Rancor and Reconciliation in Medieval England
Rancor and Reconciliation in Medieval England

Author: Paul R. Hyams

Publisher: Cornell University Press

Published: 2018-10-18

Total Pages: 376

ISBN-13: 1501725742

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Duels and bloodfeuds have long been regarded as essentially Continental phenomena, counter to the staid and orderly British ways of settling differences. In this surprising work of social and legal history, Paul R. Hyams reveals a post-Conquest England not all that different from the realms across the Channel. Drawing on a wide range of texts and the long history of argument about these texts, Hyams shatters the myth of English exceptionalism, the notion that while feud and vengeance prevailed in the lands of the Franks, England had advanced beyond such anarchic barbarism by the time of the Conquest and forged a centralized political and legal system. This book provides support for the notion that feud and vengeance flourished in England long beyond the Conquest, and that this fact obliges us to reconsider the genealogies of both common law and the English monarchy.Moving back and forth between a broad overview of 300 years of legal history and the details of specific disputes, Hyams attends to the demands of individuals who believed that they had been aggrieved and sought remedy. He shows how individuals perceived particular acts of violence and responded to them. These reactions, in turn, sparked central efforts to manage disputes and thereby establish law and order. Respectable litigation, however, never eclipsed the danger of direct action, often violent and physical.

Rancor & Reconciliation in Medieval England
Rancor & Reconciliation in Medieval England

Author: Paul R. Hyams

Publisher: Cornell University Press

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 388

ISBN-13: 9780801439964

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Duels and bloodfeuds have long been regarded as essentially Continental phenomena, counter to the staid and orderly British ways of settling differences. In this surprising work of social and legal history, Paul R. Hyams reveals a post-Conquest England not all that different from the realms across the Channel. Drawing on a wide range of texts and the long history of argument about these texts, Hyams shatters the myth of English exceptionalism, the notion that while feud and vengeance prevailed in the lands of the Franks, England had advanced beyond such anarchic barbarism by the time of the Conquest and forged a centralized political and legal system. This book provides support for the notion that feud and vengeance flourished in England long beyond the Conquest, and that this fact obliges us to reconsider the genealogies of both common law and the English monarchy.Moving back and forth between a broad overview of 300 years of legal history and the details of specific disputes, Hyams attends to the demands of individuals who believed that they had been aggrieved and sought remedy. He shows how individuals perceived particular acts of violence and responded to them. These reactions, in turn, sparked central efforts to manage disputes and thereby establish law and order. Respectable litigation, however, never eclipsed the danger of direct action, often violent and physical.

Sanctuary and Crime in the Middle Ages, 400-1500
Sanctuary and Crime in the Middle Ages, 400-1500

Author: Karl Shoemaker

Publisher: Fordham Univ Press

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 285

ISBN-13: 0823232689

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Sanctuary law has not received very much scholarly attention. According to the prevailing explanation among earlier generations of legal historians, sanctuary was an impediment to effective criminal law and social control but was made necessary by rampant violence and weak political order in the medieval world. Contrary to the conclusions of the relatively scant literature on the topic, Sanctuary and Crime in the Middle Ages, 400-1500 argues that the practice of sanctuary was not simply an instrumental device intended as a response to weak and splintered medieval political authority. Nor can sanctuary laws be explained as simple ameliorative responses to harsh medieval punishments and the specter of uncontrolled blood-feuds. --

Identity and Insurgency in the Late Middle Ages
Identity and Insurgency in the Late Middle Ages

Author: Linda Clark

Publisher: Boydell Press

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 230

ISBN-13: 9781843832706

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The most crucial issues in current research are debated in the latest volume in the series. The essays collected here provide fresh insight into a range of important topics across the period. They discuss religion([both orthodox, as revealed by the lives of anchoresses living in Norwich, and heretical, as practised by lollards living in Coventry); politics (exploring the motivations of individuals seeking election to parliament, and how the way Cade's Rebellion was recorded by contemporaries affected its subsequent perception); law (whether it may be deduced from manorial court rolls that lawyers were employed by peasants, and an examination of the process of peace-making in feuds on the Scottish border); national, ethnic and political identity in the British Isles; social ranking and chivalry (in particular knighthood in Scotland); and verse (a consideration of the poem Lydgate addressed to Thomas Chaucer, and the occasion of its composition). Contributors: JACKSON W. ARMSTRONG, JACQUELYN FERNHOLTZ, TONY GOODMAN, DAVID GRUMMITT, CAROLE HILL, MAUREEN JURKOWSKI, JENNI NUTTALL, SIMON PAYLING, ANDREA RUDDICK, KATIE STEVENSON, MATTHEW TOMPKINS

Excommunication in Thirteenth-Century England
Excommunication in Thirteenth-Century England

Author: Felicity Hill

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2022-06-09

Total Pages: 355

ISBN-13: 0198840365

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Excommunication was the medieval churchâs most severe sanction, used against people at all levels of society. It was a spiritual, social, and legal penalty. Excommunication in Thirteenth-Century England offers a fresh perspective on medieval excommunication by taking a multi-dimensional approach to discussion of the sanction. Using England as a case study, Felicity Hill analyzes the intentions behind excommunication; how it was perceived and received, at both national and local level; the effects it had upon individuals and society. The study is structured thematically to argue that our understanding of excommunication should be shaped by how it was received within the community as well as the intentions of canon law and clerics. Challenging past assumptions about the inefficacy of excommunication, Hill argues that the sanction remained a useful weapon for the clerical elite: bringing into dialogue a wide range of source material allows âeffectivenessâ to be judged within a broader context. The complexity of political communication and action are revealed through public, conflicting, accepted and rejected excommunications. Excommunication could be manipulated to great effect in political conflicts and was an important means by which political events were communicated down the social strata of medieval society. Through its exploration of excommunication, the book reveals much about medieval cursing, pastoral care, fears about the afterlife, social ostracism, shame and reputation, and mass communication.

