Introduction

Summary

This special edition of Fifteenth-Century Studies expands upon previous anthologies concentrating on violence in late-medieval and early renaissance Europe in that it includes an unprecedented array of studies, each of which is the product of a distinct discipline and methodology. Unlike Violence and Civil Order in Italian Cities 1200–1500 (ed. Lauro Martines [Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972]), a collection of twelve closely-related articles by historians of pre-modern Italy, the present publication provides scholars with seventeen essays which examine the fundamental nature of violence, present its various manifestations, and explore wide-ranging perceptions of this brutal phenomenon in France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. Most articles appear in English, but some are in German and one in French; whereas the majority address late-medieval phenomena, a few focus primarily on early renaissance issues. The essays offer diverse glimpses into subjects which have gone unexplored hitherto and therefore remained little-known: this compilation of articles widens, adjusts, and clarifies our view of the period, representing also the pluralistic character of today's scholarship. In so doing, the contributions build upon such monographs as Robert Muchembled's La Violence au village: sociabilité et comportements populaires en Artois du XVe au XVIIe siècle (Turnhout: Brepols, 1989), Christiane Raynaud's La Violence au moyen âge XIIIe–XVe siècle, d’après les livres d’histoire en français (Paris: Le Léopard d’Or, 1990), David Nirenberg's Communities of Violence: Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), Jody Enders's The Medieval Theater of Cruelty: Rhetoric, Memory, Violence (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999), and Michael Papio's Keen and Violent Remedies: Social Satire and the Grotesque in Masuccio Salernitano's “Novellino” (New York: Peter Lang, 2000).

While the most researched society and culture in the present anthology seems to be that of late-medieval France, the articles discussing violence within this region introduce a broad spectrum spanning royal and public justice, historical culture, religious and secular literature, royal and courtly illuminations, theater and music. These essays addressing France examine not only such texts as the Mystères de la Passion and the Passion Isabeau, but also the earliest extant version of Valentin et Orson, and La fille du comte de Pontieu, and such images as Jean Fouquet's Martyrdom of Saint Apollonia, miniatures from the Chroniques de Froissart commissioned by Louis de Gruuthuse, from Les Fleurs des Chroniques, and the Grandes Chroniques de France.