Democracy and Conflict in Post-apartheid Southern Africa: Dilemmas of Social Change in Small States

The article examines the process of political change in the small southern African kingdoms of Lesotho and Swaziland. After an overview of the post-colonial political and economic history of the two states, the author analyses the pressures for, and resistance to, political liberalization and shows how moves in this direction have failed to assauge internal conflict, and indeed, have in some respects exacerbated such conflict. The intervention of outside actors in the attempt to resolve conflict poses a danger to the fragile national sovereignty of these states.     

论十六国时期胡人政权速亡原因及其历史启示

十六国胡人政权速亡的根本原因有三个方面,一是胡人统治者在统治民族本身不够成熟和强大的情况下,普遍实行民族本位、民族压迫和民族防范政策,既埋下了统治力量先天不足的隐患,又加重了民族隔阂,激化了民族矛盾;二是各政权普遍存在内乱不断的现象,导致自相残杀、自取灭亡和外敌乘虚而入的惨重恶果;三是统治者普遍在政治、生活上极度腐败,重用奸臣,沉迷享乐,不恤民力,穷奢极欲,导致民不聊生,民怨沸腾,激化了社会矛盾,动摇了统治基础。民族矛盾和社会矛盾,大大削弱了十六国胡人政权自身实力,制约了政权发展壮大,导致了政权的迅速崩溃和灭亡。十六国胡人政权速亡现象具有深刻的历史启示意义。     

Kings,crisis and coinage reforms in the mid‐eighth century

Between 740 and 770 coin reforms occurred in five north‐west European kingdoms: Northumbria, East Anglia, Francia, Kent and Mercia. Comparison between them highlights important common features, especially the advent of a more explicit royal role in the supervision of minting than had hitherto prevailed. Precipitated by a substantial downturn in production probably resulting in part from shortfalls in bullion supply, the new coin issues stem from a partnership between the king and other agencies: moneyers in the Anglo‐Saxon kingdoms; secular magnates in Francia. These coinages provide an insight into international connections and local adaptation, grounded in the economic role of coinage and a complex administrative background.     

Saba and the beginning of epigraphic documentation of the Jawf

The epigraphical documentation of Nashshān gives us some interesting data about the linguistic and cultural relationships between Saba and the other kingdoms at the beginning of South Arabian history.     

South of the Pyrenees: kings,magnates and political bargaining in twelfth-century Spain

The twelfth century has been regarded as a milestone for changes at almost all levels of medieval society. Some scholars consider it a starting point to trace back the origin of more centralised political structures with power over a specific territory: the feudal kingdoms. This paper tries to describe how these changes occurred in the Iberian kingdoms. It presents the co-existence of powerful kings and strong nobilities during the twelfth century. It analyses the baronial rebellions against the kings and the peace treaties signed by the monarchs against them. One central aspect of these struggles was the definition of upper decision-making levels above the nobility which were attained through a dynamic of war and pacts made between enemy courts. The paper attempts to demonstrate the long-term outcome in favour of royal power and concludes that kings succeeded in setting themselves above the nobility and becoming centres of political networks by an increasing spiral of treaties negotiated with their hostile equals.     

