The Politics and Poetics of the ‘Scottish Gothic’ from Ossian to Otranto and Beyond

2017 ◽  
pp. 28-41
Author(s):  
Carol Margaret Davison
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
Culture Wars ◽  
Theatrical Production ◽  
Cultural Productions ◽  
The People ◽  
Private Correspondence ◽  
The Military

As Murray Pittock has cogently argued, the eighteenth century was ‘the historic battleground of the formation of Great Britain’ (1997: 1). In terms of Anglo-Scottish relations during this era, a shift occurred that saw the military battlefields of Culloden and Prestonpans give way to more intellectual battlefields and ‘culture wars’ (Moore 2003a: 46) where the question of national superiority rested upon the quality and innovation of cultural productions both ancient and modern, some of which, like James Macpherson’s Ossian, notably chronicled martial struggles. Nationalist statements proliferated about literature, especially at mid-century, such as David Hume’s comment in private correspondence in 1757 in the wake of the theatrical production of John Home’s Douglas (1756), that Scots had become, despite the devastating losses of their ‘Princes, … Parliaments, … Independent Government’, in combination with the fact that they spoke ‘a very corrupt Dialect of the [English] Tongue’, ‘the People most distinguish’d for Literature in Europe’ (1932, vol. 1: 255).

Anglo-Irish constitutional relations in the later eighteenth century

1964 ◽  
Vol 14 (53) ◽  
pp. 20-38
Author(s):  
J.C. Beckett
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
British History ◽  
Irish History ◽  
Late Eighteenth Century ◽  
The People ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
Basic Theme ◽  
History Of ◽  
George Iii

Few periods of Irish history have been more extensively written about than the later eighteenth century: a mere list of books and papers dealing with the Volunteer movement, ‘Grattan's parliament’, the insurrection of 1798 and the legislative union of 1800 would make up a moderate-sized volume. Most of these writings are concerned, directly or indirectly, with the constitutional relationship between Ireland and Great Britain. Indeed, it might be said that this relationship is the basic theme in the Irish history of the period, even for social and economic historians; and the pattern is so well-established that it may well seem rash to assume that it can be substantially modified, or even made significantly clearer, except, perhaps, by the production of new and hitherto unsuspected evidence. Yet there is something to be said for looking again at the whole subject on the basis of our existing knowledge, not simply, as Irish historians are inclined to do, from the standpoint of Ireland, nor yet as if events in Ireland were a mere appendage to British history, but rather, as Professor Butterfield has done for one brief period in his George III, Lord North and the people, to consider Anglo-Irish constitutional relations during the late eighteenth century as part of the general political history of the British Isles.

‘Like amphibious animals’: Irish protestants, ancient Britons, 1691–1707

1993 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 785-797 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jim Smyth
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
The Political ◽  
The People ◽  
Parliamentary Sovereignty ◽  
Inferior Status ◽  
The Face ◽  
Religion And Ethnicity ◽  
Two Kingdoms

ABSTRACTIreland in the 1690s was a protestant state with a majority catholic population. These protestants sometimes described themselves as ‘the king's Irish subjects’ or ‘the people of Ireland’, but rarely as ‘the Irish’, a label which they usually reserved for the catholics. In constitutional and political terms their still evolving sense of identity expressed itself in the assertion of Irish parliamentary sovereignty, most notably in William Molyneux's 1698 pamphlet, The case of Ireland's being bound by acts of parliament in England, stated. In practice, however, the Irish parliament did not enjoy legislative independence, and the political elite was powerless in the face of laws promulgated at Westminster, such as the i6gg woollen act, which were detrimental to its interests. One possible solution to the problem of inferior status lay in legislative union with England or Great Britain. Increasingly in the years before 1707 certain Irish protestant politicians elaborated the economic, constitutional and practical advantages to be gained from a union, but they also based their case upon an appeal to the shared religion and ethnicity of the sovereign's loyal subjects in the two kingdoms. In short the protestants insisted that they were English. This unionist episode thus illustrates the profoundly ambivalent character of protestant identity in late seventeenthand early eighteenth-century Ireland.

