Individual Historians Research Articles

Memorial symbols of historical heritage in educational projects of the European Association of History Teachers (EuroClio)

The subject of the research is the role of international non-governmental organizations in the implementation of the European policy of historical revisionism in relation to the cultural and historical heritage and memorialization of symbols of the historical past. The author examines this topic through the prism of the activities of the European Association of History Teachers EuroClio, which is the initiator of a whole area of public programs (international seminars, conferences) dedicated to rethinking the significance of memorial monuments and determining the legitimacy of their preservation in public places. In the course of the analysis, the author highlighted the most large-scale projects of EuroClio in the near abroad, emphasized the contribution of individual historians to the development of new approaches of these organizations to the assessment of 20th century memorials, as well as on the methods of historical propaganda and memory policy aimed at decommunization of the countries of the "transitional period". The study is based on the method of systemic, legal and institutional analysis in combination with the chronological principle and the principle of objectivity. The novelty of the study lies in the fact that in Russian historiography this topic is covered mainly through the prism of the activities of the Council of Europe and its resolutions, while the work of European specialized organizations remains poorly studied. Based on the results of the analysis of events held by EuroClio and studies by historians, the author formulates a conclusion confirming the significant contribution of the association to the implementation of the European policy of historical revisionism and its conciliatory position in relation to state vandalism in the destruction of memorials and burials.

ИСТОРИЧЕСКАЯ НАУКА В ОРДЕНА ЗНАК ПОЧЕТА ИНСТИТУТЕ ИСТОРИИ, ЯЗЫКА И ЛИТЕРАТУРЫ УФИЦ РАН СКВОЗЬ ПРИЗМУ НАУЧНЫХ БИОГРАФИЙ И MEMORY-ДИСКУРСА

This paper provides an overview of publications of historical, biographical and memorial content and highlights intellectual history in a single institution – the Institute of History, Language and Literature. The scientific contribution of individual historians is revealed against the background of the development of different chronological periods of Soviet historiography. The article highlights some areas of relevant timeless research, examines scientific continuity and intergenerational communication, the preservation of academic traditions and other issues important for understanding the development of the scientific environment. The observations obtained during the study made it possible to identify groups of scientific generations of historians and their contribution to the development of regional historical science. The Institute’s communities of historians were formed under the influence of ideological, socio-cultural and historical changes. Since the 1930s , the intellectual history of the institution has been formed with the participation of representatives of academic Moscow and St. Petersburg historical schools. Being a member of the Bashkir branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences is the next major milestone in the development of academic traditions, the creation of scientific ties and cooperation with major scientific institutions of the country, the time of the emergence of such scientific fields as ethnographic and archaeological. The tradition of continuity of academic research approaches at the Institute was shown by the resumption of the archeographic project “Materials on the History of Bashkortostan”, after 50 and 79 years, which became an indicator of a stable scientific tradition and a high methodological level of individual historians. Thus, each generation contributed to the development of historical science, scientific continuity provided joint research projects, scientific guidance and professional mentoring.

‘Missed Revolutions’: Historical Narratives During Italian Fascism (from Delio Cantimori to Camillo Pellizzi)

AbstractThis article analyses some examples of historical narratives that, long before the emergence of so‐called postmodern history, had a specific narrative character: the reconstructions of ‘missed revolutions’ taking into account a possible alternative history and tracing back the reasons for a social, political, and economic crisis to an interrupted process, one that, had it been completed, would have triggered some sort of progress. Even if this kind of historical representation cannot properly be classified as a form of alternate history, it can be placed between traditional historical accounts of the past and a more innovative pattern, which entails a more speculative argumentation, and therefore has been used to justify or suggest specific political claims. One of the most obvious examples of this literature are the narrations of the ‘unaccomplished Risorgimento’, which was a highly debated theme in the political, intellectual, and historical discussion from the period of the Italian unification until the economic and political reconstruction following the Second World War. This article will stress four possible functions of the ‘missed revolution’ narratives: first, as a way to discover some currents that have been underestimated by the official historiography or mainstream political discourse; second, to observe the role assigned to particular events in altering the destiny of a nation; third, to show how political and intellectual actors use history to justify political actions or events; and finally, to reveal how, conversely, by reconstructing ‘missed revolutions’ individual historians and, more generally, public intellectuals can take up a specific political stance while writing history.

