The Duel in Early Modern England

Abstract

Arguments about the place and practice of the duel in early modern England were widespread. The distinguished intellectual historian Markku Peltonen examines this debate, and show how the moral and ideological status of duelling was discussed within a much larger cultural context of courtesy, civility and politeness. The advocates of the duel, following Italian and French examples, contended that it maintained and enhanced politeness; its critics by contrast increasingly severed duelling from civility, and this separation became part of a vigorous attempt in the late seventeenth century and beyond to redefine civility, politeness and indeed the nature and evolution of Englishness. To understand the duel is to understand much more fully some crucial issues in the cultural and ideological history of Stuart England, and Markku Peltonen's study will thus engage the attention of a very wide audience of historians and cultural and literary scholars.

Christian Humility, Courtly Civility, and the Code of the Streets

“…This is a theme running through Shaftesbury's writing, Addison and Steele's Tatler and Spectator, and even Locke's Thoughts Concerning Education, which emphasizes the importance of "inward Civility" as the best guard against the "mistaken Civility" consisting of "Flattery" and "Dissimulation." 26 Even if this discourse of inward civility made no explicit appeal to Christianity, we can nevertheless see it as inheriting the monastic emphasis on the significance of outward appearances as genuine expressions of the soul. Mandeville, in contrast, by explicitly opposing good manners to Christian virtue, and by emphasizing that the former was nothing more than an outward appearance cloaking a universal preoccupation with self, was insisting that the promoters of sincere secular politeness were even more unrealistic than defenders of Christian civility: both assumed that human nature could be something other than utterly self-centered, but the latter at least admitted that only supernatural grace could make this possible.…”

Organized Violence in the Elizabethan Monarchical Republic

“…The concept of civil manners actually developed in tandem with the code of the duel, an early modern institution unknown to the Middle Ages. Defenders of duelling – of whom there were many – regarded it as a necessary sanction against individuals who broke the rules of civility, by egregiously insulting the honour of other gentlemen and ladies. Far from being incompatible with civility, codified rituals of violence were arguably essential to its maintenance.…”

Sex and Drugs before Rock 'n' Roll : Youth Culture and Masculinity during Holland's Golden Age

“…Numerous conduct books, usually based on Erasmus's De Civilitate morum puerilium, incorporated civility and honor with dueling. 171 In the course of the seventeenth century, fencing at the University of Leiden became a popular recreation for many students. Various fencing schools sprouted up where students could learn the techniques of using a rapier and sword.…”

“…Besides the new style of short hair on men, the generation of young people of the new Kingdom of the Netherlands in the early nineteenth century must have been educated differently and manifested a new youth culture with their own clothing, games, rites of passage, tomfoolery, recreational activities, and music. They were quite different from their forefathers who grew up de 29,80,227n,238n,276 Switzerland 88,90,105,166,254n,299 Swords see: Weapons Synod of Dordrecht 115 Syphilis 69,145,[157][158][159]162,164,[166][167][168]176,198,256n,257n,283 Tavern 15,66,78,82,[84][85][86][88][89][90][92][93]96,115,154,179,269 Teellinck,235n,276 Teerincx,J. 195,263n,276 Ten Commandments 78 Tennis 70,[77][78][136]…”

“…195,263n,276 Ten Commandments 78 Tennis 70,[77][78][136][137]210,252n,279 Tesselschade,Maria 197 Testosterone 26,28,105,145 Texel (island of ) 145 Textile 34,59,65,110,154 Theater 18,70,143,181,198 Thibault, Girard 134 Thirty Years' War (1618-1648) 23, 34, 127, 130-131, 136, 145, 165, 189, 201, 226n, 250n, 257n, 288, 306 Thulden, Theodoor van 216 Thysius, Johannes 64,234n Timmermans,Felix 179,260n,304 Tlusty,B. Ann 88,[91][92]240n,241n,250n,304,305 Tobacco 30,81,83,90,[171][172][173][174][175][176][177][178][179][180][181]…”