Op 22 november gaat de jaarlijkse prestigieuze Pirenne-lezing door, georganiseerd door de Vlaamse Werkgroep Mediëvistiek. Dit jaar werd dr. Patrick Lantschner (UCL) uitgenodigd om te spreken over ‘The Other Crisis in the Age of the Crusades: Political Volatility and City-States in the Later Medieval Mediterranean World’.
De lezing gaat van start om 18h30 in zaal de Oude Infirmerie in Het Pand, Onderbergen 1, 9000 Gent. VWM-leden worden na de lezing van harte uitgenodigd om na te praten op de receptie die doorgaat op dezelfde locatie.
The Other Crisis in the Age of the Crusades: Political Volatility and City-States in the Later Medieval Mediterranean World
Wars between states were only one dimension of the crisis which the Mediterranean world experienced in the Age of the Crusades (c.1100-1500). This period saw another, often overlooked, crisis of political authority within many states across the Christian and Islamic spheres of the Mediterranean world. The crystallisation and subsequent transformation of city-states was reflective of the volatility and propensity to civil war and conflict which was inherent in many of the diverse political systems of the later medieval Mediterranean world. This lecture therefore returns to two themes that were central to Pirenne’s work: the division between Christian and Islamic spheres, and the place of cities in medieval civilisation. Taking a comparative perspective on the most strongly urbanised regions of Italy, Syria and the Islamic West, this lecture investigates the conditions under which cities turned into important arenas of political confrontation and how they could sometimes also be among the greatest obstacles to the consolidation of states.
Patrick Lantschner
Dr. Patrick Lantschner behaalde zijn doctoraat in Oxford in 2011 en is momenteel Lecturer aan het departement History van University College London. Zijn onderzoek behelst de vergelijking en transnationale benadering van steden en politieke organisatie in de Europese en Islamitische wereld van de late Middeleeuwen. Specifiek heeft hij zich totnogtoe toegespitst op stedelijke opstanden in Italië, de Lage Landen en het Nabije Oosten, en op het fenomeen van de ‘gefragmenteerde stad’.
