This is a flyer (with 20% discount) for a book, edited by myself, Éva Guillorel and William G. Po... more This is a flyer (with 20% discount) for a book, edited by myself, Éva Guillorel and William G. Pooley, and due out VERY SOON from Routledge.
The culture of insurgents in early modern Europe was primarily an oral one; memories of social conflicts were passed on through oral forms such as songs and legends. This popular history influenced political choices and actions through and after the early modern period. This book examines many examples of how memories of revolt were perpetuated in oral culture, and analyses how traditions were used. From the German Peasants’ War of 1525 to the counterrevolutionary guerrillas of the 1790s, oral traditions can offer radically different interpretations of familiar events. This is a ‘history from below’, which challenges existing historiographies of early modern revolts.
The purpose of this book is to demonstrate that folklore collections can be used as sources for s... more The purpose of this book is to demonstrate that folklore collections can be used as sources for social history. I explore the lives of fishermen, peasants and lacemakers through the songs they sang and the stories they told. I show how, in an oral culture, people used traditional genres in a personal way, to give voice to their own thoughts and desires, and as part of a dialogue with other members of their community. By speaking through fictions they could have their say without challenging the key institutions of their social world. I address recognized problems in social history such as the division of power within the peasant family, the maintenance of communal bonds in competitive environments, and marriage strategies in unequal societies. My claim is that social history and cultural history can be reconnected through the study of individual voices, as recorded by folklorists. Above it, I argue that oral culture provided mechanisms for the poor to assert some control over their own destinies.
The growth of nations, national ideologies and the accompanying quest for the ‘authentic’ among ‘... more The growth of nations, national ideologies and the accompanying quest for the ‘authentic’ among ‘the people’ has been a subject of enquiry for many disciplines. Building upon wide-ranging scholarship, this interdisciplinary study seeks to analyse the place of folklore in the long nineteenth century throughout Europe as an important symbol in the growth and development of nations and nationalism, and in particular to see how combining perspectives from History, Literary Studies, Music and Architecture can help provide enhanced and refreshing perspectives on the complex process of nation-building. With a range of detailed case studies drawing upon archival, literary, visual and musical sources as well as material culture, it raises questions about individual countries but also about links and similarities across Europe
François Cadic was a priest and social catholic activist in Paris at the end of the nineteenth ce... more François Cadic was a priest and social catholic activist in Paris at the end of the nineteenth century. He features, for example, in Leslie Page Moch's 'The Pariahs of Yesterday: Breton Migrants in Paris'. But he was also a folksong and folktale collector, with a particular interest in the 'folk' history of the chouannerie. Thanks to Fanch Postic, the CRBC and Presses universitaires de Rennes have been republishing the mass of material that first appeared here-and-there in the journal 'La Paroisse Bretonne de Paris'.
Originaire de Matignon (22), Paul Sébillot (1843-1918) abandonne la perspective d'une carrière ju... more Originaire de Matignon (22), Paul Sébillot (1843-1918) abandonne la perspective d'une carrière juridique, pour s'engager dans la peinture. Critique d'art et peintre paysagiste, il expose dans différents salons, mais vers 1880, il décide de se consacrer à la collecte de la littérature orale de la Haute-Bretagne ; auteur d'une moisson d'une abondance et d'une qualité rares, il devient non seulement l'un des folkloristes français les plus en vue, mais joue au plan national et international un rôle de premier ordre pour l'étude et la promotion des traditions populaires : il élabore des outils (bibliographiques, questionnaires, guides d'enquêtes...), publie des synthèses, lance en 1881 "Les littératures populaires de toutes les nations", l'une des grandes collections d'ouvrages de littérature orale, organise les premiers congrès internationaux de folklore. Il est en outre à l'origine, en 1886, de la création de la Société des Traditions populaires et de la Revue du même nom qu'il anime pendant plus de trente ans.
Le présent ouvrage, publié par le Centre de Recherche Bretonne et Celtique (UBO - Brest) en collaboration avec le Laboratoire d'Anthropologie et d'Histoire de l'Institution de la Culture (LAHIC) - (Paris) et l'association La Granjagoul - Maison du Patrimoine Oral en Haute-Bretagne - (Parcé, 35), est l'occasion d'évoquer les multiples facettes de ce républicain convaincu, et d'aborder le contexte intellectuel et politique dans lequel se situe son oeuvre ainsi que les nombreux réseaux régionaux, nationaux, voire internationaux dans lesquels elle s'intègre. Cette publication vient combler une lacune et réparer une injustice, car, curieusement, peu de travaux ont été consacrés au travailleur infatigable que fut Paul Sébillot.
