23/09/2025
👇🏻
OPEN ACCESS🏆
After the Feudal Revolution: Power, Local Societies, and Change from the Tenth to Twelfth Centuries, eds. Christoph Haack, Annette Grabowsky and Steffen Patzold (Mohr Siebeck, September 2025)
https://www.mohrsiebeck.com/en/book/after-the-feudal-revolution-9783161636721/
The 11th century stands as the watershed between the »early« and »high« Middle Ages. Exactly what this means is hotly debated by historians, but at some point between the 10th and 12th centuries, the Carolingian World had changed into a political, social, and economic order distinctly different from earlier centuries, a world of knights, castles, and cities. Historians have discussed the nature of these transformations under the label of a medieval »revolution« that led to feudal society. Heavily challenged over the last decades, the »feudal revolution« has recently regained explanatory appeal. This volume opens a new perspective on the debate of the transformations of the 10th to 12th centuries, highlighting the role of the »Gregorian Reform« and the 11th century as a transformative period. The contributions offer case studies on France, Germany, Italy, and northern Spain.
CONTENTS:
Introduction
After the »Feudal Revolution«: A Look Back on the Debate and a Multiperspective Update -- Christoph Haack
Part I: Historizing and Revising the »Feudal Revolution«- Model
Challenging the Feudal Revolution in the 1990s. The Post-Mortem of a Debate -- Luise Nöllemeyer
The Terrors of the Year 1000. Structural Change and Narrations of Conflict -- Christoph Haack
Words of Power, Power of Words. Lexical and Social Change in Mâcon and Freising in the Tenth to Eleventh Centuries -- Isaac Smith
Part II: New Views on Classic Transformations
Local Perspectives on the Measurability and Patterns of Change in Southern Germany from an Archaeological Point of View (c. 500–1300) -- Lukas Werther
Abandoning Trial in Eleventh Century Catalonia -- Cornel-Peter Rodenbusch
Part III: »La mutation de l'an 1100«. Feudal Revolution and Gregorian Reform
»This toll must be paid at Koblenz«. Merchants and the »Feudal Revolution« in the Eleventh-Century Rhineland -- Charles West
A Feudal Transformation in the Empire? Historiography, Tradition and Sources -- Thomas Kohl
Building the »Feudal Revolution«. Power, Buildings, Economic Resources, and Aristocratic Identities in Central and Northern Italy (c. 950–c. 1150) -- Alessio Fiore
Rethinking Lordship in the Tenth to Eleventh Centuries. »Shared Lordship« between Laymen and Clerics and its Contestation -- Florian Mazel
Response
After the »Feudal Revolution«? A Response -- Chris Wickham