Piet van Boxel, Kirsten Macfarlane and Joanna Weinberg (eds), The Mishnaic Moment: Jewish Law among Jews and Christians in Early Modern Europe

<i>Everyday Magic in Early Modern Europe</i> (Kathryn A. Edwards, ed.)

Contents: Introduction, Allyson M. Poska, Jane Couchman and Katherine A. McIver Part I Religion: The permeable cloister, Elizabeth A. Lehfeldt Literature by women religious in early modern Catholic Europe and the New World, Alison Weber Convent creativity, Marilynn Dunn Convent music: an examination, Kimberlyn Montford Lay patronage and religious art, Catherine E. King Female religious communities beyond the convent, Susan E. Dinan Protestant movements, Merry Wiesner-Hanks Protestant womena (TM)s voices, Jane Couchman. Part II Embodied Lives: Maternity, Lianne McTavish Upending patriarchy: rethinking marriage and family in early modern Europe, Allyson M. Poska The economics and politics of marriage, Jutta Gisela Sperling Before the law, Lyndan Warner Permanent impermanence: continuity and rupture in early modern sexuality studies, Katherine Crawford Women and work, Janine M. Lanza Old women in early modern Europe: age as an analytical category, Lynn Botelho Women on the margins, Elizabeth S. Cohen Women and political power in early modern Europe, Carole Levin and Alicia Meyer. Part III Cultural Production: The Querelle des femmes, Julie D. Campbell Intellectual women in early modern Europe, Diana Robin Women in science and medicine, 1400-1800, Alisha Rankin Early modern women artists, Sheila ffolliott Beyond Isabella and beyond: secular women patrons of art in early modern Europe, Sheryl E. Reiss Material culture: consumption, collecting and domestic goods, Katherine A. McIver Images of women, Andrea Pearson Women, gender, and music, Linda Phyllis Austern Index.

George Buchanan: Political Thought in Early Modern Britain and Europe, edited by Caroline Erskine and Roger A. Mason. St. Andrews Studies in Reformation History. Farnham, Surrey, Ashgate Publishing, 2012. xvi, 315 pp. $125.00 US (cloth). Edited collections of essays, particularly those emerging out of earlier conferences, do not always make the most coherent finished products. This is most definitely not the case with this fine collection on George Buchanan (1506-82). Buchanan stood Scotland's most distinguished humanist, and was widely celebrated throughout Europe a Latin poet, playwright, historian, and political theorist. Thanks to this celebrity, however, and his infamy the scourge of Mary Queen of Scots and an architect of radical rebellion, Buchanan has remained famous, while also being surprisingly ill-understood and neglected. Outside of specialist scholarship on Renaissance and Reformation Scotland, he is often remembered in caricatured, two-dimensional terms, and effectively reduced to a stock hero or villain of Scottish history and lore. This collection of essays helps remedy this, and its success and coherence owes much to the theoretical work done by Erskine and Mason in their short but important introduction. Positioning this volume in the emerging field of the study of historical reputations, the editors have produced the first survey of Buchanan's through the centuries, well his contested, often shadowy (pp. 79, 288), and constantly mutating reputation (p. 306) a political thinker and cultural icon. While many of the contributors to this volume variously explore the influence of Buchanan's ideas and writings, this is generally done with caution, consciously reflecting the challenges inherent in the elusive methodological task of demonstrating how, or to what extent one thinker influences another. Instead, Erskine and Mason shrewdly emphasize the importance of usage: that is, the way Buchanan's ideas and have been used (and abused) by successive generations. Thus, this book is concerned less with Buchanan's influence, and much more with his legacy, another alternate term discussed by the editors; it is as much a celebration of Buchanan's readers and their responses to his texts it is of the man and his writings (p. 10). The result is a collection that is both stimulating and, the subtitle promises, wide-ranging in its scope. While Buchanan is obviously a central focus, it should be noted that he is also the lens through which we view the book's other main subject: exchange, interaction, and cosmopolitan engagement in early modern Europe. For instance, in his essay on Buchanan's chorography, or geographical descriptions of Scotland and the Scots, Roger Mason explores not only the impact Buchanan had on the way Scotland's distinct geographical and historical identity was understood at home. He also looks at how Buchanan's enduring scholarly legacy shaped the way Scotland was defined and understood in Europe. Mason's is the opening essay and it helps set the tone for much of the volume. Indeed, one of the book's main themes is the translation of texts and contexts, and the contributions of Astrid Stilma, Robert von Friedburg, and Allan Macinnes all shed valuable light on how the Buchanan-inspired concept of political resistance was exported and adapted linguistically and circumstantially across continental Europe. …

