HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor

HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor

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CHAPTER TENMEDIEVAL URBAN HISTORIOGRAPHY INWESTERN EUROPE (1100–1500)Augusto VasinaAmong the extensive and varied scientific analyses of medieval historiographyin western Europe, the part dedicated expressly to annalisticand chronicle production of an urban character after the year1000 has not been, at least in relatively recent times, very significantlydeveloped, nor, one could say, developed with a sufficient balancebetween the particular historical and geographic areas concerned.Starting in the seventeenth century, the scholarship of the Mauristspromoted and published at the national level, especially for France,Germany, and England, abundant collections of medieval narrativetexts, in the process also providing investigations and analytical studiesof individual urban chronicles. 1 We also can consider the work ofL. A. Muratori, in the collection and publication of medieval Italianchronicles from 500–1500 in his Rerum Italicarum Scriptores (RIS) tobe a branch of this tradition. 2 Works in this series are of great importance,since a large number of the narrative texts that were publishedconcern Italian cities after the year 1000, thus strongly characterizingthe historiography of this peninsula in the intervening centuries.But only in the nineteenth century, with the publication of theMonumenta Germaniae Historica’s section Scriptores (MGH SS ), edited byG. H. Pertz and his successors, has it finally been possible to seemedieval historiographical production representing sufficiently diverseEuropean historical areas in an inclusively balanced and accurateview. Thus, only recently have scholars been able to begin to select1Delogu (1994), 21.2Rerum Italicarum Scriptores (RIS ) (1723–1751). It must be remembered that, evenbefore other Italian chronicles had been published by other scholars in volumeslater than the collection, Muratori had published, parallel to the RIS, various narrativetexts, especially about south-central Italy, in volumes 3–6 of his AntiquitatesItalicae Medii Aevi (AIMAE).

318 AUGUSTO VASINAand to distinguish from the very variegated compass of medieval narrativesources the various typological components of urban historiography,and to better single out the actual texts. 3The definition of true urban chronicle-writing has been from thestart a rather difficult task, not only because of the very heterogeneousand composite character of the texts under consideration, someof which are given titles referring to urban centers that are notalways adequate and faithful to their individual narrative contents,but also because of a still imprecise idea that we have of actualurban reality, which was defined in the Middle Ages—one mustnever disregard this!—as the presence of a bishop and an episcopalsee. 4 And yet, during the course of the nineteenth century, there wasundoubtedly progress toward a more appropriate recognition of historicaldetails, of the complexity and individuality of urban phenomena.Historians of that time, inspired by the spread throughoutEurope of a lay and middle-class culture that was increasingly selfconsciousof its civic origins and of its values of liberty and autonomy,focused more attention on the medieval urban world, especiallyon the decisive phase of revival that arose all over Europe from thetorment of the centuries around the year 1000 and lasted throughoutthe period. Sometimes more, sometimes less, historians tendedto minimize consideration of the ecclesiastical components (above allepiscopal, canonical, and monastic), which in the early medievalurban world had expressed a determined presence by giving historiographicalculture a universalistic tendency. Instead, historiansfocused their attention on the great undertakings of the lay urbanforces in, for example, the more or less bold construction of communalautonomy, in the dialectic among the various social classes,and in the economic dynamics of the merchant and artisan businessmen.History and historians thus sometimes almost confused in itinerethe just-recovered sense of identity in urban life with the symbolicand effective figure of the bishop, by losing their way in a multiplicityof perspectives on realities particular to the urban world, whichwere difficult to reduce to synthesis.3Monumenta Germaniae Historica (MGH SS ) (1826–1998). A large number of theurban chronicles written after 1000 have been published, organized by national sections,in vols. 16–19 and 24.4This is a connotation of particular significance above all in the course of theearly Middle Ages; on this, see Dupré (1956), passim; Dupré (1958), passim.

CHAPTER TENMEDIEVAL URBAN <strong>HISTORIOGRAPHY</strong> <strong>IN</strong>WESTERN EUROPE (1100–1500)Augusto VasinaAmong the extensive and varied scientific analyses of medieval historiographyin western Europe, the part dedicated expressly to annalisticand chronicle production of an urban character after the year1000 has not been, at least in relatively recent times, very significantlydeveloped, nor, one could say, developed with a sufficient balancebetween the particular historical and geographic areas concerned.Starting in the seventeenth century, the scholarship of the Mauristspromoted and published at the national level, especially for France,Germany, and England, abundant collections of medieval narrativetexts, in the process also providing investigations and analytical studiesof individual urban chronicles. 1 We also can consider the work ofL. A. Muratori, in the collection and publication of medieval Italianchronicles from 500–1500 in his Rerum Italicarum Scriptores (RIS) tobe a branch of this tradition. 2 Works in this series are of great importance,since a large number of the narrative texts that were publishedconcern Italian cities after the year 1000, thus strongly characterizingthe historiography of this peninsula in the intervening centuries.But only in the nineteenth century, with the publication of theMonumenta Germaniae Historica’s section Scriptores (MGH SS ), edited byG. H. Pertz and his successors, has it finally been possible to seemedieval historiographical production representing sufficiently diverseEuropean historical areas in an inclusively balanced and accurateview. Thus, only recently have scholars been able to begin to select1Delogu (1994), 21.2Rerum Italicarum Scriptores (RIS ) (1723–1751). It must be remembered that, evenbefore other Italian chronicles had been published by other scholars in volumeslater than the collection, Muratori had published, parallel to the RIS, various narrativetexts, especially about south-central Italy, in volumes 3–6 of his AntiquitatesItalicae Medii Aevi (AIMAE).

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