This essay studies recent scholarly debates over Edmund Burke’s (1729/30-1797) relation to the Roman Catholic faith. In this essay the main arguments and considerations that have been presented in Burke scholarship since the 1990s are presented and assessed. In the light of the contemporary caricaturing of Burke as a crypto-Papist in the 18th century, and the continued debate in recent scholarship over how close Burke stood to the Roman Catholic faith, this study aims to understand what can be said about Burke’s thought as it has been presented by recent scholars. The main question posed in this essay is whether Catholicism is essential to understand Burke, and therefore a correct understanding of Burke not being possible without taking this aspect into account. The question is analysed by studying to what extent recent scholars argue for Catholicism being essential and necessary to understand Burke’s life and thought.

Ce travail a pour fin de mieux faire connaître l’oeuvre de la polygraphe jacobite Jane Barker en France, en offrant une première traduction littéraire ainsi qu’un commentaire d’un cycle de trois récits romanesques : The Amours of Bosvil and Galesia — également connu sous le titre de Love Intrigues —, A Patch-Work Screen for the Ladies et The Lining of the Patch-Work Screen. Afin de rendre plussensible la spécificité de ces textes, la traduction s’efforce de retrouver une langueaussi proche que possible du français des contemporains de Jane Barker. Après unaperçu de la vie de Jane Barker (1652-1732), puis de sa fortune critique au XXesiècle, le commentaire prolonge le travail de contextualisation historique et idéologique ébauché dans l’appareil de notes parallèle (travail également pré-requispar la traduction) en étudiant successivement chacune des trois œuvres du corpus. A l’aide des hypotextes manuscrits de la trilogie, largement construite sur une oeuvre poétique antérieure vouée à une diffusion manuscrite, il s’attache à esquisser, dans la lignée des études critiques influencées par le nouvel historicisme, les résonances intellectuelles et les implications idéologiques, ainsi que les audaces esthétiques d’une oeuvre longtemps considérée comme alimentaire et comme dominée par la recherche d’une respectabilité propre à l’écrivain femme. Abandonnant l’image posthume de Jane Barker comme fille autoproclamée de la chaste Orinda, il souligne la pluralité du discours Barkerien – méditation, plaidoyer pro-Stuart et injonction, mais aussi interaction de codes romanesques en constitution et d’une idéologie subversive. / This work is intended to make a French audience better acquainted with the work of the little-known Jacobite writer Jane Barker through a translation and study of her threefold novelistic attempt, viz The Amours of Bosvil and Galesia, also known as Love Intrigues, A Patch-Work Screen for the Ladies and The Lining of the Patch-Work Screen. The translation aims at preserving the specificity of the textsthrough a language reminiscent of XVIIIth century French. The contextualizationinitiated in the notes on the text, which is a prerequisite for the translation, is carried further in a commentary which offers first an overview of Jane Barker’s life (1652- 1732) and posthumous existence in XXth century criticism, then an analysis of each of her narratives. Paying due attention to the manuscript base of the cycle, the sources and keys of which can be traced back to Jane Barker’s former, and still privately circulated, work as a manuscript poetess, this study outlines the intellectual involvement and ideological significance, as well as formal ingenuity, of a series of texts which have for too long been considered as mere journeyman’s work by a onetime amateur, merely seeking to establish her respectability as a professional woman writer. Questioning Jane Barker’s image as a self-proclaimed daughter of the chaste Orinda, the study focuses on the evolution of multi-layered discourse, which weaves together personal meditations, pro-Stuart pleas and a partisan agenda in a fruitful interaction between emerging narrative codes and a subversive ideology.

This dissertation examines militarisation in Scotland and North America from the Jacobite Uprising of 1745-46 to the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War in 1775. Employing a biographical, case study approach, it investigates the cultural paradigms guiding the actions and understandings of British Army officers as they waged war, pacified hostile peoples, and attempted to assimilate 'other' population groups within the British Empire. In doing so, it demonstrates the impact of the Jacobite Uprising on British imperialism in North America and the role of militarisation in affecting the imperial attitudes of military officers during a transformative period of imperial expansion, areas underexplored in the current historiography. It argues that militarisation caused several paradigm shifts that fundamentally altered how officers viewed imperial populations and implemented empire in geographical fringes. Changes in attitude led to the development of a markedly different understanding of imperial loyalty and identity. Civilising savages became less important as officers moved away from the assimilation of 'other' populations towards their accommodation within the empire. Concurrently, the status of colonial settlers as Britons was contested due to their perceived disloyalty during and after the French and Indian War. 'Othering' colonial settlers, officers questioned the sustainability of an 'empire of negotiation' and began advocating for imperial reform, including closer regulation of the thirteen colonies. And, as the colonies appeared to edge closer to rebellion, those officers drew upon prior experiences in Scotland and North America to urge the military pacification of a hostile population group to ensure imperial security. Militarisation, therefore, provides important insights into how cultural imperialism was implemented in Scotland and how it was transferred and adapted to North America. Further, it demonstrates the longer-term interactions and understandings that influenced transformations in eighteenth-century imperial policy.

Cette thèse est une étude chronologique de la présence militaire irlandaise en France sous l’Ancien Régime associé à une analyse du mythe de la Brigade Irlandaise au XVIIIe siècle. En s’appuyant sur des sources primaires, dont certaines sont inédites, les quatre premiers chapitres proposent un cadre historique de la communauté militaire irlandaise et de l’acculturation progressive, mais parfois difficile, de ses membres. Le premier chapitre se concentre sur les écrits de l’élite française et de la littérature populaire d’Angleterre face aux Irlandais lors de la « Guerre des trois rois », tandis que le deuxième se penche sur l’image des soldats irlandais dans la presse des deux côtés de la Manche à la même période. Le troisième explique comment ces hommes sont devenus au fil du temps une troupe reconnue par ses pairs dans l’armée royale, tandis que le quatrième explore les stratégies mises en place par les militaires irlandais et leurs familles pour intégrer la société d’accueil. Ces deux chapitres montrent également le déclin de la présence effective d’Irlandais dans la Brigade. La question de la mémoire de la bataille de Fontenoy est au coeur du cinquième et du sixième chapitre qui étudient minutieusement la part des Irlandais dans la journée du 11 mai 1745 et le rôle des écrits du XIXe siècle dans la naissance d’une identité militaire proprement irlandaise. L’étude se focalise sur des sources contemporaines des faits pour le premier et des documents anglais, français et irlandais datant du XIXe siècle pour le second. / This PhD is a chronological study of the military presence of Irishmen in Franceunder the Ancien Regime linked to an analysis of the myth surrounding the Irish Brigade in the18th century. Based on primary sources, some of which have been hitherto unpublished, the firstfour chapters propose an historical framework of the Irish military community and thesometimes difficult but progressive acculturation of its members. The first chapter focuses onthe writings of the French elite as well as popular literature from England about the Irish in the“War of the three kings”, while the second one is about the image of the Irish soldiers in thepress on both sides of the Channel during the same period. The third one explains how thesemen came to be recognised by their peers as a valuable unit in the French royal army and thefourth one explores the tactics used by Irish militarymen and their families to integrate intoFrench society. These two chapters also show the gradual decline of the actual presence ofIrishmen within the ranks of the Brigade. The question of the memory attached to the battle ofFontenoy is at the very core of the fifth and sixth chapters where the part played by Irishmenon the 11th of May 1745 is minutely studied. The birth of a distinct Irish military identity in19th century writings is also discussed. The study focuses on 18th century sources for the fifthchapter and 19th century sources from France, England and Ireland for the sixth.