Written by Yann Lagadec and Stéphane Perréon, Breton historians of early modern society and warfa... more Written by Yann Lagadec and Stéphane Perréon, Breton historians of early modern society and warfare. I provided assistance on the 'trans-manche' perspective... Just as there's an 'Atlantic History' so there's a 'Channel History', and what happens on a Breton beach can't be understood without knowing what's going on in London, Portsmouth, the Western Approaches... and this was our attempt at writing a bit of it. Otherwise my main contribution is in chapter 9, which focuses on the transmission of the memory of the Battle, whch became a Breton lieu-de-mémoire in the nineteenth century. For a review see Professor Michael Duffy on H-France: http://www.h-france.net/vol11reviews/vol11no183Duffy.pdf
Le 11 septembre 1758, l'arrière-garde d'un corps expéditionnaire britannique est défait sur la plage de Saint-Cast par des troupes françaises commandées par le duc d'Aiguillon. Cette bataille ne constitue en fait que l'ultime épisode d'une opération bien plus vaste, l'une des " descentes " sur les côtes de France mises sur pied par Army et Navy au cours de l'été 1758. Ce raid, débuté sous les meilleurs auspices le 4 septembre par un débarquement de vive force, opération presque routinière pour les forces britanniques qui la répètent pour la troisième fois en l'espace de quelques semaines, avait pour objectif Saint-Malo, l'un des principaux port français. Il a cependant fallu au général Bligh abandonner cette perspective, les défenses de la ville mais aussi la météorologie contraignant ses troupes à rebrousser chemin et à gagner un point de rembarquement. Ce repli est d'ailleurs marqué par des opérations de " petite guerre " dans le bocage breton, exposant les Britanniques au harcèlement des milices gardes-côtes. C'est à l'étude de cette bataille atypique, " entre terre et mer " selon l'expression du chevalier de Mirabeau, que cet ouvrage est consacré. En replaçant l'affrontement du 11 septembre dans un cadre plus large, tactique, stratégique ou diplomatique, il cherche à replacer les événements dans le contexte de la guerre de Sept Ans (1756-1763) d'une part, de ce que l'on a pu appeler la " seconde guerre de Cent Ans " (1689-1815) d'autre part. Mais il s'agit aussi de comprendre ce que purent être les conséquences de ces combats pour les populations du littoral breton, ce qui conduisait aussi à la mobilisation de certains face à l'ennemi, sans négliger pour autant la lente construction de la mémoire de l'événement. Célébrée par Voltaire dès 1758, la bataille de Saint-Cast a en effet été érigée au XIXe siècle en " lieu de mémoire " breton par toute une érudition régionaliste qui y vit tout à la fois le moyen de dénoncer les agissements du duc d'Aiguillon bientôt empêtré dans l' " Affaire de Bretagne " et de vanter une certaine image de la Bretagne, conduite par ses élites naturelles que seraient les nobles.
Fifty years after his death, almost the only song that French people still sung about Napoleon re... more Fifty years after his death, almost the only song that French people still sung about Napoleon retold his conquest of the city of Mantua in 1797. ‘Le bombardement de Mantoue’ is an example of a popular European folk genre, the siege song. Siege songs use the metaphor of a violent wooer and a reluctant maiden to narrate the capture of cities. They circulated, in print and orally, from the mid seventeenth to the mid nineteenth centuries, updated for all conflicts by the substitution of the name of the besieger and the city. While often factually inaccurate, such songs are evidence of historical consciousness, and they could be used to express an identification with a national or political cause. They also anchored an early modern concept of war in popular culture, in which victory was measured in territory acquired, and in which a rampaging soldiery was pitted against a civilian and female population. Sieges envisaged as a violent courtship relocated military events into the language ...
Although a relatively recent invention (c. 1500), many legends have accumulated around the origin... more Although a relatively recent invention (c. 1500), many legends have accumulated around the origins of lace, more than have been recorded for other crafts. Almost every region involved in pillow or needle lace had its own origin story: I will concentrate on those circulating in Italy, Catalonia, France, Belgium, and England. Lacemaking was a poorly paid, dispersed and overwhelmingly female occupation, but none the less it had a strong craft tradition, including the celebration of particular saints’ feastdays. The legends drew on elements of this work culture, and especially the strong connections to royal courts and the Catholic Church, but they did not originate among lacemakers themselves. Rather they were authored by persons – lace merchants and other patrons – who in the nineteenth century took on the task of defending homemade lace in its drawn-out conflict with machine-made alternatives. Legends first circulated in print, in lace histories, newspapers and magazines, before tran...
Much historical attention in recent years has been lavished on the figure of the female soldier (... more Much historical attention in recent years has been lavished on the figure of the female soldier (and sailor), the woman who disguises herself as a man to join the army (or navy). Even so, one cannot be certain about the number of women who put on military uniform and fought in the ranks of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic armies. Rudolf Dekker and Lotte van de Pol suggest 30,1 Leon Hennet, the archivist of the Ministry of War at the end of the nineteenth century, 70,2 while Dominique Godineau has more recently pushed the figure up nearer to 80.3 A thorough search of all archives would undoubtedly turn up a few more: for example the administration of the Department of the Vosges was petitioned for money and appropriate female clothing on behalf of Marie Lefebvre and Sophie Julien, otherwise unknown to history, who had served as trumpeters in the Second Artillery Regiment between 1791 and 1798.4 And of course we will never know the number of women who maintained their disguise throughout, though, according to one eyewitness of the stripped bodies on the battlefield of Waterloo, these may have been quite numerous.5 However, we may also have to subtract a few, since not all the well-known case-histories can be substantiated. Others do not really conform to the type: were the Fernig sisters, who wore military uniform and served as Dumouriez’s aides-de-camp despite being known as women, part of the same phenomenon, or were they more of a mascot for Dumouriez’s Girondin political credentials (and somewhat louche personal reputation)?6
The relationships that soldiers of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic era had with each other, the ... more The relationships that soldiers of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic era had with each other, the states they represented and enemy combatants are relatively well known, their relationships with the civilians of the various states they passed through rather less so. Thanks to the innovative approaches of the ‘new military history’ the ‘face of battle’ has become familiar; but the ‘face of invasion’ still remains largely concealed. Yet combat was a relatively small part of the soldiers’ experience. To judge by the sources left to us, such as soldiers’ letters and memoirs, interactions with civilians were often of more immediate import. Soldiers’ letters home dwelt on the quality, quantity and cost of food, the trustworthiness of merchants, the state of the houses in which they were billeted and their relations with their hosts, the kinds of crops that were grown and the farming methods that were used. Memoirs were more likely to recall erotic encounters, but also, in the fashion of the travel literature of the period, delineated the customs of the people as well as the climate and topography of places visited.1 This knowledge of other lands enhanced the reputation of old soldiers in their home communities and helps explain the preference given to them in communal appointments.2
Introduction a un dossier consacre aux operations amphibies, dirait-on aujourd'hui, conduites... more Introduction a un dossier consacre aux operations amphibies, dirait-on aujourd'hui, conduites par l'Angleterre sur les cotes bretonnes et de leur presence dans les memoires.