scholarly journals Domestic Everyday Life, and Manners and Customs in this Country, from the Earliest Period to the end of the Eighteenth Century

1877 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 86-130
Author(s):  
George Harris
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
National History ◽  
The People

In my former paper I endeavoured to describe the condition of the people at the earliest period with which we are acquainted, and the effect, upon their civilisation produced by the Roman invasion, through the intercourse consequently established between Great Britain and Rome, at that time the grand centre and source of art and civilisation. The darkest period in our national history has now been passed through. Two causes mainly appear to me, in the first instance, to further the progress of civilisation among a people: The intercourse of a barbarous nation with foreigners who are more civilised than the former; The growing intelligence of the natives them-selves, whose capacities are thus stimulated, and their energies roused. Many other causes, no doubt, contribute in turn to the further advancement and development of civilisation, such as the institutions which spring up, and the pursuits that are followed, in any nation. Nevertheless, these two main causes to which I have particularly alluded, appear to me to be the primary elements, and are what first contribute to set the machine in motion.

Military and Civilian Justice in Eighteenth-Century England: An Assessment

1978 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 41-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur N. Gilbert
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
North America ◽  
Legal Rights ◽  
Martial Law ◽  
Military Justice ◽  
Military Institutions ◽  
The Moment ◽  
The Military

Opinion in the eighteenth century varied widely on whether or not “military justice” was, in fact, justice by the civilian standards of the day. Many leading legal commentators viewed the system with disdain. Blackstone dismissed military justice in these words:Martial law which is built upon no settled principles, but is entirely arbitrary in its decisions is … in truth and reality, no law, but something indulged rather than allowed ….Another writer, arguing along similar lines, wrote: “The moment … a gentleman enters the service, he waives the Rights and Privileges he might be entitled to as an Englishman.” It was generally believed that law in the army was deemed less important than order and discipline. A man who opted for the army or was forced into service left more than his civilian clothes behind: he abandoned the legal rights under which he had been born and bred.Yet defenders of military justice were not lacking, particularly during the last half of the eighteenth century. Stephen Payne Adye, who had served as Judge Advocate in North America, wrote a treatise praising military justice; and at the end of the century, Alexander Tytler, drawing heavily on Adye's work, did the same. Other writers occasionally complimented the army on certain legal practices they viewed as superior to civilian court procedures. Still, then as now, the arguments of the advocates of the military system were largely ignored — a reflection of the deep distrust of all military institutions in Great Britain.

scholarly journals The New Mamlukes

2002 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 126-129
Author(s):  
Imad A. Ahmad
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Arab World ◽  
Islamic Revival ◽  
State Capitalism ◽  
Popular Discourse ◽  
The People ◽  
Ruling Elites ◽  
Egyptian Government ◽  
The Military ◽  
Partial Success

Amira El-Azhari Sonbol has written an outstanding socio-politico-eco­nomic analysis of the Egyptian government and society over the last threecenturies. This book brilliantly debunks the oriental despot model ofanalysis that has been imposed on scholarly studies of Muslim societies.She achieves this with the aid of a "study of popular discourse." Sheemphasizes the need to relearn what culture is all about by examining howEgyptians see themselves and their own relationships. She finds thatEgyptian society has not been static, waiting to be transformed from theoutside, but dynamic, following its own cultural evolution. Along the way,she notes the importance of distinguishing Islamic revival from radicalismand terrorism.Sonbol argues that eighteenth-century Egypt has been misunderstood,forced into the absolutist mold that more properly characterizes today'sEgypt. Eighteenth-century Egypt reflected "social maneuverability" andthe "rule of law." In the 19th and 20th centuries the Egyptian state sought,with partial success, to establish itself as the "active creator" of law andorder. A new form of mercantilism emerged that went beyond the mere controlof imports and exports to the manipulation of all aspects of productionand exchange to the benefit of the elites. In the Nasser era, elements ofsocialism and nationalism were employed in the advancement of what wasactually a form of state capitalism, in which the elites sought to extract rentfrom their hold on power. It was a feudal compact, in which the state's"right" to political allegiance was "reciprocated by the state's 'duty' toguarantee the security of the nation and provide its people with" the necessitiesof life.Sonbol critiques the translation of khassa as elite and 'ammah as generalpub I ic. The khassa are the people of power, wealth, and distinction, onlyone part of which retains hegemony at any given time. The khassa are toodiverse (ruling elites, the military, and the business classes) to be consideredan aristocracy. From time to time the ulema, the intellectuals and the pro­fessionals have been their allies in legitimizing their power. The so-calledmodernization of the Arab world has only been a strengthening of ...

