First published in 1976, Nobles and the Noble Life, 1295-1500 offers a rounded picture of aristocratic life in England from the time Edward I began to call his great councillors together in ‘House of Lords’ through to the end of the Middle Ages. Professor Rosenthal’s treatment of the aristocracy takes full note of political and economic as well as personal aspects of nobility including the importance of status and the quest for security. He argues that in order to understand the nobility fully the student should consider it in the context of more modern views of elite groups and class structures. This book will be of interest to students of history primarily but also achieve a wider readership among academics more concerned with historical or political sociology than with medieval studies in their strictest sense.

First published in 1976, Nobles and the Noble Life, 1295-1500 offers a rounded picture of aristocratic life in England from the time Edward I began to call his great councillors together in ‘House of Lords’ through to the end of the Middle Ages. Professor Rosenthal’s treatment of the aristocracy takes full note of political and economic as well as personal aspects of nobility including the importance of status and the quest for security. He argues that in order to understand the nobility fully the student should consider it in the context of more modern views of elite groups and class structures. This book will be of interest to students of history primarily but also achieve a wider readership among academics more concerned with historical or political sociology than with medieval studies in their strictest sense.

This volume covers the last century (interpreted broadly) of the traditional western Middle Ages. Often seen as a time of doubt, decline and division, the period is shown here as a period of considerable innovation and development, much of which resulted from a conscious attempt by contemporaries to meet the growing demands of society and to find practical solutions to the social, religious and political problems which beset it. The volume consists of four sections. Part I focuses on both the ideas and other considerations which guided men as they sought good government, and on the practical development of representation. Part II deals with aspects of social and economic development at a time of change and expansion. Part III discusses the importance of the life of the spirit: religion, education and the arts. Moving from the general to the particular, Part IV concerns itself with the history of the countries of Europe, emphasis being placed on the growth of the nation states of the 'early modern' world.

A paperback edition of the successful 1994 collection of essays on society in fifteenth-century England.

Richard III is undoubtedly the dominant personality in this collection of essays, but not in his capacity as king of England. Richard was Duke of Gloucester far longer than he was king. For most of his career, he was a subject, not a monarch, the equal of the great nobility. He is seen here in the company of his fellows: Warwick the Kingmaker, Clarence, Northumberland, Somerset, Hastings a the Wydevilles. His relations with these rivals, all of whom submitted to him or were crushed, show him in different moods and from various vantage points.