This is a flyer (with 20% discount) for a book, edited by myself, Éva Guillorel and William G. Po... more This is a flyer (with 20% discount) for a book, edited by myself, Éva Guillorel and William G. Pooley, and due out VERY SOON from Routledge.
The culture of insurgents in early modern Europe was primarily an oral one; memories of social conflicts were passed on through oral forms such as songs and legends. This popular history influenced political choices and actions through and after the early modern period. This book examines many examples of how memories of revolt were perpetuated in oral culture, and analyses how traditions were used. From the German Peasants’ War of 1525 to the counterrevolutionary guerrillas of the 1790s, oral traditions can offer radically different interpretations of familiar events. This is a ‘history from below’, which challenges existing historiographies of early modern revolts.
The purpose of this book is to demonstrate that folklore collections can be used as sources for s... more The purpose of this book is to demonstrate that folklore collections can be used as sources for social history. I explore the lives of fishermen, peasants and lacemakers through the songs they sang and the stories they told. I show how, in an oral culture, people used traditional genres in a personal way, to give voice to their own thoughts and desires, and as part of a dialogue with other members of their community. By speaking through fictions they could have their say without challenging the key institutions of their social world. I address recognized problems in social history such as the division of power within the peasant family, the maintenance of communal bonds in competitive environments, and marriage strategies in unequal societies. My claim is that social history and cultural history can be reconnected through the study of individual voices, as recorded by folklorists. Above it, I argue that oral culture provided mechanisms for the poor to assert some control over their own destinies.
The growth of nations, national ideologies and the accompanying quest for the ‘authentic’ among ‘... more The growth of nations, national ideologies and the accompanying quest for the ‘authentic’ among ‘the people’ has been a subject of enquiry for many disciplines. Building upon wide-ranging scholarship, this interdisciplinary study seeks to analyse the place of folklore in the long nineteenth century throughout Europe as an important symbol in the growth and development of nations and nationalism, and in particular to see how combining perspectives from History, Literary Studies, Music and Architecture can help provide enhanced and refreshing perspectives on the complex process of nation-building. With a range of detailed case studies drawing upon archival, literary, visual and musical sources as well as material culture, it raises questions about individual countries but also about links and similarities across Europe
François Cadic was a priest and social catholic activist in Paris at the end of the nineteenth ce... more François Cadic was a priest and social catholic activist in Paris at the end of the nineteenth century. He features, for example, in Leslie Page Moch's 'The Pariahs of Yesterday: Breton Migrants in Paris'. But he was also a folksong and folktale collector, with a particular interest in the 'folk' history of the chouannerie. Thanks to Fanch Postic, the CRBC and Presses universitaires de Rennes have been republishing the mass of material that first appeared here-and-there in the journal 'La Paroisse Bretonne de Paris'.
Originaire de Matignon (22), Paul Sébillot (1843-1918) abandonne la perspective d'une carrière ju... more Originaire de Matignon (22), Paul Sébillot (1843-1918) abandonne la perspective d'une carrière juridique, pour s'engager dans la peinture. Critique d'art et peintre paysagiste, il expose dans différents salons, mais vers 1880, il décide de se consacrer à la collecte de la littérature orale de la Haute-Bretagne ; auteur d'une moisson d'une abondance et d'une qualité rares, il devient non seulement l'un des folkloristes français les plus en vue, mais joue au plan national et international un rôle de premier ordre pour l'étude et la promotion des traditions populaires : il élabore des outils (bibliographiques, questionnaires, guides d'enquêtes...), publie des synthèses, lance en 1881 "Les littératures populaires de toutes les nations", l'une des grandes collections d'ouvrages de littérature orale, organise les premiers congrès internationaux de folklore. Il est en outre à l'origine, en 1886, de la création de la Société des Traditions populaires et de la Revue du même nom qu'il anime pendant plus de trente ans.
Le présent ouvrage, publié par le Centre de Recherche Bretonne et Celtique (UBO - Brest) en collaboration avec le Laboratoire d'Anthropologie et d'Histoire de l'Institution de la Culture (LAHIC) - (Paris) et l'association La Granjagoul - Maison du Patrimoine Oral en Haute-Bretagne - (Parcé, 35), est l'occasion d'évoquer les multiples facettes de ce républicain convaincu, et d'aborder le contexte intellectuel et politique dans lequel se situe son oeuvre ainsi que les nombreux réseaux régionaux, nationaux, voire internationaux dans lesquels elle s'intègre. Cette publication vient combler une lacune et réparer une injustice, car, curieusement, peu de travaux ont été consacrés au travailleur infatigable que fut Paul Sébillot.