Aristocracy about 1760: Theory and Practice

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. R. Palmer
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Social Rank ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Political Freedom ◽  
Social Utility ◽  
Class Consciousness ◽  
General Consensus ◽  
The People ◽  
Important Sense

This chapter considers the prevailing notion in the eighteenth century that nobility was a necessary bulwark of political freedom. Whether in the interest of a more open nobility or of a more closed and impenetrable nobility, the view was the same. Nobility as such, nobility as an institution, was necessary to the maintenance of a free constitution. There was also a general consensus that parliaments or ruling councils were autonomous, self-empowered, or empowered by history, heredity, social utility, or God; that they were in an important sense irresponsible, free to oppose the King (where there was one), and certainly owing no accounting to the “people.” The remainder of the chapter deals with the uses and abuses of social rank and the problems of administration, recruitment, taxation, and class consciousness.

The State versus the People

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Rendle
Keyword(s):  
French Revolution ◽  
Effective Means ◽  
State Control ◽  
Scarce Resources ◽  
Soviet State ◽  
The People ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Complex Picture ◽  
The Military

This book provides the first detailed account of the role of revolutionary justice in the early Soviet state. Law has often been dismissed by historians as either unimportant after the October Revolution amid the violence and chaos of civil war or even, in the absence of written codes and independent judges, little more than another means of violence. This is particularly true of the most revolutionary aspect of the new justice system, revolutionary tribunals—courts inspired by the French Revolution and established to target counter-revolutionary enemies. This book paints a more complex picture. The Bolsheviks invested a great deal of effort and scarce resources into building an extensive system of tribunals that spread across the country, including into the military and the transport network. At their peak, hundreds of tribunals heard hundreds of thousands of cases every year. Not all ended in harsh sentences: some were dismissed through lack of evidence; others given a wide range of sentences; others still suspended sentences; and instances of early release and amnesty were common. This book, therefore, argues that law played a distinct and multifaceted role for the Bolsheviks. Tribunals stood at the intersection between law and violence, offering various advantages to the Bolsheviks, not least strengthening state control, providing a more effective means of educating the population on counter-revolution, and enabling a more flexible approach to the state’s enemies. All of this adds to our understanding of the early Soviet state and, ultimately, of how the Bolsheviks held on to power.

scholarly journals Slaves and Peasants in the Era of Emancipation

2020 ◽  
Vol 59 (3) ◽  
pp. 495-520
Author(s):  
Padraic X. Scanlan
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Labor Force ◽  
The People ◽  
Tenant Farmers ◽  
Plantation Labor ◽  
Plantation System ◽  
Low Wages

AbstractFrom the middle of the eighteenth century until the late 1830s, the idea of enslaved people as “peasants” was a commonplace among both antislavery and proslavery writers and activists in Britain. Slaveholders, faced with antislavery attacks, argued that the people they claimed to own were not an exploited labor force but a contented peasantry. Abolitionists expressed the hope that after emancipation, freedpeople would become peasants. Yet the “peasants” invoked in these debates were not smallholders or tenant farmers but plantation laborers, either held in bondage or paid low wages. British abolitionists promoted institutions and ideas invented by slaveholders to defend the plantation system. The idea of a servile and grateful “peasant” plantation labor force became, for British abolitionists, a justification for the “civilization” and subordination of freedpeople.

