A typology of representative institutions in late medieval Europe

This article attempts to follow the tradition established by Hintze and Elias in comparing several aspects of representative institutions throughout medieval Europe. It uses numerous recent case studies and a new more detailed examination of the Low Country sources and it tries to take into account the criticisms levelled at the rather unsophisticated generalizations of earlier scholars. Attention is given to the structure of the institutions, their actual working and their functions.Comparisons are made whenever the available information permits, if possible by quantification, although our information is often too vague and incomplete to permit this. A number of ideal types are formulated as a working hypothesis for further investigation, based on the social structures within which these types of institutions functioned. The essential variables were the extent of urbanization in a particular territory, the form of government and the economic and juridical situation of the nobles and peasants.     

Civic religion in late medieval Europe

This article reassesses the value of a term that has proved very durable in late medieval historiography. It identifies three main research clusters using ‘civic religion’ (North American, Francophone and Germanic), and examines inherent problems with the term, particularly its association with ‘civil religion’ and its ambiguity of meaning, at once ‘urban’ (specific to towns) and ‘municipal’ (governmental). The term has been applied particularly to the city-states of northern Italy: the article also looks at three different cities outside this region, Zaragoza, Bruges and Salisbury, as case studies to consider the term's wider applicability. Despite their differences, this article argues that there were in all of them common religious practices associated with urban government; and that ‘civic religion’ does serve as a useful term to classify these practices as a basis for future research – not as aspects of advancing ‘civil religion’, but to describe the connections and elisions that city councils made in sacred terms between ‘municipal’ and ‘urban’ interests.     

Kings and favourites: politics and sexuality in late medieval Europe

This article examines the use of ‘discursive sodomy’ in political critique against five late medieval monarchs and their favourites. Sources from Castile, England and Sweden reveal common themes that recur. Contemporary sources frequently stated that the king’s love for his favourite was excessive and beyond measure; that the favourite was always by the king’s side and thereby hindered others from approaching him. Critics further claimed that the king showed no moderation in his generosity toward the favourite and that the difference in rank between the two men made their relationship suspicious. This paper argues that all four themes included allusions to same-sex desire with the purpose of implying that the natural order and hierarchies were put in jeopardy. The main issue at hand was that the king had been seduced or even bewitched and therefore was no longer in control. He had let another man dominate him.     

Gifts of food in late medieval England

Gifts of food were an integral part of late medieval culture. Small items, such as fruit, might be given by anyone. As part of commensality, sociability, hospitality and charity, food gifts underpinned customary patterns of life; they developed networks of relationships, establishing good lordship, and played an important role in negotiations. Patterns of giving demonstrate the distinctiveness and appropriateness of some categories of foodstuff, and illuminate the purposes of donors. Changes over time can be identified: indiscriminate hospitality or large-scale food alms fell out of common practice after the Black Death and gifts of money were preferred in some circumstances. Giving choice foodstuffs, however, remained a constant.     

Gifts of food in late medieval England

Gifts of food were an integral part of late medieval culture. Small items, such as fruit, might be given by anyone. As part of commensality, sociability, hospitality and charity, food gifts underpinned customary patterns of life; they developed networks of relationships, establishing good lordship, and played an important role in negotiations. Patterns of giving demonstrate the distinctiveness and appropriateness of some categories of foodstuff, and illuminate the purposes of donors. Changes over time can be identified: indiscriminate hospitality or large-scale food alms fell out of common practice after the Black Death and gifts of money were preferred in some circumstances. Giving choice foodstuffs, however, remained a constant.     

Attitudes and impediments to pacifism in medieval Europe

The spirit of total pacifism can be discerned in medieval western Europe amongst individuals such as St Francis of Assisi, and within communities such as the Penitents and Humiliati in Italy and the Beguines of northern Europe: such people refused to become attached to the popular pastime of warfare; they found the taking of human life to be objectionable and sinful, and refused to fight under any circumstances, even in defence of their own towns or possessions.However, it was difficult to be a pacifist. Such a philosophy was not popular amongst the civic authorities. Even the medieval Church made it difficult to pursue such sentiments: pacifist groups tended to be tainted with heresy, and therefore to be rooted out. The thinking of medieval theologians and philosophers on the questions of war and peace tended to be ambivalent; and the Church was willing to approve and bless warfare, such as the crusades, for its own ends. The nature of warfare itself also militated against the spirit of pacifism.     