Written by Yann Lagadec and Stéphane Perréon, Breton historians of early modern society and warfa... more Written by Yann Lagadec and Stéphane Perréon, Breton historians of early modern society and warfare. I provided assistance on the 'trans-manche' perspective... Just as there's an 'Atlantic History' so there's a 'Channel History', and what happens on a Breton beach can't be understood without knowing what's going on in London, Portsmouth, the Western Approaches... and this was our attempt at writing a bit of it. Otherwise my main contribution is in chapter 9, which focuses on the transmission of the memory of the Battle, whch became a Breton lieu-de-mémoire in the nineteenth century. For a review see Professor Michael Duffy on H-France: http://www.h-france.net/vol11reviews/vol11no183Duffy.pdf
Le 11 septembre 1758, l'arrière-garde d'un corps expéditionnaire britannique est défait sur la plage de Saint-Cast par des troupes françaises commandées par le duc d'Aiguillon. Cette bataille ne constitue en fait que l'ultime épisode d'une opération bien plus vaste, l'une des " descentes " sur les côtes de France mises sur pied par Army et Navy au cours de l'été 1758. Ce raid, débuté sous les meilleurs auspices le 4 septembre par un débarquement de vive force, opération presque routinière pour les forces britanniques qui la répètent pour la troisième fois en l'espace de quelques semaines, avait pour objectif Saint-Malo, l'un des principaux port français. Il a cependant fallu au général Bligh abandonner cette perspective, les défenses de la ville mais aussi la météorologie contraignant ses troupes à rebrousser chemin et à gagner un point de rembarquement. Ce repli est d'ailleurs marqué par des opérations de " petite guerre " dans le bocage breton, exposant les Britanniques au harcèlement des milices gardes-côtes. C'est à l'étude de cette bataille atypique, " entre terre et mer " selon l'expression du chevalier de Mirabeau, que cet ouvrage est consacré. En replaçant l'affrontement du 11 septembre dans un cadre plus large, tactique, stratégique ou diplomatique, il cherche à replacer les événements dans le contexte de la guerre de Sept Ans (1756-1763) d'une part, de ce que l'on a pu appeler la " seconde guerre de Cent Ans " (1689-1815) d'autre part. Mais il s'agit aussi de comprendre ce que purent être les conséquences de ces combats pour les populations du littoral breton, ce qui conduisait aussi à la mobilisation de certains face à l'ennemi, sans négliger pour autant la lente construction de la mémoire de l'événement. Célébrée par Voltaire dès 1758, la bataille de Saint-Cast a en effet été érigée au XIXe siècle en " lieu de mémoire " breton par toute une érudition régionaliste qui y vit tout à la fois le moyen de dénoncer les agissements du duc d'Aiguillon bientôt empêtré dans l' " Affaire de Bretagne " et de vanter une certaine image de la Bretagne, conduite par ses élites naturelles que seraient les nobles.
Fifty years after his death, almost the only song that French people still sung about Napoleon re... more Fifty years after his death, almost the only song that French people still sung about Napoleon retold his conquest of the city of Mantua in 1797. ‘Le bombardement de Mantoue’ is an example of a popular European folk genre, the siege song. Siege songs use the metaphor of a violent wooer and a reluctant maiden to narrate the capture of cities. They circulated, in print and orally, from the mid seventeenth to the mid nineteenth centuries, updated for all conflicts by the substitution of the name of the besieger and the city. While often factually inaccurate, such songs are evidence of historical consciousness, and they could be used to express an identification with a national or political cause. They also anchored an early modern concept of war in popular culture, in which victory was measured in territory acquired, and in which a rampaging soldiery was pitted against a civilian and female population. Sieges envisaged as a violent courtship relocated military events into the language ...
Although a relatively recent invention (c. 1500), many legends have accumulated around the origin... more Although a relatively recent invention (c. 1500), many legends have accumulated around the origins of lace, more than have been recorded for other crafts. Almost every region involved in pillow or needle lace had its own origin story: I will concentrate on those circulating in Italy, Catalonia, France, Belgium, and England. Lacemaking was a poorly paid, dispersed and overwhelmingly female occupation, but none the less it had a strong craft tradition, including the celebration of particular saints’ feastdays. The legends drew on elements of this work culture, and especially the strong connections to royal courts and the Catholic Church, but they did not originate among lacemakers themselves. Rather they were authored by persons – lace merchants and other patrons – who in the nineteenth century took on the task of defending homemade lace in its drawn-out conflict with machine-made alternatives. Legends first circulated in print, in lace histories, newspapers and magazines, before tran...
