Schedule of Classes and Readings
SCHEDULE OF CLASSES AND READINGS FOR FALL 2003
Note: Primary source readings are preceded in the following syllabus
by one of these three adjectives:
Required: you must read that text and
will be held responsible for it on exams
Recommended: I’d love for you to read
it, but won’t test you specifically on it. Use of it on exams will impress
me.
Optional: this text will help your
comprehension of the daily topic, but won’t be on the exams
UNIT 1: Introduction
August 19: Course Introduction: Historians and Their Method
August 21: Roman Empire and Its Fall
Primary Source Readings:
Required: How to Read Primary Sources (http://www.uncg.edu/~rebarton/221-fa01-primary-source.html)
Required: Salvian, on Roman decline (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/salvian1.html)
Textbook Readings: Hollister/Bennett,
1-16, 31-35, 41-45, 49-55, 86-93
August 26: The Christian Heritage
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Letter of Pliny to Emp. Trajan (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/pliny1.html)
Required: Excerpts from Theodosian Code (5th century, not 4th, as the on-line
text asserts)
(http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/codex-theod1.html)
Required: Humiliation of Theodosius (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/theodoret-ambrose1.html)
Optional: Excerpts from the martyrdom of Perpetua (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/perpetua-excerp.html)
Textbook Readings:
Hollister/Bennett, 17-30
August 28: Germanic Successor States
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Tacitus, excerpts from Germania (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/tacitus-germania-excerp.html)
Required: Jordanes on Theodoric the Ostrogoth:
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/jordanes-theodoric1.html
Required: Letters of Theodoric (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/theodoric1.html)
Textbook Reading:
Hollister/Bennett, 35-40
UNIT 2: Early Middle Ages
September 2: The Franks: Clovis and Kingship
Primary Sources:
Required: Clovis Stories: the Vase of Soissons and his Conversion
(http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/gregtours1.html)
Required: Conversion of Clovis (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/496clovis.html)
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 45, 47-48, 65-74
September 4: The Franks: law and order
Primary Sources:
Required: Salic Law (ie., Law of Salian Franks) (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/salic-law.html)
Optional: Ordeal Formulae: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/ordeals1.html
Optional: 11th-century Judicial Duels: http://www.uncg.edu/~rebarton/judicialduels.htm
Optional: An 11th-century ordeal: http://www.uncg.edu/~rebarton/ordeals.htm
September 9: Monasticism: rule of Saint Benedict
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Rule of Saint Benedict (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/rul-benedict.html)
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 74-78
September 11: Early Medieval Belief: Saints, Miracles, Sacraments
Primary Source Readings:
Required: The Nicene Creed (http://www.uncg.edu/~rebarton/church-fathers.htm)
Required: the Life of St Eligius (read only these chapters: 1-10, 15-18,
21, 27, 30)
(http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/eligius.html)
Textbook Reading:
78-82
September 16: Women in Frankish Society
Primary Sources:
Required: Frankish Queens: http://www.uncg.edu/~rebarton/frankish-queens.htm
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 46-47
September 18: Coming of the Anglo-Saxons, c.400-700
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 82-85
September 23: The Carolingian Franks: Charlemagne and the revival of
Government
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Einhard on Charlemagne’s Wars (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/einhard-wars1.html)
Required: General capitulary on the missi, 802 (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/carol-missi1.html)
Required: Charlemagne’s letter to Baugulf (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/carol-baugulf.html)
Recommended: Summons to military service (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/carol-sum1.html)
Recommended: Einhard on Charlemagne’s personality (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/einhard1.html)
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 102-123
September 25: Viking Assaults
Secondary Source Readings
(for next week, but get started this week)
Alfred the Great, pp. 1-48, plus maps and genealogies pp. 59-63
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 125-134
October 2: Alfred the Great
Primary Source Readings
for week:
Alfred the Great, pp. 65-120, 163-186, 189-191, 193-194
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 134-140
October 9: FIRST MIDTERM EXAM
October 14: NO CLASS: FALL BREAK
UNIT 3: the High Middle Ages
October 16: Aristocratic Power and Society
Primary Source Reading:
Required: Fulbert of Chartres: Letter concerning obligations of lord and
vassal
(http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/fulbert1.html)
Required: Agreement Between Hugh of Lusignan and William of Aquitaine
(http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/agreement.html)
Suger, Deeds of Louis the Fat, 23-93
Textbook Reading:
141-145, 155-159, 160-166, 171-176
October 21: Revival of Kingship, c.1100
Primary Source Reading:
Required: Assize of Clarendon: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/aclarendon.html
Suger, Deeds of Louis the Fat, 93-159
October 23: Kingship Restored, c.1200
Primary Source Reading:
Required: Magna Carta (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/magnacarta.html)
Textbook Reading: 280-289
October 28: Peasantry and Lordship
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Texts on Peasant Life (http://www.uncg.edu/~rebarton/peasant-life.htm)
Textbook Reading:
163-171
October 30: Crusading
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Capture of Jerusalem (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/fulk2.html)
Textbook Reading:
217-219, 227-237
November 4: NO CLASS: Instructor at Conference
November 6: Rise of Papacy
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Gelasian Doctrine (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/gelasius1.html)
Required: Dictatus Papae (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/g7-dictpap.html)
Required: Ban on Lay Investitures (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/g7-invest1.html)
Required: Henry IV to Gregory VII (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/henry4-to-g7a.html)
Required: Gregory Deposes Henry IV (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/g7-ban1.html)
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 188-210, 215-216, 242-248
November 11: Law and Society
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Gratian on Marriage (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/gratian1.html)
Textbook Reading:
248-261
November 13: Abelard and Heloise
Primary Source
Readings:
Required: Letters of Abelard and Heloise, 57-106
Textbook: H/B:
308-321
UNIT 4: Late Middle Ages
November 18: War and the Bubonic Plague
DUE: Second Midterm Exam (take-home)
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Froissart, 111-112, 120-146
Recommended: Boccaccio’s description of the plague
(http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/boccacio2.html)
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 323-336, 345-349
November 20: Social Unrest
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Froissart, 146-148, 151-161, 211-241
November 25: Religious Ferment
Primary Source Readings:
Required: Boniface VIII: the bull Unam Sanctam
(http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/b8-unam.html)
Required: Froissart, 201-210 (Avignon and Schism)
Optional: Boniface VIII: Outrage at Anagni
(http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/1303anagni.html)
Textbook Reading:
336-345
November 27: NO CLASS (Thanksgiving Break)
December 2: Governmental Solutions: England
Primary Source Readings
Optional: Froissart, 316-327 [background to what follows]
Required: Froissart, 421-471 [deposition of Richard I]
Recommended: Growth of Parliamentary Government in England
(http://www.uncg.edu/~rebarton/english-parliament.htm)
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 349-356
December 4: Late Medieval Heroines
Primary Source Readings:
Required: The Life and Trial of Joan of Arc (http://www.uncg.edu/~rebarton/joanofarc.htm)
Textbook Reading:
H/B, 350-351