Historisch adelsonderzoek over de late middeleeuwen en de vroegmoderne periode in België en Nederland: een momentopname

Historical Research into the Nobility during the Late Mediaeval and Early Modern Period in Belgium and the Netherlands: A SnapshotThis introduction to a special issue on the history of the nobility in the Netherlands and Belgium gives a ‘snap-shot’ of the subject in two different ways. On the one hand, the collected essays demonstrate the state-of-the-art in the research carried out in 2008 on the nobility, on the other, they focus on the mediaeval and early modern periods. The major themes and problems of this historiographical tradition are evoked, emerging from the study outlined in another special issue of a historical journal, the Tijdschrift voor Geschiedenis of 1980, which looked at perspectives for future research. This introduction mainly examines the methods used by historians to confront inevitable questions such as: ‘What exactly is the nobility?’ and ‘How can this historical phenomenon be situated within processes and historical movements such as economic structures and conjunctures, social mobility and political centralization and decentralization?

Historisch adelsonderzoek over de late middeleeuwen en de vroegmoderne periode in België en Nederland: een momentopname

Historical Research into the Nobility during the Late Mediaeval and Early Modern Period in Belgium and the Netherlands: A SnapshotThis introduction to a special issue on the history of the nobility in the Netherlands and Belgium gives a ‘snap-shot’ of the subject in two different ways. On the one hand, the collected essays demonstrate the state-of-the-art in the research carried out in 2008 on the nobility, on the other, they focus on the mediaeval and early modern periods. The major themes and problems of this historiographical tradition are evoked, emerging from the study outlined in another special issue of a historical journal, the Tijdschrift voor Geschiedenis of 1980, which looked at perspectives for future research. This introduction mainly examines the methods used by historians to confront inevitable questions such as: ‘What exactly is the nobility?’ and ‘How can this historical phenomenon be situated within processes and historical movements such as economic structures and conjunctures, social mobility and political centralization and decentralization?’</p

Beeldvorming rond adel en ridderschap bij Froissart en de Bourgondische kroniekschrijvers

The Representation of Nobility and Chivalry in the Literature of Froissart and the Burgundian ChroniclersThis article discusses the representation of nobility and chivalry in the historiographical literature of Jean Froissart and his fifteenth-century followers. By analysing the discourse of those chronicles, this article intends to focus on the social functions of this literary tradition for its intended public; the nobles and state officials of the Burgundian-Habsburg court. As such, this publication questions the existing interpretation of the remarkable emphasis of those chroniclers on virtue as the source of ‘true nobility’ as an attempt by ambitious officials and intellectuals to obtain a noble status. The social significance of those chronicles resides in the fact that they were important for the definition and dissemination of a set of norms that governed the public behaviour of nobles

Adel en nobiliteringsprocessen in het laatmiddeleeuwse Vlaanderen: een status quaestionis

Nobility and processes of ennoblement in Late Mediaeval Flanders: a state of the artIn the county of Flanders, the later Middle Ages should not be considered simply as a period of general crisis for the nobility as an evolving class. Instead, we might call it a time of intensive renewal, accelerated mobility and diversification. The background of these developments was a threefold dialectic: the late mediaeval crisis of feudalism (which brought about a sharp deterioration of noble rent income), social and economic urban development in Flanders and, last but not least, the Flemish-Burgundian state formation process. Specifically, the latter factor has been taken into account in this article as a creative force in the renovation of the nobility. This process was accompanied by a concentration of surplus extraction on the 'state' level, resulting in what we might call ‘state feudalism’. For the traditional nobles, obtaining a political position in the county was now only possible through princely service. On the other hand, political functions and offices offered urban and rural, non-noble, political elites opportunities for gradual ennoblement. Of course, other factors too were involved: the acquisition of seigniorial power, noble alliances and ‘living like a nobleman’. Consequently, these two aristocracies (traditional nobles and political elites of the Burgundian State) merged to a certain extent, eventually resulting in a 'new' noble class, anticipating the ‘noblesse de robe’ of the modern period. For a particular family, this process of ennoblement could take several generations. In a European perspective, the redefinition and revitalisation of this ‘nobility’ as a traditional ruling class in feudal society is hardly surprising. Nevertheless, the high degree of urbanisation in Flanders gave this process a distinct character

Bruges in the sixteenth century : a ‘return to normalcy’

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