楚怀王灭越置江东郡说质疑

楚怀王灭越置江东郡之说,缺乏可靠的文献和考古学材料作为支持,因而疑点颇多。杨宽先生所持楚灭越于吴越故地设置江东郡的说法,难以成立。     

论陶寺古城的发展阶段与性质

本文分析了陶寺古城的发展阶段。通过陶寺小城和陶寺大城的比较,判定陶寺小城为有唐氏之都,陶寺大城为尧舜禹的都城。陶寺晚期文化偏晚阶段遗址为有唐氏遗民所居的村落。     

Unpicking the web: the divorce of Ecgfrith and Æthelthryth

The concept of a woman who is a ‘peace-weaver’ is known chiefly from Anglo-Saxon literature, yet is also a role that must have been reflected in the actual marriage alliances among the Anglo-Saxon dynasties. This article considers how networks of marriage and kinship may have functioned among the Anglo-Saxons of the late seventh century, and to what extent a woman could have real value in the role. It takes as starting point the historian Bede's account of how the marriage of Ecgfrith, king of Northumbria, and his wife, known to history as St Æthelthryth, was dissolved on grounds of non-consummation. Bede's claims that Ecgfrith was reluctant to let his wife go, sometimes dismissed as hagiographic convention, are here taken seriously and used to explore what reasons Ecgfrith might have had to want to maintain the marriage by looking at the politics of peace and war in the English kingdoms of the period, the role played by seventh-century marriage ties in relations between kingdoms, and what the value of such a marriage and the consequences of dissolving it may have been.     

三国时期墓葬特征述论

三国时期墓葬制度是从"汉制"向"晋制"的转变过渡时期。这一时期墓葬形制同东汉时期相比有较大的改变,突出表现在曹魏和东吴地区。随葬器物组合方面基本沿用东汉晚期,但又出现了一些新器型。此外各区域间的墓葬文化表现出频繁交流的特点。综合以上诸要素可知"晋制"的形成主要源自于中原地区的曹魏墓葬,突出表现在墓葬形制和葬俗方面,同时东吴墓葬中的随葬品种类亦被中原地区所接纳,成为西晋墓中典型的器物组合。     

Slavs in Fredegar and Paul the Deacon: medieval gens or ‘scourge of God’?

This article presents a new interpretation of the accounts of Slavs given by two early medieval Latin narrative sources. The first section discusses Fredegar's Wendish account, while the second section considers Paul the Deacon's view of the Slavs in his Historia Langobardorum . The instrumental use of the Slavs in the domestic affairs of the Frankish and Lombard kingdoms constitutes the emphasis of the last section, in which the author compares Fredegar's and Paul the Deacon's historiographical perspectives.     

论《三国志》的谋篇布局

陈寿用纪传体写分裂时期的历史,并且把三国统为一书,这在体例和编纂方法上本身就是一个创新.在谋篇布局上,陈寿视野开阔,不仅着眼于魏、蜀、吴三国,而且看到了三国之外的天下全貌;不仅关注三国鼎足而立的格局,而且纵向考察了由汉末群雄纷争到三国分立再到西晋统一的历史发展大势.因此,在结构安排和内容记述上,<三国志>分中有合,合中有分,主次分明,纵横结合,从而较好地反映了该时期的历史面貌和特点.     

Balance of power across the Channel: reassessing Frankish hegemony in southern England (sixth–early seventh century)

Relations between southern Britain and the Merovingian kingdoms in the sixth and early seventh centuries have largely been understood in terms of a Frankish hegemony extending across the Channel. However, a re-examination of the small group of written sources on which this idea is based shows that they do not necessarily imply such overlordship. Sixth-century archaeological evidence points to a different and more complex picture of Frankish influence: displaying links with the Franks was crucial for the self-representation of elites in southern England, and should be understood in the context of extensive transmarine contacts.     

The archaeological remains of Ratu Boko: From Sri Lankan Buddhism to Hinduism

From the 8th to the early 10th century the region around mounts Merapi and Sumbing in central Java was the centre of powerful Indianised kingdoms. One such site, Ratu Boko, was transformed into a Javanese replica of the Abhayagiri-vihāra, a well-known Buddhist monastery in Sri Lanka. Shortly afterwards, the Sinhalese influence showed elements of Hindu and Vajrayāna traditions revealing from the archaeological remains that it was not merely a copy of a Sri Lankan model but a testimony of Javanese civilisation and history.     

THE EMERGENCE OF WANAX IDEOLOGY IN THE MYCENAEAN PALACES

Summary. The following approach tries, as far as the Greek mainland is concerned, to discuss the prominent position of the wanax from the archaeological record in Mycenaean palaces, in the burial grounds and in the Linear B tablets. Multivariate analysis and explanatory methods related to repeated patterns reveal different stages in the Mycenaean ideological setting from the LH III A 1 period onwards, despite its roots in earlier stages of Mycenaean civilization. The complex and more sophisticated social position of the wanax points to historical implications associated with the rise of the centralized Mycenaean kingdoms.     