Much historical attention in recent years has been lavished on the figure of the female soldier (... more Much historical attention in recent years has been lavished on the figure of the female soldier (and sailor), the woman who disguises herself as a man to join the army (or navy). Even so, one cannot be certain about the number of women who put on military uniform and fought in the ranks of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic armies. Rudolf Dekker and Lotte van de Pol suggest 30,1 Leon Hennet, the archivist of the Ministry of War at the end of the nineteenth century, 70,2 while Dominique Godineau has more recently pushed the figure up nearer to 80.3 A thorough search of all archives would undoubtedly turn up a few more: for example the administration of the Department of the Vosges was petitioned for money and appropriate female clothing on behalf of Marie Lefebvre and Sophie Julien, otherwise unknown to history, who had served as trumpeters in the Second Artillery Regiment between 1791 and 1798.4 And of course we will never know the number of women who maintained their disguise throughout, though, according to one eyewitness of the stripped bodies on the battlefield of Waterloo, these may have been quite numerous.5 However, we may also have to subtract a few, since not all the well-known case-histories can be substantiated. Others do not really conform to the type: were the Fernig sisters, who wore military uniform and served as Dumouriez’s aides-de-camp despite being known as women, part of the same phenomenon, or were they more of a mascot for Dumouriez’s Girondin political credentials (and somewhat louche personal reputation)?6
The relationships that soldiers of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic era had with each other, the ... more The relationships that soldiers of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic era had with each other, the states they represented and enemy combatants are relatively well known, their relationships with the civilians of the various states they passed through rather less so. Thanks to the innovative approaches of the ‘new military history’ the ‘face of battle’ has become familiar; but the ‘face of invasion’ still remains largely concealed. Yet combat was a relatively small part of the soldiers’ experience. To judge by the sources left to us, such as soldiers’ letters and memoirs, interactions with civilians were often of more immediate import. Soldiers’ letters home dwelt on the quality, quantity and cost of food, the trustworthiness of merchants, the state of the houses in which they were billeted and their relations with their hosts, the kinds of crops that were grown and the farming methods that were used. Memoirs were more likely to recall erotic encounters, but also, in the fashion of the travel literature of the period, delineated the customs of the people as well as the climate and topography of places visited.1 This knowledge of other lands enhanced the reputation of old soldiers in their home communities and helps explain the preference given to them in communal appointments.2
Introduction a un dossier consacre aux operations amphibies, dirait-on aujourd'hui, conduites... more Introduction a un dossier consacre aux operations amphibies, dirait-on aujourd'hui, conduites par l'Angleterre sur les cotes bretonnes et de leur presence dans les memoires.
Marauding first emerged as a suitable topic for the popular imagery manufacturers located in Fran... more Marauding first emerged as a suitable topic for the popular imagery manufacturers located in France’s eastern garrison cities in the wake of the Allied invasions of 1814-15. During the nineteenth century, however, domestic marauders replaced foreign soldiers as a central theme in military imagery. While foreign soldiers were condemned for such actions, French soldiers were lauded for their marauding talent. Marauding was depicted as part of a martial re-education programme, in which rural recruits were taught to despise their peasant origins and to prey on their countrymen. Thus the soldier acquired a new military morality and developed the skills of quick-wittedness and individual bravura so necessary for his new occupation. Because such fl air was conceived of as inherently Gallic, marauding was also a process of becoming more French. For the state authorities, who censored the production of popular imagery and were even major customers (through the schools), such prints were a me...
Richelieu's army: war government and society in France, 1624–1642. By David Parrott. Cambridg... more Richelieu's army: war government and society in France, 1624–1642. By David Parrott. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Pp. xxiv+599. ISBN 0-521-79209-6. £65.00.The dynastic state and the army under Louis XIV: royal service and private interest, 1661–1701. By Guy Rowlands. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. xxiv+404. ISBN 0-521-64124-1. £55.00.The French army, 1750–1820: careers, talent, merit. By Rafe Blaufarb. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2002. Pp. xii+227. ISBN 0-7190-6262-4. £45.00.The people in arms: military myth and national mobilization since the French Revolution. Edited by Daniel Moran and Arthur Waldron. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Pp. xi+268. ISBN 0-521-81432. £50.00.From revolutionaries to citizens: antimilitarism in France, 1870–1914. By Paul B. Miller. Durham, NC, and London: Duke University Press, 2002. Pp. xiii+277. ISBN 0-8223-2766-X. £13.95.Although all the books under review are military histories, internat...
Port Acadie: Revue interdisciplinaire en études acadiennes, 2013
Le rôle joué par les religieux tant dans la collecte que dans la valorisation des traditions oral... more Le rôle joué par les religieux tant dans la collecte que dans la valorisation des traditions orales n’est pas spécifique à la Bretagne ni au Canada francophone : les religieux sont tout aussi présents parmi les folkloristes et ethnographes d’autres régions de l’Europe. Et les mêmes questions peuvent être posées sur leur implication dans la culture populaire : leur investissement a-t-il à voir avec leur vocation religieuse (ou était-ce simplement un résultat fortuit chez une personne cultivée au fait des tendances littéraires qui vit en étroite relation avec la culture rurale) ? Comment ont-ils surmonté l’hostilité religieuse pour certains éléments douteux de la culture populaire, et l’association du populaire et de la superstition ? Y avait-il notamment des réseaux cléricaux autour des savoirs populaires qui diffusaient des modèles de comportement en matière de collecte ? Y avait-il une conception spécifiquement catholique ou protestante de la valeur du folklore ? Comment la positio...
One indicator of the comparative social emancipation of middle-class women in nineteenth-century ... more One indicator of the comparative social emancipation of middle-class women in nineteenth-century Britain was the number of women who travelled in, and wrote about, continental Europe. Several such writers were involved with The Folklore Society, but this European and gendered contribution to the development of the discipline can be overlooked. This note considers the case of two such women, Rachel Busk and Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco who, despite their opposing political commitments, made their home in Italy and wrote about that country’s folklore for a British audience.
This paper was given at the workshop 'Du folklore à l’ethnologie : l’autre d’ici, une affaire de femmes?' held at the GARAE in Carcassonne in November 2015.
This is the draft of a chapter for the book 'European Street Literature' (Cambridge Scholars, 201... more This is the draft of a chapter for the book 'European Street Literature' (Cambridge Scholars, 2019), edited by Dave Atkinson and Steve Roud.
