Debating the Middle Ages: issues and readings

"This book brings together some of the most original and influential recent work in the field of medieval history. It provides a stimulating overview of current medieval historiography, demonstrating that history is not a collection of static facts, but rather a dynamic process of interpretation." "Each part of the book comprises an introduction by the editors, discussing the significance of the topic and the history of its interpretation. There follow, for each, five to six readings from books or articles that reflect some of the most important current scholarship in the field. Several pieces are here translated into English for the first time."--Jacket.

Conceptions of ethnicity in early medieval studies / Walter Pohl -- The barbarians in late antiquity and how they were accommodated in the west / Walter Goffart -- The fall of Rome will not take place / Chris Wickham -- The decline of the western empire / Richard Hodges and David Whitehouse -- Gregory of Tours and Clovis / Ian N. Wood -- Missionaries and magic in dark-age Europe / Alexander Murray -- The banal seigneury and the "reconditioning" of the free peasantry / Pierre Bonnassie -- The year 1000 without abrupt or radical transformation / Dominique Barthelemy -- The tyranny of a construct : feudalism and historians of medieval Europe / Elizabeth A.R. Brown -- Giving each his due / Fredric L. Cheyette -- Strangers and Neighbors / Monique Bourin and Robert Durand -- Amicitae [friendhips] as relationships between states and people / Gerd Althoff -- Queens as Jezebels : the careers of Brunhild and Balthild in Merovingian history / Janet Nelson -- Women and the Norman conquest / Pauline Stafford -- The "cruel mother" : maternity, widowhood, and dowry in Florence in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries -- Men's use of female symbols / Caroline Walker Bynum -- Burdens of matrimony…