Europe

by Diana Mosley , Language: English

A consummate writer and intimate of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, Diana Mosley was a frequent guest at their parties in Paris or at ‘the Moulin’ in Orsay, where they were neighbours. Written in her inimitable style – archly intelligent, witty and perceptive – Diana Mosley paints a remarkable portrait of her friend that is both extremely life-like and realistic with regards to her flaws. What was it that utterly captivated the heir to the throne and made him renounce it so that he might never be parted from her? It is this question which Diana Mosley seeks to answer and which she is perhaps better qualified to answer than anyone else, given her love of her husband Sir Oswald Mosley, Leader of the British Fascists.

by John Hardman , Language: English

A thought-provoking, authoritative biography of one of history’s most maligned rulersLouis XVI of France, who was guillotined in 1793 during the Revolution and Reign of Terror, is commonly portrayed in fiction and film either as a weak and stupid despot in thrall to his beautiful, shallow wife, Marie Antoinette, or as a cruel and treasonous tyrant. Historian John Hardman disputes both these versions in a fascinating new biography of the ill-fated monarch. Based in part on new scholarship that has emerged over the past two decades, Hardman’s illuminating study describes a highly educated ruler who, though indecisive, possessed sharp political insight and a talent for foreign policy; who often saw the dangers ahead but could not or would not prevent them; and whose great misfortune was to be caught in the violent center of a major turning point in history.H

by Roger Hutchinson , Language: English

In the 1830s and 1840s the district of Glendale on the island of Skye was swamped by immigrants cleared from other north Skye estates. The resultant overcrowding and over-use of land caused simmering discontent – not against the incomers, but against the landowners, who regarded their tenants as no more than chattels. This book is a definitive account of what happened when the powder-keg erupted and a full-scale land-war ensued. Pitched battles with police, factors and bailiffs, military intervention, arrests, trials, imprisonment and the personal intervention of the Prime Minister were to have huge consequences for crofters all over the Highlands, who, ultimately, were the victors.

by Andy Fear , Jamie Wood , Language: English

Isidore of Seville (560–636) was a crucial figure in the preservation and sharing of classical and early Christian knowledge. His compilations of the works of earlier authorities formed an essential part of monastic education for centuries. Due to the vast amount[-]of information he gathered and its wide dissemination in the Middle Ages, Pope John Paul II even named Isidore the patron saint of the Internet in 1997. This volume represents a cross section of the various approaches scholars have taken toward Isidore’s writings.

by David Long , Language: English

"It is not the walls that make the city, but the people who live within them." — George VIAs George VI so rightly said, it is the loves, schemes, failures, battles, intrigues, and dreams of the people who live in a city that make it what it is. And in a city as vibrant and chaotic as London those lives are going to be quite extraordinary. Seeking to unravel the stories locked within each district, London expert David Long turns to the characters that have defined them.

by Lewdige , Language: English

Partly on the strength of their apparent success in insurgencies such as Malaya and Northern Ireland, the British armed forces have long been perceived as world class, if not world beating. However, their recent performance in Iraq and Afghanistan is widely seen as—at best—disappointing; under British control Basra degenerated into a lawless city riven with internecine violence, while tactical mistakes and strategic incompetence in Helmand Province resulted in heavy civilian and military casualties and a climate of violence and insecurity.

by David Harvey , Language: English

Collecting David Harvey’s finest work on Paris during the second empire, Paris, Capital of Modernity offers brilliant insights ranging from the birth of consumerist spectacle on the Parisian boulevards, the creative visions of Balzac, Baudelaire and Zola, and the reactionary cultural politics of the bombastic Sacre Couer.

by Peter Darby , Faith Wallis , Language: English

Bede (c. 673-735) was Anglo-Saxon England’s most prominent scholar, and his body of work is among the most important intellectual achievements of the entire Middle Ages. Bede and the Future brings together an international group of Bede scholars to examine a number of questions about Bede’s attitude towards, and ideas about, the time to come. This encompasses the short-term future (Bede’s own lifetime and the time soon after his death) and the end of time. Whilst recognising that these temporal perspectives may not be completely distinct, the volume shows how Bede’s understanding of their relationship undoubtedly changed over the course of his life.

by Hester Vaizey , Language: English

The changes that followed the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 were particularly dramatic for East Germans. With the German Democratic Republic effectively taken over by West Germany in the reunification process, nothing in their lives was immune from change and upheaval: from the way they voted, the newspapers they read, to the brand of butter they bought. But what was it really like to go from living under communism one minute, to capitalism the next? What did the East Germans make of capitalism? And how do they remember the GDR today? Are their memories dominated by fear and loathing of the Stasi state, or do they look back with a measure of fondness and regret on a world of guaranteed employment and low living costs?This is the story of eight citizens of the former German Democratic Republic, and how these dramatic changes affected them.

by T J Clarkson , Language: English

This book traces the history of relations between the kingdom of Strathclyde and Anglo-Saxon England in the Viking period of the ninth to eleventh centuries AD. It puts the spotlight on the North Britons or ‘Cumbrians’, an ancient people whose kings ruled from a power-base at Govan on the western side of present-day Glasgow. In the tenth century, these kings extended their rule southward from Clydesdale to the southern shore of the Solway Firth, bringing their language and culture to a region that had been in English hands for more than two hundred years.

by Thomas Finkenauer , Hans Josef Wieling , Language: German

Der Sammelband vereinigt Beiträge vieler renommierter Romanisten zum römischen Sklavenrecht. Vermögensrechtliche Fragen, namentlich des Sondervermögens (peculium) von Sklaven, werden ebenso erörtert wie die soziale Stellung einzelner Sklavengruppen.

