Although the eruption of religious dissent in Germany touched off by Martin Luther in 1517 began as a theological disagreement, the ensuring years would reveal that these religious ideas had important social consequences. They set into motion a process of reordering society and forming of confessional identities that had significant implications for the nuclear family. Reflecting John Calvin's assertion that "every individual Family ought to be a Little Church of Christ," Reformed Protestants sought to transform nuclear families into spiritual communities, creating domestic microcosms of the larger church. This project examines the religious formation of families among the French Reformed (Huguenot) Churches, demonstrating that this was a cultural offensive as much as it was a religious one. Huguenot leaders wanted far more than their congregants to attend church: this programme transformed the roles and responsibilities of family members, shaped the activities and routines of the household, circumscribed and defined the appropriate associations of family members, and reorganized the family schedule. This study illuminates the Huguenots' conception of a "holy household" by analyzing the four primary characteristics of these godly families - ordered, educational, pure, and pious - and describes how they were conceived of and implemented in Reformed communities across early modern France. In order to provide a comprehensive understanding of the French Reformed family, this dissertation bridges the divide between intellectual history and social history. There was no greater intellectual source for French Protestantism than John Calvin and Geneva: Calvin was one of the primary theologians influencing the development of Protestantism in France, and the Genevan Church served as an advisor and template for many of the Huguenot churches. Accordingly, each chapter examines in depth the theological underpinnings of this effort, analyzing Calvin's sermons, commentaries, Institutes of the Christian Religion, and written correspondence with leaders of the Huguenot churches. This investigation, in turn, provides an understanding of the religious sources for this new emphasis holy family and domestic piety in France, without which it would be impossible to fully appreciate. To balance these prescriptive sources, I analyze descriptive records to understand how the actual reform of the family was carried out on the local level. In particular, my research relies extensively on church discipline records (consistory registers) from churches throughout France: Albenc (1606-1682), Archiac (1600-1637), Blois (1574-1579), Coutras (1582-1584), Die (1639-1686), Le Mans (1560-1561), Mussidan (1593-1599), Nîmes (1561-1564), Pont-de-Camares (1574-1579), Rochechouart (1596-1635), and Saint-Gervais (1564-1568). These records reveal the complex and messy manner of this reform, which was often marked by contestation and negotiation. Throughout, I compare these records to Genevan discipline records to compare and contrast how Calvin's own church instituted this familial reform in the Genevan context. My project, in sum, reveals the heretofore overlooked religious role and significance of the family and home in Reformed churches of early modern France.

This thesis examines the cartographic works of Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci (1552-1610), who spent his last twenty-seven years in Ming China. In particular, by focusing on Ricci's 1602 map, I examine the broader significance of Ricci's cartographic production to understand how it reflected early modern Chinese-European exchanges. In addition to the 1602 map, I use Ricci's letters to construct a framework for his cartographic involvement. In his writings, Ricci revealed his rationale for mapmaking and explained his collection of information. Only one year after his entry into China, in 1584, Ricci compiled a world map in the Chinese language and featured China towards the center of the map. In 1602, he completed the third revision of his map, adding a significant amount of details to his previous versions. This map was reproduced during and after Ricci's lifetime and has become a celebrated map in cartography. In my thesis, I contend that more than a proselytizing tool to attract the attention of the Chinese elites, Ricci used cartography to organize, preserve and transmit the information he collected during his travel in China. In my thesis, I show that while Ricci established himself as a religious man, under the influence of both his humanist education and his travel, he also became increasingly interested in the natural world that surrounded him. Ricci's letters and map reveal his intellectual development. In particular, Ricci's long tenure in China witnessed two phases of his intellectual transformation. The first phase, from 1582 to 1595, displayed Ricci's humanist education as he learned about China through the writing and translation of ancient Chinese and Western classics. In the second phase, from 1596 to 1610, however, Ricci presented himself as a scientist as he applied his scientific skills to collect information while traveling. In the process, he became increasingly interested in cartography which he came to view as a powerful tool to organize and present information. In time, Ricci's cartographic works became more sophisticated, reflecting both his European education and the Chinese culture.

The purpose of this thesis is to demonstrate the ways in which the core-periphery relationships of English and Dutch colonial ventures in North America were impacted by local events in New Amsterdam-New York, a Dutch colony that was lost to the English following the Second Anglo-Dutch War in 1664. Increased peripheralization of New Amsterdam-New York negated centralizing efforts of the Dutch and effectively ended the potential for Dutch geopolitical power in North America. While the Atlantic World has traditionally been understood as a framework for understanding international phenomenon and global processes, this thesis suggests that it was impacted by multiple geopolitical scales simultaneously. Placing New Amsterdam-New York’s colonial history in a framework of evolving core-periphery relationships and highlighting the central role of local social, political, and spatial processes provides a foundation for understanding the outbreak of ethnic hostilities in the late 1680s. I argue that the increasing importance of the local is demonstrated by the attention given to social, political, and spatial ordinances that sought not to control “the English” or “the Dutch”, but to control the actions and actors of individual streets, wards, and districts.

