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The period from the fifth century to the eighth century witnessed massive political, social and religious change in Europe. Geographical and historical thought, long rooted to Roman ideologies, had to adopt the new perspectives of late antiquity. In the light of expanding Christianity and the evolution of successor kingdoms in the West, new historical discourses emerged which were seminal in the development of medieval historiography. Taking their lead from Orosius in the early fifth century, Latin historians turned increasingly to geographical description, as well as historical narrative, to examine the world around them. This book explores the interdependence of geographical and historical modes of expression in four of the most important writers of the period: Orosius, Jordanes, Isidore of Seville and the Venerable Bede. It offers important readings of each by arguing that the long geographical passages with which they were introduced were central to their authors' historical assumptions and arguments.
The system of royal succession in the Vandal kingdom of North Africa has long been regarded as idiosyncratic within the early medieval west, but its fullest implications have rarely been investigated closely. The present article examines the origins of succession by agnatic seniority under the strong rule of King Geiseric, and argues that it was one of several innovations intended to establish the emergent Hasding royal house against other aristocratic challenges. The article goes on to explore the consequences of this law in the two major dynastic crises of the Vandal kingdom: under Huneric in c.481 and under Hilderic in 530. In both cases, the standard narratives of events are challenged, and with them assumptions about the ‘constitutional’ status of Geiseric's law of succession.
The notion of 'Vandalism' is common to all modern western languages, and yet the metaphorical origins of the term are frequently forgotten. When the barbarian Vandals of the early medieval period are remembered, it is often assumed that they were particularly violent, even by the bloody standards of that time. The present article explores the origins of the notion of 'vandalisme' in the aftermath of the French Revolution and examines the varied representations of the historical Vandals in the Enlightenment It argues that the Vandals enjoyed a complex series of associations during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and appeared in a variety of guises in the prose, plays and political tracts of the period. It concludes that the wholly negative representation of the group arose ultimately from a specific school of French historiography in this period, which sought to contrast the creative energies of the Vandals with the idealized Franks.
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