scholarly journals A Cornish revival? The nascent iconization of a post-obsolescent language

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart Dunmore
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Language Shift ◽  
Historical Record ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Social Constructions ◽  
Group Level ◽  
Group Boundaries ◽  
South West

AbstractThis article considers the case of Cornish, a Celtic language that was in decline in the south-west of Great Britain from the early medieval era until the end of the eighteenth century, when its last recorded native speakers died out. At the point when a language under pressure eventually succumbs to forces of language shift, its role in representations of a distinct sociocultural identity might be expected to die with the medium itself. Yet a sense of cohesion at the group level has been observed to endure long after a shift to another language has occurred, with the obsolescent variety retaining a role in the maintenance of group boundaries. In situations of language shift, the meanings of such social constructions can change considerably, and the obsolescent variety may retain ideological associations with the group as an iconized symbol of identity. The analysis presented in this paper is based on an examination of the historical record as well as a synthesis of recent sociological research on Cornish. Attention will be drawn specifically to the manner in which the language has functioned as an icon of identity since the nadir of its decline as a spoken vernacular, through the ‘Cornish Revival’ of the twentieth century to the present day.

scholarly journals Jan Sobieski’s latifundium and the soldiers (1652-1696)

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 62-69
Author(s):  
Magdalena Ujma
Keyword(s):  
Economic Activity ◽  
Military Service ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Geographic Location ◽  
The State ◽  
Necessary Condition ◽  
Economic Market ◽  
The People ◽  
Actual Strength ◽  
The Military

Abstract An analysis of the relationship between Jan III Sobieski and the people he distinguished shows that there were many mutual benefits. Social promotion was more difficult if the candidate for the office did not come from a senatorial family34. It can be assumed that, especially in the case of Atanazy Walenty Miączyński, the economic activity in the Sobieski family was conducive to career development. However, the function of the plenipotentiary was not a necessary condition for this. Not all the people distinguished by Jan III Sobieski achieved the same. More important offices were entrusted primarily to Marek Matczyński. Stanisław Zygmunt Druszkiewicz’s career was definitely less brilliant. Druszkiewicz joined the group of senators thanks to Jan III, and Matczyński and Szczuka received ministerial offices only during the reign of Sobieski. Jan III certainly counted on the ability to manage a team of people acquired by his comrades-in-arms in the course of his military service. However, their other advantage was also important - good orientation in political matters and exerting an appropriate influence on the nobility. The economic basis of the magnate’s power is an issue that requires more extensive research. This issue was primarily of interest to historians dealing with latifundia in the 18th century. This was mainly due to the source material. Latifundial documentation was kept much more regularly in the 18th century than before and is well-organized. The economic activity of the magnate was related not only to the internal organization of landed estates. It cannot be separated from the military, because the goal of the magnate’s life was politics and, very often, also war. Despite its autonomy, the latifundium wasn’t isolated. Despite the existence of the decentralization process of the state, the magnate families remained in contact with the weakening center of the state and influenced changes in its social structure. The actual strength of the magnate family was determined not only by the area of land goods, but above all by their profitability, which depended on several factors: geographic location and natural conditions, the current situation on the economic market, and the management method adopted by the magnate. In the 17th century, crisis phenomena, visible in demography, agricultural and crafts production, money and trade, intensified. In these realities, attempts by Jan III Sobieski to reconstruct the lands destroyed by the war and to introduce military rigor in the management center did not bring the expected results. Sobieski, however, introduced “new people” to the group of senators, who implemented his policy at the sejmiks and the Parliament, participated in military expeditions and managed his property.

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