“I only do it to stay alive”. Development of the Narrative of “Unification of the Western Lands of Ukraine and Belarus with the Ukrainian and Belarusian Soviet Republics” in Soviet Historical Propaganda.

The article analyses selected aspects of the formation of the historical propaganda narrative of the unification of the lands of Western Ukraine with the Ukrainian SSR and of Western Belarus with the Belarusian SSR as well as the participation of individual historians deliberately involved or for various reasons forced to take part in developing the academic justification for the change in borders. The knowledge and authority of scholars often originating from the pre-revolutionary school were necessary for creating a historical narrative legitimizing the change in policy and reinforcing the propaganda message.

Edycje akt sejmikowych ziem i województw prowincji małopolskiej

The sejmik (dietine) records of the Old Polish period are an invaluable source material concerning almost all aspects of the everyday life of that time. In the Małopolska (Little Poland) province, apart from the general sejmik sporadically held in Nowe Miasto Korczyn and occasional assemblies of the nobility from some lands and districts, there were 17 regular sejmiks. The paper first discusses all the editions of sejmik resolutions that have so far appeared in print. The study then presents the next volumes of this kind of source texts that are under preparation for publication. When describing the process of editing sejmik records, attention was drawn to the research centers that have made contributions to this research field, and to individual historians involved in such undertakings. The text also stresses the changes that took place in the first decades of the 20th century, when publishers took into account various categories of sources concerning the functioning of Old Polish sejmiks. A lot of room is devoted to the scope of library and archival research and to major stores of source materials that were and still are used by editors. The paper closes with a list of all existing and planned publications that are expected to appear in this field in the coming years.

THE NEW IS WHAT HAS BEEN FORGOTTEN (ON THE STUDY AID OF D. M. VOLODIKHIN)

This article is devoted to the analysis of the study aid of D. M. Volodikhin “Historiography of Russian History. Outstanding historians of the 18-20th centuries”. Based on his previous publications in 1995 and 1997, the author created a book on Russian historiography for teachers and students of humanitarian faculties, as well as a wide range of readers interested in Russian history. The presentation of the material in this book is based on the biographical principle - the author refers to the lives and scientific activities of individual historians. Analyzing their creativity, he seeks to show the ways of the development of Russian historical science from the 18th to the beginning of the 20th century. However, this format of the training manual has proved outdated and cannot be recognized as successful for teaching a modern student audience. The author's attempts to give his own interpretation of the directions on which the development of national historical science was going were also unsuccessful.

Ancient Histories of Rome in Sixteenth-Century England: A Reconsideration of Their Printing and Circulation

This essay addresses the printing and circulation of ancient histories in England before 1600. A detailed case study in the context of wider European printing trends, it focuses on the significance of historians of Rome in particular, drawing on a new statistical analysis of the printing of ancient historians across Europe derived from the Universal Short Title Catalogue. Demonstrating new patterns of print popularity, the essay provides a nuanced understanding of the role histories of Rome played in early modern political culture and aims to facilitate more precise studies of the importance and popularity of individual historians, such as Livy, Plutarch, and Tacitus—both in England and in Europe.

