Europe: A Cultural History

by Rietbergen; Peter

• ISBN13: 9780415323581
• ISBN10: 0415323584
• Edition: 2nd
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-04-19
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Following on from his highly acclaimed first publication, Peter Rietbergen's excellent second edition brings the reader up to date with Europe's current cultural trends. In a new student-friendly format, Rietbergen examines the many varied cultural building blocks of Europe, their importance in the continent's cultural identity, and how the perception of Europe has changed over the centuries. Working chronologically from the beginnings of agricultural society in Africa before Christ, right up to today's mass culture, the book studies culture through the media of literature, art, science, technology and music. With thorough revisions on the late twentieth and early twenty-first century, a wide selection of excerpts, lyrics from contemporary songs, and lavish illustrations, this book is an excellent student resource for both historical and cultural studies.

Table of Contents

List of plates	xiii
List of maps	xv
Prologue Europe — a present with a past	xvii
Europe: old Europe, new Europe, old borders, new borders	xvii
Europe: ideas	xx
Europe: realities	xxiii
Europe: on the problems of writing its (cultural) history	xxvi
On choices: the scope and structure of this book	xxix
On the use of this book	xxxv
Acknowledgements	xxxvi
PART I Continuity and change: new ways of surviving	1	(84)
1 Before 'Europe': towards an agricultural and sedentary society	3	(38)
Beginnings in Africa and the eastern Mediterranean, or the non-European origins of European culture	3	(4)
The advent of agriculture, temple and state	7	(6)
Invasion, conquest and change: the first wave	13	(4)
BABYLON, THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY BC: THE LAW CODE OF MAMMURÁPI	16	(1)
Beginnings in Europe: after the last Ice Age	17	(3)
Invasion, conquest and change: the second wave	20	(2)
A 'marginal' culture? Religion and state formation in Israel	22	(1)
A 'marginal' culture? Trade and communication in Phoenicia	23	(1)
A 'marginal' culture? Democracy and its limitations in Greece	24	(9)
A 'marginal' culture? Tribal society in Celtic Europe	33	(2)
The 'birth of Europe' and the Greek 'world-view', or how to define one's own culture	35	(2)
The world of Alexander the Great	37	(4)
2 Rome and its empire: the effects and limits of cultural integration	41	(20)
Between the Alps and the Mediterranean, between the Etruscan and the Greek worlds: the expansion of the early Romans	41	(4)
From an informal to a formal empire	45	(8)
ROME, THE SECOND CENTURY AD: A LEGAL SYSTEM, A LEGAL SOCIETY THE ROMAN CONTRIBUTION	50	(3)
Roman culture	53	(2)
The Roman Empire and the worlds beyond	55	(6)
3 An empire lost — an empire won? Christianity and the Roman Empire	61	(26)
Developments within the Jewish world: the genesis of Christianity	61	(1)
From Jews — and Gentiles — to Christians: the role of Jesus of Nazareth and his followers	62	(5)
Religions in the Roman Empire	67	(1)
A sect of 'hopeless outlaws'	68	(4)
CARTHAGE, AD 180: ARGUMENTS AGAINST AND FOR THE RELIGION OF THE CHRISTIANS	71	(1)
Towards an empire Roman as well as Christian	72	(5)
Rome and its neighbours in the fourth and fifth centuries AD: 'decline and fall'? The division and loss of the political empire — the survival of the cultural empire	77	(5)
Empire and language	82	(3)
PART II Continuity and change: new forms of belief	85	(100)
4 Towards one religion for all	87	(21)
The Christian world-view: the survival of classical culture within the context of Christianity and Europe	87	(8)
MOUNT SINAI, AD 547: KOSMAS EXPLAINS THE CHRISTIAN COSMOGRAPHY	89	(6)
One religion for all: the fusion of Christianity and Europe	95	(2)
The rise of a new empire: Frankish statecraft and Christian arguments	97	(4)
Culture and cohesion: the role of ideology and education in the shaping of Carolingian Europe, or the 'First Renaissance'?	101	(4)
The impact of monasteries	105	(3)
5 Three worlds around the Inner Sea: western Christendom, eastern Christendom and Islam	108	(19)
Confrontation and contact from the sixth century onwards	108	(1)
The world of the Prophet: Islam	108	(6)
God's kingdom among men: orthodox Christendom	114	(4)
A far corner of the earth: Roman, Catholic Christendom	118	(2)
The Crusades: western Christendom versus Islam and eastern Christendom	120	(7)
CLERMONT, 26 NOVEMBER 1095: POPE URBAN II CALLS FOR A CRUSADE	122	(5)
6 One world, many traditions. Elite culture and popular cultures: cosmopolitan norms and regional variations	127	(60)
Europe's 'feudal' polities	127	(3)
The Church and the early states	130	(3)
Economic and technological change and the early states	133	(4)
Stronger states — stronger rulers?	137	(2)
The towns and the early states	139	(6)
A Christian world or a world of Christian nations?	145	(6)
Elite culture and popular cultures: cosmopolitan norms and regional variations	151	(8)
LONDON, AD 1378: GEOFFREY CHAUCER DESCRIBES HIS WORLD	154	(5)
The importance of the universities	159	(7)
Interlude. The worlds of Europe, c.1400-1800	166	(1)
A world of villages	167	(8)
A world of towns	175	(5)
Two worlds?	180	(5)
PART III Continuity and change: new ways of looking at man and the world	185	(152)
7 A new society. Europe's changing views of man	187	(18)
The survival of classical culture and the beginnings of Humanism	187	(2)