New Books across the Disciplines

This introductory chapter provides a brief overview of the book The Reach of the Republic of Letters: Literary and Learned Societies in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe (2 vols.) and its chapters. The book is the result of two workshops aimed at the discussion of the differences and resemblances between several regional types of literary and learned associations in early modern and late medieval Europe, and their possible interplay. It aims at bridging the gap in the study of literary and learned societies that exists between the perspectives of the history of science, literature, music, and the visual arts, and social and cultural history. These disciplines all study (aspects of ) literary and learned societies for different reasons and from different angles. Keywords: cultural history; early modern Europe; late medieval Europe; learned societies; literary

Introduction Why and How Gender Matters? Marianna Muravyeva and Raisa Maria Toivo Part 1: Historiography and the Politics of Gender 1. From Women's Oppression to Male Anxiety: The Concept of Patriarchy in the Historiography of Early Modern Europe Androniki Dialeti 2. The Metaphysics of Gender in Christine De Pizan's Thought Ilse Paakkinen 3. 'That Women Are But Men's Shadows': Examining Gender, Violence and Criminality in Early Modern Britain Anne-Marie Kilday Part 2: Female Spirituality, Religion and Gender Identities 4. A Good Wife?: Demonic Possession and Discourses of Gender in Later Medieval Culture Sari Katajala-Peltomaa 5. Between Martyrdom and Everyday Pragmatism: Gender, Family, and Anabaptism in Early Modern Germany Paivi Raisanen 6. Women's Sexuality between Legal Prescription and Ecclesiastical Control in the Romanian Principalities in the 18th Century Constanta Vintila-Gitulesku Part 3: Gendered Witches and Nordic Patriarchal Compromises 7. Women, Witches, and the Town Courts of Ribe: Ideas of the Gendered Witch in Early Modern Denmark Louise Nyholm Kallestrup 8. Male Witches and Masculinity in Early Modern Finnish Witchcraft Trials Raisa Maria Toivo 9. Gendering Moral Crimes in Early Modern England and Europe - Blasphemy the Mirror Image of Witchcraft? David Nash Part 4: Laws, Genders and Deviancies 10. Gendered Suicide in Early Modern Sweden and Finland Riikka Miettinen 11. The Responsibility of a Seducer?: Men and the Breach of Promise in Early Modern Swedish Legislation Mari Valimaki 12. Personalizing Homosexuality and Masculinity in Early Modern Russia Marianna Muravyeva

Origins of Europe’s north-south divide: Population changes, real wages and the ‘little divergence’ in early modern Europe

