Passages from Antiquity to FeudalismPassages from Antiquity to Feudalism is a sustained exercise in historical sociology that shows how the slave-based societies of Ancient Greece and Rome eventually became the feudal societies of the Middle Ages. In the course of this study, Anderson vindicates and refines the explanatory power of historical materialism, while casting a fascinating light on the Ancient world, the Germanic invasions, nomadic society, and the different routes taken to feudalism in Northern, Mediterranean, Eastern and Western Europe. Through this work and its companion volume, Lineages of the Absolutist State, Anderson presents a Marxist history of Western political development that takes readers from the first stirrings of political consciousness in the classical world to the rise of absolutist monarchies in Europe and the birth of the modern epoch. |
Contents
The Slave Mode of Production | 18 |
Greece | 29 |
The Hellenistic World | 45 |
Rome | 53 |
The Germanic Background | 107 |
Towards Synthesis | 128 |
The Feudal Mode of Production | 147 |
Typology of Social Formations | 154 |
The Feudal Dynamic | 189 |
The General Crisis | 197 |
East of the Elbe | 213 |
The Pattern of Development | 229 |
The Crisis in the East | 246 |
South of the Danube | 277 |
| 294 | |
| 302 | |
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13th century 3rd century administrative agrarian agriculture aristocracy armies Athenian Athens Balkans barbarian became Bohemia Byzantine Byzantine Empire Byzantium Carolingian central centres Christian cities citizenry civilization clan classical Antiquity colonization communities conquest countryside crisis cultural Dark Ages demesne dominated dynasty early East Eastern emerged Emperor England epoch estates expansion feudal feudal mode fief frontiers Gaul Germanic Greece Greek Hellenistic henceforward hoplite imperial system invasions Italy juridical Kievan labour land landowners late Later Roman Empire latifundia London lords magnates manorial mediaeval Mediterranean Middle Ages military mode of production monarchy Mongol never nobility noble nomadic oligarchy Ostrogoths pattern peasant peasantry Poland polis political population provinces regions Republic Roman Empire Roman imperial Rome royal rulers rural Russia seigneurial senatorial serfdom Slav slave mode slave-labour slavery social formations society Spain structure territorial tion towns trade traditional tribal typical urban Varangian Viking virtually Visigoths West Western Europe whole zone