IMC 2018: Sessions

Session 715: Re-Thinking the Aristocracy in Capetian France, III: Regulating the Aristocracy

Tuesday 3 July 2018, 14.15-15.45

Sponsor:	Society for the Study of French History (SSFH)
Organisers:	Charlotte Crouch, Graduate Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Reading Niall Ó Súilleabháin, Department of History, Trinity College Dublin
Moderator/Chair:	Daniel Power, Centre for Medieval & Early Modern Research (MEMO), Swansea University
Paper 715-a	How Did the Peace of God Make Peace? (Language: English) Geoffrey Koziol, Department of History, University of California, Berkeley Index terms: Ecclesiastical History, Law, Politics and Diplomacy
Paper 715-b	The Sires of Beaujeu as Crusaders, 1147-1250 (Language: English) Jean H. Dunbabin, St Anne's College, University of Oxford Index terms: Crusades, Genealogy and Prosopography, Politics and Diplomacy
Paper 715-c	Different Rules, Same Game?: Marriage as a Tool of Power for the Bourbon Family in Late 12th and 13th-Century France (Language: English) Charlotte Crouch, Graduate Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Reading Index terms: Charters and Diplomatics, Genealogy and Prosopography, Politics and Diplomacy
Abstract	The aristocracy are central to the history of the French kingdom in the period 987-1328. This series of panels seeks to bring together scholars across the period to question historiographical traditions, and develop a more nuanced history of the aristocracy of Capetian France. The subject of the control and limitations placed upon aristocratic behaviour - whether legal, religious, cultural, or social - is one that has been the centre of much historiographical debate. This panel seeks to bring together examples of aristocratic (self-) regulation from different periods and regions, to begin a discussion of aristocratic control more broadly. Geoffrey Koziol will reconsider the Peace of God, to show that its effectiveness has been previously underestimated by scholars; Jean Dunbabin will look at the lords of Beaujeu, and the opportunities, and drawbacks, which participation in the Crusades brought to the family; and Charlotte Crouch will analyse the marriage contracts of the Bourbon family, to consider how far marriage was controlled, and to what extent the aristocratic family could use marriage as a tool of power.