MANUSCRIPT XXXIV: ‘The feelings of friendship which We have always entertained’: Fragments of Tongan–Hawaiian Relations, 1880–8

ABSTRACT

After the Hawaiian Kingdom had played an important part as a model for Tonga's transition to a modern constitutional monarchy from the 1850s to 1870s, Tonga's government attempted to reconnect with Hawai‘i in the 1880s by suggesting a friendship treaty between the two kingdoms but then failed to follow through, despite Hawaiian enthusiasm for the project. Correspondence in the Hawai‘i State Archives, hitherto unacknowledged by historians, documents these late 19th-century fragments of Hawaiian–Tongan relations.     

Gift Exchange and Interpretations of Captain Cook in the Traditional Kingdoms of the Hawaiian Islands

The relationship between the kanaka maoli people of the traditional kingdoms of the Hawaiian Islands and Captain James Cook and his crew is interpreted in the context of a theory of gift exchange. It is argued that interpretations of kanaka maoli behaviour based on an implicit assumption that social relations were structured primarily by property rights leads to error. Instead, sense can be made of kanaka maoli behaviour only if a logic based on rights of person is taken into account.     

"And the Bones Come Together": Women'sReligious Expectations in Southern Africa, c. 1900–1945

African religious beliefs invaded Christian missions and provided the backdrop for interaction between African converts and women missionaries. African women came to missions not as tabulae rasae; their culture had stamped them with expectations and insights with which they imbibed and moulded the Christian message. They viewed religion as a resource. Their cultural expectations reinforced missionary promises and facilitated Christian conversion. As religious specialists women gained status, respect, social and economic security in pre-colonial society because they provided necessary and important services. These expectations lingered among African women at the missions. Thus, within patriarchal Christian denominations African women often exhibited an assertiveness which missionaries misunderstood and maligned. Mission conflicts were based on missionary attempts to make African women dependent upon their Christian spouses. This role was contradictory to African beliefs and Christian African needs. Differences were further exacerbated by gender discrimination within the church, which affected both European and African women, and colonialism, which provided the background for Christian occupation of the colony. Although familial obligations and cultural expectations were points of contention, motherhood, literacy, and leadership training provided meeting points of mutual concern for African women and missionaries.     

Louis the Pious and the contours of empire

When the southern Iberian city of Mérida revolted against Umayyad control, the Carolingian emperor Louis the Pious (814–40) sought to gain recognition there of his own political authority, probably in early 830. Motivated by a desire to project Frankish power after Umayyad intervention in Catalonia, the move was also in keeping with larger patterns of Carolingian expansion in the Iberian frontier zone. The incident is further revealing of Louis the Pious's wider imperial ambitions in the 820s, which early medieval conceptions of space allowed to be expressed over surprisingly long distances, well beyond the frontiers of the Frankish kingdoms.     

尊严与道德:从康德的“目的王国”看人的尊严

在康德的"目的王国"里,尊严是最高价值的存在。人的尊严既是一种合目的性的存在,同时也是一种道德的存在。道德是人的尊严存在的价值依据,这种价值依据主要体现在四个方面:一、尊严以独立性为前提;二、尊严以责任为载体;三、尊严通过权利体现出来;四、尊严导向的是道德与幸福的统一。而尊严最终只有在道德王国与自然王国的统一中才能实现。     

The Norman invasion of Gwent: a reassessment

Shortly after the Norman conquest of England, William fitz Osbern was created earl of Hereford. Most historians suggest he overran all Gwent east of the Usk before his return to the continent in 1071. This article will argue that his occupation of Gwent was more limited and was possibly confined to the territories claimed by Harold Godwinson, once earl of Hereford, before his death at Hastings. Instead, the accession of William Rufus in 1087 is seen as the context for a new aggressive policy towards South Wales. In the next fifteen years, Gwent and its neighbouring kingdoms of Morgannwg and Bucheiniog were overrun by William's marcher lords.