Eclipse of Empire?
Perceptions of the Western Empire and its Rulers in Late-Medieval France
By (author) Chris Jones
Through an innovative and wide-ranging exploration this book examines the reality behind the assumption that the idea of a universal ruler became increasingly irrelevant in late-medieval Europe. Focusing on France in the century before the outbreak of the Hundred Years War, it explores attitudes towards the contemporary institution of the western Empire, its rulers, and its place in the world. Historians have tended to assume that there was little place for a universal Empire and its would-be rulers in late-medieval thought. Pointing to the rapid decline in the fortunes of the Empire after the death of the Emperor Frederick II, the rediscovery of Aristotle’s Politics by western Europeans, and the growing confidence – and burgeoning bureaucracy – of the kings of France and England, it is often argued that the claims to universal domination of men like the Emperor Henry VII, or indeed of popes like Boniface VIII, were becoming increasingly anachronistic, not to say a little ridiculous. Perceptions of the Empire undoubtedly changed in this period. Yet, whether it was in the cloisters of Saint-Denis, the pamphlets of Pierre Dubois, or even the thought of Charles d’Anjou, the first Angevin king of Sicily, this book argues that the Empire and its ruler still had an important, indeed unique, role to play in a properly ordered Christian society. Chris Jones grew up in the Middle East before reading history at Durham. He now lives in New Zealand where he holds a lectureship in History at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch.
Through an innovative and wide-ranging exploration this book examines the reality behind the assumption that the idea of a universal ruler became increasingly irrelevant in late-medieval Europe. Focusing on France in the century before the outbreak of the Hundred Years War, it explores attitudes towards the contemporary institution of the western Empire, its rulers, and its place in the world. Historians have tended to assume that there was little place for a universal Empire and its would-be rulers in late-medieval thought. Pointing to the rapid decline in the fortunes of the Empire after the death of the Emperor Frederick II, the rediscovery of Aristotle’s Politics by western Europeans, and the growing confidence – and burgeoning bureaucracy – of the kings of France and England, it is often argued that the claims to universal domination of men like the Emperor Henry VII, or indeed of popes like Boniface VIII, were becoming increasingly anachronistic, not to say a little ridiculous. Perceptions of the Empire undoubtedly changed in this period. Yet, whether it was in the cloisters of Saint-Denis, the pamphlets of Pierre Dubois, or even the thought of Charles d’Anjou, the first Angevin king of Sicily, this book argues that the Empire and its ruler still had an important, indeed unique, role to play in a properly ordered Christian society. Chris Jones grew up in the Middle East before reading history at Durham. He now lives in New Zealand where he holds a lectureship in History at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch.
- By (author) Chris Jones
Other Titles in this Series
A Renaissance Baron and his Possessions
Paolo Giordano I Orsini, Duke of Bracciano (1541-1585)
Volume 15
Victorine Restoration
Essays on Hugh of St Victor, Richard of St Victor, and Thomas Gallus
Volume 39
From Tyrant to Philosopher-King
A Literary History of Alexander the Great in Medieval and Early Modern England
Volume 19
Writing History in Medieval Poland
Bishop Vincentius of Cracow and the 'Chronica Polonorum'
Volume 28
Order into Action
How Large-Scale Concepts of World-Order determine Practices in the Premodern World
Volume 40
Dreams, Medicine, and Literary Practice
Exploring the Western Literary Tradition Through Chaucer
Volume 18
Luigi Pulci in Renaissance Florence and Beyond
New Perspectives on his Poetry and Influence
Volume 29
Andreas Vesalius and the ‘Fabrica’ in the Age of Printing
Art, Anatomy, and Printing in the Italian Renaissance
Volume 33
Saints and their Lives on the Periphery
Veneration of Saints in Scandinavia and Eastern Europe (c.1000-1200)
Volume 9
Material Restoration
A Fragment from Eleventh-Century Echternach in a Nineteenth-Century Parisian Codex
Volume 7
Jerusalem in the Alps
The Sacro Monte of Varallo and the Sanctuaries of North-Western Italy
Volume 37
Guests, Strangers, Aliens, Enemies
Ambiguities of Hospitality in the Middle Ages, c. 1000-1350
Volume 45
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