This volume investigates the history of the parliamentary assemblies of Sweden, Poland and Hungary in the final period of the ancien régime, offering an analysis of these three representative assemblies in a systematic comparative framework for the first time.The book studies the Polish sejm, the Swedish riksdag and the Hungarian diaeta, focusing on the eighteenth century with retrospective consideration of developments in the previous century an...

Over the last two centuries, Europe has developed various forms of political representation from which democratic parliamentary systems gradually emerged. This book unravels the conditions, scale and impact under which political participation of common burghers and peasants emerged.Political participation in Europe before the Revolutions moved away from the traditional focus on ‘Three Estates’ which has often blurred the interpretation of popular participation’s role in societies. ...

Introduction to Medieval Europe 300–1500 provides a comprehensive survey of this complex and varied formative period of European history within a global context, covering themes as diverse as barbarian migrations, the impact of Christianisation, the formation of nations and states, the emergence of an expansionist commercial economy, the growth of cities, the Crusades, the effects of plague and the intellectual and cultural dynamism of the Middle Ages.The book explores the...

This volume investigates the history of the representative assemblies of Sweden (the riksdag), Poland (the sejm) and Hungary (the diaeta) in the final period of the ancien régime. It concentrates on the practices and ideas of parliamentarism and constitutionalism, and examines the ideologies that motivated the members of these parliaments. Attempts at the suppression as well as the restoration of the estates’ power in all these three countries are examin...

The emergence of the state in Europe is a topic that has engaged historians since the establishment of the discipline of history. Yet the primary focus of has nearly always been to take a top-down approach, whereby the formation and consolidation of public institutions is viewed as the outcome of activities by princes and other social elites. Yet, as the essays in this collection show, such an approach does not provide a complete picture. By investigating the importance of local and indivi...

The Routledge Handbook of Maritime Trade around Europe 1300-1600 exploresthe links between maritime trading networks around Europe, from the Mediterranean and the Atlantic to the North and Baltic Seas. Maritime trade routes connected diverse geographical and cultural spheres, contributing to a more integrated Europe in both cultural and material terms. This volume explores networks’ economic functions alongside their intercultural exchanges, contacts and practical arrangements in ports on ...

The acclaimed historian demonstrates a link between climate change and social unrest across the globe during the mid-17th century.Revolutions, droughts, famines, invasions, wars, regicides, government collapses—the calamities of the mid-seventeenth century were unprecedented in both frequency and severity. The effects of what historians call the "General Crisis" extended from England to Japan and from the Russian Empire to sub-Saharan Africa and the Americas.

European History from the High Middle Ages, which began in approximately AD 1000, until the modern day.TABLE OF CONTENTS:A Background of European History: Thinking Historically Minded Fall of the Roman Empire Barbarians Unite Romanesque and Gothic Art Papal Power in the Middle Ages Society in the Middle AgesThe Crises of the Middle Ages: Introduction New Breeds of Art The Hundred Years War The Rise of Towns and Commerce Growth of National Monarchies The Black Death Challenges to Spiritual ...

In this book Peter Burke adopts a socio-cultural approach to examine the changes in the organization of knowledge in Europe from the invention of printing to the publication of the French Encyclopédie.The book opens with an assessment of different sociologies of knowledge from Mannheim to Foucault and beyond, and goes on to discuss intellectuals as a social group and the social institutions (especially universities and academies) which encouraged or discouraged intellectua...

During the European Renaissance, an age marked equally by revolutionary thought and constant warfare, it was armies, rather than philosophers, who shaped the modern European nation state. "Mobile cities" of mercenaries and other paid soldiers-made up of astonishingly diverse aggregations of ethnicities and nationalities-marched across the land, looting and savaging enemy territories.In the 15th century, Poland hired German, Spanish, Bohemian, Hungarian, and Scottish soldiers. Later,...

A spirited history of the changes that transformed Europe during the 1,000-year span of the Middle Ages: "A dazzling race through a complex millennium."— Publishers WeeklyThe millennium between the breakup of the western Roman Empire and the Reformation was a long and hugely transformative period—one not easily chronicled within the scope of a few hundred pages. Yet distinguished historian Chris Wickham has taken up the challenge in this l...

The period 1350–1750 saw major developments in European warfare, which not only had a huge impact on the way wars were fought, but also are critical to long-standing controversies about state development, the global ascendancy of the West, and the nature of 'military revolutions' past and present. However, the military history of this period is usually written from either medieval or early-modern, and either Western or Eastern European, perspectives. These chronological and geographical li...