National Interest in the Methodology of Domestic Historical Personality

The article aims to make final conclusions on methodological issues of personalities in national history. The main purpose of the research on this topic is the analysis of methodological problems of personalities with the aim of forming an independent historical consciousness. Since the methods used in the methodology of historical personalities in the Soviet and post-Soviet space depend on ideological principles, the place and role of research objects in historical events and phenomena have been underestimated.Therefore, subjective judgments and conclusions were made in the analysis and evaluation ofbiographies, social and political activities and the work of historians. Formation of criteria for assessingthe position of historians and their place in history using the modern methodological approach of nationalpersonality allows us to draw objective conclusions when updating the content of history. The articleanalyzes the wording of the party-state nomenclature used in the Soviet personalities, with the methodsof elite conclusions. As an alternative to the ideology of the party-state nomenclature, the advantagesof using the concept of elite in historical research are defined. Considering historical events and phenomenawith an elite approach, we present the methodological criteria for assessing the socio-politicalactivity and creativity of individual historians. Conclusions about the scientific assessment of individualsin the history of the Fatherland for their service to national-state interests are made. Considering that onlycertain aspects of the methodology of historical personalities are considered in the works of domesticresearchers, the scientific results achieved in the article complement the theoretical foundations of thisindustry. The criterion for evaluating the activities of historical personalities can also be used to updatethe content of history, scientific research and the content of special disciplines.

“The Light of History”: Scholarship and Officialdom in the Era of the First World War

ABSTRACTThis analysis examines the interplay between academia and officialdom during the First World War and its immediate aftermath. The role of more especially historians prior to and during the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 and the degree to which they succeeded—or failed—to affect decision making have been examined in some considerable detail by recent scholarship. Far less attention has been paid to the impact of individual historians’ experience of employment in war-time government agencies on their post-war scholarly pursuits. The effect of the war on historical scholarship, in fact, was profound. Not the least, it stimulated the establishment of diplomatic history as a distinct field of academic research and the emergence of the nascent discipline of international relations led by scholars who had served in wartime intelligence.

Study of the history of Ukraine in the context of socio-political transformations in Poland (1989–2017)

Recently, the necessity to study the past of Ukraine becomes the very actual problem. The special place takes researching of development of the Ukrainian issue in Poland. The author proposes a hypothesis that the process of studying history of Ukraine in Poland is closely connected to the process of social and political transformations in the state. The appeal to the theme is conditioned by needing to fill one of the gaps in modern historiography as for generalizing the process of studying the history of Ukraine in the context of socio-political transformations in Poland (1989–2017), needing to study the experience of the neighbouring country in the direction of the study of Ukrainian history in the context of socio-political transformations. The article is devoted to the analysis of the process of studying the problems of the Ukrainian history in Polish public and political thought in the context of the general political process in Poland (1989–2017). Particular attention is paid to the activities of Polish scientific centres and individual historians who are engaged in the study of the problems of Ukrainian history. The author comes to the conclusion, that the development of the social-politic transformation in Poland, the democratic changes of the end of the twentieth century started the process of establishing relations between Poland and Ukraine, studying and analyzing the common past. The attention of Polish historians has been paid to the «acute problems» of the common past. The issues of cultural and spiritual development, national consciousness of Ukrainians, Ukrainian-Polish cooperation, etc. remained unexplored.

