George Chastelain (c.1415-1475) was the official historian of the last two Valois dukes of Burgundy, Philip the Good († 1467) and Charles the Bold († 1477). This study of his Chronicle and career seeks to contextualise - and thereby understand - his work by examining it in relation to the political and historical culture of the Burgundian court. The first chapter reconstructs Chastelain's family background and early career, and notes the differences between the chronicler's account of this period and new record evidence relating to it. The years he was thought to have spent in France were not the formative personal experience they have been taken for in the past. In chapter two, an examination of Chastelain's career at the ducal court after 1446, it is argued that his diplomatic duties, personal contacts and privileged position at the heart of the Burgundian elite were of a nature to profoundly influence his representation of its history. Having examined the political culture from which the Chronicle sprang, chapter three situates the work in the context of the historical culture of the court. By considering the reasons for Chastelain's appointment, the nature of the patronage nexus and the perceived audience which, because of the contemporary success of his <I>opuscula</I>, he thought himself to be addressing, it will be seen that Chastelain's apparently Francocentric outlook was moulded less by his experience in the kingdom than by the milieu in which he moved in the second half of his life. It should be possible at this stage to attempt a reading of the Chronicle based upon the contextual circumstances described in the first three chapters. Before doing so, however, a major impediment to our understanding of the work must be addressed - the text's fragmentary survival.

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This thesis examines the continuing significance in contemporary Italy of the Italian new social movement of 1973-83, Autonomia, by positing it as a movement of refusal: of capitalist work, of the party form, of the clandestine form of political violence, and of the politics of 'taking power'. It was in discontinuity with the value systems of the reformist Old Left and the revolutionary New Left, but in continuity with contemporary Italian antagonist and global anti-capitalist movements. In defining the research subject, the concept of individual and collective autonomy emerges as a central characteristic of the Italian new social movements. Autonomy is understood not only as independence from the capitalist State and economy and their institutions of mediation, but also as the self-determination of everyday life, related to the needs, desires and subjectivity of what Italian 'workerism' defined as the Fordist 'mass worker' and the post-Fordist 'socialised worker'. Using the 'class composition' theoretical perspective of Autonomist Marxism to critique classical Marxism, neo-Marxism and new social movement theory's minimalisation of the political content of new social movements and dismissive analysis of Autonomia, the scope of research was limited to the interpretation of 48 interviews of former participants and observers, of primary texts produced by Autonomia and of secondary accounts based on 'collective historical memory'. The thematic framework consists of chapters on workers' autonomy and the refusal of work; forms of political organisation and violence involving 'organised', 'diffused' and 'armed' Autonomia; and on the youth counter-cultures and antagonist communication of 'creative Autonomia' and the 1977 Movement. The thesis concludes that Autonomia expressed the violent social conflicts produced by the rapid transformation of an industrial into a post-industrial society, but ultimately was only a partial break from the traditions and practices of the Old and New Lefts, leaving an ambiguous legacy for contemporary Italian autonomous social movements.

