How Medieval Europe was Ruled

The volume How Medieval Europe was Ruled brings a much-needed shift in the scholarship’s concept of what ‘Medieval Europe’ was, and how we should approach, study and understand that period of European history. In stead of being narrowly limited to the so-called Western Christendom, the chapters in this volume analyze and present the political mores and developments in Europe in its entirety, from Portugal to Norway, Kievan Rus’ and Byzantium, as well as in Europe’s medieval outskirts, like Khazaria, or outposts, like the Latin East. The ways in which Medieval Europe was ruled, diverse as they were, only point to the necessity of researching Medieval Europe through the lenses of the region’s pronounced interconnectivity.

Vlada Stanković, University of Belgrade

The 15 essays in How Medieval Europe Was Ruled present a geographically expansive view of medieval Europe, ranging from the steppe Khaganate of Khazaria – mentioned in Chinese, Greek, Latin, Arabic, Persian, Slavonic, and Hebrew sources – to a Kingdom of Norway that included Iceland and Greenland to the Outremer Europe of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. This geographical breadth is matched by the intellectual depth of each scholar’s close and careful analysis of a wide variety of primary sources. These deep dives into rulership in many different places in medieval Europe are brought into conversation with each other by exploring several interconnected topics, including "negotiated authority" between the rulers and the ruled and "shared authority" between men and women in ruling families. As fascinating as these similarities are, the differences are even more striking, in terms of both regional diversity and change over time within a particular area. How Medieval Europe Was Ruled is an excellent example of why collaborations like this exist, because no one person could have written a book like this, which explores in such detail the rich mosaic of rulership in medieval Europe.

Paul Milliman, University of Arizona

The fifteen contributions in How Medieval Europe Was Ruled provide fascinating overviews on the different, but still interconnected types of governance in certain parts within the whole of medieval Europe,

– from Norway to Spain and from the British Isles to the Kievan Rus’ and the Latin East,

– from monarchies to urban communities,

– from the roles of kings and the contribution of elites to the impact of women.

The volume, thus, provides excellent opportunities to establish a better understanding of and basis for discussion connected to the formation and development of today’s European cultures as well as the current political situation.

Gerhard Jaritz, Central European University