Module description
This module introduces students to a formative period in the society and culture of Western Europe: the debates surrounding feudalism and the controversial narrative of how feudal society came into being (known as the Feudal Revolution). We will engage in a rich and conflict-full historiography, and show how close source analysis can provide other compelling narratives of this fundamental period of European change.
How, why, where and when 'feudal' society came into being has long been a concern of medieval historians. During the 1950s, Georges Duby, a prominent historian working in France, came up with a totalising argument explaining how all the elements we associate with the medieval period - chivalry, knighthood, homage, fealty, the fief as the unit of property, aristocratic lineages - were caused and unleashed by a radical transformation in the way in which power was exercised around the year 1000. For Duby, the old public order of the Carolingian Empire suddenly and irreversibly disintegrated, leaving in its stead a private order of lordly power, closed family units, and a larger aristocratic class. Power was no longer exercised by the public order of the state but by the private order of lords. Because of their wide explanatory power, Duby's view found great favour among historians working within and outwith France for about thirty years. Since then, however, Duby's ‘revolution’ or mutation has become far more controversial. Fewer and fewer historians believe in the historical reality of such a transformation or revolution in the exercise of power over the year 1000 and even fewer believe that these political arguments explain the wide range of social and cultural phenomena that Duby posited. Even the concepts of 'feudalism' and 'feudal society' have become inherently problematic. Yet it is still extremely difficult understand historical change between the years 980 and 1200 without recourse to the explanation of feudal revolution. Understanding these debates, and what the problem is with feudalism, is thus key to anyone wishing to research any social, legal or political phenomenon in medieval Europe. This module will thus be of interest to anyone wishing to do further research on lordship, medieval hierarchies and the exercise of power, and who wishes their work to span the great divide between the early and the central Middle Ages.
More information available here: https://keats.kcl.ac.uk/mod/book/view.php?id=3195516&chapterid=262080
Assessment details
1 x 4,000-word essay (100%)
Teaching pattern
10 x 2-hour seminars