Compared with Spain or Germany, France, or at least the French-speaking parts of that country, does not possess a very rich ballad tradition. Inspired by Breton successes, French folksong collectors actively searched for ballads throughout the second half of the nineteenth century, but the harvest was meagre. Lyric song was the prevailing genre. This absence has long been remarked and has been the subject of scholarly investigation. However, perhaps the most plausible explanation is the relative scarcity of broadside ballads. This is not to deny that broadside ballads have a long history in France, with famous collections surviving from the sixteenth century. The same is true of other other genres of cheap print. Before the French Revolution, Parisian streetsingers congregating around the Pont-Neuf were famous for their songbooks or ‘garlands’, while in other cities songbooks were produced for carnival. In the smaller towns, marketplace-singers relayed news and, in particular, sensational crime stories, while others sold religious knicknacks. Provincial print houses, particularly in Troyes and Rouen, were famous for their chapbooks (known in France as ‘la bibliothèque bleue’) and almanacs; these were carried to every part of the countryside by pedlars. Therefore, there was clearly a market for ‘street literature’. However, whereas in England text dominated the single-sheet print, in France it was the image that mattered. Every region had its own imagists, although by the mid-nineteenth century such production had been concentrated in eastern France. These highly coloured images were often accompanied by songs, but songs were secondary. The reasons for this preference lie both in the specifics of production (the makers of woodcut images originated in the card-making industry, rather than printing), and consumption. Images, especially religious images, were supposed to do work for their consumers; they watched over their belongings and provided blessings for the household. The songs that accompanied images certainly influenced popular song traditions, but because the production of coloured images was more expensive and print runs longer, producers tended to play safe and avoid new material. Censorship also encouraged conservatism. Songs on a single sheet, known as ‘canards’ continued to be sold by marketplace singers, but the ‘canard’ was considered a low genre, and marked by its own conventionalism, in that most songs were sung to just one tune (Fualdès, or Le Maréchal du Saxe). Popular aesthetics were more stimulated by the visual than the aural in France.
Regionalism and Modern Europe: Identity Construction and Movements from 1890 to the Present Day, 2019
This is the draft of chapter for 'Regionalism and Modern Europe: Identity Construction and Moveme... more This is the draft of chapter for 'Regionalism and Modern Europe: Identity Construction and Movements from 1890 to the Present Day' (Bloomsbury, 2019), edited by Xosé M. Núñez Seixas and Eric Storm.
In western Europe at least, the region has become the default unit for folklore investigation since the subject’s institutional foundations were laid in the 1870s. Tales, songs, proverbs and legends are published in regional collections, albeit often under a national umbrella. Over the same period folklore has provided regionalist activists with many recognisable symbols of their cause, as they adopted regional costume, music, dance and even folk cuisine to demonstrate cultural distinctions. The connection is just as evident in the most politically fractious regionalisms as in those with barely a hint of separatist ambitions. For right-wing regionalists, regional, usually rural, folk traditions imply an ethnically homogeneous and hierarchical community; for those on the left they exemplify resistance to state-led and capitalist homogenization. And simultaneously they appear, without ideological claims, in the most banal objects of touristic consumption. This chapter explains when and why regionalism and folklore became so intertwined.
This paper considers the repertoire of Flemish lace tells and explores how these work songs might... more This paper considers the repertoire of Flemish lace tells and explores how these work songs might illuminate the history of lacemakers in nineteenth-century Belgium.
This is a draft of a chapter for the book 'New Worlds, Old Orders' on Restoration Europe (1815-18... more This is a draft of a chapter for the book 'New Worlds, Old Orders' on Restoration Europe (1815-1848), edited by Michael Broers and Ambrogio Caiani.
When Hans Christian Andersen published The Tinderbox in 1835, he claimed it was ‘a tale I heard as a child’, probably from his father, a shoemaker and veteran of Denmark’s contribution to the final battles of the Napoleonic Wars. (As he lay dying of a fever in 1816, he believed he was receiving orders from Napoleon himself.) However, this was not the first time this story of a soldier’s sexual violence and social revenge had appeared in print: a version had appeared in the second volume of the Grimm brothers’ Kinder- und Hausmärchen in 1815, and a second, ‘The Wonderful Pipe’, in Gyorgy Gaal’s 1822 collection of Märchen der Magyaren. He had recorded it from a hussar from the 12th Cumanian Regiment stationed in Vienna. The fashion for fairytales during the Restoration owes much to the Grimms’ example and their personal connections (Gaal was influenced by the circular calling for the collection of popular traditions that Jacob Grimm distributed at the Congress of Vienna; Grimm was also in direct contact with the folktale collector and mentor to Andersen, Mathias Thiele). One purpose of this chapter is to consider why, under the Restoration, these representatives of the educated middle classes wanted to record and publish plebeian storytellers, soldiers prominent among them. However, it will also consider the practice of storytelling among soldiers, the processes by which this particular story (Aladdin relocated to a Europe) spread among European armies, and what message it inculcated in barracks and camp.
