James D. Tracy

In this widely praised history, noted scholar James D. Tracy offers a comprehensive, lucid, and masterful exploration of early modern Europe's key turning point. Establishing a new standard for histories of the Reformation, Tracy explores the complex religious, political, and social processes that made change possible, even as he synthesizes new understandings of the profound continuities between medieval Catholic Europe and the multi-confessional sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. This revised edition includes new material on Eastern Europe, on how ordinary people experienced religious change, and on the pluralistic societies that began to emerge. Reformation scholars have in recent decades dismantled brick by brick the idea that the Middle Ages came to an abrupt end in 1517. Martin Luther's Ninety-five Theses fitted into an ongoing debate about how Christians might better understand the Gospel and live its teachings more faithfully. Tracy shows how Reformation-era religious conflicts tilted the balance in church-state relations in favor of the latter, so that the secular power was able to dictate the doctrinal loyalty of its subjects. Religious reform, Catholic as well as Protestant, reinforced the bonds of community, while creating new divisions within towns, villages, neighborhoods, and families. In some areas these tensions were resolved by allowing citizens to profess loyalty both to their separate religious communities and to an overarching body-politic. This compromise, a product of the Reformations, though not willed by the reformers, was the historical foundation of modern, pluralistic society. Richly illustrated and elegantly written, this book belongs in the library of all scholars, students, and general readers interested in the origins, events, and legacy of Europe's Reformation.

Doctrine, Politics, and Community

Europe's Reformations, 1450-1650

This book focuses on why Europe became the dominant economic force in global trade between 1450 and 1750.

State Power and World Trade, 1350-1750

The Political Economy of Merchant Empires

Heiko Augustinus Oberman

Thomas A. Brady

The Handbook of European History 1400-1600 brings together the best scholarship into an array of topical chapters that present current knowledge and thinking in ways useful to the specialist and accessible to students and to the educated non-specialist. Forty-one leading scholars in this field of history present the state of knowledge about the grand themes, main controversies and fruitful directions for research of European history in this era. Volume 1 (Structures and Assertions) describes the people, lands, religions and political structures which define the setting for this historical period. Volume 2 (Visions, Programs, Outcomes) covers the early stages of the process by which newly established confessional structures began to work their way among the populace. - Publisher.

Handbook of European History, 1400-1600: Structures and assertions. Population

Thomas Brady

Oberman

Preliminary Material /Thomas A. Brady , Heiko A. Oberman and James D. Tracy -- Ideas of Reformatio and Renovatio from the Middle Ages to the Reformation /Gerald Strauss -- Visions of Order in the Canonists and Civilians /Constantin Fasolt -- Voices of Reform from Hus to Erasmus /Erika Rummel -- The Humanist Movement /Ronald G. Witt -- Luther's Reformation /Martin Brecht -- The Popular Reformation /Peter Blickle -- The Urban Reformation in the Holy Roman Empire /Berndt Hamm -- International Calvinism /Robert M. Kingdon -- The Radical Reformation /James M. Stayer -- The New Religious Orders, 1517-1648 /S.J. John Patrick Donnelly -- Catholic Reformation, Counterreformation and Papal Reform in the Sixteenth Century /Elisabeth G. Gleason -- Settlements: The Holy Roman Empire /Thomas A. Brady -- Settlements: The Netherlands /J.J. Woltjer and M.E.H.N. Mout -- Settlements: France /Philip Benedict -- Settlements: The British Isles /W. Ian P. Hazlett -- Settlements: Spain's National Catholicism /Christian Hermann -- Scandinavia, 1397-1560 /Michael F. Metcalf -- Reformation and Counterreformation in East Central Europe /Winfried Eberhard -- New Patterns of Christian Life /Hans-Christoph Rublack -- The Great Witch-Hunt /Brian P. Levack -- Confessional Europe /Heinz Schilling -- The Coinages of Renaissance Europe, circa 1500 /Thomas A. Brady , Heiko A. Oberman and James D. Tracy -- European Rulers, 1400-1650 /Thomas A. Brady , Heiko A. Oberman and James D. Tracy -- Index of Persons /Thomas A. Brady , Heiko A. Oberman and James D. Tracy -- Index of Places /Thomas A. Brady , Heiko A. Oberman and James D. Tracy -- Religions of Europe circa 1580 /Thomas A. Brady , Heiko A. Oberman and James D. Tracy.

