Caroline M. Barron is the worlds leading authority on the history of medieval London. For half a century she has investigated Londons role as medieval Englands political, cultural, and commercial capital, together with the urban landscape and the social, occupational, and religious cultures that shaped the lives of its inhabitants. This collection of eighteen papers focuses on four themes: crown and city; parish, church, and religious culture; the people of medieval London; and the citys intellectual and cultural world. They represent essential reading on the history of one of the worlds greatest cities by its foremost scholar.

This book considers the history of the Prester John legend and its impact on the Crusades, investigating its entangled mythical history between East and West during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The present study thus responds to the still pressing need for a comprehensive historical investigation of the twelfth and thirteenth crusading history of the legend and its impact on the Muslim-Crusader encounters, examining various Latin, Arabic, Syriac, and Coptic accounts. It further reflects on new eastern aspects of the legend, presenting a new Arab scholarly view. This book first charts a pre-history of the legend in the late ancient Christian prophecy of the Last Emperor down to the emergence of the legend in the mid-twelfth century. Second, the work presents a historical discussion of the legend and its association with actual occurrences in the Far East and the Levant, analysing the legend history under the crusading crisis and the imperial papal schism in Europe. Meanwhile, the work considers the vague Prester John Letter addressed to Manuel I Komnenus, Byzantine Emperor, and its elaborate conception of a mythical eastern kingdom, revealing imaginative parallels on the wondrous East and legendary Eastern Christian kings in Arabic Muslim and Christian accounts of the Muslim geographer and cartographer al-Idrisi, the Coptic Abu al-Makarim and the Syriac Ibn al-Ibri (Bar Hebraeus), among others. Moreover, the book examines how the legend impacted war and peace processes between the Ayyubids and the Crusaders during the Fifth Crusade against Egypt (1217-1221), revealing how it was mingled with Arabic and Eastern Christian prophecies at the time. The study concludes by investigating the perception of Prester John by the papal and European envoys to the Mongols in the thirteenth century, revealing how the legend was instrumentalised (and even weaponised) to establish a Latin-Mongol crusade through a parallel exploration of relevant Latin, Arabic and Syriac sources.

To those who study the physical culture of arms in medieval Europe, the German Fechtbucher-treatises on combat arts-are among the most important surviving documentary sources: no other region in Europe produced such an extensive body of writings on the techniques of medieval combat. Among these, and indeed among the martial-arts treatises produced by any culture, the massive compendia commissioned by the scholar-swordsman Paulus Hector Mair (1517-1579) stands out as uniquely ambitious and monumental. The text survives in three manuscript copies, each consisting of two volumes, with each manuscript running to approximately 1200 pages, and includes about 17weapon-forms (depending on how one counts them) from two-handed sword to rapier, armoured combat to sickle and scythe; each form consists of anywhere from 8 to 136 lavishly illustrated techniques, in many cases followed by one or more seminal texts on the form. The various weapon-forms are mutually integrated with each other in techniques and vocabulary, and collectively offer an enormous volume of interpretable material. The combination of text and image in the illustrated techniques offers obvious advantages to the understanding of a physical practice, and Mair is unique among the German masters in systematically giving instructions to both combatants, so that as one learns how to perform a technique, they also learn how to counter it. Lastly, one of the most important features of the Ars Athletica is the Latin translation, which serves as something of a Rosetta stone for interpreting the vocabulary of these long-lost martial arts. In this series, Dr. Jeffrey Forgeng, translator of the equally seminal Fechtbucher of Joachim Meyer and Hans Leckuchner has compiled a team of translator-practitioners to tackle Mairs opus. Over a decade of work has gone into transcribing, translating and annotating the Ars Athletica (Treatise on the Martial Arts) presenting both the original German and Latin, as well as a modern English translation. Volume One of this series presents the Longsword, which was the traditional centerpiece of the German medieval tradition and provides the core instruction through which all other weapons of the tradition can be understood. In three languages and full-color illustrations readers will find a complete curriculum of cuts, thrusts, disarms and grapples; even using the sword as a short spear, which forms the foundation for armoured combat-the subject of a later volume.

