Skip to content

Norman Reid and Robert Houghton Contribute to: Absentee Authority across Medieval Europe

A recent publication from Boydell Press features the contributions of two St Andrews-affiliated historians. Dr Norman H Reid, currently Honorary Research Fellow with the School of History, and Dr Robert Houghton, who graduated with a PhD in History from the University in 2013, have written chapters in Absentee Authority across Medieval Europe, published 2017. The following release is from the publishers. Click here for a flyer which discounts the purchase of the book.

“In the medieval world, what happened when a figure of recognised authority was absent? What terminology, principles and solutions of proxy authority were developed and adopted? Did these solutions differ and change over time depending on whether the absence was short or long and caused by issues of incapacity, minority, disputed succession, geography or elective absenteeism? Did the models of proxy authority adopted by ruling dynasties and large institutions influence the proxy choices of lesser authority?

The circumstances and consequences of absentee authority, a major aspect of the systems of medieval power, are the focus of this volume. Ranging across the realms of medieval Europe (but with a focus upon the British Isles and France), its essays embrace a wide variety of experience – royal, parliamentary, conciliar, magnatial, military, ecclesiastical (papal to parochial), burghal, household, minor or major, male or female, exiled, captive or infirm – and explore not merely political developments, but the dynastic, diplomatic, financial, ideological, religious and cultural ramifications of such episodes.

Contributors: James Bothwell Michelle Bubenicek, Léonard Dauphant , Bruno Dumézil, Laurent Hablot, Torsten Hiltmann, Tom Horler-Underwood, Robert Houghton, Olivier de Laborderie, Frédérique Lachaud, Hans Jacob Orning, Michael Penman. Norman Reid
An e-book version of this title is available (9781787440791), to libraries through a number of trusted suppliers.”