The medieval to early modern transition in a digital age: new developments relevant to the study of domestic buildings

SUMMARY: Transitions in the archaeological and historical record are difficult to discuss and frequently avoided. The authors briefly outline here how this topic has been studied, particularly in Post-Medieval Archaeology, reviewing differences of approach between European-based archaeologists, who stress continuities with medieval times, and archaeologists in the USA and elsewhere, who commence their studies with the arrival of Europeans. This outline is then used to explore how this earliest formative era of the post-medieval period can be studied via modern digital techniques, using a case study drawing on the study of buildings archaeology to further understanding of the transition. This 50th-anniversary contribution therefore intentionally bridges the old and the new.     

Myth and reality: A cyclic convergence

Martin, Calvin, ed. The American Indian and the Problem of History. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987. xiv + 232 pp. including cumulative bibliography. $24.95 cloth, $9.95 paper.

Bailey, Garrick, and Roberta Glenn Bailey. A History of the Navajos: The Reservation Years. Santa Fe, New Mexico: School of American Research Press, 1986. xx + 360 pp. including photographs, tables, appendices, chapter notes, bibliography, and index. No price.     

Experiencing refugees: A review essay

MacDonald, Jeffery L. and Amy Zaharlick, eds. Selected Papers on Refugee Issues: III. Arlington, VA: Committee on Refugee Issues, General Anthropological Division, American Anthropological Association, 1994. ii +188 pp. $10.00 paper ($8.00 for AAA Members).

Donnelly, Nancy D. Changing Lives of Refugee Hmong Women. Seattle: University of Washington Press. 1994. viii + 224 pp. including maps, figures, tables, photographs, notes, references, and index. $30.00 cloth.     

Les Révolutions françaises. Les phénomènes révolutionnaires en France du moyenâgeànos jours

In this article, I examine friendship as a subject of political theory rather than as a social practice relevant to political life. As suggested by Francesco d'Altobianco Alberti in the poem recited at the first certame coronario, two ideas of political friendship existed side by side in Medicean Florence. They appeared in full in Palmieri's Vita civile and in Platina's De optimo cive. As I will show, the Ciceronian language of friendship is used in these works to resolve two key problems of Renaissance political thought: the need for political unity and the just way of appointing the governing elite. Palmieri placed friendship in the political sphere of concord: he was a republican imperialist who believed that civic friendship protected the political unity of the city, without which Florence would not have been able to expand. Platina, on the other hand, situated friendship in the political sphere of counsel: his concern was to support the selection of the most virtuous and knowledgeable citizens, worthy of access to public office. While Palmieri looked back to the city's medieval past, Platina cast light on the politics of friendship that allowed the Medici to stay in power.