This volume addresses the history of saints and sainthood in the Middle Ages in the Baltic Region, with a special focus on the cult of saints in Russia, Prussia, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Estonia, and Latvia (Livonia). Essays explore such topics as the introduction of foreign (and "old") saints into new regions, the creation of new local cults of saints in newly Christianized regions, the role of the cult of saints in the creation of political and lay identities, and the potential role of saints in times of war.

In vormodernen Monarchien beobachten wir Widerspruch und Widerstand gegen einzelne Herrscher, ihre politischen Entscheidungen und ihre Verwaltung, aber in der Regel keine direkten Angriffe auf die Ordnungsprinzipien und das politische System. Wenn Unzufriedenheit zu Aufstanden und Revolten fuhrten, blieb es normalerweise bei einem bloen Austausch des Regenten. Subtilere Methoden der Herrscherkritik konnten sich mittels fester Usancen oder spezifischer Codes und Spielregeln innerhalb des legalen Rahmens Gehor verschaffen und zielten darauf ab, die Qualitaten des Regenten zu verbessern oder spezifische Modi der Amtsfuhrung zu reformieren. Diese verschiedenen Formen und Praktiken von Herrscherkritik in vormodernen monarchischen Gesellschaften sind Gegenstand dieses Bandes.When looking at pre-modern monarchical societies, one does not expect to observe fundamental dissent directed at the social order as such or at the political system. As a rule, criticism was limited to individual monarchs, their performance and decisions. While discontent could lead to insurrection and rebellion, which normally only culminated in the ruler being replaced by another monarchical figurehead, the subtler methods of voicing criticism were applied within a framework of legality, of a set of customs or of a code of rules of the game and intended to improve the performance of the incumbent or reform his conduct at court. The various forms of verbal or staged censure of rulers in pre-modern monarchical societies are the subject of this volume.

In The Third Gender, McDaniel addresses the idea of the "third gender" in early hagiography and Latin treatises on virginity and then examines Aelfrics treatment of gender in his translations of Latin monastic Lives for his non-monastic audiences. She first investigates patristic ideas about a "third gender" by describing this concept within the theoretical frameworks of monasticism and then turns to creating a historical and theological cultural context within which to locate an interpretation of Aelfrics portrayals of male and female saints.

The expression "liturgical drama" was formulated in 1834 as a metaphor and hardened into formal category only later in the nineteenth century. Prior to this invention, the medieval rites and representations that would forge the category were understood as distinct and unrelated classes: as liturgical rites no longer celebrated or as theatrical works of dubious quality. This ground-breaking work examines "liturgical drama" according to the contexts of their presentations within the manuscripts and books that preserve them.

This volume is a collection of essays focusing on marginalized women mostly in Central and Eastern Europe from around 1350 to 1650. "Other" women are discussed in three different categories: women whose religious practices put them on the social margins, "common women" who are in society but not of society because they are in the sex trade, and women whose occupations were reason enough to shunt them. In order to fill a gap in gender history for countries east of the Rhine River, the studies included present how official city-funded brothels in medieval Austria worked, how a princess disability affected her life as Byzantine empress, how one unmarried Transylvanian woman who got pregnant dealt with being the center of a court case, and how enslaved women in medieval Hungary were treated as sexual property. The hope with this volume is that it will show the many interdisciplinary ways that women on the margins can be studied in this region, and to diminish the taboo of discussing this topic to begin with.

Inspired by our age-old fascination with equids, Materiality of the Horse brings the latest academic research in equine history to a wider readership. Themes examined within the book by specialist contributors include explorations of material culture relating to horses and what this discloses about the horse-human relationship; fresh observations on significant medieval horse-related texts from Europe and the Islamic world; and revealing insights into the effect of the introduction of horses into indigenous cultures in South America. Thought-provoking and original, Materiality of the Horse is the second volume in Trivent Publishings innovative "Rewriting Equestrian History" series.

This book is not about witches. First of all, because it focuses on the Middle Ages. And, despite common misconceptions among the general public, the figure of the witch as a woman who seals a pact with the Devil is not a "medieval" invention. Becoming a Witch explores the feminization of what civil and religious authorities defined as "magic" in medieval times. It looks into the complex connections between women, the natural, the supernatural, and the tragedy of existence. The chapters in this book span from the far north of Europe to the Mediterranean area, and investigate topics such as divination, erotic "magic", flying and dancing bodies, cannibalism, milk-stealing witchcraft, the circulation of "superstitious" knowledge among women, Otherness, agency, and, last but not least, contemporary representations of the witch in books, TV series, and cinema productions. From whom did women learn their beliefs and remedies? Were they really in contact with demons? Were they a social threat? And, most importantly, should men fear and stop them?

