Neighbours and strangers

Local societies in early medieval Europe

Bernhard Zeller, Charles West, Francesca Tinti, Marco Stoffella, Nicolas Schroeder, Carine van Rhijn

• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781526139818
• eBook ISBN: 9781526139832
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: European Medieval History
• Index: History

This book explores social cohesion in rural settlements in western Europe from 700–1050, asking to what extent settlements, or districts, constituted units of social organisation. It focuses on the interactions, interconnections and networks of people who lived side by side – neighbours. Drawing evidence from most of the current western European countries, the book plots and interrogates the very different practices of this wide range of regions in a systematically comparative framework. It considers the variety of local responses to the supra-local agents of landlords and rulers and the impact, such as it was, of those agents on the small-scale residential group. It also assesses the impact on local societies of the values, instructions and demands of the wider literate world of Christianity, as delivered by local priests.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of figures
• Abbreviations
• Conventions
• Preface
• 1 Questions to pursue
• 2 Setting the scene
• 3 The fabric of local societies: people, land and settlement
• 4 Making groups: collective action in rural settlements
• 5 Shepherds, uncles, owners, scribes: priests as neighbours in early medieval local societies
• 6 Interventions in local societies: lower office holders
• 7 Interventions and interactions
• 8 Neighbours, visitors and strangers: searching for the local
• Appendix: written sources
• Glossary
• Bibliography
• Index