You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
Sample Text
The eighth century has not been analysed as a period of economic history since the 1930s, and is ripe for a comprehensive reassessment. The twelve papers in this book range over the whole of Europe and the Mediterranean from Denmark to Palestine, covering Francia, Italy and Byzantium on the way. They examine regional economies and associated political structures, that is to say the whole network of production, exchange, and social relations in each area. They offer both authoritative overviews of current work and new and original work. As a whole, they show how the eighth century was the first century when the post-Roman world can clearly be seen to have emerged, in the regional economies of each part of Europe.
Recent advances in research show that the distinctive features of high medieval civilization began developing centuries earlier than previously thought. The era once dismissed as a "Dark Age" now turns out to have been the long morning of the medieval millennium: the centuries from AD 500 to 1000 witnessed the dawn of developments that were to shape Europe for centuries to come. In 2004, historians, art historians, archaeologists, and literary specialists from Europe and North America convened at Harvard University for an interdisciplinary conference exploring new directions in the study of that long morning of medieval Europe, the early Middle Ages. Invited to think about what seemed to eac...
In 1127 Charles the Good, count of Flanders, was surrounded by assassins while at prayer and killed by a sword blow to the forehead. His murder upset the fragile balance of power between England, France, and the Holy Roman Empire, giving rise to a bloody civil war while impacting the commercial life of medieval Europe. The eyewitness account by the Flemish cleric Galbert of Bruges of the assassination and the struggle for power that ensued is the only journal to have survived from twelfth century Europe. This new translation by medieval studies expert Jeff Rider greatly improves upon all previous versions, substantially advancing scholarship on the Middle Ages while granting new life and immediacy to Galbert’s well informed and courageously candid narrative.
Charlemagne's Early Campaigns is the first book-length study of Charlemagne at war. The neglect of this subject has truncated our understanding of the Carolingian empire and the military success of its leader, a true equal of Frederick the Great and Napoleon.
Provocative interrogation of how the Ottonian kingdom grew and flourished, focussing on the resources required.
Cradle of northern Europe's later urban and industrial pre-eminence, medieval Flanders was a region of immense political and economic importance -- and already, as so often later, the battleground of foreign powers. Yet this book is, remarkably, the first comprehensive modern history of the region. Within the framework of a clear political narrative, it presents a vivid portrait of medieval Flemish life that will be essential reading for the medievalist -- and a boon for the many visitors to Bruges and Ghent eager for a better understanding of what they see.
The origins of the large estate of Carolingian Europe and the role it played in the evolution of Frankish society and economy are the themes of this volume. The first group of articles focus on documentary evidence, especially the polyptychs and their interpretation. Though there is insufficient material for any true quantitive history, Professor Devroey argues that the evidence points to demographic expansion, coupled with the exploitation of new agricultural methods and crops, and a reliance on the family as the unit of production. Further studies relate these estates to the commercial networks of the area, from a local to an international level. A final concern is to demonstrate that the ...
The Byzantine princess Theophano, who came to the West in 972 to marry the Ottonian emperor Otto II, died as empress of the Ottonian Empire in Nijmegen in 991. In commemoration of this event a group of distinguished scholars met in 1991 at the castle of Hernen in the Netherlands with the aim of discussing various issues and aspects of Theophano's background in Byzantium, her life in the West, and her impact on society at the turn of the first millennium. This volume brings together in carefully edited form a group of the papers and proceedings from 1991. Each contribution helps to place Theophano in a broad cultural and historical context. The historical, intellectual and artistic background of her age are described, and there are essays on her education, her surroundings, and on the image of noble women in the middle ages.