« Le Moyen Age scandinave, que les historiens du nord de l'Europe font débuter vers 1100, est relativement méconnu en France. Les royaumes qui se constituèrent alors sont encore tenus pour des mondes marginaux, plus soumis à un héritage et à des coutumes propres qu'influencés par les modèles sociaux, politiques et culturels de l'Europe occidentale. Les communications, présentées lors du colloque qui a réuni en juin 2005 à Paris des médiévistes nordiques et français, et rassemblées dans ce volume, apportent un regard nouveau sur les relations que les royaumes nordiques ont entretenues avec le reste de l'Occident, en prenant comme fil conducteur l'histoire de leurs élites, clercs et laïcs. Deux approches ont été privilégiées, l'analyse des formes et des lieux d'échanges et celle des systèmes de reproduction de la domination sociale. Que ce soit par les voyages, la diplomatie, ou par la confrontation violente, qu'elles aient fréquenté les cours royales et princières, la Curie romaine, les monastères ou les universités, ces élites ont parcouru l'espace européen et se sont approprié les outils de domination sociale et culturelle, comme l'écrit, les livres, les pratiques intellectuelles, les valeurs symboliques... Leur diffusion a été aussi assurée par les Occidentaux venus dans le Nord, prélats, chevaliers et marchands. Pour exercer le pouvoir politique, les aristocraties nordiques ont largement puisé dans des usages et des normes partagés par l'ensemble des élites européennes. Elles se sont appuyées sur des réseaux similaires de consanguinité et d'alliance. Elles ont adopté les modes de vie, les idéaux, les codes du paraître et de l'honneur des noblesses occidentales. Du XIIe au XVe siècle, sans nier les particularismes éventuels, l'histoire des élites et celle du pouvoir politique ont donc connu des développements synchrones : renforcement de la loi, émergence des juristes, essor d'une élite de conseil, ambitieuse et souvent frondeuse, inflexions idéologiques de la fonction royale. »--Quatrième de couverture

This book, first in a series of three, examines the social elites in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Iceland, and which social, political, and cultural resources went into their creation. The elite controlled enormous economic resources and exercised power over people. Power over agrarian production was essential to the elites during this period, although mobile capital was becoming increasingly important. The book focuses on the material resources of the elites, through questions such as: Which types of resources were at play? How did the elites acquire and exchange resources?

This book provides an analysis of the ideology of power in Norway and Iceland as reflected in sources written during the period 1150-1250. The main focus is explaining the way that Kings’ power in Norway, and that of chieftains in Iceland, was idealised in important texts from the 12th and 13th centuries (Sverris saga, Konungs skuggsjá, Hákonar saga Hákonarsonar, Íslendingabók, Egils saga, Laxdæla saga and Þórðar saga kakala). The originality of this work consists in the fact that it is the first monograph to comparatively analyse the ideology of power in Iceland, looking specifically at representations of king(s) and chieftains during the Civil Wars period, and compare the findings to those pertaining to Norway.

Nordic Elites in Transformation, c. 1050-1250, Volume II explores the structures and workings of social networks within the elites of medieval Scandinavia to reveal the intricate relationship between power and status. Section one of this volume categorizes basic types of personal bonds, both vertical and horizontal, while section two charts patterns of local, regional and transnational elite networks from wide-scope, longitudinal perspectives. Finally, the third section turns to case-studies of networks in action, analyzing strategies and transactions implied by uses of social resources in specific micro-political settings. A concluding chapter discusses how social power in the North compared to wider European experiences. A wide range of sources and methodologies is applied to reveal how networks were established, maintained, and put to use – and how they transformed in processes of centralizing power and formalizing hierarchies. The engagement with and analysis of intriguing primary source material has produced a key teaching tool for instructors and essential reading for students interested in the workings of medieval Scandinavia, elite class structures, and Social and Political History more generally.

By the mid-twelfth century the lands on the eastern coast of the Baltic Sea, from Finland to the frontiers of Poland, were Catholic Europe’s final frontier: a vast, undeveloped expanse of lowlands, forest and waters, inhabited by peoples belonging to the Finnic and Baltic language groups. In the course of the following three centuries, Finland, Estonia, Livonia and Prussia were incorporated into the Latin world through processes of conquest, Christianisation and settlement, and brought under the rule of Western monarchies and ecclesiastical institutions. Lithuania was left as the last pagan polity in Europe, yet able to accept Christianity on its own terms in 1386. The Western conquest of the Baltic lands advanced the frontier of Latin Christendom to that of the Russian Orthodox world, and had profound and long lasting effects on the institutions, society and culture of the region lasting into modern times. This volume presents 21 key studies (2 of them translated from German for the first time) on this crucial period in the development of North-Eastern Europe, dealing with crusade and conversion, the establishment of Western rule, settlement and society, and the development of towns, trade and the economy. It includes a classified bibliography of the main works published in Western languages since World War II together with an introduction by the editor.

Translations of French romances into other vernaculars in the Middle Ages have sometimes been viewed as "less important" versions of prestigious sources, rather than in their place as part of a broader range of complex and wider European text traditions. This consideration of how French romance was translated, rewritten and interpreted in medieval Sweden focuses on the wider context. It examines four major texts which appear in both languages: Le Chevalier au lion and its Swedish translation Herr Ivan; Le Conte de Floire et Blancheflor and Flores och Blanzeflor; Valentin et Sansnom (the original French text has been lost, but the tale has survivedin the prose version Valentin et Orson) and the Swedish text Namnlös och Valentin; and Paris et Vienne and the fragmentary Swedish version Riddar Paris och jungfru Vienna. Each is analysed through the lens of different themes: female characters, children, animals and masculinity. The author argues that French romance made a major contribution to the Europeanisation of medieval culture, whilst also playing a key role in the formation of a national literature in Sweden.