Contents: Preface Introduction: Historical studies in perceptions of work, Catharina Lis and Josef Ehmer. Part 1 The Heritage of Antiquity: Perceptions of work in classical antiquity: a polyphonic heritage, Catharina Lis. Part 2 Work and Identities: Reading Renaissance merchants' handbooks: confronting professional ethics and social identity, Jaume Aurell Lifting the curse: or why early modern worker autobiographers did not write about work, James S. Amelang The attitude of Milanese society to work and commercial activities. The case of the porters and the case of the elites, Luca Mocarelli. Part 3 Representations of Work in Visual Images and in Literary Texts: The visual representation of late medieval work: patterns of context, people and action, Gerhard Jaritz Representations of labour in late 16th-century Netherlandish prints: the secularization of the work ethic, Ilja M. Veldman Representing women's work in early modern Italy, Peter Burke. Part 4 Perceptions of Work in Early Modern Theory: Perceptions of work in early modern economic thought. Dutch mercantilism and central European cameralism in comparative perspective, Thomas Buchner Cultivating the landscape: the perception and description of work in 16th- to 18th-century German 'household literature' (HausvAterliteratur), Torsten Meyer Advocating for artisans: the AbbA(c) Pluche's Spectacle de la Nature (1732a 51), Cynthia J. Koepp. Part 5 Perceptions of Work and Labour Practices: The making of wages and attitudes towards labour in the crafts in early modern Central Europe, Reinhold Reith Perceptions of mobile labour and migratory practices in early modern Europe, Josef Ehmer. Part 6 Discussions and Comments: Work and identity of merchants and artisans in a larger context. Comment on Jaume Aurell and James S. Amelang, Hugo Soly Representations of labour in visual images and literary texts. Comment on Gerhard Jaritz, Ilja M. Veldman and Cynthia J. Koepp, Keith Thomas Discourse and practice, custom and market force(s): relations of dialogue and tension. Comment on Luca Mocarelli and Reinhold Reith, Steven L. Kaplan Perceptions of work, gender and migration: comment on Thomas Buchner, Josef Ehmer and Torsten Meyer, Sylvia Hahn Select bibliography Index.

Women and warfare is an emerging field in early modern history with a rapidly growing historiography. Art historians and cultural historians have been captivated by images of feminine martial power that deploy the figures of Athena, Minerva, Diana the Huntress, Judith, and Amazons. Much of the historical literature has focused on queens, regents, and female power in early modern royal states. Political and gender historians have examined powerful female rulers and regents such as Mary of Hungary, Margaret of Parma, and Infanta Isabella in the Habsburg Low Countries; Mary I Tudor and Elizabeth I Tudor in England; Marie de Guise and Mary Stuart in Scotland; Catherine de’ Medici, Maria de’ Medici, and Anne of Austria in France; and Amalia Elizabeth in Hesse—who all engaged in military planning and diplomacy. Historians and gender studies scholars are now setting these women warriors and powerful queens into a much broader context of women, gender, and war in early modern Europe. Noblewomen, city women, and peasant women were all swept up into the maelstrom of war in early modern Europe. This bibliographical essay brings together diverse historiographies of women’s history, gender history, history of sexuality, art history, literary history, history of violence, and war and society history. The essay includes sources on women, gender, and warfare in peasant revolts, urban revolts, noble revolts, civil wars, religious wars, and colonial wars, as well as in conventional interstate wars and coalition wars. An initial section discusses General Overviews and historical surveys of women, gender, and war in early modern Europe. A section on Theoretical and Comparative Studies of Gender and War outlines diverse methodological approaches to studying the subject. Brief sections on Reference Works, Textbooks and Pedagogical Sources, Anthologies, and Journals discuss research and teaching tools in the field. A thematic section on Women, Power, and War in Early Modern Europe goes beyond biographical studies to examine gendered dynamics of authority, agency, and power in the early modern period. Women rulers directed warfare and negotiated peace in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Artistic images and literary representations shaped notions of women and war that influenced contemporary political culture. Women and War in the Renaissance and Reformation (1450s-1550s) then considers women and gender in the Italian Wars and in religious and social conflicts during the Reformation era. Another section on Women and Gender in the European Wars of Religion (1550s-1650s) examines women’s experiences and gender dynamics in the French Wars of Religion, Dutch Revolt, Thirty Years’ War, and British Civil Wars. Gendered dynamics of violence in early modern maritime empires are considered in a section on Women, Gender, and Violence in Maritime Empires, focusing on the Portuguese, Spanish, British, and Dutch empires. Indigenous peoples’ experiences of slavery and colonial warfare are contemplated, along with maritime raiding, privateering, and piracy. Gender in Military Culture considers how gender and honor culture fueled familial and social conflict through dueling, feuds, and vendettas. Military organizations promoted specific forms of masculinity and notions of armed service. Women participated in the “campaign communities” that formed around field armies as soldiers’ wives, sutlers, peddlers, and prostitutes. Another section on Gender and Early Modern State Development (1640s-1700s) examines how the rise of permanent armies in the seventeenth century transformed military culture, gradually pushing women out of the military sphere. The section also surveys women and war in the Ottoman expansion, Russian imperial and Eastern European warfare, and French wars of expansion during the reign of Louis XIV. A final section on Women and Atrocities in Early Modern Warfare contemplates women’s suffering from rape, pillage, and massacre. Discussions of women’s status in warfare and attempts to restrain violence against non-combatants drove the development of laws of war in early modern Europe. Warfare was pervasive in early modern Europe, affecting entire states and societies in profound ways. This bibliographic essay provides an introduction to the myriad connections between war, gender, and society in early modern societies. I would like thank Alexander Sosenko, a Ph.D. candidate in history at Northern Illinois University who served as my graduate research assistant, for his assistance in identifying sources for this bibliographic essay.

