When thinking about history we often hold two parallel definitions: History is both the sequence ... more When thinking about history we often hold two parallel definitions: History is both the sequence of events which we believe to have happened in the past and also the attempts of historians to interpret and reinterpret those events in order to gain new understanding of the past. When historians seek to reinterpret the past they unavoidably bring their own interests and contemporary concerns to those past events, this, as Christopher Hill pointed out, is not problematic as current interests can stimulate new directions and new avenues for historical study and new questions for historians; for example, the growth of the women’s liberation movement in the 1960s and 70s stimulated a expansion in interest among historians in the role of women within history. Hill warned that although contemporary concerns can create new questions for historians they should take care to avoid finding contemporary answers .
To examine the way in which different historians writing at different times and with different political interests have used the same historical evidence to come to widely different conclusions it is useful as a case study to examine the way in which the history of the British colonel and war hero turned revolutionary conspirator and condemned traitor, Edward Despard has been examined and interpreted by different historians and suggest how those historians’ own political and historical approaches have affected their interpretations. Now on blog.
Available on blog. When the historian Charles Haskins in an essay in 1927 first applied the idea... more Available on blog. When the historian Charles Haskins in an essay in 1927 first applied the idea of a Twelfth century renaissance, it was pivotal in reshaping modern interpretations of the Middle Ages. Previously, historians had accepted the picture first propagated by the propagandists of the 15th century, who, wishing to emphasise the difference with their own dynamic age, created a narrative of the middle ages as a stagnant society, violent, ignorant and mired in superstition. Most modern medievalists have largely abandoned this in favour of a view of the period as one of far more profound change and development. When understood in its most popular as an intellectual awakening or revival, then there is little problem, however, the anachronistic application of the term ‘renaissance’ has led some writers (including Haskins) to seek to discover a full range of the humanistic teaching of the 15th century Republican Italian city states in the still coalescing monarchical realms of the 12th century. There was a flowering of intellectual expression in the 12th century amongst the literate population of Western Europe. This was, in part, a reflection of the increased confidence within Christendom as a whole after the turn of Millennium: as the existential threats whether from pagan tribes to the North and East, or from Islam, in the Mediterranean were either converted, and brought within the fold of the Church or were being turned back by the armies of Christ. The crusades brought increased contact with Byzantium and the Levant, which in turn led to a wealth of newly rediscovered classical works being brought to the attention of Western scholars. Previously, such Pagan works had been viewed with suspicion by the Western Church, but, in these newly confident times there was a wider audience for them, both within the Monasteries which had been the safe houses of learning in the West since the fall of Rome, and also, slowly, outside of the confines of the cloister.
When thinking about history we often hold two parallel definitions: History is both the sequence ... more When thinking about history we often hold two parallel definitions: History is both the sequence of events which we believe to have happened in the past and also the attempts of historians to interpret and reinterpret those events in order to gain new understanding of the past. When historians seek to reinterpret the past they unavoidably bring their own interests and contemporary concerns to those past events, this, as Christopher Hill pointed out, is not problematic as current interests can stimulate new directions and new avenues for historical study and new questions for historians; for example, the growth of the women’s liberation movement in the 1960s and 70s stimulated a expansion in interest among historians in the role of women within history. Hill warned that although contemporary concerns can create new questions for historians they should take care to avoid finding contemporary answers .
To examine the way in which different historians writing at different times and with different political interests have used the same historical evidence to come to widely different conclusions it is useful as a case study to examine the way in which the history of the British colonel and war hero turned revolutionary conspirator and condemned traitor, Edward Despard has been examined and interpreted by different historians and suggest how those historians’ own political and historical approaches have affected their interpretations. Now on blog.
Available on blog. When the historian Charles Haskins in an essay in 1927 first applied the idea... more Available on blog. When the historian Charles Haskins in an essay in 1927 first applied the idea of a Twelfth century renaissance, it was pivotal in reshaping modern interpretations of the Middle Ages. Previously, historians had accepted the picture first propagated by the propagandists of the 15th century, who, wishing to emphasise the difference with their own dynamic age, created a narrative of the middle ages as a stagnant society, violent, ignorant and mired in superstition. Most modern medievalists have largely abandoned this in favour of a view of the period as one of far more profound change and development. When understood in its most popular as an intellectual awakening or revival, then there is little problem, however, the anachronistic application of the term ‘renaissance’ has led some writers (including Haskins) to seek to discover a full range of the humanistic teaching of the 15th century Republican Italian city states in the still coalescing monarchical realms of the 12th century. There was a flowering of intellectual expression in the 12th century amongst the literate population of Western Europe. This was, in part, a reflection of the increased confidence within Christendom as a whole after the turn of Millennium: as the existential threats whether from pagan tribes to the North and East, or from Islam, in the Mediterranean were either converted, and brought within the fold of the Church or were being turned back by the armies of Christ. The crusades brought increased contact with Byzantium and the Levant, which in turn led to a wealth of newly rediscovered classical works being brought to the attention of Western scholars. Previously, such Pagan works had been viewed with suspicion by the Western Church, but, in these newly confident times there was a wider audience for them, both within the Monasteries which had been the safe houses of learning in the West since the fall of Rome, and also, slowly, outside of the confines of the cloister.
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To examine the way in which different historians writing at different times and with different political interests have used the same historical evidence to come to widely different conclusions it is useful as a case study to examine the way in which the history of the British colonel and war hero turned revolutionary conspirator and condemned traitor, Edward Despard has been examined and interpreted by different historians and suggest how those historians’ own political and historical approaches have affected their interpretations. Now on blog.
To examine the way in which different historians writing at different times and with different political interests have used the same historical evidence to come to widely different conclusions it is useful as a case study to examine the way in which the history of the British colonel and war hero turned revolutionary conspirator and condemned traitor, Edward Despard has been examined and interpreted by different historians and suggest how those historians’ own political and historical approaches have affected their interpretations. Now on blog.