Editorial Introduction: A Festschrift for Jerry Bentley

Editorial Introduction: A Festschrift for Jerry Bentley Fabio López-Lázaro Jerry Bentley’s dedication to intellectual inclusiveness and to disciplinary rigor should be celebrated as two sides of a groundbreaking career in the discipline of history. His enduring advocacy for investigations into world history, because it was broadly and deeply conceived, was not complacent: To the end, it aimed to challenge us. And his advocacy remained dynamic in his last publication, a critique of John Headley’s history of the European origins of global democracy.1 Bentley there described the current challenge as “the difficult work of actually investigating historical reality in the larger world, just as professional historians from Leopold von Ranke forward have compiled remarkable histories of Europe and its American offshoots.”2 Bentley was specifically thinking of the challenge of Headley’s Eurocentric thesis about democracy, but the content of Bentley’s other final writings indicates that he was thinking more programmatically about world history in general. Bentley labored under no illusions that history is an easy discipline, perhaps especially world history. For example, a truthful history of democratic ideas and practices “in global context,” Bentley argued in his critique of Headley’s book, would have to explore how these two historical phenomena took “different shapes and sport[ed] different colors in different societies,” and not straightjacket the historical evidence of “complicated” and “interrelated” reality into one preconceived taxonomy [End Page 459] (evidence, it should be noted, should thus be privileged according to Bentley over desires for simplicity). The challenge is a familiar one to historians: Generalizations, like translations, have to reach heights of intellectual accomplishment, but they must be solidly grounded in the evidence of specific contexts. Perhaps Bentley was thinking of this issue of how resuscitating the lived, grounded truth of the past should matter more to historians than rhetorical heights when in a 1981 book review he quoted Edward Fitzgerald’s approving self-assessment of his rather free translations of Omar Khayyam’s poems: “better a live sparrow,” mused Fitzgerald, “than a stuffed eagle.”3 Lived reality is to be preferred to preconceptions, anachronism, or aggrandizement. However, this is daunting historical work: Reviving the lived past while avoiding the stuffed eagles of the present is a collective goal that relies on individual historians’ intellectual efforts. Like the meticulous work carried out by the Renaissance scholars whom Bentley studied in his early years, world history is a humanistic endeavor, writ large, and Bentley argued in his analysis of Headley’s book that its critical investigative moment has arrived, a feeling easily confirmed by a quick perusal of scholarly journals, which shows that there is more research of a cross-cultural, entangled, histoire croisée, or transnational vein than ever before: “The time has come, in the interests of clear historical understanding unclouded by Eurocentric mythologies,” Bentley contended, “to take the larger world seriously, to scour global archives just as assiduously as historians have examined the European record over the past two centuries, and to follow as clearly as Headley has done for Europeans the contributions that peoples beyond Europe have made to the development of democracy and human rights.”4 The way Bentley praised Headley’s rigorous scholarship but critiqued the limitations imposed on him by his Eurocentric evidence is emblematic of the great legacy of Bentley’s scholarship, which this Festschrift celebrates. Despite our many accomplishments, much of the world’s history still remains to be fully investigated in a rigorous fashion. Over the years, and with increasing focus, Bentley’s writing encouraged many to take up this “difficult work of actually investigating historical reality in the larger world.” But there was an implicit model as well (less [End Page 460] often perceived) in the arc of his career, from his early methodological realizations to his final culminating recommendations for the future. We can learn from the way Bentley’s trajectory went from young historian of Renaissance humanism in the 1970s to early advocate of world history in the 1980s and then finally to mature proponent of world-historical research in the early 2000s, especially because this evolution parallels key developments in the recent history of the modern historical profession...

Kraljevske svadbene svečanosti u srednjovjekovnoj Bosni / Royal Nuptial Festivities in Medieval Bosnia

There are almost no writings about weddings in medieval Bosnia. Several occasional mentions by individual historians related to weddings and marriages are rare, but they are still sufficient to get an image of the content of nuptial activities of that time. One of the rare historiographic texts that refers to this topic and deserves an important place is the work of Jaroslav Šidak who to some extent resolved this problem. His writings will actually serve as the basis for our interpretation. In this sense, we will attempt to closely present the procedure of royal festivities of medieval Bosnia as far as available source material for this topic allows it.

History of education in Canada: historiographic “turns” and widening horizons

This paper explores major historiographic “turns” in history of education with a focus, although not exclusively, on English-speaking Canada. It addresses the transformative intellectual impact of the turn toward social history on the history of education, the impact of cultural history and the linguistic turn, the reception of Michel Foucault, and the state of the debate in history at-large today and its implications for the history of education. It also attempts to contextualise the intellectual trends permeating the writing of the history of education in light of developments in education, and signals new directions in historiography influencing history of education. Given the limitations of space, rather than engaging in a historiographical analysis of individual historians of education, the paper traces broad trends, while highlighting the contributions of a significant few.

The role and impact of the archivi della scrittura popolare

In the early twentieth century, archives for the collection and storage of non-professional writings, mostly life-histories by working-class authors, were established in Europe. I indicate their roles in different national contexts and the political and social ambitions of their founders. In Italy the collection by individual anthropologists, historians and political militants of autobiographical texts, oral and written, was expanded in the 1980s by the creation of a network of archivi della scrittura popolare, dedicated to gathering life-writings in their many forms. The most important was the Archivio Diaristico Nazionale at Pieve Santo Stefano, where Vincenzo Rabito's typescript is stored. I analyse the aims and achievements of its founder, Saverio Tutino, and the evolution of its influential place in Italy's cultural heritage.