Volume II: Visions, Programs, Outcomes

Handbook of European History 1400-1600: Late Middle Ages, Renaissance and Reformation

Erasmus, the Growth of a Mind

Under what conditions were limited forms of self-government possible in medieval and early modern Europe? While many historians have sought an answer by investigating the development of parliamentary institutions in emerging national monarchies and the wider autonomy enjoyed by various city-states within their own borders, James D. Tracy concentrates instead on a relatively neglected phenomenon at an intermediate level of political organization—the self-governing province. Focusing on the province of Holland during the reigns of Charles V and Philip II (1506–1566), Tracy argues convincingly that Holland effectively underwent an apprenticeship in self-government. The seven provinces of the Dutch Republic—among which Holland was the richest and most populous—were the first in history to govern themselves by a consensus among their towns and nobles. The foundations for this internal cohesion were put in place long before the Dutch Revolt; first by medieval provincial dynasties, then by the dukes of Burgundy, and finally by the House of Habsburg. At the turn of the sixteenth century, Holland was urbanized to a surprising degree, with over forty percent of its population residing in some thirty small and mid-sized towns. Forced by external threats to rise above their economic rivalries, the towns joined together through the forum of the provincial parliament, or States of Holland, which came to assume a primary role in the management of public finances. While noting that the growing autonomy of Holland did not make the Dutch Revolt inevitable, Tracy points out that the revolt could hardly have succeeded without provinces that already had a tradition of managing their own affairs. In the broader context of European political institutions, the circumstances that permitted the provincial states to assume many of the functions of government illustrate not only the capacity for self-government but also the formation of genuine body politics. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1990.

The Formation of a Body Politic

Holland Under Habsburg Rule, 1506-1566

Handbook of European History, 1400-1600: Visions, programs and outcomes

Thomas Allan Brady

Heiko A. Oberman

The first of two volumes that present the current state of research in the field, and do this across as many fields and subjects as possible. The volumes are meant to be introductions to the subjects and aids to research, not summaries, though the mixture of narrative, analysis, and historiographical commentary varies from author to author. Volume 1 contains 19 chapters organized into two parts: the framework of everyday life; and politics, power, and authority--assertions. The extensive chapter-ending bibliographies both support the chapters and provide selective introductions to the current literature. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Ed. by Thomas A. Brady; Heiko A. Oberman; James D. Tracy

Visions, Programs and Outcomes

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1985.

Renten and Renteniers in the County of Holland, 1515-1565

A Financial Revolution in the Habsburg Netherlands

"Tracy's 'life and times' approach results in a considerably deeper understanding on the part of the reader of what sparked Erasmus's works, and of their intent."--Elisabeth G. Gleason, University of San Francisco "This sensitive and well-researched intellectual biography of Erasmus, situating him in his political and cultural milieu . . . contributes to a new understanding of Erasmian texts."--Erika Rummel, Wilfrid Laurier University "Tracy's 'life and times' approach results in a considerably deeper understanding on the part of the reader of what sparked Erasmus's works, and of their intent."--Elisabeth G. Gleason, University of San Francisco

Erasmus of the Low Countries

Campaign Strategy, International Finance, and Domestic Politics

Emperor Charles V, Impresario of War

Structures and Assertions

This work presents the state of our knowledge about the grand themes of European history in this era. It brings together the best scholarship into an array of topical chapters that present our current knowledge and thinking in ways useful to the specialist and accessible for students and the educated non-specialist. The articles are written by a distinguished international group of leading scholars in the field.

James D. Tracy

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