German Medieval History: Politics, Economy, Society, and Other Aspects

Author: Hou Shudong
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2006-02-01
Features: The book Deutsche Mittelaltergeschichte – Politik, Wirtschaft, Gesellschaft und andere discusses the political and socio-economic history of Germany during the Middle Ages. However, this book is not a comprehensive and complete account of the political and socio-economic history of Germany in the Middle Ages; it only examines several specific issues within a certain time frame. Nevertheless, there are inherent connections between the chapters on political history and the chapters on socio-economic history. The first five chapters follow the development of the German monarchy in the 10th and 11th centuries as the main thread, discussing the early political history of medieval Germany. The last five chapters take the German Peasants' War as the main thread, discussing the socio-economic history of Germany in the 15th and 16th centuries. The last chapter is a lengthy book review, summarizing a representative contemporary Western work on the German Peasants' War. The term "Middle Ages" in the book's title follows the convention in Chinese academia, which includes the "Early Modern" period. Since the reform and opening-up, Western medieval European history research in China has made significant progress, but the development of this discipline still faces many difficulties. The reasons for these difficulties are both objective and personal. The disadvantages in language preparation, access to historical materials, updating methods, keeping up with developments, and information exchange are obvious. However, lamenting the difficulties is of no use; the path must be taken step by step, and our work must start from the reality. Under the conditions permitted by reality, we should contribute to the study of China's own historical and cultural heritage, and we should project the perspective and vision of the Chinese people into the study of Western historical and cultural heritage. Therefore, the aforementioned disadvantages do not mean that we cannot make any contribution. Under the current conditions, it should be feasible to collect as much relevant literature as possible, fully draw on Western academic achievements, and conduct a relatively in-depth analysis of these achievements, based on which to elaborate on some preliminary views. This is also the basic attitude the author adopts when examining certain issues in the medieval history of Germany. This book is compiled and revised based on academic papers, some of which have already been published in relevant journals. During the author's study and exploration of medieval German history, he received dedicated guidance from his mentor, Professor Kong Xiangmin. The author's profound insights into some major issues in medieval German history provided him with significant inspiration. The author also received encouragement and guidance from Professor Pang Zuohe of the History Department of Tianjin Normal University during his study and exploration. The author sincerely thanks both professors for their teachings! Professor Zhu Xiaoyuan of the History Department of Peking University also provided guidance and assistance to the author during his study and exploration. The author sincerely thanks him here! The author also thanks Mr. Zhu Jiao of the Commercial Press for his hard work in publishing this book! The author is fully aware that the exploration in this book is only a preliminary attempt, and there will undoubtedly be many shortcomings and even errors. The author welcomes criticism and corrections from.