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This thesis examines the political role of the three estates in the Scottish parliament and general council between 1424 and 1488. Previous histories of the Scottish parliament have judged it to be weak and constitutionally defective. By placing each meeting of the estates within the context of political events, examining the frequency of meetings, identifying previously unknown parliaments, and studying those who attended and sat on its committees, a more detailed picture of parliament's role and influence has been created. A broadly chronological approach has been used in order to place parliaments in the context of the time in which they sat. Chapters 1 and 2 examine parliament between the return of James I from England in 1424 and 1435 and show the opposition he faced regarding taxation and the developing noble and clerical resentment to attempts to extend royal authority in the secular and ecclesiastical spheres. Chapters 3 and 4 discuss the crisis in parliament and general council between 1436 and James I's death, its role in the establishment of a new minority government, and the interaction between the Crichton, Livingston and Douglas families between 1437 and 1449. Chapter 5 examines James II's use of parliament as a tool against the Black Douglases between 1450 and 1455, while Chapter 6 shows parliament's ability to exert influence over royal lands and possessions and to criticise royal behaviour from 1455 to 1460. Chapter 7 shows the role of factions in parliament in the minority of James III, and their ability to undermine the government. Chapters 8, 9 and 10 discuss the campaign of criticism against James III in the 1470s, the parliamentary crisis that faced him in 1479-82, and the greater royal control exerted in the 1480s. Chapter 11 examines the lords of the articles between 1424 and 1485 and concludes that the committee was not, as has formerly been suggested, a royal board of control. In conclusion the Scottish parliament is judged to have played a leading role in political affairs, providing a forum in which the estates were able to criticise, oppose and defeat the crown over a broad range of issues.

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This thesis offers a reassessment of the political culture of Scotland in the later fifteenth century, from c. 1440 to c. 1490, through an examination of communitarian discourses and practices. It argues that the current understanding of political relations is limited by too great a focus upon personal relationships. While these were undoubtedly important, it is necessary also to consider the structures of law and governance which framed political interactions, and the common principles and values which underpinned action, in order to gain a fuller picture. In particular, it is argued that the current model, which assumes a more or less oppositional relationship between crown and ‘political community', ought to be replaced with a public domain in which claims to authority were asserted and contested. This approach allows the familiar political narrative to be firmly connected to the ideas expressed in contemporary advice literature, while also situating political authority spatially, by asking how it was experienced as well as how it was projected. The focus upon language and space allows for clear parallels to be drawn between different local political cultures, and allows connections and contrasts to be made between those cultures and the norms of kingship and lordship. It argues that reforms to civil justice made during James III's reign have played a far more important part in the turbulent politics of the time than has been appreciated, that both royal and aristocratic authority could be presented as acting both for the common good and for the interests of the crown, and that Scotland's towns not only had a vibrant political culture of their own, but were an important part of the politics of the realm.

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Between the conquest of Padua in 1405 and its temporary rebellion in 1509, Venice built the strongest territorial state in Italy, expanding its apparatus of government to incorporate originally heterogeneous lands into an administrative whole. Military defeat in 1509 allowed Padua's secession, an anachronistic return to separate identity motivated by its political class's resentment at subjection to Venice: denied representation in mainstream public life, they enjoyed illusory local administrative autonomy. In military terms Padua's passage under Venetian rule was marked by the adaptation of the terraferma provinces' systems of defence to their new territorial configuration, achieved firatly by the creation of a permanent, professional army. Its units had no particular territorial affiliation; their recruitment, conditions of service and dislocation were decided by central authority. The province of Padua, strategically placed in the terraferma, served to accomodate companies in transit and long-term billetting, and to supply conscript auxiliary forces. Local fortifications were of secondary importance, and in consequence poorly maintained. The army was the main recipient of terraferma taxation, which was dogged by organizational difficulties, in the assignment of income to spending, and in co-ordination between capital and provinces, with a frequent excess of expenditure over effective revenue. Gross imbalance in the distribution of taxation, with delay and abuse in its collection, characterized Padua's fiscal system. Growing intervention by central government, and the diminution of Paduans' residual fiscal competence, were the constant elements in Venice's largely unsuccessful remedial action. Tax therefore became a point of conflict; Venice grew impatient with Paduan inefficiency and illwill, the Paduan political class showed anger at encroachment by Venetian authority, and fear for the loss of the city's fiscal privilege.

The theses analyses ways of literary representations of perception of space in Czech 15th century travel narratives. With special regard to the genre classification of the travel narratives, this study covers a part of travellers' mentalities in the Late Middle Ages. The concept of perception of space represents the ways of viewing the surrounding world. It helps to understand how travellers confronted social stereotypes with their own experiences. The thesis highlights how relations between natural foundations of the Earth and human thought are construed and shows that both bear the same importance for the shaping of the narration.

The content of this thesis is to evaluate the extensive artifact of the current file, obtained within the rescue archaeological research in the Prague suburb in České Budějovice in 1995. The thesis also summarizes the history of the settlement, the historical context of the establishment of the royal town České Budějovice, urbanism, information relating to the local suburb and the local pottery production, the circumstances of the archaeological research and the description of finding situations. Keywords: České Budějovice, 14th -15th century, suburb, archeology, urbanism