When The News Was Sung: Ballads as News Media in Early Modern Europe

News songs differ in crucial ways to the other news media of the early modern period like newsletters, newspapers, or diplomatic correspondence – they differ even from the prose broadsheets and pamphlets that they so closely resemble. As historians of news we need to ask different kinds of questions of these multi-media artifacts. For example, how does the presentation in a performative genre affect the dissemination and reception of information about events? What part do orality and aurality play in how the news was sold and received? Here the activities and social status of street singers play an important role. We must consider the production, format and distribution of these songs in order to understand their impact. We also need to pay attention to the conjunction between text and melody, and the ways in which this affected the presentation of a news event. On a broader scale, what kind of information can ballads provide about specific news events that other documents cannot or will not provide? Can they offer us a new medium by which to interpret historical events? And lastly, how should historians deal with these profoundly emotive texts? The combination of sensationalist language and affecting music meant that songs had the potential to provoke a more powerful response than any other contemporary news source, and this emotional potency can at times be challenging for a modern historian to decipher and explain. This article will attempt to answer some of these questions and suggest some of the skills we as historians need to develop in order to appreciate the full meaning of songs as the most popular of news media in early modern Europe

The effects of siblings on the migration of women in two rural areas of Belgium and the Netherlands, 1829-1940

This study explores the extent to which the presence and activities of siblings shaped the chances of women migrating to rural and urban areas in two rural areas of Belgium and the Netherlands during the second half of the nineteenth and first decades of the twentieth century. Shared-frailty Cox proportional hazard analyses of longitudinal data from historical population registers show that siblings exerted an additive impact on women's migration, independently of temporal and household characteristics. Just how siblings influenced women's migration depended on regional modes of production and on employment opportunities. In the Zeeland region, sisters channelled each other into service positions. In the Pays de Herve, where men and women found industrial work in the Walloon cities, women were as much influenced by their brothers' activities. Evidence is found for two mechanisms explaining the effects of siblings: micro-economic notions of joint-household decision-making and social capital theory

La conscience et la peur

Gewissen und Angst : wer hat den Pfarrer getötet ? Am 9.März 1733 schicken der Vogt und der Superintendant von Kirchheim unter Teck ein Schreiben an den Herzog von Wurtemberg, worin sie den plötzlichen Tod des Pfarrers der Pfarrgemeinde von Zell unter Aichelberg während seiner Heimreise von einer theologischen Disputation in Kirchheim mitteilen. 10 Jahre später geht das Gerücht um, der Pfarrer sei von den Brüdern Drohmann, zwei reichen Bauern, ermordet worden. Der Herzog ordnet eine Untersuchung an. Anhand eingehender Studien der Archivakten lassen sich die Herrschaftsformen in einer deutschen Kleinstadt während der ersten Hälfte des 18. Jahrhunderts nachzeichnen, insbesondere die Beziehungen zwischen lokaler Herrschaft und staatlichen Institutionen. Gezeigt wird, wie die verschiedenen Fraktionen, die im Verlauf der Affäre Gestalt gewinnen, sich entlang komplexer, aus der Uberschneidung von Verwandschafts- und Besitzverhältnissen gebildeter Strukturen konstituieren. Mittels Analyse der Aussagen der Akteure zur Affäre, der Art und Weise in der sie vom Geschwätz Gebrauch machen, schließlich ihrer Definition von «Gewissen» und «Gewissensfall» werden die Mechanismen aufgedeckt, mit denen es den Ärmsten gelingt, ihre Denunziation an die Öffentlichkeit zu tragen.Conscience and Fear : Who Killed the Vicar ? On March 9th 1733, the two senior magistrates of the town of Kircheim-unter-Teck sent a report to the Duke of Wurtemberg, announcing the death of the vicar of the parish of Zell-unter-Aichelberg ; the priest had died suddenly on his way home from Kircheim, where he had taken part in a theological discussion. Ten years later, a rumour began to circulate in the region that the priest had been murdered by two rich peasants, the Drohmann brothers. The Duke ordered an inquiry. A close study of the village archives brings to light the forms of power in an early 18th-century German village and the relationship between local power and the State institutions, by showing how the different factions which emerged around the affair were aligned on the complex structures formed by the intersection between kinship relations and property relations. At a deeper level, analysis of the actors' discourse about the affair, the use they make of gossip and their definitions of «conscience» and «matters of conscience» reveals the mechanisms through which the least powerful actors were able to bring their denunciations before public opinion.La conscience et la peur : qui a tué le pasteur ? Le 9 mars 1733, les deux principaux magistrats de la ville de Kirchheim-unter-Teck envoient un rapport au duc de Wurtemberg pour annoncer la mort du pasteur de la paroisse de Zell-unter-Aichelberg survenue brutalement alors qu'il revenait de la ville de Kirchheim où il avait participé à une discussion théologique. Dix ans après, un bruit se met à circuler dans le pays : le pasteur a été assassiné par deux riches paysans, les frères Drohmann. Le duc ordonne une enquête. L'étude minutieuse du dossier d'archives met en lumière les formes du pouvoir dans un village allemand de la première moitié du 18e siècle et les relations entre le pouvoir local et les institutions d'État en montrant comment les différentes factions qui se mettent en place au cours de l'affaire s'alignent sur les structures complexes formées par l'intersection des rapports de parenté et des rapports de propriété. Plus profondément, l'analyse du discours des acteurs sur l'affaire, de l'usage qu'ils font du ragot et de la définition qu'ils se donnent de la «conscience» et du «cas de conscience», révèle les mécanismes par lesquels les plus démunis parvenaient à porter leurs dénonciations devant l'opinion publique.Sabean David. La conscience et la peur . In: Actes de la recherche en sciences sociales. Vol. 51, mars 1984. La dénonciation. pp. 41-53

Household formation and geographical mobility : a family register study for a Württemberg village, 1760-1900

Sabean David. Household formation and geographical mobility : a family register study for a Württemberg village, 1760-1900. In: Annales de démographie historique, 1970. Migrations. pp. 275-294

Famille et tenure paysanne : aux origines de la guerre des Paysans en Allemagne

Sabean David. Famille et tenure paysanne : aux origines de la guerre des Paysans en Allemagne. In: Annales. Économies, Sociétés, Civilisations. 27ᵉ année, N. 4-5, 1972. pp. 903-922