The Posadnichestvo of Pskov: Some Aspects of Urban Administration in Medieval Russia

Slavic Review ◽  
1984 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 46-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence N. Langer
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Considerable Change ◽  
The Political ◽  
Male Population ◽  
Working Through ◽  
Form Of Government ◽  
Urban Administration

To the Memory of Arcadius Kahan, 1920–1982Ever since the publication of V. L. Ianin's study of the Novgorodian mayors (posadniki) in 1962, the commonplace image of republican Novgorod with its political institutions grounded in the sovereignty of the veche—the “democratic” assembly of the city's free male population—has undergone considerable change. It is now generally conceded that Novgorod was essentially a boyar oligarchy, but controversy still surrounds Ianin's contention that the veche from its inception was primarily composed of boyars and other wealthy landowners, who in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries were known as the well-to-do (zhit'i liudi). Most scholars are willing to accept the view that in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the veche was dominated by a boyar oligarchy, but some, including Knud Rasmussen, Henrik Birnbaum, and Jörg Leuschner, believe that the composition of the veche in the twelfth century was more complex and that Novgorodian “democracy” was more evident, at least until the late thirteenth century, when the boyars working through the Council of Lords (Sovet gospod—first recorded in 1291) usurped the “rights” of the populace. Following the work of Klaus Zernack, Leuschner believes the veche was composed of all the free males including those from the subordinate towns (prigorody) outside Novgorod. But in the last two centuries of the republic's existence, certainly following the reforms of 1416 and 1417, Novgorod changed, in Birnbaum's words, “from a quasi-democratic form of government based on the veche to a purely oligarchic rule determined exclusively by the feudal lords.“ Having admitted that representation in the veche became limited to some forty “feudal” clans, Birnbaum accepts the contention of Carsten Goehrke that Pskov, the political and legal institutions of which are thought to have approximated those of Novgorod, retained its genuinely democratic veche throughout the fifteenth century. Thus Pskov is brought to the front lines to debunk the “extreme views” of Ianin, characterized by Goehrke as increasingly dogmatic and speculative, and is now caught in the controversy surrounding Novgorod.

“The Devil Begins to Roar”: Opposition to Early Methodists in New England

2006 ◽  
Vol 75 (1) ◽  
pp. 94-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Baldwin
Keyword(s):  
New England ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Political ◽  
French Government ◽  
Sexual Predators ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Form Of Government ◽  
Hearts And Minds ◽  
The Devil

In the several decades after their arrival in the New England states in the late 1780s, Methodists were the objects of a wide variety of attacks, some of them mutually contradictory. Their preachers were accused of being pickpockets, horse thieves, and sexual predators, while on the other hand some converts were mocked for their excessive moral seriousness. They were suspected alternatively of being agents of the English crown, spies for the French government, and Jeffersonian radicals. Further, to some it seemed that their episcopal form of government and ecclesiastical tribunals functioned as a sort of shadow government undermining the political institutions of the nation. They were attacked for their Arminian theology, in defense of which they vigorously condemned Calvinist doctrine. They were mocked as enthusiasts and fanatics whose preachers, pretending to an immediate divine calling, inflamed the passions of their listeners and whose gatherings degenerated into bedlams of disorder, confusion, and moral scandal. They were disturbers of churches, transgressing parochial boundaries, sowing disorder, and fracturing the covenant relationship between minister and flock, all of which recalled memories of the upheaval accompanying the awakenings of the 1740s. They were unlearned rustics not fit to instruct people in divinity, but they were also sly enough to worm their way into the hearts and minds of people by shrewdly hiding their true intentions and prejudicing their hearers against the standing ministers.

