Week 3: The Nobility

 
Was there a 'crisis of the nobility' during the Wars of Religion?

General reading

• David Potter, A History of France, 1460-1560 (1995), chap. 6
• Robert J. Knecht, The French Civil Wars, 1562-1598 (2000), chap. 2
• Davis Bitton, The French Nobility in Crisis, 1560-1640 (1969)
• J.B. Wood, ‘The Decline of the Nobility in Sixteenth and Early Seventeenth-Century France: Myth or Reality?’, Journal of Modern History, 48 (1976)
• Jonathan Dewald, Aristocratic Experience and the Origins of Modern Culture: France, 1570-1715 (1993)
• Henry Heller, Iron and Blood: Civil Wars in Sixteenth-Century France (1991)
• E. Schalk, 'The Appearance and Reality of Nobility in France during the Wars of Religion: an Example of How Collective Attitudes can Change', Journal of Modern History, 48 (1976), 19-31
• K. Neuschel, Word of Honor: Interpreting Noble Culture in sixteenth-century France, esp. chap. 1

Further reading

• J.B. Wood, The Nobility of the Election of Bayeux, 1463-1666: Continuity through Change (1980)
• Stuart Carroll, Noble Power during the French Wars of Religion: The Guise Affinity and the Catholic Cause in Normandy (1998), also an e-book
• ‘The Guise Affinity and Popular Protest during the Wars of Religion’, French History, 9 (1995), 125-52
• ‘The Peace in the Feud in Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century France’, Past and Present, 178 (2003), 74-115
• Blood and Violence in Early Modern France (2006)
• 'Vengeance and Conspiracy during the French Wars of Religion', in B. Coward and J. Swann (eds), Conspiracies and Conspiracy Theory in Early Modern Europe (2004), pp. 71-86
• Jean Marie Constant, ‘The Protestant Nobility in France during the Wars of Religion: A Leaven of Innovation in a Traditional World’, in P. Benedict et al (eds), Reformation, Revolt and Civil War in France and the Netherlands, 1555-1585 (1999), pp. 69-82
• J.R. Major, 'Noble Income and Inflation and the Wars of Religion in France', American Historical Review, 86 (1981), 21-48
• R.R. Harding, Anatomy of a Power Elite: The Provincial Governors of Early Modern France (1978)
• Mark Greengrass, 'Noble affinities in early modern France: the case of Henri I de Montmorency, Constable of France', European Studies Quarterly, 16 (1986), 275-311
• 'Property and Politics in sixteenth-century France: the Landed Fortune of Constable Anne de Montmorency', French History, 2 (1988), 371-98
• Sharon Kettering, 'Clientage during the Wars of Religion', Sixteenth Century Journal, 20 (1989), 221-39
• Mack P. Holt, 'Patterns of Clientele and Economic Opportunities at Court during the Wars of Religion: the Household of François Duke of Anjou', French Historical Studies, 13 (1984)
• W.A. Weary, ‘The House of La Trémoïlle, Fifteenth through Eighteenth Centuries: Change and Adaptation in a French Noble Family’, Journal of Modern History, 49 (1977)
• Joan Davies, ‘The Politics of the Marriage Bed: Matrimony & the Montmorency Family, 1527-1612’, French History, 6 (1992), 63-95
• A. Eurich, The Economics of Power: The Private Fortunes of the House of Foix-Navarre-Albret during the Religious Wars (1994)
• J.H.M. Salmon, ‘A Second Look at the Noblesse Seconde: The Key to Noble Clientage and Power in Early Modern France?’, French Historical Studies, 25 (2002), 575-93
• Arlette Jouanna, Le Devoir de révolte: la noblesse française et la gestation de l'état moderne (1559-1661) (1989)
• Denis Crouzet, 'Recherches sur la crise de l'aristocratie en France au XVIe siècle: les dettes de la maison de Nevers', Annales: histoire, économie, société, 1 (1982), 7-50

Documents: Potter: Chap. 1, docs. 3-6, 10; Chap. 4, doc. 1; Chap. 6

Documents: 19