29466 - Civilization of the High Middle Ages (1) (LM)

Learning outcomes

At the end of this course, the student should acquire a critical knowledge of the original characters of the culture and society of the High Middle Ages (V-X centuries) by applying the appropriate tools and highlighting the differences and peculiarities of the previous and subsequent ages. He should be able to communicate in written and/or oral form, accurately documenting the conclusions of his own historiographic path.

Course contents

A peasant Europe.
Peasants in the early Middle Ages, bwtween economic reality and social imaginary

Rural economy has a very particular and complex character in the early Middle Ages, as it is strictly intertwined with a wood and pasture economy that assumes a decisive role in productive patterns. Therefore, particular and complex is the figure of the peasant, hardly corresponding to what we mean today with that name.

The course aims to discuss, starting from terminology, what “to be a peasant” does mean in early medieval centuries, when the foundations are laid of a European culture – no more a Mediterranean one, as in ancient times – that on one side is the root of what we have become, on the other side must be defined in a different, original way, both in respect of the ancient pattern, and of a “modern” paradigm that already begins as early as the high and late Middle Ages. Written, iconographic and archaeological sources will be taken into account, on the double track of the economic-social history and the history of culture and ideas.

Outline of the covered topics:

1 Peasants as social figures: free men, servants, settlers

2 Peasants as economic figures: land-work land and use of silvo-pastoral resources

3 Peasants and the market

3 Peasants as political figures: men of the king, men of the lord

4 Peasants as religious figures: pagans vs christians

5 Peasants in literary representations: from the roman “pius agricola” to the “rude and bestial vilain”

6 Peasants in artistic representations

7 Peasants in the theory of the three “ordines”

8 Peasants men and women: gender issues

Readings/Bibliography

Attending students will have specific readings in order to prepare their own papers.

*

Not attending students will have a written and an oral test.

Written test will be based on S. Gasparri, C. La Rocca, Tempi barbarici. L'Europa occidentale tra antichità e Medioevo (300-900), Roma, Carocci, 2012.

For the oral test, they will study a book, chosen in this list:

M. Montanari, Contadini di Romagna, Bologna, Clueb, 1994.

M. Montanari, Campagne medievali, Torino, Einaudi, 1984.

G. Pasquali, Sistemi di produzione agraria e aziende curtensi nell’Italia altomedievale, Bologna, Clueb, 2008.

W. Rösener, I contadini nel Medioevo, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1987.

A. Cortonesi, G. Pasquali, G. Piccinni, Uomini e campagne nell’Italia medievale, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2002.

Teaching methods

The course will have a seminar format and will be structured along 15 lessons of two hours each. It requires a regular attendance and an active involvement of the students.

After some introductive lectures, readings will be proposed to understand the topic in its complexity, on a European dimension (therefore, not always in Italian language). Readings will be compulsory made during the course, in order to ensure a good collective discussion of the contents.

Finally, some lessons will be devoted to reading, cataloging and interpreting written sources.

Assessment methods

The course constitutes, together with Storia dell’Europa medievale, the integrated course Origini dell'Europa and therefore the final exam is conceived as unique.

Students attending both courses will prepare a paper that will be the only final test of the integrated course.

Final assessment will be based both on the completeness and accuracy of the work, and the ability to expose critically the topics.

*

Not attending students will take only one written test, common for both courses, followed by an oral test: the two tests can be taken in the same scheduled exam date but it’s also possible to take the oral test in a succeeding scheduled exam date.

To access the oral exam, students need to have taken the written test and to have passed it with a score of minimum 18/30.

The written test will verify the knowledge gained through the manual and consists of five open-ended questions which requires correct and concise answers (the first one, with a score from 0 to 10; the others with a score from 0 to 5). The best possible result is 30/30.

The oral exam, also common to both courses, will be a free conversation to verify the knowledge of chosen books.

The maximum score assigned for the oral test is 30/30. For the evaluation, language skills, understanding of the discussed issues, ability to propose connections among the various topics will be taken into account.

The final score will come out from the average between the results of the written and the oral test. A word of praise can be added at the discretion of the teacher.

Teaching tools

The University's repository will be used for the distribution of teaching tools: power points for the synthesis of lesson contents, pdf files of sources and further readings.

Office hours

See the website of Massimo Montanari