Sumptuary laws and prostitution in late medieval Italy

Although ancient Roman lawmakers had often adopted statutes designed to curb conspicuous displays of wealth, sumptuary legislation was uncommon in medieval Europe prior to 1300. Then statutes imposing limits on ostentation and extravagance, particularly in women's clothing, suddenly appeared in large numbers. This article analyzes the principal themes of this legislation, concentrating particularly on the sumptuary statutes of fifteen northern Italian towns. The author concludes that the reappearance of legislative concern with dress and related matters reflected the new prosperity of the period, as well as new social developments, including a constriction of the marriage market for young women, apprehensions about social cohesion among successful merchants and tradesmen, and a desire to channel resources into more productive kinds of investment. In addition, he argues, sumptuary statutes mirrored new fashions in jurisprudence during the post-Bartolist period and a desire to employ legislation to affirm the moral aspirations, although not necessarily the actual practices, of communities.*     

The knighthood in and around late medieval Brussels

This article focuses on the social and political features of the knighthood in one of the most densely populated areas of the Low Countries, the administrative district of Brussels, known as the ammanie, in the fifteenth century. A systematic identification of all knights (rather than a selection) enables us to correct Huizinga’s picture and that of other, more recent, historians of the late medieval nobility as a social group in decay. Moreover, this case study contributes to ongoing debates on the position and status of late medieval knighthood. First, the data make it possible to assess the impact of Burgundian policies on the social, political and military relevance of the knighthood of Brabant. Second, special attention is given to their feudal possessions, in particular lordships and fortified residences, in order to establish stratification within the knighthood. Finally, the status and position of bannerets within the Brabantine knighthood is highlighted since they played a crucial role as intermediaries between the duke of Brabant and the urban elites of Brussels.     

Collective living and individual identities in late medieval England

ABSTRACT

Late medieval lodgings within secular, vicarial and collegiate complexes provide an example through which the construction and maintenance of collective and individual identities can be perceived. The remains indicate a middle-status group with a well-defined identity emerging in the Late Medieval period who were provided with accommodation reflecting their new stratum in society. The architectural display, or vocabulary, demonstrated a complicated even conflicting narrative to the medieval audience, which we can identify through analysis of their remains.     

Reconciling mendicant and secular confessors in late medieval England

This essay questions the argument, advanced by some historians to explain anti-fraternalism in fourteenth-century England, that friars appeared as lax and even socially disruptive confessors because they placed less emphasis than secular parish priests on confession and penance as a means of social discipline and resolution of interpersonal conflict, emphasising instead the individual, psychological aspects of sin. To test this hypothesis, this study examines instructions for interrogating penitents about the sins of wrath/anger and the requirements for the reconciliation of enemies. It compares the Latin manuals of the Dominican, John of Freiburg, and the anonymous, Franciscan Fasciculus morum on the one hand with the Latin manual by the secular clerk William of Pagula and the Middle English manuals for secular clergy by John Gaytrick and John Mirk on the other. The findings challenge the supposed dichotomy between secular and mendicant approaches to penance. Manuals for both types of confessor addressed conflict and enmity and encouraged introspection that connected anti-social behaviour and discord with an individual's psychology and spiritual wellbeing. Nor can it be assumed that such introspection was imposed on the laity, which was accustomed to struggling with feelings of anger or hatred when attempting to make peace.     

The development of the conjugal bond in late medieval Bohemia

In late medieval Bohemia the focus of the family became more and more the relationship between husband and wife at the expense of the husband's male kin group. Where the tie of loyalty to one's male lineage and its future welfare prevailed, disposals of property after death restricted a widow's rights only to her dowry. The law of the land and custom generally supported this practice. However, more and more from the fourteenth to the early sixteenth century men gave their widows greater social security and authority over their estates and children, in the process excluding their own male kin.These conclusions arise from a numerical analysis of dowry contracts and last wills and testaments in three modest sized towns in Bohemia. The analysis shows that most men ensured their widow's secure title to the family inheritance either alone or jointly with their children. It also shows that the rate of property arrangements favouring the wife increased in the course of the centuries examined.     

The fear of downward social mobility in late medieval England

ABSTRACT

Studies of medieval social mobility have tended to focus upon the success of socially ambitious, generally male, careerists. Alongside this tendency to use social mobility as a synonym for upward mobility has been a tradition of assigning the most agency in creating economic change to ambitious entrepreneurs. This article redresses these imbalances by exploring status anxiety and the fear of downward mobility in late medieval England. Using the surviving letter collections of the fifteenth century together with medieval literature, this article explores not only the importance of gender and the life cycle in shaping these fears but also the subtle distinctions between status anxiety, which often accompanied positions of authority, and a fear of imminent social decline, generally precipitated by financial difficulties. Through a reconsideration of demesne lessees and fraternities and guilds, it also shows how such anxieties and fears could affect both rural and urban economic developments.     

The development of the conjugal bond in late medieval Bohemia

In late medieval Bohemia the focus of the family became more and more the relationship between husband and wife at the expense of the husband's male kin group. Where the tie of loyalty to one's male lineage and its future welfare prevailed, disposals of property after death restricted a widow's rights only to her dowry. The law of the land and custom generally supported this practice. However, more and more from the fourteenth to the early sixteenth century men gave their widows greater social security and authority over their estates and children, in the process excluding their own male kin. These conclusions arise from a numerical analysis of dowry contracts and last wills and testaments in three modest sized towns in Bohemia. The analysis shows that most men ensured their widow's secure title to the family inheritance either alone or jointly with their children. It also shows that the rate of property arrangements favouring the wife increased in the course of the centuries examined.