Nationalist historiography and the English and Gaelic worlds in the late middle ages

1986 ◽  
Vol 25 (97) ◽  
pp. 1-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven G. Ellis

Much more so than in modern times, sharp cultural and social differences distinguished the various peoples inhabiting the British Isles in the later middle ages. Not surprisingly these differences and the interaction between medieval forms of culture and society have attracted considerable attention by historians. By comparison with other fields of research, we know much about the impact of the Westminster government on the various regions of the English polity, about the interaction between highland and lowland Scotland and about the similarities and differences between English and Gaelic Ireland. Yet the historical coverage of these questions has been uneven, and what at first glance might appear obvious and promising lines of inquiry have been largely neglected — for example the relationship between Gaelic Ireland and Gaelic Scotland, or between Wales, the north of England and the lordship of Ireland as borderlands of the English polity. No doubt the nature and extent of the surviving evidence is an important factor in explaining this unevenness, but in fact studies of interaction between different cultures seem to reflect not so much their intrinsic importance for our understanding of different late medieval societies as their perceived significance for the future development of movements culminating in the present.

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. p79
Author(s):  
Eleonora Belligni

At the beginning of the early modern age, philosophers, religious and political thinkers writing on economics had to deal with categories that were still based on the religious certainties of the medieval West, and with a paradigm built on Aristotelian dialectic between oikos (the family economy) and chrèmata (wealth). From this frame, articulated and innovative investigations on the contemporary economic world were born in the late Middle Ages of Europe: but up until the late seventeenth century, at least, the Aristotelian paradigm remained a rigid cage for most of the writers. Yet, both the impact of some theoretical work on the relationship between religion and economy, and some significant changing in European scenario started to break this cage. Evidence of a shifting of paradigm could be detected even in Counter-Reformation authors like the Italian Giovanni Botero.


2014 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ármann Jakobsson

AbstractSigurður the Blind is a relatively obscure Icelandic poet, and there has been very little study of his work since the early 20th century, perhaps due to the fact that any such study is prone to get lost in the confusion concerning the identity of this late medieval “Homer of the North”. While this may be distracting from the study of his work, this fog may in fact be paradoxically illuminating as to the problems facing scholarship of the late Middle Ages, often revolving around sparse but nevertheless seemingly contradictory sources. Furthermore, one of the most interesting aspects of previous scholarship concerning the poet is how his blindness has figured in the attribution of various poems to Sigurður, and how this blindness has linked him to other blind poets of the 14th to the 17th centuries.


1996 ◽  
Vol 32 ◽  
pp. 145-169
Author(s):  
Margaret Harvey

One feature of late medieval life always strikes the modern student as most strange: the Roman Church was an institution which you could, if you had the courage, opt out of, but you did not opt in, or rather, it was assumed that you were in unless you took steps to make dissent clear. Here I would want to add that being ‘in’ included accepting the papacy. My object in this paper is to discuss aspects of this situation, to ask how the papacy was perceived before opinions were distorted by the need to accommodate the impact of Luther. There are few areas where it is more important not to write history from the Reformation backwards; between Protestant polemic and Catholic apologetic the late medieval papacy remains in need of an impartial historian. Textbooks are few and detailed studies of many aspects non-existent. In this paper I will merely try to illuminate a few questions which arise when one begins to consider what it meant to say that in the late Middle Ages all orthodox Latin Christians accepted the papacy.


1963 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 313-339 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. Z. (J. W.) Hirschberg

Students of the history of North Africa in general, and of the history of the Jews there in particular, commonly think that a considerable proportion—one half or more—of the Jews who live, or until recently lived, in North Africa are descended from the Berbers, who prior to the Arab conquest formed the overwhelming majority of the population. In their opinion, these Jews were the offspring of tribes among which Jewish beliefs spread in the pre-Arab era and part of which actually embraced Judaism. This assumption, which seemingly answers the question as to the origin of the Jews who inhabited the North African hinterland, and especially the districts bordering on the Sahara, has gained such wide currency that the term ‘Berber Jew’ has been coined, i.e. Jew descended from Judaized Berbers. The proponents of this assumption apparently suppose that the stories of Jews, or Judaized people, living among Berber tribes, though describing events of the late Middle Ages or of modern times, reflect conditions precedent to the Muslim conquest of North Africa. In other words, the supporters of the theory of the Judaized Berbers think that this phenomenon cannot have originated in Muslim times since the new religion precluded every chance of Jewish proselytizing. If, therefore, Judaized people are found in Africa, even in recent times, they must be remnants of a religious movement going back to the period before the Arab conquest. In the view of the adherents of this theory, Judaism spread among the Berbers during the first centuries of the Christian era.