The vast literature of World War II in France contains a major gap. There is little on the daily life of civilians prior to France's defeat during the Battle of France or civilian life after the liberation of France from the German occupier. Most literature on France during the war focuses on the Vichy years from 1940-1944. This dissertation extends the timeline to encapsulate the whole war from 1939-1945. By doing so, historians can uncover other themes central to the French civilian experience besides the German presence. This dissertation shows the benefits of this chronological extension through its investigation of the southern French city of Montélimar. This dissertation argues that from the time France entered World War II until the end of the war France was occupied. To consider this, one must look at the central theme of requisitions. For the entirety of the war, people all over France had to adapt because of the imposition of requisition policies. French government policy required the sacrifice of civilian possessions in a time of war. These policies continued across different governments: the French Third Republic, Vichy France, the Italian occupation, the German occupation, and during the Free French provisional government. Montélimar's civilians understood that requisitions were necessary. There was, however, a limit to their understanding. When civilians felt they were excessively burden with requisitions or unfairly treated, they appealed in a number of ways. They engaged with the state in what this dissertation calls the "politics of requisitioning." It provided a figurative space where civilians challenged their responsibilities to the state. Though civilian appeals usually failed, they provided an opportunity where civilians contested the meaning of their civic responsibilities and the state explored the limits of its obligations to the inhabitants of the city. These experiences, in addition to the Axis occupation, capture daily life in wartime Montélimar.

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No description available.

This dissertation examines the initial contacts and cultural encounters between Europe and the Mexica and investigates the ways in which the Mexica treasures acquired by the conquistadores played a pivotal role in shaping social, cultural, political and religious perceptions and misperceptions about the Mexica, Hapsburgs and their empire, and Europe as a whole in the early sixteenth-century. The initial shipment of art, artifacts, weapons and other goods given to King of Spain and Holy Roman Emperor Charles V Hapsburg by the Mexica ruler Moctezuma (via Hernán Cortés) arrived in Seville on November 5th, 1519, followed by additional deliveries soon thereafter. The objects included in these shipments would play a significant role in shaping and promoting the newly-expanded imperial identity, while simultaneously contributing to the European audience’s construction of an identity for the indigenous peoples of the New World, doing so through a European vision and recontextualization of pre-Columbian and earlypost-Conquest art and artifacts. This project explores these issues by focusing on three specific media: gold, mosaics (or small stonework) and featherwork, the three media most associated with the indigenous peoples and most coveted by European audiences. In doing so, I seek to understand what it was about these media specifically that inspired their new-found audiences to desire these materials so intensely, above all other forms of production to be found in the pre-Columbian Americas; how each art form fit into existing preconceptions and was used to shape new identities and beliefs about both cultures; and what we learn from answering these questions. / Art History

This thesis examines perceptions of lower-class female prostitutes and prostitution in eighteenth-century London. It reveals that throughout the Hanoverian period perceptions of prostitution were shaped by sensibilities about morality, the social order, and sin. To explore attitudes towards prostitution in eighteenth-century London, this dissertation evaluates how governing elites, ecclesiastical authorities, contributors to the newspaper press, and popular commentators discussed prostitution. This dissertation engages with two main assumptions about prostitution in eighteenth-century London. First, it demonstrates that there is more continuity in perceptions of prostitution than historians have recognized; attitudes towards prostitutes did not shift from hostility to sympathy in a straight-forward manner. Second, this dissertation reveals that prostitution was regarded by Augustan and Hanoverian Londoners as a significant social problem because it embodied and encapsulated the seven deadly sins – lust, avarice, pride, envy, gluttony, sloth, and wrath. This thesis suggests that prostitutes’ excessive lust and avarice were not seen as disparate issues, but were often discussed together. Paradoxically, discussants recognized that financial considerations drove some women into prostitution, but these women were regarded as abnormally greedy and corrupt because they resorted to deceptive tactics. Pride and envy were associated with prostitution because Hanoverians believed some prostitutes bought extravagant clothes and cosmetics to conceal their lowly status and enhance their appearance to emulate elites. Hanoverians regarded these prostitutes with trepidation because they threatened to undermine their hierarchically ordered society. Prostitutes’ proclivities towards drunkenness and idleness were associated with gluttony and sloth. Commentators feared that drunken and idle prostitutes would encourage men to engage in these dissolute activities, leading to greater disorder. Wrath was closely associated with prostitution because of its association with violence. Although prostitutes were both the victims and perpetrators of assault, incidents in which prostitutes were assailants were reported more frequently, suggesting that Britons regarded prostitutes as disorderly, sinful criminals. Each chapter also brings attention to concerns regarding prostitutes’ lack of self-control and their apparent ability to cause men to lose self-control; how double standards of morality influenced discussions of prostitution; the consequences of prostitutes’ criminality and ability to deceive Londoners; and the various institutions, organizations, and suggestions proposed and established to reform prostitutes and eradicate sin from society.

The question of decline in the historiography of seventeenth-century Spain originally included socio-economic analyses that determined the decline of Spain was an economic recession. Eventually, the historiographical debate shifted to include cultural elements of seventeenth-century Spanish society. Gender within the context of decline provides further insight into how the deterioration of the Spanish economy and the deterioration of Spanish political power in Europe affected Spanish self-perception. The prolific Spanish women writers, in addition, featured their points of view on manhood in their works and created a model of masculinity known as virtuous masculinity. They expected Spanish men to perform their masculine duties as protectors and providers both in public and in private. Seventeenth-century decline influenced how women viewed masculinity. Their new model of masculinity was based on ideas that male authors had developed, but went further by emphasizing men treating their wives well.

In 1976 Joan Kelly released her influential article “Did Women have a Renaissance?” Kelly argued that women did not enjoy any of the benefits of the period. Rather, she claimed, the lives of women were actually worse after the 1400s than they had been before. Since 1976, new primary documents authored by women have been discovered. Moreover, new access to relevant writings by authors like Francesco Barbaro, Pier Vergerio, Leonardo Bruni, Juan Luis Vives, and Erasmus make revisiting Kelly’s arguments possible. This thesis uses a sample of these texts to explore women’s experiences and create innovative avenues to explore in gender history. Towards those ends, it combines recent scholarship with primary documents to reveal an incongruence between the expectations placed on women and their self-identified lived experiences. It offers, thus, a more complicated world than that presented in Kelly’s paradigmatic study.