The Old Testament in Translated Patristic Works: Ezekiel 1–4:3 and 40:1–47 in Fr. Gonzalo de Ocaña’s (1442) Spanish Translation of Homiliarum in Ezechielem Prophetam libri duo by Pope Gregory I

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (4-5) ◽  
pp. 349-385
Author(s):  
Gemma Avenoza
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
The Political ◽  
Historical Evidence ◽  
Spanish Translation ◽  
New Information ◽  
Pope Gregory I ◽  
General Estoria

Abstract This study explores the political and cultural context of Fr. Gonzalo de Ocaña’s translation of the Homiliarum in Ezechielem of Pope Gregory I. It sheds light on the personality of the translator, offering new information about his life. It also delves into the political circumstances in which Queen María of Castile requested this translation from her chaplain. In fact, Ocaña’s prologue to his translation provides unique historical evidence of his own personal position vis-à-vis the political strife between the Queen’s brothers and her husband, John II of Castile, a struggle that had brought Castile close to ruin. The translation of this patristic text is also important because it provides us with a literal version of extensive passages from the Book of Ezequiel and constitutes the only known translation of this book of the Old Testament made from the Vulgata in the fifteenth century. Ocaña’s use of the Latin source is by no means a trivial issue, for the only two known versions of the Book of Ezekiel translated from Latin into Spanish, the pre-Alfonsine Bible and the General estoria, were prepared much earlier, in the thirteenth century.

Agnes of Harcourt, Felipa of Porcelet, and Marguerite of Oingt: Women Writing about Women at the End of the Thirteenth Century

2007 ◽  
Vol 76 (2) ◽  
pp. 298-329 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean L. Field
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Early Middle Ages ◽  
Religious Women ◽  
Clemence Of Barking ◽  
Anglo Norman ◽  
Women Writing ◽  
European Women

Three vernacular religious biographies were written by women about other women around the year 1300: Agnes of Harcourt's FrancienVie d'Isabelle de France(ca. 1283), Felipa of Porcelet's ProvençalVida de la benaurada sancta Doucelina(begun ca. 1297), and Marguerite of Oingt's Franco-ProvençalVia seiti Biatrix virgina de Ornaciu(between 1303 and 1310). Although a limited number of similar texts had been composed in Latin dating back to the early Middle Ages, and a few twelfth-century women such as Clemence of Barking had refashioned existing Latin lives of early female martyr-saints into Anglo-Norman verse, the works of Agnes, Felipa, and Marguerite are the first extant vernacular biographies to have been written by European women about other contemporary women. Just as strikingly, after the three examples studied here, few if any analogous works appeared until the later fifteenth century, with most writing by women about other religious women in the intervening period instead being found in “Sister Books” and convent chronicles.

The New Palace Yard and Its Fountains: Excavations in the Palace of Westminster 1972-4

1989 ◽  
Vol 69 (2) ◽  
pp. 279-297
Author(s):  
Valerie Horsman ◽  
Brian Davison
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Central Area ◽  
Historic Buildings ◽  
Historic Site ◽  
High Quality ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Important Site

Excavations in the New Palace Yard at the Palace of Westminster, between 1972–4, have illuminated the development of this historic site on the northern periphery of the medieval palace. The Yard was first laid out in the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century over previously marshy land at the edge of Thorney Island. In the central area of the Yard, part of the foundation of a magnificent fountain, known historically as the Great Conduit was found. Built in the mid-fifteenth century, the conduit formed a major landmark until its demolition some two hundred years later. Preserved within its foundation were the fragmentary redeposited remains of a high quality fountain of polished Purbeck marble, dated to the late twelfth century. Due to the enormous scale of the building works significant environmental evidence was recovered allowing elucidation of the topographical development of this important site, from the prehistoric period to the creation of the Yard in the late thirteenth century.This paper is published with the aid of a grant from the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission for England.