Author(s):  
Francesco Guidi Bruscoli

The discovery of America and, more broadly, the European expansion to other continents are the major events characterizing the trade networks of the Renaissance. Several scholars have discussed the impact of these factors on European development as well as on the world’s steps toward capitalism and globalization. Circa the mid-17th century (the chronological limit of this bibliography), however, inter-European trade still made up the majority of overall trade. By and large, trade was not badly affected by the otherwise disastrous consequences of the Black Death of the mid-14th century. The demands of those who survived, constantly fueled by a wider range of products available on the market, along with a much-improved transport system, led to an increase in the volume of trade. International merchants were able to set up extensive commercial networks or broaden existing ones, which extended into a number of prominent towns. Beginning in the 16th century, following the exploration of the African coast by the Portuguese, their arrival in India, and, in particular, the discovery of America, trade expanded globally. Commercial empires sprang up—first in the countries of the Iberian Peninsula, then in the northwestern European countries (notably England and Holland and, to a lesser extent, France). In the seventeenth century, merchants from these areas began to strengthen their influence in the Mediterranean, thus reversing what formerly had been the scenario in the late Middle Ages, when southern European and German merchants dominated in the North Sea.


2014 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 105
Author(s):  
José María Salvador González

As is well known, St. Francis of Assisi heroically embraced evangelical poverty, renouncing material goods and living in abject poverty, in imitation of Jesus Christ. Furthermore, through his writings and oral testimonies collected by his disciples, the saint fervently urged Christians to live to some degree voluntary poverty , of which Christ was the perfect model. By basing this reading on some Poverello’s quotations, this paper intends to show the potential impact that these exhortations from San Francisco to poverty may have had in the late medieval Spanish painting, in some iconographic themes so significantly Franciscan as the Nativity and the Passion of the Redeemer. Through the analysis of a large set of paintings representing both issues, we will attempt to put into light if the teachings of St. Francis on evangelical poverty are reflected somehow in Spanish painting of the late Middle Ages.


2002 ◽  
Vol 37 ◽  
pp. 133-144
Author(s):  
Judith Middleton-Stewart

There were many ways in which the late medieval testator could acknowledge time. Behind each testator lay a lifetime of memories and experiences on which he or she drew, recalling the names of those ‘they had fared the better for’, those they wished to remember and by whom they wished to be remembered. Their present time was of limited duration, for at will making they had to assemble their thoughts and their intentions, make decisions and appoint stewards, as they prepared for their time ahead; but as they spent present time arranging the past, so they spent present time laying plans for the future. Some testators had more to bequeath, more time to spare: others had less to leave, less time to plan. Were they aware of time? How did they control the future? In an intriguing essay, A. G. Rigg asserts that ‘one of the greatest revolutions in man’s perception of the world around him was caused by the invention, sometime in the late thirteenth century, of the mechanical weight-driven clock.’ It is the intention of this paper to see how men’s (and women’s) perception of time in the late Middle Ages was reflected in their wills, the most personal papers left by ordinary men and women of the period.


2018 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
pp. 131-160 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michel Reddé

In a series of studies about settlement density in the Rhine area from protohistoric to modern times, K.-P. Wendt and A. Zimmermann try their hand at the difficult task of evaluating the palaeodemography of a region. Their task is all the more complex because these are times and spaces for which written sources are lacking, as a result of which reasoning relies very broadly on interpretation of the archaeological record. The two researchers also attempt to characterize the density of rural settlements and their spatial distribution. I shall not dally on the methods employed, which involve quite complex statistics and geomatics (anyway, they lie outside my area of scientific competence), and shall take the figures at face value, even if I might question some of them. I shall contemplate the economic impact of population growth on the countryside of Gaul in Imperial times. It is a subject that has often been addressed, but one which I intend to reconsider in the context of a European programme on this issue. The relationship between population numbers, agricultural yield, gross domestic product and taxation has certainly been one key to our understanding of the Roman economy ever since the model suggested by K. Hopkins. Here, however, I do not wish to proceed in terms of theory, but intend to review critically the archaeological sources, which, for want of written evidence, are our mainspring for evaluating the key components of economic development on the regional scale of NE Gaul.