Moines et religieux dans la ville (XII e –XV e siècle) Edited by Nicole Bériou and Cécile Caby (review)

Moines et religieux dans la ville (XIIe-XVe siecle). Edited by Nicole Beriou and Cecile Caby. [Cahiers de Fanjeaux, 44.] (Toulouse: Editions Privat. 2009. Pp. 639, with 1 CD. euro35,00. ISBN 978-2-7089-3447-4.)This volume of the Cahiers de Fanjeaux is based on the 2008 colloquy, the theme of which is stated in the title. Religieux here represents those subject to some rule (as opposed to the secular clergy) but not cloistered (as the moines were) and who were ordinarily in close contact with the laity.The first essay, by Nicole Beriou, provides a general overview of the relationship between religious orders and the cities of Europe between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries. He emphasizes that, despite the close connection between urbanization and the mendicant orders noted by Jacques Le Goff and others, older orders found their way into the cities well before the mendicants appeared. Yves Esquieu then traces a general history of the clergy in southern French cities from the fourth to the eleventh centuries.The next section concentrates on religious orders other than the mendicants. The first of them, by Jorg Oberste, traces the successive appearances of various monastic communities at Toulouse, emphasizing the roles they played and their contests for power, prestige, and income. As he proceeds from Benedictine monasticism through Cluniac reform and its amplification in the hands of a rising papacy, then through the Cistercians and the new military orders, Oberste furnishes a miniaturized history of western monasticism from the beginning to the early-thirteenth century as it played out in the rising cities, offering another reminder that, long before the mendicants appeared, monastic institutions performed an important role in satisfying the spiritual needs of those cities.Daniel Le Blevec, too, concentrates on a single city (Montpelier), whereas other articles specialize in other ways. Damien Carraz concentrates on the military orders and Alexis Grelois on the Cistercians, whereas Henri Gilles discusses monks at the universities. Yannick Veyrenche examines the canons regular of Saint-Ruf at Avignon and Valence, whereas Denyse Riche deals with the Cluniacs at Moissac.The next section turns to the mendicants, who understandably receive a lion's share of the attention. The book comes with a CD, but individual historians' enthusiasm about utilizing it depends on their project. Nelly Pousthomis-Dalle employs it admirably in her survey of mendicant settlement in southwestern France, as does Francois Guyonnet in his tour of mendicant houses in southeastern France. Both clarify their presentation with a plethora of maps and photographs. …

New Directions in Military History, 1900–1950: Questions of Total War and Colonial War