I. Sir John Fastolf's Lawsuit Over Titchwell 1448–55

1958 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
P.S. Lewis
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Legal Knowledge ◽  
Violent Action

When Edmund Paston was at Clifford's Inn in the spring of 1445 he was firmly advised by his mother ‘to thynkk onis of the daie of yowre fadris Counseyle to lerne the lawe for he seyde manie tymis that ho so euer schuld dwelle at Paston schulde have nede to Conne defende hymselfe’. In this much-quoted remark as in other opinions her sound and sensible husband, judge William Paston, was far from being original. The advice was at least two centuries old, if not older; the popularity of law-books for their estate managers in the thirteenth century is evidence of how many landlords then took it to heart.1 A landowner's land was a permanent temptation for his neighbours; such legal knowledge in some degree was therefore vital to him or to his stewards for its defence. More violent action was restricted, if not wholly extinguished by twelfth-century legislation; but that legislation itself and later enactments provided new, more subtle and probably more certain ways of depriving an honest possessor of his property. And titles to land, complicated from the thirteenth century on by landowners’ increasing employment of the entail and the use, gave in the later Middle Ages ample scope for the dexterous at law. Lawsuits on three manors bought on dubious and complicated titles nearly doubled their cost for an over-eager Sir John Fastolf in the middle of the fifteenth century. As Agnes Paston told Edmund her son and as an anonymous versifier told other potential landowners, it was as well to beware.

scholarly journals Images of Cities on the Nomismata of the Principality of Epiros from the First Half of the Thirteenth Century

2020 ◽  
Vol 48 ◽  
pp. 301-309
Author(s):  
Sergei A. Denisov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Urban Communities ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Local Community ◽  
Holy Roman Empire ◽  
The Political ◽  
Architectural Elements ◽  
The City

This paper has analysed the images of Arta and Thessalonike on eight types of billon nomismata minted in the Principality of Epirus in 1224–1248. These images were represented separately or included into the portraits of local rulers from the Doukai family: Theodore I (1215–1230), Manuel (1230–1237), John (1237–1244), and Michael II (1237–1267). There are two types of representation of the city on the coins. The first image followed the Byzantine iconographic tradition of the eleventh and twelfth century and appeared on the coins from 1224–1244. It comprises the scene showing the heavenly patron of the community (St. Demetrios) or archangel Michael giving a Doukas the model of Thessalonike. This scene underlined the religious legitimation of the ruler’s power over the local community and implied schematic presentation of the city as a model. To the second type occurring on the nomismata from 1237–1248 features the images of urban architectural elements (gates, walls, and towers) incorporated into the ruler’s portraits or shown separately on the reverse. These images also underlined the ruler’s relation with the local community; they are typical of more detailed execution of drawing of fortifications (blocks, embrasures, and flags). The second type images appeared on the coins under the influence from iconographic samples from the Holy Roman empire caused by the political alliance between the Doukai and Friedrich II Hohenstaufen (1212–1250). Using the representation of their power as the patrons of urban communities, the Doukai gained support for their policy from the local inhabitants and used it as a support for their power and struggle for the Byzantine heritage.

scholarly journals Przemiany polityczne na Islandii w warunkach kryzysu bankowego i gospodarczego

2011 ◽  
pp. 14-45
Author(s):  
Joachim Osiński
Keyword(s):  
The Netherlands ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Banking Sector ◽  
Banking Crisis ◽  
Banking System ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
Special Role ◽  
Form Of Government

