Historical writing of the early middle ages tends to be regarded as little more than a possible source of facts, but Rosamond McKitterick establishes that early medieval historians conveyed in their texts a sophisticated set of multiple perceptions of the past. In these essays, McKitterick focuses on the Frankish realms in the eight and ninth centuries and examines different methods and genres of historical writing in relation to the perceptions of time and chronology. She claims that there is an extraordinary concentration of new text production and older text reproduction in this period...

This is a study of the place of patron saints in Frankish society during the Carolingian and early Capetian periods. The book focuses on the composition of works in praise of dead holy people - hagiography - and the veneration of their physical remains - the cult of saints. It examines the patrons of a single diocese, Orleans, because a saint's power of patronage was defined in terms of a particular locale. Beyond the documentation of this region's textual and institutional traditions, the book explores the uses made of sanctity and patronage by the Franks. These so-called 'fathers' protected...

This study of the social, geographical, and disciplinary composition of the University of Paris in the early fourteenth century--the most detailed of its kind ever attempted--is based on the reconstruction of a remarkable document: the financial record of tax levied on university members in the academic year 1329-1330. After a thorough examination of this document, the book explores residential patterns, the relationship of students, masters, and tutors, social class and levels of wealth, interaction with the royal court, and the geographical background of university scholars.

This book consists of a study of two important and related pieces of thirteenth-century English legislation--the Provisions of Westminster of 1259 and the Statute of Marlborough of 1267. In establishing the political and legal context of these statutes and examining the process of drafting them, the volume utilizes an exceptionally wide range of manuscript sources. Revealing how the legislation was used and interpreted up to 1307, it is the first major work on any of the statutes in this period of major legislative change.

If the medieval king was the helmsman of the ship of state, the royal household was the ship's engine. It comprised men from most ranks of society, from the great magnates of the realm to simple servants who looked after the day-to-day needs of the king and his court. This is the first full-length study of the most important group of the court household, the king's knights: socially é lite, militarily preeminent, and indispensable for the workings of English medieval government.

This book, covering the close of Stephen's reign (1135-54) and the early phase of Henry II's (1154-89), examines the government of England in the aftermath of civil war. It suggests that the extent of "anarchy" under Stephen has been exaggerated and that there was much administrative continuity from one reign to the next. Previous studies of Henry II's government have often neglected his earliest years, but here there is a reassessment of the significance of financial and judicial measures during 1163-65, as "restoration" gave way to "reform."

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 and asks a number of questions about the society they developed there. Why did these people come to Ireland? How did they interact with the native Irish neighbors? What was the nature of their relationship with England? This was also a time of English expansion in Wales and Scotland, and the book suggests comparisons and contrasts with the Irish experience in this broader setting.

Centered on a study of the early archives of the Venerabile Collegio Inglese in Rome, this book attempts to place in its political, commercial and religious setting the English community that was in Rome between 1362, when the first English hospice for poor people and pilgrims was founded, and 1420. The book also uncovers a notable, although unsuccessful, attempt to forward English participation in commerce with Rome before 1420, revealing important links between the English laity in Rome and the city of London.

This is a political history of Brittany between 1158 and 1203, when it was ruled by the Angevin king of England, Henry II, and his successors. The book examines the process whereby Henry II gained sovereignty over Brittany, and how it was governed thereafter. This is the first study of this subject, offering an important contribution to the historiography of both Brittany and the "Angevin empire." It also offers a corrective to previous scholarship by suggesting that the Angevin regime in Brittany was neither alien nor opppressive to the Bretons.

This book is the first major study in English of a group of late twelfth-century religious enthusiasts, the early Humiliati, who were condemned by the Church as heretics in 1184 but--in a remarkable transition--were reconciled seventeen years later and went on to establish a highly successful religious order in northern Italy. Using a wide range of sources, the nature of the early movement and its processes of institutional development are reconstructed. The book also includes a Bullarium Humiliatorum, a list of papal and episcopal letters and privileges.