The loss of Byzantium – the gain of Europe: the further development of Humanism in Italy	189	(5)
From Humanism to the Renaissance in Italy	194	(7)
ROME, AD 1538: MICHELANGELO TALKS ABOUT ITALIAN ART	197	(4)
Humanism and the Renaissance: Italy and beyond	201	(4)
8 A new society: Europe as a wider world	205	(34)
Economic and technological change and the definitive formation of the 'modern' state	205	(3)
From manuscript to typescript	208	(4)
Gunpowder and compass	212	(4)
THE HAGUE, All 1625: HUGO GROTIUS EXPOUNDS 'THE LAW OF NATIONS'	215	(1)
Church and State: the break-up of religious unity	216	(5)
Printing, reading and the schools: education for the masses?	221	(6)
Unity and diversity: printing as a cultural revolution	227	(9)
Europe and its frontiers: nation-feeling and cultural self-definition	236	(3)
9 A new society: Europe and the wider world since the fifteenth century	239	(33)
The 'old' world and the 'older' world	239	(6)
The 'old' world and the 'new'	245	(4)
The 'Columbian exchange'	249	(7)
EUROPE, THE EARLY SIXTEENTH CENTURY: OPINIONS ON THE CONQUEST OF AMERICA AND ITS CONSEQUENCES	255	(1)
Images of America and mirrors of Europe	256	(8)
Further cultural consequences of European expansion	264	(8)
10 A new society: migration, travel and the diffusion and integration of culture in Europe	272	(25)
Migration, travel and culture	272	(1)
Non-voluntary travel: the cultural significance of migrations	273	(3)
Three types of cultural travel	276	(14)
ROME, WINTER 1644-5: JOHN EVELYN VISITS THE ETERNAL CITY	288	(2)
The practice of travel	290	(3)
To travel or not to travel?	293	(2)
Travel as an element in growing cosmopolitanism and cultural integration	295	(2)
11 A new society: the 'Republic of Letters' as a virtual and virtuous world against a divided world	297	(17)
The Republic of Letters: a quest for harmony	297	(1)
The Republic of Letters and the ideal of tolerance: theory and practice	298	(6)
CHATEAU MONTAIGNE, NEAR BORDEAUX, AD 1580: MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE ON EUROPE AND 'THE OTHER'	299	(5)
The Republic of Letters and its enemies: national cultural policies, or the political uses of culture	304	(3)
The Republic of Letters, or how to communicate in an invisible institution	307	(3)
The Republic of Letters and the 'intertraffic of the mind': three examples	310	(4)
12 A new society: from Humanism to the Enlightenment	314	(23)
Humanism and empiricism between 'ratio' and 'revelatio'	314	(4)
From — scientific — empiricism to new visions of man and society	318	(7)
EUROPE, THE EARLY SEVENTEENTH CENTURY: VIEWS ON THE SCIENTIFTC METHOD OF FRANCIS BACON AND RENE DESCARTES	320	(5)
From Humanism to Enlightenment: a long dawn	325	(5)
Enlightenment and Romanticism: poles apart?	330	(7)
PART IV Continuity and change: new forms of consumption and communication	337	(141)
13 Europe's revolutions: freedom and consumption for all?	339	(27)
Material culture and conspicuous consumption: Europe's process of consumer change until the end of the eighteenth century	339	(4)
Production and reproduction: a process of economic and demographic change until the end of the eighteenth century	343	(3)
A process of social and cultural change: the convergence of elites until the end of the eighteenth century	346	(4)
Two 'revolutions': one political, one economic, both cultural	350	(11)
PARIS, 27 AUGUST 1789: THE CULTURAL IMPORTANCE OF THE 'DÉCLARATION DES DROITS DE L'HOMME ET DU CITOYEN'	353	(8)
Urban, industrial culture: the regulation and consumption of time	361	(5)
14 Progress and its discontents: nationalism, economic growth and the question of cultural certainties	366	(26)
The revolutions and their aftermath	366	(4)
Elements of nationalism: the political culture of the nineteenth century	370	(3)
New elites, new mechanisms of cultural diffusion, new manifestations of culture	373	(16)
BASLE, THE MIDDLE OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: JACOB BURCKHARDT (1818-97) CRITICIZES CONTEMPORARY CULTURE	380	(9)
Money and time, goods and leisure: towards a consumer culture	389	(3)
15 Europe and the other worlds 392
Europe and its expanding world	392	(1)
Europe and Latin America: a severed relationship?	393	(2)
The 'old' world and the 'new': North America as a vision of freedom	395	(3)
Capitalism and consumerism: freedom or slavery, progress or decadence?	398	(3)
NEW YORK, 1909: HERI3ERT CROLY (1869-1930) INTERPRETS 'THE PROMISE OF AMERICAN LIFE'	400	(1)
Europe and 'America': a cultural symbiosis, or the growth of the western world'	401	(2)
To the 'heart of darkness': Europe and Africa	403	(2)
The 'old' world and the 'older' world	405	(9)
16 The 'Decline of the Occident' — the loss of a dream?
From the nineteenth to the twentieth century	414	(1)
The sciences: positivism and increasing relativism	414	(8)
BERLIN, 1877: HEINRICH STEPHAN REJOICES IN THE FIRST GERMAN TELEPHONE SERVICE	415	(7)
Europe in hiding, Europe surviving	422	(5)
A growing sense of fin de siècle between pessimism and optimism	427	(5)
A world between wars	432	(9)
17 Towards a new Europe?	441	(37)
Science, culture and society	441	(7)
After the Second World War: deconstruction and reconstruction	448	(6)
A culture of time versus money	454	(6)
From Familyman' to 'salaryman' — from group identity to individual identity?	460	(4)
Dimensions of identity — culture as communication: towards an 'anonymous mass culture'?	464	(14)
EUROPE SINCE THE 1960's: POPULAR MUSIC — HIGH CULTURE?	472	(6)
Epilogue Europe — a present with a future	478	(16)
Notes	494	(35)
Index	529