Apparently this was when nationalism began superseding feudal allegiances crafted by marriages. Eng’s divorce was symbolic. This was when the channel became basis of boundary between England and France rather than noble family land titles. Nobility= tax-haven corps today.
Conversation
I’m struck by how much religion was an economics theory back then. Indulgences, confession. absolution, heaven/hell, grace: these were all monetary concepts in 14th century with church being spiritual bank. Even used metaphor of Jesus paying off debt of sins, treasury of merit.
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Modern idea that economics is a religion is false. Traditional religion when seriously believed and practiced is an economics. Modern half-assed religiosity is more like a fandom hobby. Abrahamic and karmic religions are schools of afterlife economics. With fiscal/monetary policy
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Very interesting chapter on the visit of Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV to Paris in 1377 to visit his nephew Charles V. Dog and pony show to legitimate former’s resumption of hostilities with England. Lots of pomp.
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Segues into account of mystic sects like the Bretheren of the free spirit. Wikipedia has a page on everything. I’d never heard of this. Church was basically a bank so people looked elsewhere for spiritual needs
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Magic, black magic, witch burning and some early rational philosophy. 1370s were basically intellectual bankruptcy proceedings. This guys seems alright.
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Finally at halfway point of book. Lengthy telenovela type chapter on papal succession conflict, return of papacy from Avignon to Rome, Catherine of Siena, and much else. This is deep inside baseball of European history. Kinda tedious. Pope Urban vs Pope Clement schism splits EU.
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Still working through this book. Now into commoners revolts in England, Netherlands and France.
Pattern: they revolt over taxes, are suppressed brutally, bunch of executions, ceremonial apologies and heavy fines follow, king distributes fines to nobles doing the suppressing.
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Big lesson from this book: never bet on the commoners. They get their periodic opportunities to blow up violently but pay a heavy price later. Being a countryside noble is good. Being a town noble is sketchy. Being upper bourgeoisie is dangerous. Being Jewish is very dangerous.
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Still reading this. Now several chapters into part 2, rise of Coucy. Not as much to summarize or highlight since it’s more biographical. Our hero goes on diplomatic missions and military campaigns, plays a part in court intrigues etc. Among the better reps of a decadent class.
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Replying to
“Deschamps is a scold but not an advocate of fundamental change... he is a bourgeois in sympathy, deplores injustice to the peasant... but he denounces peasants who attempt to become squires”
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“Sorrowing, even sad, yet beautiful;
He seemed too melancholy for one
Whose heart was hard as steel”
Contemporary verse about Louis 1, Duc d’Orleans. Apparently a mix of hedonist and ascetic, and a gambling addicted politically ambitious scholar.
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Evil uncles removed from scene in France and Coucy gets to be the Grand Butler to Charles VI. Various intrigues that sound like a cross between Seinfeld and bizarro Camelot. General bloodiness seems to have given way to palace intrigues with young kings in England and France.
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Everything seems to be falling apart by the late 1380s but our man Coucy is doing well for himself. A ghostly portrait is starting to emerge: balding, sage, epitome of chivalry and knightly virtue but apparently not the vices that are rotting the median knight.
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This book just goes on and on piling on the shittiness. Dumb mini-crusade against Tunisia. Tedious religious crap, a bad king Wenceslas. I suspect we’re headed for an exhausted whimper of an unhappy ending.
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Even Tuchman’s writing can not redeem this last decade. It just exhausting stupid intrigues among elites. General condition is ghoulish fascination with death. Death cults on the rise. Death masks, obsession with rotting corpses, danse macabre on the rise
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Generally impressed by the sheer amount of 14th century information that seems to be available to historians. This whole reconstruction is very vivid. I’d like to watch a solid TV show based on this book.
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Mad king Charles VI on throne for decades. Makes Trump look actually stable if not a genius. Evilunclocracy in England and France. Rise of occult and magic. Torture and extraction of confessions to devil worship a routine way to cancel people. OG cancel culture. We are at 1393.
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Well, more intrigues in Italy and a misguided crusade later, out man Coucy is dead in Turkish captivity waiting to be ransomed. Kinda sad. He’s the hero of this story even though he never quite comes alive. Tuchman chose him because his life intersected a lot of key events.
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He’s a better example of chivalry and missing the corrupting weaknesses of the class. Sagacious and level-headed. Tuchman suggests he might have been a Washington style leader in a non-monarchical time but I don’t buy it. He comes across as a COO type. Execution, not vision.
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Tuchman’s own tldr of the ~60 years spanned by Coucy’s life: elites had exciting times, commoners had plague, pillage and taxes. Book does a fair job balancing the two, if favoring elite storyline a bit. Fair because there’s more to tell. Elites were mobile and agenty.
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Whew after awhistle-stop tour to the Middle Ages nadir in the 1450s and an epilogue tracing the fate of the Coucy estate into modernity, we’re finally done. Long-ass book but now I am an expert on the long 14th century++.
tldr: lousy ass century. Not recommended for time travel.
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History books are always unsatisfying and don’t end cleanly. The part she rushed through in 1 chapter to stick the landing (1400-1453) is probably worth its own book. Joan of Arc, Agincourt, etc.
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unroll
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