as a democracy. Despite this, this study highlights a wide variety of ideas, practices, procedures, and institutions that, although different from their ancient predecessor (direct democracy) or modern successor (liberal representative democracy), played a significant role in the history of democracy. This volume covers almost 1,000 years and a wide range of territories. It deals with different political spheres (ecclesiastical and secular) and socio-political settings (courtly, urban, and rural) and examines the phenomenon from the local level up to the universal realm. This volume adopts a broad cultural approach and is structured thematically. Each chapter takes a theme as its focus: sovereignty; liberty and the rule of law; the common good; economic and social democracy; religion and the principles of political obligation; citizenship and gender; ethnicity, race, and nationalism; democratic crises, revolutions, and civil resistance; international relations; and the scalability of democracy beyond the limits of a single city. These ten themes add up to an extensive, synoptic coverage of the subject

Introduction: an overview of Medieval and Renaissance warfare -- Meeting the warriors and the tools of their trade -- The long-haired kings -- "Human thoughts are inclined to greed" -- "They went about in bands of thousands" -- "All the foreign knights, bowmen, their attendants, and the mercenaries" -- "An escort of galloglas armed with battle-axes" -- "Drink thy blood, Beaumanoir" -- "They were bold and warlike fellows" -- A skeleton in armor -- "The light of italy" -- "Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous" -- Conclusions -- Appendices -- Armor -- Swiss mercenaries -- Chronology.

Warfare on the periphery of Europe and across cultural boundaries is a particular focus of this volume. One article, on Castilian seapower, treats the melding of northern and southern naval traditions; another clarifies the military roles of the Ayyubid and Mamluk miners and stoneworkers in siege warfare; a third emphasizes cultural considerations in an Icelandic conflict; a fourth looks at how an Iberian prelate navigated the line between ecclesiastical and military responsibilities; and a fifth analyzes the different roles of early gunpowder weapons in Europe and China, linking technological history with the significance of human geography. Further contributions also consider technology, two dealing with fifteenth-century English artillery and the third with prefabricated mechanical artillery during the Crusades. Another theme of the volume is source criticism, with re-examinations of the sources for Owain Glyndwr's (possible) victory at Hyddgen in 1401, a (possible) Danish attack on England in 1128, and the role of non-milites in Salian warfare. Contributors: Nicolas Agrait, Tonio Andrade, David Bachrach, Oren Falk, Devin Fields, Michael S. Fulton, Thomas K. Heeboll-Holm, Rabei G. Khamisy, Michael Livingstone, Dan Spencer, L.J. Andrew Villalon

Marxist and free-market economists and historians have tended to agree in regarding the peasantry as an obstacle to progress, hence doomed to vanish. Rediscovery of the indirect resistance (as opposed to insurrection) has revised this tendency to underestimate the resourcefulness of peasants. In view of this more favorable estimate of peasant resistance, the article examines peasant revolts from the fourteenth to early-sixteenth centuries. The best-known of these is the German Peasants' War of 1525, a failure that had permanent effects on the nature of the Lutheran Reform and the internal politics of the Empire. Other revolts were rather more successful. The peasants' uprising in Catalonia (1462-1486) led to the abolition of serfdom as did the English Rising of 1381 which was put down but which marked the beginning of a precipitous decline of servitude. Such revolts should not be seen as spasmodic manifestations of despair but rather as perceived opportunities that went beyond the everyday means of peasant evasion of the seigneurial system. The ideological context of these insurrections is more sophisticated than normally thought. Peasant were not trapped in a mentality that was closed off from all elite influence. An investigation into the nature and formulation of their grievances shows an ability to appropriate notions of Christian equality and human liberty that were widely shared and argued over by the higher order of society. ; Marxist and free-market economists and historians have tended to agree in regarding the peasantry as an obstacle to progress, hence doomed to vanish. Rediscovery of the indirect resistance (as opposed to insurrection) has revised this tendency to underestimate the resourcefulness of peasants. In view of this more favorable estimate of peasant resistance, the article examines peasant revolts from the fourteenth to early-sixteenth centuries. The best-known of these is the German Peasants' War of 1525, a failure that had permanent effects on the nature of the Lutheran Reform and the internal politics of the Empire. Other revolts were rather more successful. The peasants' uprising in Catalonia (1462-1486) led to the abolition of serfdom as did the English Rising of 1381 which was put down but which marked the beginning of a precipitous decline of servitude. Such revolts should not be seen as spasmodic manifestations of despair but rather as perceived opportunities that went beyond the everyday means of peasant evasion of the seigneurial system. The ideological context of these insurrections is more sophisticated than normally thought. Peasant were not trapped in a mentality that was closed off from all elite influence. An investigation into the nature and formulation of their grievances shows an ability to appropriate notions of Christian equality and human liberty that were widely shared and argued over by the higher order of society.