P. S. Barnwell

Political Assemblies in the Earlier Middle Ages (Studies in the Early Middle Ages) P. S. Barnwell

Were political assemblies in the earlier Middle Ages convened to confirm decisions already taken elsewhere or were they genuinely deliberative? How, if at all, did political assemblies create consensus? Other recurrent themes in this study relate to the level(s) of the political and administrative hierarchy at which assemblies were held, who attended such gatherings, how they were conducted, and where they were held. A distinctive feature of the volume is that some contributors bring archaeological, as well as historical, evidence to bear. Political Assemblies brings together more than a dozen scholars from a range of geographical, political and historiographical backgrounds and traditions (history, archaeology and philology). The papers offer a coherent thread of analysis running from the immediate successor states of the Roman Empire through to the Carolingian and Ottonian periods, bridging the millennium and into the twelfth century. The geographic coverage (from Scandinavia to Catalonia, Ireland to Hungary) is admirably wide.