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This thesis considers the impact that ideas about disability and disabled people have had on debates about euthanasia in Britain and the United States since the end of the Second World War. I demonstrate that the debate has long been characterized by a deeply paternalistic attitude, in which assumptions and stereotypes about disabled people are held to be of such truth and relevance that the idea of having disabled people contributing to the debate simply does not occur. To this end, the thesis looks at the debates through the prism of Disability Studies, and shows that the stereotypical and outdated ideas about disability and disabled people with which these debates abound are not simply down to a chance shared inclination amongst the participants exhaustively to discuss some aspects of the issue whilst not even acknowledging others, as might easily be assumed. Instead they are based upon the assumption that, when 'euthanasia' is debated, the impairment of the individual(s) concerned is the only relevant issue. Though pervasive and often unquestioned, these ideas are now being challenged by such people as disability theorists, campaigners, and academics in the new field of Disability Studies. I will discuss this in greater detail in my Introduction. The thesis begins with the Nuremberg Medical Trial of 1946-47, at which the perpetrators of Nazi medical crimes were prosecuted. These crimes included the 'euthanasia' programme. Despite being cruel, systematic and totally non-consensual, the programme was not treated properly as a crime, the judgment stating that a state was perfectly at liberty to subject classes of its citizens to euthanasia – in other words to subject them to non-consensual killing. The thesis then explores the reactions of outsiders to the Nuremberg Medical Trial. This reveals that the judges' view of the programme was unchallenged by observers in the UK and US press, and by medical and legal commentators, who saw the Trial as solely concerned with the prosecution of Nazi perpetrators of human vivisection. Chapters Three, Four and Five continue to explore these themes of paternalism and moral inconsistency. This is done by looking at historians' perceptions of the Nazi 'euthanasia' programme (Chapter Three), cases of individual euthanasia and how they are dealt with in English and US law (Chapter Four), and the use of the Nazi analogy in bioethical debates on the subject (Chapter Five). I conclude that, though paternalism and dismissive attitudes are still problematic, things are beginning to change, thanks to such factors as greater civil rights, greater scope for participation in society as a whole, and new academic disciplines such as disability studies and disability history.

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This thesis examines the dispossession of the Trencavel Viscounts of Carcassonne, Beziers, Albi and Razes by the Albigensian crusaders in 1209. It considers the factors influencing the crusaders' decision to attack Beziers and Carcassonne and the response from the Trencavel lands, setting the end of Trencavel power in the context of their eleventh- and twelfth-century history. The introduction considers the use of the name 'Trencavel' and construction of the family identity. It then sets out the major political developments of twelfth -century Languedoc, and surveys the main events of the Albigensian crusade from the 1209 campaign against Beziers and Carcassonne to Raymond Trencavel II's surrender to Louis IX in 1247. The first chapter considers the primary and secondary sources for the study of the Trencavel and the apparent division in previous historiography between studies of the Albigensian crusade and of the twelfth-century nobility of Languedoc. The next four chapters then examine the development of Trencavel power during the twelfth century and their position on the eve of the crusade. They compare their nominal with their actual authority, arguing that they were ill-placed to command for themselves sigmficant local support against the crusade, and consider the lack of response to Trencavel dispossession in this light. The following two chapters then consider the factors influencing the choice of the Trencavel lands as the first target of the crusade. They argue that the Trencavel were neither heretical themselves nor especially tolerant of heresy, and that it was the family's poor relations with the Cistercian Order which set them apart from their neighbours for the crusaders. They conclude with a consideration of Pope Innocent III's woMes about the effect of the crusade on the reputation of the church, and exarmine the ameliorating effect of the case of Trencavel dispossession on papal concerns for the crusade.

This dissertation examines funerals and trials as sites of structured and systematic left-wing political opposition. Both funerals and trials offered radical republicans an important opportunity to bypass the restrictions that censorship and anti-association laws put on publicising their agenda: large crowds were amassed, lengthy speeches were made (often viciously critical of the government), and these events received wide-spread press coverage. The theme which runs through these sites of political activity is the interplay between the accusation of violence and claims of political legitimacy. The scope of this project is contained by following the lives (and deaths) of two prominent radicals from the generation that came into public politics with the Revolution of 1830: François-Vincent Raspail (1794-1878) and Louis-Auguste Blanqui (1805-1881). Both from Southern France, they came to Paris as students, struggled to make ends meet, and became involved with the <i>Charbonnerie</i> in the 1820s. They emerged as political leaders in the aftermath of the Revolution of 1830, and both went on to be involved with the opposition press and political clubs. Although Blanqui spent nearly 40 years in prison to Raspail’s seven and some, they were arrested and stood trial with comparable regularity. The opportunity for political organisation and expression created by the death of notable figures reached well beyond their funerals, and statue campaigns and anniversary celebrations proved particularly important. The significance of this final chapter does not just rest on the strategic expansion of the political space created by these deaths, but on the extent to which the use of the mythology around Raspail and Blanqui went on to be used to serve different agendas after their deaths.