Kingship, Rebellion and Political Culture
Kingship, Rebellion and Political Culture

Author: B. Weiler

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2016-01-05

Total Pages: 249

ISBN-13: 0230593585

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Taking as its starting point two uprisings in England and Germany (Richard Marshal in 1233-4 and Henry (VII) in 1234-5), this book offers a new take on the political culture of high medieval Europe. Themes include: the role of violence; the norms of political behaviour; the public nature of politics; and the social history of political exchange.

Crime, Law and Society in the Later Middle Ages
Crime, Law and Society in the Later Middle Ages

Author:

Publisher: Manchester University Press

Published: 2013-01-01

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 1526112833

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This book provides an accessible collection of translated legal sources through which the exploits of criminals and developments in the English criminal justice system (c.1215–1485) can be studied. Drawing on the wealth of archival material and an array of contemporary literary texts, it guides readers towards an understanding of prevailing notions of law and justice and expectations of the law and legal institutions. Tensions are shown emerging between theoretical ideals of justice and the practical realities of administering the law during an era profoundly affected by periodic bouts of war, political in-fighting, social dislocation and economic disaster. Introductions and notes provide both the specific and wider legal, social and political contexts in addition to offering an overview of the existing secondary literature and historiographical trends. This collection affords a valuable insight into the character of medieval governance as well as revealing the complex nexus of interests, attitudes and relationships prevailing in society during the later Middle Ages.

Crusading as an Act of Vengeance, 1095–1216
Crusading as an Act of Vengeance, 1095–1216

Author: Susanna A. Throop

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-04-22

Total Pages: 243

ISBN-13: 1317156730

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Only recently have historians of the crusades begun to seriously investigate the presence of the idea of crusading as an act of vengeance, despite its frequent appearance in crusading sources. Understandably, many historians have primarily concentrated on non-ecclesiastical phenomena such as feuding, purportedly a component of "secular" culture and the interpersonal obligations inherent in medieval society. This has led scholars to several assumptions regarding the nature of medieval vengeance and the role that various cultures of vengeance played in the crusading movement. This monograph revises those assumptions and posits a new understanding of how crusading was conceived as an act of vengeance in the context of the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries. Through textual analysis of specific medieval vocabulary it has been possible to clarify the changing course of the concept of vengeance in general as well as the more specific idea of crusading as an act of vengeance. The concept of vengeance was intimately connected with the ideas of justice and punishment. It was perceived as an expression of power, embedded in a series of commonly understood emotional responses, and also as an expression of orthodox Christian values. There was furthermore a strong link between religious zeal, righteous anger, and the vocabulary of vengeance. By looking at these concepts in detail, and in the context of current crusading methodologies, fresh vistas are revealed that allow for a better understanding of the crusading movement and those who "took the cross," with broader implications for the study of crusading ideology and twelfth-century spirituality in general.

Introduction to English Legal History
Introduction to English Legal History

Author: John Baker

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2019-03-26

Total Pages: 835

ISBN-13: 0192540742

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Fully revised and updated, this classic text provides the authoritative introduction to the history of the English common law. The book traces the development of the principal features of English legal institutions and doctrines from Anglo-Saxon times to the present and, combined with Baker and Milsom's Sources of Legal History, offers invaluable insights into the development of the common law of persons, obligations, and property, and also of criminal and public law. It is an essential reference point for all lawyers, historians and students seeking to understand the evolution of English law over a millennium. The book provides an introduction to the main characteristics, institutions, and doctrines of English law over the longer term - particularly the evolution of the common law before the extensive statutory changes and regulatory regimes of the last two centuries. It explores how legal change was brought about in the common law and how judges and lawyers managed to square evolution with respect for inherited wisdom.

The Oxford History of the Laws of England Volume II
The Oxford History of the Laws of England Volume II

Author: John Hudson

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2012-03-22

Total Pages: 981

ISBN-13: 0191630039

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This volume in the landmark Oxford History of the Laws of England series, spans three centuries that encompassed the tumultuous years of the Norman conquest, and during which the common law as we know it today began to emerge. The first full-length treatment of all aspects of the early development of the English common law in a century, featuring extensive research into the original sources that bring the era to life, and providing an interpretative account, a detailed subject analysis, and fascinating glimpses into medieval disputes. Starting with King Alfred (871-899), this book examines the particular contributions of the Anglo-Saxon period to the development of English law, including the development of a powerful machinery of royal government, significant aspects of a long-lasting court structure, and important elements of law relating to theft and violence. Until the reign of King Stephen (1135-54), these Anglo-Saxon contributions were maintained by the Norman rulers, whilst the Conquest of 1066 led to the development of key aspects of landholding that were to have a continuing effect on the emerging common law. The Angevin period saw the establishment of more routine royal administration of justice, closer links between central government and individuals in the localities, and growing bureaucratization. Finally, the later twelfth and earlier thirteenth century saw influential changes in legal expertise. The book concludes with the rebellion against King John in 1215 and the production of the Magna Carta. Laying out in exhaustive detail the origins of the English common law through the ninth to the early thirteenth centuries, this book will be essential reading for all legal historians and a vital work of reference for academics, students, and practitioners.