by Gervase Rosser , Language: English

Guilds and fraternities, voluntary associations of men and women, proliferated in medieval Europe. The Art of Solidarity in the Middle Ages explores the motives and experiences of the many thousands of men and women who joined together in these family-like societies. Rarely confined to a single craft, the diversity of guild membership was of its essence. Setting the English evidence in a European context, this study is not an institutional history, but instead is concerned with the material and non-material aims of the brothers and sisters of the guilds.G

by Patricia Knight , Language: English

The early twentieth century in Italy was a crucial period in its history. Mussolini and Fascism surveys all the important issues and topics of the period including the origins and rise of Fascism, Mussolini as Prime Minister and Dictator, the Totalitarian state, foreign policy and the Second World War. It also examines how Italian Fascism compared to other inter-war dictatorships.

by John A Weal , Language: English

by Christian Freigang , Jean-Claude Schmitt , Language: German

Thema des Bandes sind die höfischen Inszenierungen im Spätmittelalter und ihre innere Kohärenz. Die spezifischen Repräsentationsmuster einzelner Höfe werden insbesondere auf ihre Zielsetzung befragt. Neben der Analyse einzelner Phänomene der höfischen Kultur widmen sich die Beiträge vor allem dem Zusammenwirken von Architektur und Kunst, Zeremoniell, Literatur und Musik am Hofe. Über eine bloße Betrachtung der Bildkünste hinaus spannt sich damit der methodische Rahmen hin zu einer interdisziplinären Untersuchung, in der historische Anthropologie, Musik und Literaturwissenschaft sowie Baugeschichte berücksichtigt werden.

by Dan Van der Vat , Language: English

by Steve Murdoch , Language: English

This important new book provides the first detailed and clear analysis of the Scots involvement in naval warfare during the early modern period. The lazy use by both contemporaries and some modern authors of the word ‘piracy’ as a catch-all for all sorts of maritime activity obscures a complex picture of Scottish maritime warfare. Through the use of letters of marque and reprisal (rightly distinguished in this analysis) as well as dedicated Crown fleets, Scottish warfare against against a wide range of enemies are scrutinised.

by Nick Wilding , Language: English

Galileo’s Idol offers a vivid depiction of Galileo’s friend, student, and patron, Gianfrancesco Sagredo (1571-1620). Sagredo’s life, which has never before been studied in depth, brings to light the inextricable relationship between the production, distribution, and reception of political information and scientific knowledge. Nick Wilding uses as wide a variety of sources as possible – paintings, ornamental woodcuts, epistolary hoaxes, intercepted letters, murder case files, and others – to challenge the picture of early modern science as pious, serious, and ecumenical.

by Catherine Hanley , Language: English

In 1215 a group of English barons, dissatisfied with the weak and despicable King John, decided that they needed a new monarch. They wanted a strong, experienced man, of royal blood, and they found him on the other side of the Channel: astonishingly, the most attractive candidate for the crown of England was Louis, eldest son and heir of the king of France.In this fascinating biography of England’s least-known “king”—and the first to be written in English—Catherine Hanley explores the life and times of “Louis the Lion” before, during, and beyond his quest for the English throne.

by Williamson Clifford , Language: English

This book offers an innovative approach to the character of the intellectual life of Catholics in Scotland. It looks at Catholic attempts to fight the appeal of communism amongst the working classes in interwar Scotland, it analyses developments in the devotional life of Scottish Catholics and it discusses the unique theological contribution made by Scottish clerics. Chapters also explore the increasing presence of Catholics in Scotland in higher education and their role in shaping change within the Catholic Church.

by Susan Mosher Stuard , Language: English

In the fourteenth century, garish ornaments, bright colors, gilt, and military effects helped usher in the age of fashion in Italy. Over a short span of years important matters began to turn on the cut of a sleeve. Fashion influenced consumption and provided a stimulus that drove demand for goods and turned wealthy townspeople into enthusiastic consumers. Making wise decisions about the alarmingly expensive goods that composed a fashionable wardrobe became a matter of pressing concern, especially when the market caught on and became awash in cheaper editions of luxury wares.F

by Ronald H Fritze , William Baxter Robison , Language: English

Providing the chronological setting for many of Shakespeare’s plays, various swashbuckling novels from Sir Walter Scott’s to Robert Louis Stevenson’s, and such Hollywood films as Braveheart, late Medieval England is superficially well known. Yet its true complexity remains elusive, locked in the covers of specialized monographs and journal articles. In over 300 entries written by 80 scholars, this book makes the factual information and historical interpretations of the era readily available. Covering political, military, religious, and constitutional subjects as well as social and economic topics, the volume is easy to use, comprehensive, and authoritative.

by Eva De Visscher , Language: English

In "Reading the Rabbis" Eva De Visscher examines the Hebrew scholarship of Englishman Herbert of Bosham (c.1120-c.1194). Chiefly known as the loyal secretary and hagiographer of Archbishop Thomas Becket and enemy of Henry II, he appears here as an outstanding Hebraist whose linguistic proficiency and engagement with Rabbinic sources, including contemporary teachers, were unique for a northern-European Christian of his time. Two commentaries on the Psalms by Herbert form the focus of scrutiny.

by Ryan P Freeburn , Language: English

Hugh of Amiens (c. 1085-1164) was an important intellectual figure in the twelfth century. During a long life he served as a cleric, Cluniac monk, abbot, and archbishop of Rouen. He wrote a number of works including poems, biblical exegesis, anti-heretical polemics, and most importantly one of the earliest collections of systematic theology, his Dialogues. This book examines all of Hugh’s writings to uncover a better understanding not only of this individual, but also of the twelfth-century as a whole, especially the theological preoccupations of the period, including the development of systematic theology and views on the differences of the monastic and clerical ways of life.