Puissants et miserables

This is an extremely substantial work, the fruit of decades of thought and of a deep knowledge of primary sources of all types, and of the Francophone historiography of the past two generations—though other historiographies are noticed. It is also informed throughout by the thinking of sociologists, especially Weber, and of social anthropologists. A brief introduction outlines the aim: given that medieval schemes of social organisation tend to be formulated within a religious ideology in which élites are dominant and women under-represented, this book will try to capture the standpoint of peasants in the Frankish world. Thereafter it is structured in three main parts: the tools available for studying social systems, types of distinction between persons, and peasants within landlordly society. The first part (‘Tools’) has four chapters, covering early medieval views of the world order, institutions, families, and personal ties between men. All four bring the application of modern social theory to medieval texts, analyse medieval concepts, deal with problems of vocabulary, and outline and critique some recent analyses—though they do so in varying degrees. Chapter One engages with the concept of Christendom and with the medieval ordines—for Devroey, as for other recent commentators, a more appropriate analytical tool than class. Chapter Two is primarily concerned with kingship and specifically with the functions of kings, the legitimation of royal power and the heterogeneity of the ideology of kingship; it includes a particularly vivid evocation of the Carolingian royal court. The third chapter is occupied with the extensive recent literature from historians of the family and with the influence of social anthropology upon that scholarship; it includes some extremely acute observations on the instability of vocabulary, the hazards of translation, the unevenness of source-provision and the difficulty of generalising from regional behaviour; whether or not the identification of wide kin groups can tell us anything about behaviour within the kin is a major issue that emerges. Chapter Four deals essentially with the historians’ model of ‘feudal society’ and the way that this has changed across the twentieth century: ‘vassality’ has been deconstructed; the word fides—‘trust’ in many contexts but also ‘faith’, ‘loyalty’—has been shown to have multiple implications; and it is misleading to use Tassilo of Bavaria as a model for all types of vassalage; there is also a useful section on other types of group and association. Throughout this part, Devroey stresses that we know much more about aristocrats than about peasants

Archaeology · Historiography · Ideology · Legitimation · Monarchy · Political science · Politics · Power (physics · Sociology · Classics · Historical, Literary, and Cultural Studies · History · Law · Medieval and Early Modern Justice · Medieval Literature and History