'This book uses the lives of a typical aristocratic French family as a window into many of the key themes of the Central Middle Ages. As a prize-winning liberal arts teacher, Livingstone knows how to draw in student readers, and she does so by humanizing her subjects and making even the most complex topics, like medieval lordship, accessible. By pairing her own analysis of the Beaugency family with dozens of previously untranslated primary sources, Livingstone gives her readers a vivid sense of the way historians work with sources to make sense of the past.'
Adam J. Davis, Denison University, USA
'With a sensitive reading of landscape, material culture in its widest sense, and contemporary society, Medieval Lives evokes a complex world navigated by the Beaugency and their lords and tenants, a world marked by spiritual as well as practical concerns. A clearly written and accessible text, abundant photographs, judiciously chosen translated texts, and an interactive website provide an admirable illustration of how a medieval family "worked."'
Theodore Evergates, McDaniel College, USA
This is a richly detailed micro-history of the people and places associated with the Beaugency family in the central middle ages, yet it takes full account of important developments in the period 1000-1300. It serves as an excellent introduction to medieval social, political and economic history, backed up with a useful selection of primary sources.
Leonie Hicks, Canterbury Christ Church University, UK
'In an engaging and candid writing style, Livingstone describes the changes of the Central Middle Ages through the lives and experiences of the men and women of one aristocratic family in central France, and leads her reader through the historiographical debates that swirl around that complex past. This is a fine introduction to the medieval period and many of the primary sources that inform our understanding of it.'
Kate Staples, West Virginia University, USA
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