Drawing on the family archive of personal and estate papers, Brennan (Renaissance studies, U. of Leeds) looks at how the powerful Sidney dynasty, based in Kent, interacted with English royalty, often
This volume focuses on women's literary history in Britain between 700 and 1500. It brings to the fore a wide range of women's literary activity undertaken in Latin, Welsh and Anglo-Norman alongside t
The Vedic Age completes the first set of three monographs in the People's History of India series. It deals with the period c. 1500 to c. 700 bc, during which it sets the Rigveda and the subsequent Ve
Constructing Gypsy Identity in Early Modern England, 1500-1700 examines the construction of gypsy identity in England between the early sixteenth century and the end of the seventeenth century. Drawin
Webb (history, King's College, London, UK) ably conveys the complexity of pilgrimage in medieval life, giving attention to the range of motives people went on pilgrimage and the range of people who pa
This volume, now available in paperback for the first time, focuses on women's literary history in Britain between 700 and 1500, a period traditionally marginalized in accounts of women's writing in E
The contributions to this volume enter into a dialogue about the routes, modes and institutions that transferred and transformed knowledge across the late antique Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf. E
This volume explores the issues of taking, using and being hostages in the Middle Ages. It brings together recent research in the areas of hostages and hostageships, looking at the act of ho
This comparative study explores three key cultural and political spheres – the Latin west, Byzantium and the Islamic world from Central Asia to the Atlantic – roughly from the emergence of Islam to the fall of Constantinople. These spheres drew on a shared pool of late antique Mediterranean culture, philosophy and science, and they had monotheism and historical antecedents in common. Yet where exactly political and spiritual power lay, and how it was exercised, differed. This book focuses on power dynamics and resource-allocation among ruling elites; the legitimisation of power and property with the aid of religion; and on rulers' interactions with local elites and societies. Offering the reader route-maps towards navigating each sphere and grasping the fundamentals of its political culture, this set of parallel studies offers a timely and much needed framework for comparing the societies surrounding the medieval Mediterranean.
More than 700 greater houses of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries survive in England and Wales, of which nearly two-thirds are in continuous occupation. Yet they have been little-studied in comparison with the country's medieval castles, cathedrals and abbeys. This book, first published in 1996, surveys the houses in detail. It is an illustrated record of the surviving residences of the Crown, the greater and lesser nobility, and church leaders - the 'movers and shakers' of medieval society. All major and most lesser houses are appraised in detail, concentrating on their architectural development and historical relevance. They are grouped by region, prefaced by short introductions which establish their historical and architectural context. The topic will be covered in three volumes - on northern England, central England and Wales, and southern England. When complete the volumes will be the first and only comprehensive survey of the subject. Volume 1 (on northern England) describes
