Social Relations, Politics, and Power in Early Modern France: Robert Descimon and the Historian’s Craft

Published by Penn State University Press 2016

Social Relations, Politics, and Power in Early Modern France

Robert Descimon and the Historian’s Craft

Edited by: Barbara B. Diefendorf

Volume 19 in the series Early Modern Studies

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780271091150

Overview
Contents

About this book

The study of history is a fundamentally sociable practice, with the exchange of ideas taking place in writing, over the seminar table, and often in informal discussions over food. These essays grew out of a web of sociability centered around French historian Robert Descimon, and focus on the nexus of social relations, politics, and power in France as it moved from the age of religious wars into the age of absolutism. Using a wide variety of historical approaches and methods, these essays offer new insights into the evolving role of early modern elites and the social, familial, and cultural influences that shaped their values and priorities.

Author / Editor information

Diefendorf Barbara B. :

Barbara B. Diefendorf (PhD, University of California–Berkeley) is professor of history emerita at Boston University. Her books include Paris City Councillors in the Sixteenth Century: The Politics of Patrimony (1983), Beneath the Cross: Catholics and Huguenots in Sixteenth-Century Paris (1991), and From Penitence to Charity: Pious Women and the Catholic Reformation in Paris (2004, winner of the J. Russell Major Prize from the American Historical Association). She is currently completing a book manuscript on the contested early stages of France’s Catholic Reformation.

Reviews

“The selections in this volume build on Robert Descimon’s critical work on the workings and nature of the early modern state by focusing on the complexities underlying actions and contentions among French elites during the crucial transition to Bourbon rule.”
—Michael Wolfe, Queens College, CUNY

“Honoring the path-breaking social and political history of Robert Descimon, these essays describe and themselves display the innovative methods and insight that mark his scholarship on early modern France. Following Descimon’s lead into archives, manuscripts, and marginalia, the authors add to our understanding of the construction of the absolute state and the networks and loyalties of the elites on which it depended. Social Relations, Politics, and Power is also a testimony to the networks of friendship that sustain historians in their work on both sides of the Atlantic. A book full of riches!”
—Natalie Zemon Davis

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Introduction: Robert Descimon and the Historian’s Craft Barbara B. Diefendorf Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. Robert Descimon, the Annales Tradition, and the Social History of the Ruling Classes Jonathan Dewald Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	25
2. Law and Social History in Early Modern France Michael P. Breen Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	42
3. Local Officials and Torture in Seventeenth-Century Bordeaux Sara Beam Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	61
4. Urban Elites and Politics in Sixteenth-Century Dijon Mack P. Holt Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	87
5. The Notary as Rural Power Broker: Maître Coujard and Pierre Collenot, Syndic of Alligny James B. Collins Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	106
6. Reading Municipal Lists, Interpreting Civic Practice from the Insights of Robert Descimon to Seventeenth-Century Bourges Hilary J. Bernstein Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	134
7. Qui étaient les députés? An Unknown Group of Protestant Leaders on the Eve of the First War of Religion Philip J. Benedict Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	158
8. Civic Engagement and Public Assistance in Sixteenth-Century Paris Barbara B. Diefendorf Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	184
9. Unfinished Business: An Edition of the “Manuscript History of the League” Mark Greengrass, Marco Penzi and Mark Critchlow Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	212
10. Gallicans Not Magistrates: The Dupuy Cabinet in the Age of Richelieu Robert A. Schneider Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	237
11. Intellectual Trajectories and Relationships of a French Historian Robert Descimon Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	260
Bibliography of Robert Descimon’s Writings Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	283
Glossary Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	295
Contributors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	301
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	305

Language: English
Publisher: Penn State University Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 320

eBook

Published: August 25, 2016
ISBN: 9780271091150