Kingship and Unity - G W S Barrow

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Résumé :
'Kingship and Unity is not only a perceptive and accomplished book, but it is also written in an accessible and engaging manner. This reissued edition remains the authoritative account of the shaping of Scotland during the High Middle Ages and of the kingdom's place in the British Isles and Europe.' Katie Stevenson, University of St Andrews This is a history of the forging of the Scottish kingdom during the first three centuries of the second millennium. In AD 1000 the Scottish kings had embarked on the annexation of English-speaking Lothian and of Cumbric-speaking Clydesdale, Ayrshire and Dumfriesshire. The country's enlargement continued under a line of remarkably able kings with the inclusion first of the highlands and then, after the defeat of the Norwegians in 1263, of the islands of the Inner and Outer Hebrides. How Scotland's landscape influenced its people and conditioned its outlook on the world is a theme running throughout the book. Geoffrey Barrow describes the evolution of Scottish kingship and government during the period, in the process examining the character of Scottish feudalism and the manner of its imposition. He discusses the social, economic and political changes of the period, with separate chapters on the expansion of towns and trade, the role of the church, and advances in education and learning. A sense of national identity had, he argues, become sufficiently strong by the end of the thirteenth century for the country to survive humiliation by Edward I and to reunite under Robert Bruce. With Bruce's coronation as Robert I in 1306 this richly detailed and readable account of Scotland's formative period comes to an end. Reissued for the Edinburgh Classic Editions series, this seminal work can now take its rightful place amongst the classics of Scottish history.

Biographie:

G. W. S. Barrow was Sir William Fraser Professor of Scottish History and Palaeography, University of Edinburgh, 1979-92. His books include Feudal Britain (London, 1956); Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland (4th edition, Edinburgh, 2005); The Anglo-Norman Era in Scottish History (Oxford, 1980 - his Ford lectures); Scotland and its Neighbours in the Middle Ages (London, 1992); and The Kingdom of the Scots (2nd edition, Edinburgh, 2003).

Sommaire:
Genealogy of the Royal House; Part One; 1. Land and People; 2. Kings and Kingship; 3. The Feudal Settlement; 4. The Church Transformed; 5. Education and Learning; 6. Burghs and Burgesses; Part Two; 7. The Winning of the West; 8. Communities of the Realm; 9. Scotland in Europe; A Note on Measures and Money; Glossary of Unfamiliar Words; Chronology; Further Reading; Index; Map I: Scotland in 1286; Map II: The Church in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries.