In January 1564, Charles IX and Catherine de Médicis embarked on a two-year progress around France. Their motivation was to confirm the authority of the young king and to enforce the Edict of Amboise, which compelled his subjects to show religious toleration following the civil war of 1562-1563. Royal entries were a principal medium through which city councils, on behalf of the people, communicated their views to Charles. As he walked in procession through urban centres, the king was presented with specially-created triumphal arches, paintings and recitals. The imagery in these scenes, which could be illusory or clear-cut, is invaluable when it comes to understanding the interbellum of 1563-1567. This thesis examines the functions and artistic content of these ceremonies, particularly in Troyes, Lyon and Toulouse, in order to reveal how Charles was perceived as a monarch and whether the edict was well-received. The work draws on festival books that detail the scenes, which hitherto have been an untapped resource, and emblem books to elucidate the contemporary meaning behind the images. City council records, local memoirs and correspondence from figures at court have been used to reconstruct the local and national contexts in which the entries were made. This research demonstrates that Charles was viewed as the divinely-chosen ruler to whom complete obedience was owed, but many people had more respect for the office than for Charles himself. They feared he was too young and inexperienced to rule, and this impacted badly on the Edict of Amboise. The Crown had hoped for a peaceful resolution to the conflict and intended the edict as a temporary measure until the heretics returned to the Church or Charles matured into a more inspiring king. Yet the edict was too intolerable to Catholics and Huguenots, particularly among local officials who often obstructed its enforcement, and so peace could not be maintained, even if it was the will of the king.

The subject of this thesis is the Carolingian regnum of Lotharingia in the years between the Treaty of Meersen in 870 and its incorporation into the kingdom of Henry I in 925. Traditionally, the history of this half-century in Lotharingia is told in conventional terms. Despite the loss of its king in 869 and subsequent division in 870, the regnum Lotharii apparently remained a coherent geo-political structure which, in maintaining a permanent presence in the landscape, provided a focus for contemporary political action, and thus a suitable and straightforward topic of subsequent historical investigation. This thesis challenges that traditional approach and demonstrates that, for much of the initial period following 870, the regnum Lotharii was precisely not such a coherent structure. Arguing that standard methodological approaches are flawed in seeing the survival of terminology as evidence of permanence in the political landscape, this thesis offers a more nuanced explanation, and shows that the terminology survived because it provided an elastic political legacy that could be deployed at opportune moments by either kings, or their challengers, in constructing images of their own power and authority. Lotharingia was a politically active unit by the early years of the tenth century and this thesis proceeds to show its emergence. It again exposes traditional explanations as unsatisfactory. This thesis offers an alternative explanation by proposing the emergence of a distinct aristocracy in Lotharingia only at the end of the ninth century. In re-examining the narrative and charter evidence, the thesis reveals this new identity as a reaction to a moment of crisis within the ranks of one particular aristocratic community. It was not a residual identity from an earlier period of political independence waiting for reactivation.

This is a study of an event: an abortive royalist insurrection in the city of Nîmes in June 1790 and its aftermath - a series of royalist revolts centred upon the commune of Berrias in the department of the Ardèche in 1790, 1791 and 1792. The thesis is divided into four parts, each designed to contribute to an explanation of what made these events possible. Part I is a discussion of the composition and ideological assumptions of royalism in the South-East of France. Part II consists of an examination of the social and economic structure of Nimes in the eighteenth century. Part III is a study of the relationship between Nimes and its hinterland as it was organised through the production of silk. Part IV deals with the manner in which the form of this town-country relationship intersected with tensions and conflicts within the city itself in the later eighteenth century. It is argued from this analysis that it is impossible to explain royalism in unilateral terms. Royalism was the product of a developing social process; it cannot therefore be deduced from the divisions which it contributed to produce after 1790. Royalists became royalists because of the particular form of their relationship to those who became "patriots" in the decades preceeding 1790. Secondly, royalism cannot be explained exclusively in terms of local and regional tensions. Royalists occupied a particular place within the hierarchy of functions which articulated the relationship between Nimes and its hinterland. Rather, therefore, than deducing royalism from tensions at one particular level - whether of the village, small town, region or city - this study has sought to explain royalism in terms of the relationship between these different levels, and of the manner in which contemporaries sought to understand this relationship. The argument pursued throughout this study is that royalism in the South-East can be seen as one possible "solution" to the "problem" of social mobility in eighteenth century France.

This thesis explores parole detention as a site of transnational exchange through a case study of Verdun, a central depot for British civilian and military prisoners of war in Napoleonic France. By focusing on the interactions between captives and captors, this study throws into relief the ambiguities of nation-building and the totalisation of warfare, which kept these two countries at odds in the long eighteenth century. The main finding that has arisen from this work is the predominance of social dynamics over national, martial and religious antagonisms during this forced cohabitation, which nuances the truism of French and British identities forged against each other during the period. Furthermore, moving beyond the common assumption that the concept of honour lost its substance in France after 1789, I argue that parole detention in Verdun was based on gendered and ad hoc practices of internment, which syncretised old and revolutionary understandings of the notion. Whilst the situation of sequestered women has received little attention, this thesis makes the original claim that parole was in fact tailored to the presence of female 'voluntary captives' in Verdun. Composed of seven thematic chapters, and drawing on a variety of sources (ego-documents, newspapers, botanical specimens, material and visual culture), this thesis intends to provide a fresh sociocultural and transnational contribution to the burgeoning field of POW studies. Beyond conventional and nation-centric 'histoire-batailles', which so frequently place the question of military captivity within the rigid frame of a three-staged 'experience'– a trope inspired by memoirs of captivity – this thesis re-considers the experience of detention as a liminal 'passage'. By putting emphasis less on being than becoming a captive, this perspective situates military detention in a wider temporal framework, which includes the aftermath of 1814 and lifewriting as part of the experience.

This thesis examines the development and implementation of media control in France during the First World War. First it describes the evolution of the press control system between 1914 and 1916 and outlines its bureaucratic framework. The study then analyses the extent to which censorship of the press was useful in helping the French government achieve its aims during the particularly turbulent years of 1917 and 1918. The chapters are set out chronologically and contain sections that examine the role of censorship on a case by case basis. The last two years of the war have been chosen for special examination in this thesis because in 1917 and 1918 France’s war effort was increasingly strained simultaneously by both internal and external events. In 1917 France was threatened with rising war weariness, coinciding with the failed Nivelle Offensive, mutinies at the front and international calls for a negotiated peace settlement. In 1918, as Clemenceau began to rally the nation, France faced its most crucial enemy attack since the Marne in 1914. Most of the thesis focuses on censorship of newspapers in Paris. These papers not only had far larger ciculations than their provincial counterparts but often were read in the provinces more than were local papers. Finally by following a few papers specifically through these two years, it is possible to see the evolution of the way in which papers on the left, right and centre were monitored by the government. This thesis argues that France’s censorship system, while not perfect was effective in achieving the aims set out as its goals in 1914 by the War Ministry: to keep military secrets from the enemy and to help maintain public order.