Author(s):  
Pardaev Ahrorqul Hasanovich ◽  

The article examines the historical medieval towns, fortresses and other geographical areas of the Jizzakh oasis based on written sources and data obtained from archeological excavations. As a result of scientific analysis, the geographical locations of the Jizzakh Horde and its environs, which are the location of the modern city of Jizzakh in the late Middle Ages, have been clarified.


Kavkaz-forum ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 101-119
Author(s):  
Г.Н . Вольная (Керцева)

Материальная культура позднего средневековья Дигорского ущелья Северной Осетии недостаточно хорошо изучена по сравнению с другими периодами. В статье впервые представлен комплекс археологических памятников, расположенных на Поляне Мацута Дигорского ущелья: памятники, их расположение, история изучения. Цель исследования – рассмотреть Поляну Мацута как погребальный и культовый комплекс, где находятся позднесредневековые полуподземные склепы, каменные ящики, менгиры, цырты, «нартовский» ныхас, поселения кобанского и аланского периодов. Это памятники являются почитаемыми у местного населения, упоминаются в нартовском эпосе. В статье использовались полевые методы исследования, метод анализа и аналогий. В статье представлен авторский материал спасательных раскопок 2020 г. «Грунтового могильника Мацута I, средневековье» XVI-XVIII вв. в зоне реализации проекта «Строительство фельдшерско-акушерского пункта в с. Мацута». Могильник представляет собой погребения в каменных ящиках. Всего было раскопано 75 ящиков, в которых покойные лежали вытянуто на спине головой на запад с широтными отклонениями. Некоторые ранние погребения сопровождаются обрядом кремации. Погребальный обряд находит аналогии в горной Балкарии. Для погребального обряда характерно отсутствие керамической посуды в погребениях. Над ранними погребениями могильника была устроена тризна с кремацией и большим количеством фрагментированной керамики, скорее всего местного производства. Погребальный инвентарь достаточно беден и характерен для горнокавказской культуры позднего средневековья. Во взрослых погребениях найдены одежда, обувь, пояса, головные уборы, пояса; в женских – украшения; в мужских – ножи, оселки. В детских погребениях (в большинстве случаев) слева от головы обнаружены только куриные яйца, либо погребальный инвентарь совсем отсутствует. Отмечается высокая детская смертность. Детские погребения составляют почти 50% от всего числа раскопанных погребений. The material culture of the late middle ages of the Digor gorge in North Ossetia is not well studied in comparison with other periods. The article presents for the first time a complex of archaeological monuments located in The Matsuta Glade of the Digor gorge: monuments, their location, and history of study. The purpose of the study is to consider the Matsuta Glade as a funerary and cult complex, where there are late medieval semi-underground crypts, stone boxes, menhirs, tsyrts, "nartovsky" Nykhas, settlements of the Koban and Alan periods. These monuments are revered by the local population, mentioned in the Nart epic. The article uses field research methods, the method of analysis and analogies. The article presents the author's material of rescue excavations in 2020 of the "Ground burial ground of Matsuta I, middle ages" of the XVI-XVIII centuries in the area of the project "Construction of a paramedic and midwifery station in the village of Matsuta". The burial ground is a burial in stone boxes. In total, 75 boxes were excavated, in which the deceased lay stretched out on their backs with their heads facing West with latitude deviations. Some early burials are accompanied by a cremation ceremony. The funeral rite finds analogies in the mountainous Balkaria. The funeral rite is characterized by the absence of ceramic dishes in the burials. A funeral feast with cremation and a large amount of fragmented pottery, most likely of local production, was built over the early burials of the burial ground. The grave goods are rather poor and typical for mountain Caucasian culture of the late middle ages. In adult burials found clothes, shoes, belts, headwear, belts; women's jewelry; the men's knives, whetstones. In most children's burials, only chicken eggs are found to the left of the head, or there is no burial equipment at all. Children's funerals account for almost 50% of the total number of excavated graves.


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