To those who study the physical culture of arms in medieval Europe, the German Fechtbucher - treatises on combat arts - are among the most important surviving documentary sources: no other region in Europe produced such an extensive body of writings on the techniques of medieval combat. Among these, and indeed among the martial-arts treatises produced by any culture, the massive compendia commissioned by the scholar-swordsman Paulus Hector Mair (1517-1579) stands out as uniquely ambitious and monumental. The text survives in three manuscript copies, each consisting of two volumes, with each manuscript running to approximately 1200 pages, and includes about 17 weapon-forms (depending on how one counts them) from two-handed sword to rapier, armoured combat to sickle and scythe; each form consists of anywhere from 8 to 136 lavishly illustrated techniques, in many cases followed by one or more seminal texts on the form. The various weapon-forms are mutually integrated with each other in techniques and vocabulary, and collectively offer an enormous volume of interpretable material. The combination of text and image in the illustrated techniques offers obvious advantages to the understanding of a physical practice, and Mair is unique among the German masters in systematically giving instructions to both combatants, so that as one learns how to perform a technique, they also learn how to counter it. Lastly, one of the most important features of the Ars Athletica is the Latin translation, which serves as something of a Rosetta stone for interpreting the vocabulary of these long-lost martial arts. In this series, Dr. Jeffrey Forgeng, translator of the equally seminal Fechtbucher of Joachim Meyer and Hans Leckuchner has compiled a team of translator-practitioners to tackle Mairs opus. Over a decade of work has gone into transcribing, translating and annotating the Ars Athletica (Treatise on the Martial Arts) presenting both the original German and Latin, as well as a modern English translation. Volume Two of this series presents the Dusack, a sporting version of the older Langesmesser (long-knife) a single-edged utility sword characteristic of the German-speaking areas of Europe. Made sometimes of wood, sometimes of leather, occasionally of steel, the Dusack was the training weapon for all single-handed swords. Mairs 44 Dusack sequences contained herein represent one of the earliest surviving treatises on this weapon: previous texts tend to focus on the Messer, and readers will find Mair ends this section by including his own redaction and treatment of some of the most famous Messer texts of the previous century.

The Jeu dAdam is an Anglo-Norman mid-twelfth-century representation of several biblical stories, including the temptation of Adam and Eve and the subsequent fall, Cain and Abel, and the prophets Isaiah and Daniel. Its framework builds on the Latin responses of the mass during the liturgical season of Septuagesima, from before Lent to Easter. This collection of essays explores whether this early play was monastic or secular, its Anglo-Norman character, and the texts musical provenance.

Focusing on languages political power, these essays discuss how representation, through language norms, plays and court spectacles, manipulations and adaptations of texts and images, both constitutes and reflects a cultural milieu. The volume brings together various disciplinary approaches, offering a complex appreciation of these questions. While a core of the essays focuses on France, the contributions engage a broad range of geographical contexts, from Byzantium to eastern Germany and England from the early centuries of the Common Era to the seventeenth century, revealing the prevalence and persistence of the key interconnected issues of images and authority. Contributors: Carla Bozzolo; Philippe Caron; Robert L. A. Clark; Paul Cohen; Thomas Conley; Jean-Philippe Genet; Douglas Kibbee; Gillette Labory; Nicole Pons; Mara R. Wade.

Eric Bohme analyses two processes of conquest which are generally considered prime examples of the expansion of Latin-Christian powers into the Islamicate Mediterranean. The Norman conquest of Sicily 10611091 put a close to more than two hundred years of Muslim rule over the island. Two centuries later, the Catalan-Aragonese conquest of eastern al-Andalus (c. 12291245) and its transformation into the Kingdom of Valencia constituted a major advance in the Christian expansion on the Iberian Peninsula. The striking parallels between both changes of rulership are now analysed indepth for the first time. At the centre of the analysis is the perspective of the conquered Muslim communities: With what motivation and strategies did they participate in processes of interaction and negotiation with the new rulers and other immigrant groups?

