The ‘Feudal Revolution’ After All? A Discussion on Four Recent Books

Abstract

The article discusses four books published during the 2010s, which address – directly or indirectly – the problem of the ‘feudal revolution’; that is, the break-up of the Carolingian structures of political power that is said to have taken place all across western Europe at some point between the early and the central medieval period, leading to the creation of localised lordships. This interpretative framework was seriously challenged in the early 1990s, when Dominique Barthelemy and other historians argued that the sharp distinction between Carolingian ‘public order’ and ‘feudal’ lordships was ill-conceived. The article shows how the books by Charles West, Alessio Fiore, Nicolas Schroeder and Maria Elena Cortese have contributed – and might further contribute – to this debate.