Abstract
THIS volume in the History of Civilisation Series is one of peculiar interest for English readers. The Burgundian court was a great formative influence in the history of European culture. The four dukes who united Burgundy and Flanders under their rule in the period extending from the middle of the fourteenth century to the end of the fifteenth, gathered around them sculptors, painters, scholars, and poets from all parts of Europe, while their court was the last school of the dying order of chivalry. The rivalry of the houses of Burgundy and Armagnac gave England the opportunity of intervention. But the alliance between the English kings and the Burgundian dukes, which was a dominating factor in the troubled politics of France, had an abiding effect on English culture. By ensuring an outlet for our wool trade in the great commercial centres of Flanders, it confirmed the development of English rural life and industry along the lines which ended in the formation of the great pastoral estates, with subsequent economic and social consequences known to all. Prof. Cartellieri here deals with a subject which he has made peculiarly his own. His book is no mere recital of political events, but in a very real sense a social history in which every aspect of life, art, and literature is followed in detail. One chapter deals with the famous witchcraft persecution at Arras.
The Court of Burgundy: Studies in the History of Civilisation.
Otto
Cartellieri
By. Translated by Malcolm Letts. (The History of Civilisation Series.) Pp. xv + 282 + 25 plates. (London: Kegan Paul and Co., Ltd.; New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1929.) 21s. net.
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The Court of Burgundy: Studies in the History of Civilisation . Nature 125, 12 (1930). https://doi.org/10.1038/125012a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/125012a0