Uploads
Books by David Hopkin
The culture of insurgents in early modern Europe was primarily an oral one; memories of social conflicts were passed on through oral forms such as songs and legends. This popular history influenced political choices and actions through and after the early modern period. This book examines many examples of how memories of revolt were perpetuated in oral culture, and analyses how traditions were used. From the German Peasants’ War of 1525 to the counterrevolutionary guerrillas of the 1790s, oral traditions can offer radically different interpretations of familiar events. This is a ‘history from below’, which challenges existing historiographies of early modern revolts.
https://www.routledge.com/Rhythms-of-Revolt-European-Traditions-and-Memories-of-Social-Conflict/Guillorel-Hopkin-Pooley/p/book/9781138205048
Le présent ouvrage, publié par le Centre de Recherche Bretonne et Celtique (UBO - Brest) en collaboration avec le Laboratoire d'Anthropologie et d'Histoire de l'Institution de la Culture (LAHIC) - (Paris) et l'association La Granjagoul - Maison du Patrimoine Oral en Haute-Bretagne - (Parcé, 35), est l'occasion d'évoquer les multiples facettes de ce républicain convaincu, et d'aborder le contexte intellectuel et politique dans lequel se situe son oeuvre ainsi que les nombreux réseaux régionaux, nationaux, voire internationaux dans lesquels elle s'intègre. Cette publication vient combler une lacune et réparer une injustice, car, curieusement, peu de travaux ont été consacrés au travailleur infatigable que fut Paul Sébillot.
Le 11 septembre 1758, l'arrière-garde d'un corps expéditionnaire britannique est défait sur la plage de Saint-Cast par des troupes françaises commandées par le duc d'Aiguillon. Cette bataille ne constitue en fait que l'ultime épisode d'une opération bien plus vaste, l'une des " descentes " sur les côtes de France mises sur pied par Army et Navy au cours de l'été 1758. Ce raid, débuté sous les meilleurs auspices le 4 septembre par un débarquement de vive force, opération presque routinière pour les forces britanniques qui la répètent pour la troisième fois en l'espace de quelques semaines, avait pour objectif Saint-Malo, l'un des principaux port français. Il a cependant fallu au général Bligh abandonner cette perspective, les défenses de la ville mais aussi la météorologie contraignant ses troupes à rebrousser chemin et à gagner un point de rembarquement. Ce repli est d'ailleurs marqué par des opérations de " petite guerre " dans le bocage breton, exposant les Britanniques au harcèlement des milices gardes-côtes. C'est à l'étude de cette bataille atypique, " entre terre et mer " selon l'expression du chevalier de Mirabeau, que cet ouvrage est consacré. En replaçant l'affrontement du 11 septembre dans un cadre plus large, tactique, stratégique ou diplomatique, il cherche à replacer les événements dans le contexte de la guerre de Sept Ans (1756-1763) d'une part, de ce que l'on a pu appeler la " seconde guerre de Cent Ans " (1689-1815) d'autre part. Mais il s'agit aussi de comprendre ce que purent être les conséquences de ces combats pour les populations du littoral breton, ce qui conduisait aussi à la mobilisation de certains face à l'ennemi, sans négliger pour autant la lente construction de la mémoire de l'événement. Célébrée par Voltaire dès 1758, la bataille de Saint-Cast a en effet été érigée au XIXe siècle en " lieu de mémoire " breton par toute une érudition régionaliste qui y vit tout à la fois le moyen de dénoncer les agissements du duc d'Aiguillon bientôt empêtré dans l' " Affaire de Bretagne " et de vanter une certaine image de la Bretagne, conduite par ses élites naturelles que seraient les nobles.
Papers by David Hopkin
The culture of insurgents in early modern Europe was primarily an oral one; memories of social conflicts were passed on through oral forms such as songs and legends. This popular history influenced political choices and actions through and after the early modern period. This book examines many examples of how memories of revolt were perpetuated in oral culture, and analyses how traditions were used. From the German Peasants’ War of 1525 to the counterrevolutionary guerrillas of the 1790s, oral traditions can offer radically different interpretations of familiar events. This is a ‘history from below’, which challenges existing historiographies of early modern revolts.
https://www.routledge.com/Rhythms-of-Revolt-European-Traditions-and-Memories-of-Social-Conflict/Guillorel-Hopkin-Pooley/p/book/9781138205048
Le présent ouvrage, publié par le Centre de Recherche Bretonne et Celtique (UBO - Brest) en collaboration avec le Laboratoire d'Anthropologie et d'Histoire de l'Institution de la Culture (LAHIC) - (Paris) et l'association La Granjagoul - Maison du Patrimoine Oral en Haute-Bretagne - (Parcé, 35), est l'occasion d'évoquer les multiples facettes de ce républicain convaincu, et d'aborder le contexte intellectuel et politique dans lequel se situe son oeuvre ainsi que les nombreux réseaux régionaux, nationaux, voire internationaux dans lesquels elle s'intègre. Cette publication vient combler une lacune et réparer une injustice, car, curieusement, peu de travaux ont été consacrés au travailleur infatigable que fut Paul Sébillot.
Le 11 septembre 1758, l'arrière-garde d'un corps expéditionnaire britannique est défait sur la plage de Saint-Cast par des troupes françaises commandées par le duc d'Aiguillon. Cette bataille ne constitue en fait que l'ultime épisode d'une opération bien plus vaste, l'une des " descentes " sur les côtes de France mises sur pied par Army et Navy au cours de l'été 1758. Ce raid, débuté sous les meilleurs auspices le 4 septembre par un débarquement de vive force, opération presque routinière pour les forces britanniques qui la répètent pour la troisième fois en l'espace de quelques semaines, avait pour objectif Saint-Malo, l'un des principaux port français. Il a cependant fallu au général Bligh abandonner cette perspective, les défenses de la ville mais aussi la météorologie contraignant ses troupes à rebrousser chemin et à gagner un point de rembarquement. Ce repli est d'ailleurs marqué par des opérations de " petite guerre " dans le bocage breton, exposant les Britanniques au harcèlement des milices gardes-côtes. C'est à l'étude de cette bataille atypique, " entre terre et mer " selon l'expression du chevalier de Mirabeau, que cet ouvrage est consacré. En replaçant l'affrontement du 11 septembre dans un cadre plus large, tactique, stratégique ou diplomatique, il cherche à replacer les événements dans le contexte de la guerre de Sept Ans (1756-1763) d'une part, de ce que l'on a pu appeler la " seconde guerre de Cent Ans " (1689-1815) d'autre part. Mais il s'agit aussi de comprendre ce que purent être les conséquences de ces combats pour les populations du littoral breton, ce qui conduisait aussi à la mobilisation de certains face à l'ennemi, sans négliger pour autant la lente construction de la mémoire de l'événement. Célébrée par Voltaire dès 1758, la bataille de Saint-Cast a en effet été érigée au XIXe siècle en " lieu de mémoire " breton par toute une érudition régionaliste qui y vit tout à la fois le moyen de dénoncer les agissements du duc d'Aiguillon bientôt empêtré dans l' " Affaire de Bretagne " et de vanter une certaine image de la Bretagne, conduite par ses élites naturelles que seraient les nobles.
This paper was given at the workshop 'Du folklore à l’ethnologie : l’autre d’ici, une affaire de femmes?' held at the GARAE in Carcassonne in November 2015.
Compared with Spain or Germany, France, or at least the French-speaking parts of that country, does not possess a very rich ballad tradition. Inspired by Breton successes, French folksong collectors actively searched for ballads throughout the second half of the nineteenth century, but the harvest was meagre. Lyric song was the prevailing genre. This absence has long been remarked and has been the subject of scholarly investigation. However, perhaps the most plausible explanation is the relative scarcity of broadside ballads. This is not to deny that broadside ballads have a long history in France, with famous collections surviving from the sixteenth century. The same is true of other other genres of cheap print. Before the French Revolution, Parisian streetsingers congregating around the Pont-Neuf were famous for their songbooks or ‘garlands’, while in other cities songbooks were produced for carnival. In the smaller towns, marketplace-singers relayed news and, in particular, sensational crime stories, while others sold religious knicknacks. Provincial print houses, particularly in Troyes and Rouen, were famous for their chapbooks (known in France as ‘la bibliothèque bleue’) and almanacs; these were carried to every part of the countryside by pedlars. Therefore, there was clearly a market for ‘street literature’. However, whereas in England text dominated the single-sheet print, in France it was the image that mattered. Every region had its own imagists, although by the mid-nineteenth century such production had been concentrated in eastern France. These highly coloured images were often accompanied by songs, but songs were secondary. The reasons for this preference lie both in the specifics of production (the makers of woodcut images originated in the card-making industry, rather than printing), and consumption. Images, especially religious images, were supposed to do work for their consumers; they watched over their belongings and provided blessings for the household. The songs that accompanied images certainly influenced popular song traditions, but because the production of coloured images was more expensive and print runs longer, producers tended to play safe and avoid new material. Censorship also encouraged conservatism. Songs on a single sheet, known as ‘canards’ continued to be sold by marketplace singers, but the ‘canard’ was considered a low genre, and marked by its own conventionalism, in that most songs were sung to just one tune (Fualdès, or Le Maréchal du Saxe). Popular aesthetics were more stimulated by the visual than the aural in France.
In western Europe at least, the region has become the default unit for folklore investigation since the subject’s institutional foundations were laid in the 1870s. Tales, songs, proverbs and legends are published in regional collections, albeit often under a national umbrella. Over the same period folklore has provided regionalist activists with many recognisable symbols of their cause, as they adopted regional costume, music, dance and even folk cuisine to demonstrate cultural distinctions. The connection is just as evident in the most politically fractious regionalisms as in those with barely a hint of separatist ambitions. For right-wing regionalists, regional, usually rural, folk traditions imply an ethnically homogeneous and hierarchical community; for those on the left they exemplify resistance to state-led and capitalist homogenization. And simultaneously they appear, without ideological claims, in the most banal objects of touristic consumption. This chapter explains when and why regionalism and folklore became so intertwined.
When Hans Christian Andersen published The Tinderbox in 1835, he claimed it was ‘a tale I heard as a child’, probably from his father, a shoemaker and veteran of Denmark’s contribution to the final battles of the Napoleonic Wars. (As he lay dying of a fever in 1816, he believed he was receiving orders from Napoleon himself.) However, this was not the first time this story of a soldier’s sexual violence and social revenge had appeared in print: a version had appeared in the second volume of the Grimm brothers’ Kinder- und Hausmärchen in 1815, and a second, ‘The Wonderful Pipe’, in Gyorgy Gaal’s 1822 collection of Märchen der Magyaren. He had recorded it from a hussar from the 12th Cumanian Regiment stationed in Vienna.
The fashion for fairytales during the Restoration owes much to the Grimms’ example and their personal connections (Gaal was influenced by the circular calling for the collection of popular traditions that Jacob Grimm distributed at the Congress of Vienna; Grimm was also in direct contact with the folktale collector and mentor to Andersen, Mathias Thiele). One purpose of this chapter is to consider why, under the Restoration, these representatives of the educated middle classes wanted to record and publish plebeian storytellers, soldiers prominent among them. However, it will also consider the practice of storytelling among soldiers, the processes by which this particular story (Aladdin relocated to a Europe) spread among European armies, and what message it inculcated in barracks and camp.