This thesis begins with some old questions about the French conservatism. Why has the French right failed to create a united party on the British model'? Why have conservatives so regularly turned to authoritarianism? More precisely, how is the emergence the Croix de Feu in the 1930s to be accounted for? Was it fascist? Did it pose a threat to the established order? These questions have been addressed by means of a detailed study of the right and the extreme right in one French department, the Rhone. It is argued that from 1870 until the early 1960s the French right was divided by two fundamental problems: the desirability or otherwise of industrialization and the legacy of the French Revolution, especially the historic quarrel over the place of the Catholic Church in French society. Neither of these issues were primary; what is important is the way in which they were related in the minds of conservatives. In the 1930s these problems became acute. The efforts of conservative governments from 1928 to 1932 to stabilize and modernize the Republic initiated, on the contrary, a process of fragmentation. Instability was exacerbated by the world economic crisis. By 1935 coalition politics had become impossible. Government could be carried on only thanks to the grant of special powers. This was the context in which the Croix de Feu emerged. The league represented a mobilization of the rank and file of the right against leaders who were perceived to have failed in domestic and foreign politics. Hence its combination of radicalism and reaction. It is argued that the Croix de Feu (though not its successor, the PSF) was a fascist movement. It is also suggested that in the period which ended with the "fascist riots" of 6 February, 1934, a crisis had been developing out of which a fascist regime might have emerged. But the formation of the Popular Front and its success in manipulating the French Republican tradition, prevented this crisis from developing beyond its early stages. The electoral victory of the Popular Front, the strikes of June 1936 and the dissolution of the leagues put paid to the fascist threat. But the right remained as unstable as ever. So authoritarianism survived in different ways. In the Rhone this crisis took the form of a breakdown of the liberal tradition which had dominated conservative politics since the 1840s, and which was deeply rooted in the silk industry. In the 1920s this liberal conservative tradition was concretized in the Chamber of Commerce and the Federation republicaine. From the end of the decade it was undermined from two directions. On the one hand th~re was a challenge from a coalition of Catholic integrists, merchant-manufacturers and large landowners who were worried by certain aspects of economic and social change. In the early 1930s this group won control of the Federation republicaine. On the other hand there emerged a reformist challenge to the liberal tradition. In the countryside independent peasant proprietors turned to the Jeunnesse agricole chretienne. In Lyon the bureaucratization and feminization of white collar work coincided with the formation of a Catholic trades union movement. The diversification of the economy led to the emergence of a challenge from engineering employers. In the late 1920s these groups were sympathetic to the parties of the centre right. During the crisis of the 1930s they turned to the Croix de Feu and the PSF.

This thesis examines the evolution of presidentialism in contemporary France, with particular reference to the presidencies of Charles de Gaulle (1958-1969) and Francois Mitterrand (1981-88), as articulated in constitutional studies, political writings and speeches, electoral programmes and polemics, journalism and other sources. Since the foundation of the Fifth Republic in 1958, the nature and extent of presidential power in France have been the subject of intense critical scrutiny. While there is a growing corpus of writings reflecting the diverse interpretations of the President's function, no study has yet focused upon an analysis of the debate itself. The thesis is primarily a textual study, based upon a wide range of sources. It opens with a discussion of the 1958 Constitution, the texts on which it was based, the writings of those most closely involved in its drafting and the different historical, ideological and cultural considerations underlying the concept of presidential power which it articulates. The thesis then examines the body of opposition to this conception of the presidency, focused most sharply in the polemical writings of Francois Mitterrand in the 1960s and '70s. By exploring the evolution of Mitterrand's opposition to the style of presidentialism emerging under de Gaulle, Pompidou and Giscard d'Estaing, the study identifies the beginnings of the Left's reconciliation to the institutions of the Fifth Republic, whilst also highlighting the many tensions and ambiguities to which this evolving stance gave rise. The thesis then goes on to consider how Mitterrand's tenure of the French presidency subjected that office to the most exacting interrogation since the foundation of the Fifth Republic. The study shows how Mitterrand's first septennate invites a fundamental re-appraisal of the nature and limits of preSidential power in contemporary France. In so dOing, it calls for a new understanding of an office subject to a range of constitutional, political, personal and Circumstantial factors. The study shows how, during his first term of office, Mitterrand explored the full spectrum of presidential power, from the confident interventionism ensured by the landslide SOCialist victory in 1981 to the tightly restricted 'cohabitation' with the right-wing government of Jacques Chirac. There is, the thesis argues, a whole tradition of French Socialist ideology bound up in Mitterrand's early critiques of the Gaullist presidency, while his first seven years in power brought about important shifts in his own perception of presidential power and redefined the terms in which the debate over presidential ism in France was to be conducted. The writings of such contemporary analysts as Avril, Gicquel, Duverger and Colombani attest to the complexity of the questions raised by this study and suggest ways in which Mitterrand's exercise of pre-Sidential power brought new dimensions to a debate that has been ongoing since 1958.