In this essay I survey some, though by no means all, recent publications and projects in the military history of Russia and the Soviet Union in the first half of the 20th century. The major wars of the Soviet and Russian army since War II--the Afghan war and the Chechen war--have been treated by individual historians but are probably more effectively captured in journalist accounts, fiction, and film. I also propose a rather catholic understanding of military history; I review books that certainly can be identified with an older type of military history that treats wars from the standpoint of armies and commanders and that guides readers through decisions about campaigns and the travails of military supply, especially in weapons and ammunition. But I also want to include new books about army and society more broadly, whether conscription, refugees, prisoners of war, or other manifestations of the collateral damage of modern combat. I want to draw attention to a relatively new subfield, that of history and memory, where wars figure prominently in the official and popular images and narratives of a very violent 20th century. Several of the authors to be discussed choose to situate wars in either a war or colonial war model, thereby tying their own scholarship to a broader community of historians who are studying colonialism in other parts of the world and trying to evaluate the impact of especially the two world wars on state systems, societies, and cultures. These welcome trends situate Russian and Soviet military history in transnational and comparative history. One of these welcome trends has been the recovery of lost wars, starting with the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-5. In a situation strangely parallel to that of the 1917 revolutions and War I (more on this soon), the Russo-Japanese War has been approached primarily as the backdrop to Russia's first great revolutionary upheaval of the 20th century. For example, John Bushnell, in his pathbreaking account of soldier rebellion during the failed revolution, does not dwell much on the war itself, since most of the mutinous soldiers and sailors were not in the Far East. (1) The fortunate coincidence of the greater accessibility of Russian archives during the 1990s, particularly the Russian State Military History Archive, and the pending centenary of the war inspired five scholars who are veterans of military history conferences--Bruce W. Menning, David Schimmelpenninck van der Oye, David Wolff, Shinji Yokote, and John W. Steinberg--to convene a large international group of specialists to rethink the Russo-Japanese War as World War Zero. (2) The list of authors includes historians from Japan, Russia, the United States, Britain, and elsewhere and presents the most thorough reconsideration of the war to date, above all arguing for a truly global perspective on this global war. Not only was it truly international in terms of the belligerent states involved, but this was also the first total war--namely, modern, industrial mass warfare between two modernizing states. The record shows, however, that the armies were not quite ready for the challenges of war (nor would they be later). One of the editors has subsequently published his own book, which situates the Russo-Japanese War in the context of military reform and the obstacles to reform posed by the autocracy and its elite culture. John Steinberg's All the Tsar's Men makes a persuasive argument that the army had plenty of competent, intelligent officers and intellectuals who grew increasingly aware of Russia's shortcomings vis-a-vis Germany after the Franco-Prussian War, but that the Old Guard of the upper aristocracy and the tsar himself thwarted efforts to remedy this situation. (3) The failure to reform the army, Steinberg argues, contributed greatly to the disastrous performance of the Imperial Army in both the Russo-Japanese War and War I and ultimately to the fall of the autocracy. …

Touching the void: Affective history and the impossible

The contention of this essay is that historical research is an affective experience of such intensity that it has been able to withstand the challenges of post-structuralism and postmodernism. While the intensity of the archival encounter is not often admitted in print, it continues to motivate the efforts of individual historians. The abstractions of theory cannot intrude upon the physical experience of holding a piece of the past. It demands our attention. But the intellectual consequences of the physicality of the archival encounter need to be effectively theorised: what is the role of touching and feeling in the pursuit of knowing? The archive is the place where historians can literally touch the past, but in doing so are simultaneously made aware of its unreachability. In a maddening paradox, concrete presence conveys unfathomable absence. In the archive, researchers are both confronted with the absolute alterity of the past and tempted by the challenge of trying to overcome it. It is suggested that this impossibility underpins the powerful attraction of the historical endeavour. Without an understanding of this attraction, theory and research will continue to talk at cross purposes; the one insisting that the past is unknowable, the other unable to ignore the vitality of its sources.

Toward a Model of Conspiracy Theory for Ancient Rome

Although the term conspiracy theory does not appear in my Conspiracy Nar ratives in Roman History, one reviewer remarked, It was hard not to misre member Pagan's title as 'Conspiracy Theories in Ancient Rome.' l Given the preponderance of conspiracies in ancient Rome, conspiracy theory is a reason able expectation; however, so self-evident is the impact of conspiracy on the political life of the Romans that they scarcely engaged in a discourse of con spiracy theory that was not embedded in some response to a specific political crisis. As a modern sociological phenomenon, conspiracy theory was not part of the vocabulary of the ancient Romans; they did not attempt a formal defini tion. Conspiracy demanded action, not theory. Therefore the study of con spiracy theory in ancient Rome demands its own methods?and yields its own results. In this essay I build a model of conspiracy theory based on a wide array of ancient sources and suggest some of the consequences that conspiracy theory had for Roman society. In the absence of a term for conspiracy theory in Latin or Greek, I adopt a sociohistorical approach that moves beyond isolated political events as narrated by individual historians so that I can illustrate how conspiracy forms a substantial part of the Roman mind-set, as evidenced in a variety of

