Bücher der Reihe Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought: Fourth Series

This study of urban society in twelfth-century Italy challenges traditional views that the Normans stifled urban development. Examining the self-governing role of urban communities, their social ordering, identities and communal activities, this book reveals that south Italian urban communities still had a level of autonomy under the Norman monarchy.

Legal formularies provide modern historians with information on many aspects of ordinary life in early medieval Europe, from labour and land agreements to cases which we would nowadays associate with criminal law. This book provides a detailed analysis of formularies, setting out their problems and possibilities as historical sources.

This detailed study explores the close relationship between the Order of the Temple and the landowning families it relied upon for support. Focussing on the regions of Burgundy, Champagne and Languedoc, Jochen Schenk investigates the religious expectations that guided families to found and support Templar communities in the European provinces.

The monastic community of Fulda was one of the most powerful institutions in early medieval Europe. Tracing its development from its foundation in the 740s over 150 years, this interdisciplinary study presents a vivid picture of life in this monastery and also in early medieval religious communities in general.

The reign of Richard II has long been subject to intense debate. This new interpretation of the politics of the late-fourteenth century offers an in-depth survey of Richard's reign from the perspective of one of the leading nobles who came to oppose him, Thomas Beauchamp, the Earl of Warwick.

This innovative analysis of Carolingian moral norms demonstrates how gender interacted with political and religious thought to create a distinctive Frankish elite culture. It explores the complex interactions between Christian ideals and social realities, between religious leaders and the elite they addressed, presenting a new picture of early medieval masculinity.

This groundbreaking study of coinage in early medieval England is the first to take account of the very significant additions to the corpus of southern English coins discovered in recent years and to situate this evidence within the wider historical context of Anglo-Saxon England and its continental neighbours.

What did it mean to be Roman once the Empire had collapsed in the West? This is the first systematic study of the changing nature of Roman identity in post-Roman North Africa, revealing the value and flexibility of the notion of 'Romanness' across the Mediterranean.

In the first dedicated treatment of Anglo-Saxon assembly politics since the 1950s, Roach takes into account recent discussions of continental rulership in the early Middle Ages. He investigates the constitutional aspects of assemblies and the symbolic and representational nature of these gatherings, and challenges existing models of the late Anglo-Saxon state.

This 2003 book examines the evidence for literacy in early medieval Italy under the 'barbarian' rule of the Lombards - usually considered the darkest of the Dark Ages in Italy - and shows that Lombard Italy possessed a relatively sophisticated written culture prior to the so-called Carolingian Renaissance of the ninth century.

Paying particular reference to the Earls of Lancaster, Gloucester, Lincoln, Cornwall, Warenne and Hereford, Nobility and Kingship in Medieval England offers a detailed analysis of the political, governmental, social and military lives of the earls during the reign of Edward I and evaluates their position in thirteenth-century politics.

This wide-ranging new analysis of national sentiment and national identity in fourteenth-century England places this important but sometimes controversial topic in the context of late medieval English political culture for the first time, using not only familiar literary sources but also previously neglected official records.

Combining art history, analysis of contemporary documents, and new archaeology of medieval Rome, this study explores the building campaign of Pope Paschal I. It reveals that the transformation of Rome's sacred landscape was used to reinforce the authority and power of the papacy both in the city and beyond.

A major new study of Ivo of Chartres, his works and his role in the intellectual, religious and political culture of medieval Europe. It provides a new interpretation of the authorship of canon law collections attributed to Ivo, revealing that he did not compile the Panormia, contrary to current assumptions.

In this study, first published in 1988, the authors offer the first full-scale study of William of Tyre as a historian. They examine the influences which fashioned his material, and examine what he had to say about certain topics - the monarchy in Jerusalem, the Church, the papacy, the Byzantine empire and the Crusade - and why he wrote as he did.

Within Anglo-Saxon England there was a strong and enduring tradition of royal sanctity - of men and women of royal birth who, in an age before the development of papal canonization, came to be venerated as saints by the regional church.

This book examines the role of envoys in the period from the establishment of the first 'barbarian kingdoms' in the West, to the eve of Justinian's wars of reconquest. It makes a significant contribution to the developing field of ancient and medieval communication.

Offers a perspective on central Italy, an area of early medieval Europe where political developments held most significance for the future, and where the power and aspirations of Lombard kings, Byzantine emperors, the rising dynasty of Charlemagne and the popes overlapped.

This book uses a history written by a late tenth-century monk as a point of departure for an exploration of the political, religious and intellectual culture of tenth-century France. It focuses chiefly on the ways that this monk and his contemporaries engaged in and reacted to contemporary political events.

In the later Middle Ages people increasingly viewed themselves in terms of how they were seen in relation to others, the world and God. This book explores religious handbooks, theological writings and medieval scientific works to show how this question of vision led to a unique concept of the self.

The English Franciscan William of Ockham (c.1285-1347) is widely known as one of the most influential philosophers and theologians in late medieval Europe, but his political thought remains enigmatic. This 2007 book offers a fresh historical reappraisal of Ockham's anti-papal polemical writings.

This is a fascinating study of religious culture in England from 1050 to 1250. Drawing on the wealth of material about religious belief and practice that survives in the chronicles, the book challenges prevailing assumptions and sheds light on belief during a period in which the religious landscape was transformed.

This is a study of the economic, social, legal and religious position of three minorities - Jews, Muslims and pagan Turkic nomads - within the medieval Christian kingdom of Hungary. It demonstrates that their status depended not simply on Christian religious tenets, and investigates the complex situation 'at the gate of Christendom'.

This is a detailed study of the forms in which charitable giving was organised in medieval Cambridge and Cambridgeshire, unravelling the economic and demographic factors which created the need for relief as well as the forms in which the community offered it.

This study describes the way in which the Franciscan and Dominican orders became involved in preaching the cross and examines their contribution to the crusading movement of the thirteenth century.

Merchants were the most important political and commercial group in medieval towns. This book adopts a holistic approach by integrating a very wide range of evidence to provide an inclusive picture of merchant society through the lives of over 1400 individuals.

The history of English rule in Ireland stretches back to the twelfth century. This book examines the actions of the earliest English settlers in Ireland, in the eastern coastal area known today as county Louth, and asks a number of questions about the society they developed there.

This is the first full-length study of the elite group which surrounded King John, the household knights. As well as fighting for the king, they organized his armies, were involved in government, undertook diplomatic missions, controlled important castles, and proved themselves generally indispensable for the workings of English medieval government.

Despite the recent renaissance in studies of the reign of Richard III, most historians have remained focussed on conventional themes, especially the character and motivation of the king and the fate of his nephews. Less attention, as a result, has been devoted to the reign's importance in the patterns of late medieval government and in the evolution of royal authority.

From 1250 to 1795 Lithuania covered a vast area of eastern and central Europe. Until 1387 the country was pagan. How this huge state came to expand, defend itself against western European crusaders and play a conspicuous part in European life are the main subjects of this book, first published in 1994.