Violence and the State in Languedoc, 1250-1400

Synopsis

Although it is often assumed that resurgent royal government eliminated so-called 'private warfare', the French judicial archives reveal nearly one hundred such wars waged in Languedoc and the Auvergne between the mid-thirteenth and the end of the fourteenth century. Royal administrators often intervened in these wars, but not always in order to suppress 'private violence' in favour of 'public justice'. They frequently recognised elites' own power and legitimate prerogatives, and elites were often fully complicit with royal intervention. Much of the engagement between royal officers and local elites came through informal processes of negotiation and settlement, rather than through the imposition of official justice. The expansion of royal authority was due as much to local cooperation as to conflict, a fact that ensured its survival during the fourteenth-century crises. This book thus provides a new narrative of the rise of the French state and a fresh perspective on aristocratic violence.

Copyright:

2014

Book Details

Book Quality:

Publisher Quality

ISBN-13:

9781139904964

Publisher:

Cambridge University Press

Date of Addition:

04/30/14

Copyrighted By:

Justine Firnhaber-Baker

Adult content:

No

Language:

English

Has Image Descriptions:

No

Categories:

History, Nonfiction, Social Studies, Philosophy, Politics and Government, Sociology

Submitted By:

Bookshare Staff

Usage Restrictions:

This is a copyrighted book.