Medieval Rome

Reviews / Votes

Wickham's books are always detailed, thorough, challenging and rewarding, and Medieval Rome is an important assessment of the city and its people and its workings -- economic and cultural, much less religious -- across the span of c AD 900-1150, a complex period of urban instability to regeneration and redefinition. * Medieval Archaeology * a breathtaking book... Wickham is the most ambitious and provocative of medieval historians. * Peter Thonemann, Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year 2014 * This book is quite revolutionary in reframing the study of medieval Rome as a social history of its people and their places, with the pope as the bishop of diocese. * Caroline Goodson, The Times Literary Supplement. * inspiring ... a masterly example of comparative history, in which similarities and differences between Rome and other Italian cities are carefully weighed and interpreted ... [a] marvellous book * Antonio Sennis, History Today * Certainly this book is an achievement. It is very learned and refers equitably to a huge amount of scholarship about Rome ... Moreover, Wickham is more methodologically self-conscious than most medievalists, and aware of why and how historiographies have developed. * Paolo Squatriti, The Medieval Review * the sophistication of his arguments will appeal to a specialist audience, but the clear, conversational style and lack of jargon, coupled with his obvious grasp of the evidence and historiography, make both of these volumes accessible to nonspecialists. Wickham's passion for medieval Italian urban history comes across on every page. * Corinne Wieben, H-Net * Wickham sets out to tell the history of medieval Rome from scratch, starting with landscape and geography and determining the relationship between city and countryside. He has reviewed every document from the period, re-examining property transactions, legal cases, chronicle accounts and letters. In so doing, he has revealed some not-unforeseen biases in the state of our knowledge and set out to correct them ... Wickhams book makes clear that medieval Rome should not be taken as exceptional; it must be analysed like any other city, with attention to its economy, aristocracy and intellectual life and how the confines of the urban environment charged alliances and enmities. * Caroline Goodson, Urban History * offer[s] impressive contributions to the field of medieval Italian history. Wickham's careful reading of and deep insights into a vast and complex historiography make these two works required reading ... form[s] a new foundation for Italian medieval studies. * Louis I. Hamilton, American Historical Review * a work that offers a mine of evidence and rich interpretation on one of the most complex cities imaginable. * Paul Oldfield, Medieval Mediterranean * this book is a model for the socio-political history of a premodern city, written in a direct and enjoyable manner. * Frances Muecke, Parergon *