New Ways in History, 1966 2006

This essay focuses on a series of commentaries on the state of historical studies by E.P. Thompson, Eric Hobsbawm and others that the Times Literary Supplement ran in 1966, and two recent books on the state of the discipline, Geoff Eley’s highly personal A Crooked Line and a multi-author volume edited by David Cannadine, What is History Now? Using these very different works as entry points, it assesses ways that the historical profession has changed during the past forty years. Topics addressed range from the shifting audience for academic work on the past, to the links and tensions between social and cultural history, to the varying kinds of historians who have felt marginalized at different points in the recent past. Mirroring Eley’s emphasis on how the backgrounds (generation, area of specialization, gender, etc.) of individual historians are bound to shape their assessments of disciplinary trends, the author presents his own critique as one made not from Olympian heights, but from the particular perspective of someone who mostly focuses on China’s past and was trained at Berkeley in the 1980s.

The "Character" of James the First and Antiquarian Secret History

Isaac D'Israeli's An Inquiry into the Literary and Political Character of James I (1816) was less concerned with recreating James as an historical personality than with challenging his representation in national histories as a degraded stylized character. This convention of writing inherited from classical historiography assessed a prominent figure through an inventory of salient traits compressing the life into a concise set of characteristics rather than a narrative. Typically, it offered a final evaluative look at the historical subject, as in David Hume's great History of England, which included a character of each monarch after narrating his death. Tied to the model of humanist history, the character as a convention declined in the 18th century, but, while overlooked in current historical studies of the Romantic period, it remained prominent in the 19th century, as D'Israeli's title reveals in the production of what he termed public From the mid-seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth century, James bore a remarkably consistent and negative character forged in the polemics of the Commonwealth pamphlet wars but surviving through history. Crossing ideological, formal and methodological lines, the persistence of this character illustrates the influence of aesthetic taste on the formation of national history: James repeatedly failed to become a historical subject because he could not become an aesthetic one. Individual historians, influenced by their own allegiances, determined if a figure was suited to be an historical a subject of national history. James represented a convergence of taste and of aesthetic judgment, sustaining the obvious moral, political and intellectual dimensions. Taste, Archibald Alison declared in his influential essay, is the mental power whereby individuals perceive and enjoy whatever is beautiful and sublime in the works of nature or art. Perception and enjoyment are not, however, precisely coordinates; Alison carefully distinguishes them as lower and higher stages in the work of taste: taste proper, he says, has no resemblance to a sense, and he identifies the pleasures of taste with an activity of imagination whereby internal associations are brought to bear on an object, extending and harmonizing it. (1) Thus objects appealing to the eye, such as gardens and paintings, stand lower in the hierarchy of taste than poetry with its address to the imagination, while beauty depends centrally on the abstract and relational quality of unity (unity of character, expression, emotion, etc.). The character of James, however, his incoherent sensibility on the one hand and his ungainly body on the other, is outside the bounds of taste. Paradox, contradiction, self-cancellation--these are the keynotes, rooted in witness-narratives from his own time and restated in Hume's History (1754): Many virtues, it must be owned, he was possessed of; but scarce any of them pure, or free from the contagion of the neighbouring vices. generosity bordered on profusion, his learning on pedantry, his pacific disposition on pusillanimity, his wisdom on cunning, his friendship on light fancy and boyish fondness. (2) Hume's judgment is echoed in early nineteenth-century texts, from an iconoclastic Whig history of Scotland produced by Malcolm Laing in 1800 (Pedantic without the merit of useful literature, and prodigal without the praise of true generosity) to the Catholic-inflected reading of English history by the respected priest, John Lingard, in the 1820s: His quickness of apprehension and soundness of judgment were marred by his credulity and partialities, his childish fears and habit of vacillation.... discourse teemed with maxims of political wisdom, his conduct frequently bore the impress of political folly. (3) The balanced syntax tries to harmonize a confused subjectivity, but the problem of James evokes the grotesque, the irregularity and disproportion that rendered him baroque, beyond the aesthetic categories within which high historical personages were routinely accommodated. …