Over the last twenty years research on guilds has freed itself from traditional clichés, such as the guilds supposed backwardness and seclusion, and has thus paved the way for a new and more differentiated assessment of these historical institutions. Yet the subject matter remains far from being exhaustively studied. This e-book addresses some of the most disputed questions on craftsmen corporations, such as: the role of women and senior journeymen within guild structures, the interaction of guilds with local authorities and other urban institutions as well as their interrelations with local job markets and supra-local entrepreneurship.By combining more general theoretical reflections with micro-historical case studies the trilingual contributions do not only shed light on the institutional side of guilds but also on the individual actors within these corporations. By studying the phenomenon over a period of several hundreds of years (14th 18th century) the volume furthermore offers a long-term perspective on the research matter while its geographical spread offers points of reference for future comparative studies.

NATO Europe is an underestimated factor in strategic arms control. NATO Europe was the nemesis of the SALT II process. Europe feared an early SALT ratification. The SALT process was artificially delayed in order to create a time window for an INF deployment. NATO sought negotiation currency prior to the start of the planned SALT III negotiations. The NATO dual track decision killed the SALT II treaty. Superpower detente was the victim. The Second Cold War originated in Europe and not on the periphery. This multi-archival research monograph analyzes the penetration of US decision-making under the Carter Administration, the limitation of the influence of NATO Europe to non-central systems and the re-nationalization of US decision-making under the Reagan Administration. The latter paved the way to the arms control breakthrough of the mid-1980s.

Superpower détente during the Nixon-Ford Administration led to the formation of an East-West regime aimed at conflict control and systemic stability. Equal Security was the proclaimed goal. By institutionalizing bipolarity, however, the bilateral US-SU Strategic Arms Limitation Talks actually threatened Western European security, for global security and Alliance security were ultimately incompatible. NATO Europe feared the emergence of a global directorate of the superpowers and became apprehensive that the US would be ready to abandon the cause of Europe and sacrifice European and German unity for the sake of a stable world order. In reaction, NATO Europe sought to shape the SALT process to ensure that equal security applied to all the Soviet Union, the United States and the European Allies. This e-book analyses the linkages between SALT, MBFR, NATO and the special Anglo-American nuclear relationship. It also explores how NATO Europe penetrated US decision-making and co-shaped the US SALT agenda and how Scoop Jackson Democrats and NATO Europe aligned to preserve Western block superiority, freezing the SALT II process. Based on recently declassified European archival material, the e-book offers a fresh interpretation of and a new look at SALT.

This is the third and final volume of essays issuing from the Leverhulme International Network Renaissance Conflict and Rivalries: Cultural Polemics in Europe, c. 1300c. 1650. The overall aim of the network was to examine the various ways in which conflict and rivalries made a positive contribution to cultural production and change during the Renaissance. The present volume, which contains papers delivered at the third colloquium, draws that examination to a close by considering a range of different strategies deployed in the period to manage conflict and rivalries and to bring them to a positive resolution. The papers explore these developments in the context of political, diplomatic, social, institutional, religious, and art history.

This volume focuses on phenomena, structures and constellations of power and rule in the 12th century from a comparative perspective. Comparing England and the Empire is a promising research project, because the Staufen and the Plantagenets ruled over more than one kingdom and claimed hegemony. Therefore, the divergence between legality and the demands of ruling over diverse lordships can be explored. The examples of extended royal rule in different constellations, treated by international authors, show how the practice of power and the structures of rule based on legitimate claims diverge.

Sven Leif Ragnar de Roode analyzes Dutch, English, and German perceptions of European integration against the backdrop of dominant elements of national self-images in a comparative perspective. The study is based on a source sample of more than 1200 newspaper editorials about the founding treaties of the European Communities in the 1950s and the Treaty on European Union from 1992/3. The source analysis is framed by an analysis of dominant, publicly acknowledged national self-images in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century. The representation of European integration in Dutch, English, and German newspapers shows that both, the perception of Europe and national self-images, were essentially contested. It demonstrates how nationalised the gaze unto Europe was. The perception of Europe was tinted and judged by national self-images. The discourse on European integration was inseparably intertwined with the discourse on the nation. Europe was essentially thought through the nation.