Contrary to what the Indocentrism that has long prevailed in the field of Mughal studies would tend to suggest, the empire founded by Babur cannot be reduced to an extractive machine feeding itself with agrarian surplus and working in quasi complete isolation from the rest of the early modern world. Quite to the opposite: the 17th century witnessed the development and diversification of the European presence in the subcontinent on an unprecedented scale as well as a significant increase in the exchanges with the West. Concurrently, and as may be seen from the multi-ethnic composition of the Mughal nobility, the empire attracted elites in search of employment from all over the Asian-Islamicate ecumene stretching from Istanbul to Aceh. And yet the impact of those multi-directional exchanges on the political genesis and evolution of the Mughal state is a question that has not been sufficiently addressed. While the Mughal-European relationship has long attracted the attention of specialists of economic history as well as historians interested in the Western perceptions of the Orient, the historiography dealing with the Mughal dynasty and its immediate neighbours and competitors (Safavids, Uzbeks, Ottomans) has largely confined itself to diplomatic studies of a traditional workmanship and to a handful of structuralist comparisons informed by the old orientalist paradigm. Recently, however, scholars such as Sanjay Subrahmanyam have reminded us of the highly competitive nature of early modern state building and, in order to reach a deeper understanding of the latter, have alerted us to the necessity of paying due attention to the processes of circulation, imitation or rejection of political models born out from this very inter-imperial rivalry. This appears all the more necessary in the case of the Mughal empire as historians have generally emphasized the influence of past rather than contemporary imperial experiments when trying to uncover the layers of its construction. With a view to filling that gap, the present article will therefore tackle two broad sets of interconnected questions. First, what was the political horizon of the Mughals, what did they know about the political experiments that took place in early modern Europe and Muslim Asia? Second, what were the elements of these experiments, if any, that were deemed adaptable in the Indian context? Answering these questions, one may hope to map out more clearly some of the highways and dead ends which ran across the political space of early modern Asia and Europe.

Part 1 Comparative studies of serfdom and slavery: slvaery, serfdom and other forms of coerced labour - similarities and differences, Stanley L. Engerman some controversial questions concerning 19th-century emancipation from slavery and serfdom, Peter Kolchin. Part 2 Themes and case studies on slavery: continuity and change in Western slavery - ancient to modern times, William D. Phillips Jr the origin and establishment of Ancient Greek slavery, Tracey Rihll the hierarchical household in Roman society - a study of domestic slavery, Richard Saller emancipation in Byzantium - Roman law in a medieval society, Rosemary Morris New World slavery, Old World slavery, Howard Temperley slave exploitation and the elementary structure of enslavement, Robin Blackburn slave emancipation in modern history, David Turley. Part 3 Themes and case studies in serfdom: serfdom in medieval and modern Europe, Michael Bush on servile status in the early Middle Ages, Wendy Davies the rises and declines of serfdom in medieval and early modern Europe, Robert Brenner memories for freedom - attitudes towards serfdom in England, 1200-1350, Christopher Dyer subject farmers in Brandenberg-Prussia and Poland - village life and fortunes under manorialism in early modern Central Europe, William W. Hagen the serf economy and the social order in Russia, Steven Hoch when and why was the Russian peasantry emancipated?, Boris N. Mironov.

