Economic and social history of medieval Europe

Pirenne

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1937 - History - 239 pages

A great Belgian historian recounts the economic and social evolution of Western Europe from the end of the Roman Empire to the mid-fifteenth century. Translated by I. E. Clegg.

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Review: An Economic and Social History of Medieval Europe

User Review  - David Robertus - Goodreads

Right up there with his class on the Medieval city, but still Pirenne falls a little short. He becomes a little too vehement against other authors about mid way through, and this makes the read a ...

Contents

• Preface to the English Translation: 1
• TWO THE TOWNS: 8
• commerce in the West 4 economic regression under: 14
• THE REVIVAL OF COMMERCE: 27
• t THE REVIVAL OF URBAN LIFE: 39
• The bourgeoisie and agrarian society 49 freedom of: 53
• H CHANGES IN AGRICULTURE FROM THE BEGINNING OF: 66
• German colonisation beyond the Elbe 76 influence of: 84
• ism 91 attitude of the princes towards commerce: 91
• Natural economy and money economy 102 Carolingian: 115
• merchants 126 loans at interest 128 progress of credit: 134
• the port of Bruges 145 the Teutonic Hanse 146 Han: 148
• tance of commercial profits 162 origins of mercantile capi: 165
• SIX URBAN ECONOMY AND THE REGULATION: 167
• n URBAN INDUSTRY: 185
• Economic characteristics of the fourteenth and fifteenth: 201
• a new class of capitalists 212 princes and capitalists 214: 214
• General Index: 229

About the author

Belgian-born historian Henry Pirenne spent most of his professional life as professor of history at the University of Ghent. During World War I, he was a leader of Belgian passive resistance and spent several years as a hostage of the Germans. As a historian Pirenne centered his attention on the urban development of the Low Countries during the medieval period. In Medieval Cities, published in 1925, he argues that medieval urban development grew out of regional fortresses. With the economic revival beginning in the tenth century, city and town life expanded. These communities created their own laws, allowing the development of individual freedoms. Pirenne is best remembered, however, for the "Pirenne thesis" about the foundations of European civilization, which he put forth in his 1937 work Mohammed and Charlemagne. The thesis is that the great event that pushed Europeans into the formation of their own civilization was not the collapse of the Roman Empire in the fifth century but the Islamic conquest of much of the Mediterranean.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Economic and social history of medieval Europe; Volume 14 of Harvest books, 14
• Author: Pirenne
• Edition: reprint
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1937
• ISBN: 0156275333, 9780156275330
• Length: 239 pages
• Subjects: Business & Economics / Economic History; History / Medieval