The author begins with a brief description of the essential political institutions of Iceland, as a republic with a parliamentary cabinet form of government and the special role of the president, arguing with the point of views that Iceland should be seen as a state with a semi-presidential form of government. Describing the political situation before the banking crisis, the author underlines the strong position of the Independence Party, which according to the results of the parliamentary elections (elections in 2007), plays a leading role in the "political life" of the state. The author pays attention to the process of oligarchisation in that party and the informal systems of social-network-based links and pathological links between the worlds of politics and business. Growing since the 90s, the dominance of a few family clans, together with the deregulation and privatization of the economy, led to nepotism and lack of accountability on the part of politicians and business representatives. An expansion of the three largest Icelandic banks Landsbanki, Kaupthing and Glitnir, without any significant criticism and state control, has led to a situation where at the end of 2008 their assets were 10-fold greater than the GDP of Iceland. Loss of confidence in the interbank markets after the collapse of Lehman Brothers in the U.S., caused inhibition of liquidity and consequently the collapse of these banks, eventually acquired by the state. The most spectacular was the collapse of Icesave - the Internet branch of Landsbanki operating in the UK and the Netherlands. The disintegration of the banking system led to a disintegration of the coalition government. Early elections in April 2009, won by the Social Democratic Alliance and the Left-Green Movement, led to the formation of a center-left government of Prime Minister, Ms J. Sigur?ardóttir. The first major action was the government's reorientation of foreign policy and submitting an application for EU membership, and the subsequent arrangement of the debts after the collapse of these banks, reform of the central bank and banking supervisors, the establishment of a parliamentary committee to investigate the banking crisis and identify those responsible, the appointment of a special Prosecutor investigating violations of law during privatization of the banking sector and the actions taken on the eve of the crisis. The article contains the constitutional and legal analysis of the first and second so-called referendum. on Icesave, conducted after the President vetoed a further act concerning Iceland's agreements with its creditors - the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. As a result, residents of Iceland have not agreed to repay debts incurred without any fault on their part and through arrogance, incompetence and greed of the financial elite and the political managers controlling the banking system. This puts into question the country's future membership in the EU. The government, despite the opposition to the proposal made by a vote of no confidence, which fell, still take the difficult decisions associated with the revitalization of the banking system and economy of Iceland and improve its international image.

‘De tradicione Guenonis’: An Edition with Translation

Traditio ◽  
1988 ◽  
Vol 44 ◽  
pp. 201-251 ◽  
Author(s):  
William D. Paden ◽  
Patricia Harris Stäblein
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
British Library ◽  
Chanson De Roland ◽  
Editio Princeps ◽  
Wilhelm Grimm ◽  
Latin Version

British Library manuscript Cotton Titus A.xix, a miscellany compiled in the fifteenth century, contains on folios 153r–155r an untitled Latin version of the legend of Roland with the colophon ‘Explicit de tradicione Guenonis.’ This text was first published in 1837 by Francisque Michel as an appendix to the editio princeps of the Chanson de Roland in the Oxford manuscript, with no commentary of any kind. In 1838 Wilhelm Grimm declared that the Latin version was a deliberate condensation of the legend and hazarded that it might have been composed in the twelfth century. In 1839 the Swiss scholar Johann Caspar von Orelli reprinted Michel's text in a classicizing orthography with occasional conjectural improvements, and dated the poem in the twelfth or thirteenth century on the basis of its resemblance to the Ysengrimus and the Speculum stultorum.

The Papacy Takes Charge

2021 ◽  
pp. 157-170
Author(s):  
James Morton
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Southern Italy ◽  
New Order ◽  
Fourth Crusade ◽  
Legal Structures ◽  
Pope Innocent Iii ◽  
Fourth Lateran Council

Chapter 8 moves from the Norman kingdom of the twelfth century to the newly changed situation in the early thirteenth century, as the demise of the Hauteville dynasty and the minority of the young king Frederick II Hohenstaufen (r. 1198–1250) created an opportunity for Pope Innocent III (r. 1198–1216) and his successors to enforce their authority in southern Italy. Meanwhile, the Latin conquest of Constantinople in the Fourth Crusade (1204) created an imperative for the papacy to develop a coherent policy towards the integration of Greek Christians into the Roman church’s administrative and legal structures. The chapter discusses how the papacy formulated this policy at the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) and the resulting increase in papal interventions in the legal affairs of the southern Italian Greeks. It then looks at Pope Honorius III’s (r. 1216–1227) short-lived effort to organise Byzantine-rite monasteries into an Order of St Basil under Grottaferrata (a predecessor to Eugenius IV’s more successful fifteenth-century order). It examines the Grottaferrata Nomocanon (Marc. gr. 171), a manuscript produced at the monastery in c. 1220–1230 that was apparently intended to provide a legal guide for the new order yet was still entirely Byzantine in character. The chapter finishes by focusing on the conflict between the Holy Saviour monastery of Messina and the papacy in the 1220s–1230s as an important example of the papacy’s efforts to bring the royal monasteries of the Kingdom of Sicily under episcopal control.

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