The aim of this dissertation is to explore the contribution made by the nobility, both Gallo-Roman and Frankish, to the creation of a new society after the collapse of imperial authority in the west, Gallo-Frankish society. The first chapter of this dissertation is a review of the sources, both ancient and modern, used in the research undertaken for this dissertation. It is important to realise that, while not as numerous as those of other periods, sufficient ancient material survives to make a study such as this valid. Modern issues and debates will be highlighted, including an indication of what led me to this particular thesis. The second chapter outlines the history of Gaul and the barbarians to the middle of the fifth century. It then looks at the institutions that were the backbone of Gallo-Roman society. The third chapter explores the lives of a number of individuals who lived in Gaul during the late third and fourth centuries. They exemplify the challenges that faced the nobility and the ways they found of facing them. Chapter four introduces the Franks as the successors to imperial rule in Gaul. A narrative history is followed by a study of the institutions that they made use of in establishing their power. Chapter five narrows the focus still further and looks at the role that the monarchy and the nobility had to play in the creation of Gallo-Frankish society. It will look at specific examples in order to demonstrate the vital role that the fusion taking place between Gallo-Romans and Franks played in this process. The final chapter, chapter six reaches the conclusion that Gallo-Frankish society was based on an amalgamation of Gallo-Romans and Franks, an amalgamation that was remarkably peaceful, given the events of the period.

The thesis attempts to examine the character and motivation of the Catholic royalist movement in the Gard from the fall of the First Empire to the eve of the Second Empire. The thesis proceeds chronologically, with six chapters and a conclusion. In chapter one, the origins of the Catholic royalist movement are traced to the antagonism between Catholic and Protestant elites in the late eighteenth century, and to the subsequent ascendancy of the Protestants during the Revolution and the Empire. During the First Restoration, Catholics resented the moderation of the royal government. The Hundred Days gave them a pretext to plan the counter-revolution they desired. Chapter two presents the White Terror of 1815 as a calculated measure, designed to eliminate the Protestants as a political force, and to ensure Catholic royalist domination in the department. Chapter three examines the unsuccessful struggle of the Catholic royalists to retain their grip on the Gard during the "liberal phase" of the Restoration. Chapter four presents the revival of Catholic royalist dominance after 1820., when the murder of the duc de Berry discredited the liberal policies of Decazes, and the ascendancy of Catholic royalism until 1830. Chapter five examines the transfer of power to the Protestant bourgeoisie after the July Revolution. Until 1833, Catholic royalists waged a "guerilla" campaign against the Orleanist authorities, but the failure of military opposition led many young Catholics to challenge the July Monarchy in elected assemblies. By the 1840's, there was a strong Legitimist opposition group in the Gard. In chapter six, the effects of the 1848 Revolution on Legitimism are studied. Universal suffrage gave Catholics a numerical majority in the department, but revealed a split between the notables and the working classes. Nevertheless, in 1851, the coup d'etat received the support of the Catholic population, while it was resisted by the Protestants. The conclusion stresses the local nature of Catholic royalism in the Gard, and the importance of sectarian rivalry in sustaining it.

This thesis provides a coherent history of Celtic ideas in the modern era. Combining intellectual and cultural history in a transnational framework, it has two main aims. The first is to chart the transformation of perceptions of the Celts from those of a sought-after European ancestor to those of a marginalised people living on the ‘fringes’ of western Europe over the longue durée of 1700-1900. The second aim is to illustrate the wider intellectual, cultural, and political ramifications of this protracted ideological shift. I examine the scholarship of antiquarians, historians, philologists, race scientists, and other intellectuals of all stripes, before investigating how Celtic cultural nationalist movements grew out of these ideas and remained anchored in them. With the racialisation of nations and the cultural shift wherein the nation became a salient political consideration in the period c.1780-c.1820, Celtic ideas were no longer mere passive descriptors of nations, their particular pasts, and their places within wider European history, but active connectors of peoples with both their history and their supposed national destiny. Developments in scholarship combined with the changing imperatives of national thought led to the emergence of an archetypal Celtic image around 1830, where ‘the Celts’ became usefully politicised by both English chauvinists and Celtic nationalists alike. This era also saw the beginnings of Pan-Celticism, where race, far from being used to castigate the Celts, became a central pillar around which members of the different Celtic nations rallied. Tracing Celtic ideological vicissitudes over this longue durée serves as a case-study for how national thought and its conceptual relatives evolved over the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, following the early-modern squabbles over Celtic ancestry through to the early-twentieth century Pan-Celtic movement, the version of Celticism we have inherited more or less intact today.