The Mishnaic Moment: Jewish Law among Jews and Christians in Early Modern Europe, by Piet van Boxel, Kirsten Macfarlane, and Joanna Weinberg (Eds.)

Teaching &amp; Learning Guide for: Politics, Print Culture and the Habermas Thesis Cluster

Reviewed by: Infanticide, Secular Justice, and Religious Debate in Early Modern Europe by Adriano Prosperi Jane Bitomsky Prosperi, Adriano, Infanticide, Secular Justice, and Religious Debate in Early Modern Europe, trans. by Hilary Siddons (Europa Sacra, 10), Turnhout, Brepols, 2016; hardback; pp. viii, 407; R.R.P. €110.00; ISBN 9782503531748. By Adriano Prosperi's own admission, 'no other crime has been studied, analysed and described more' than infanticide (p. 49). It is difficult then to offer an original argument or to advance the already abundant scholarship on this offence. Prosperi's text engages in a fine-grained analysis of the 1709 trial and conviction of Bolognese singlewoman Lucia Cremonini for the murder of her newborn son. The author's choice of Cremonini as the focus of this work is predicated on the richness of the archival material on her trial, and the fact that Cremonini is representative of the archetypal early modern infanticidal mother. That Cremonini committed an infanticide is tangential though to how Prosperi uses the extant court documents on her case to reconstruct the greater cultural processes at play in early modern Europe. Indeed, Lucia's act of infanticide is merely a vehicle through which Prosperi can illustrate how the extraction of material from her trial can provide valuable insights into early modern European culture, law, and theology. This text also queries 'whether these obscure inhabitants of the criminal archives are truly knowable in their concrete reality' (p. 369). Prosperi's work is divided into four parts. Each part revolves around a key component or character from Lucia Cremonini's trial. Part 1 provides a retelling and contextualization of the 'words set down in the trial documents'(p. 15). We learn the circumstances surrounding Lucia's commission of this [End Page 247] 'unspeakable crime', and how Lucia conformed, from her marital status to her purported motives, to the early modern template of the infanticidal mother (p. 8). There is also a discussion of the other early modern stereotypes that were propagated about infanticide, with reference to Jewish ritualistic practices, witches, 'donne malefiche' (evil women), and the impecunious midwife (p. 43). Part 2 is entitled 'The Mother'. Here, Prosperi dissects key phrases from Cremonini's 1709 testimony in an attempt to distinguish Lucia from 'the crowd of women convicted of infanticide' (p. 85). Her reference to 'a young priest' as the putative father, for example, is expanded upon to expose how the sexual transgressions of the clergy were typically concealed by the ecclesiastical courts, and to highlight how the paternal figure was largely excluded from early modern investigations of infanticides (p. 93). Lucia's declaration that 'he robbed me of my honour and took my virginity', meanwhile, is found to be consistent with narratives of rape in the early modern Bologna court records, and reflective of the unequal power relations between early modern men and women (p. 113). Although, as Prosperi acknowledges, these court documents contain 'no expression of any feelings', the contextualization of these key phrases allows the reader to make some inferences about Lucia's experiential mindset (p. 114). Part 3 explores the early modern theological and cultural beliefs superimposed on the body of Lucia's deceased male infant. In his discussion of the early modern theological dogma on the unbaptized infant and the question of ensoulment, Prosperi thought-provokingly contends that 'even the unborn is not absent from the historical process just because it is devoid of speech' (p. 136). The final part of this text, perhaps fittingly, ends with a description of Lucia's execution on the scaffold. From the absence of irons on her wrists to the imprisonment of the hangman for 'keeping her in agony for a while', even Lucia's death functions as a commentary on the cultural beliefs ingrained in the spectacle of early modern executions (p. 328). This analysis was motivated by Prosperi's desire 'to understand the story of a mother who committed infanticide' (p. 372). Following the example of scholars Carlo Ginzburg and Natalie Zemon Davis, Prosperi showcases how fine-grained contextual analysis can enrich our understanding of historical individuals whose names are only discoverable due to their appearance in the court records. The value of Prosperi's...

Enchanted Europe: Superstition, Reason, and Religion, 1250–1750