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E-book The Creighton Century, 1907-2007

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Penilaian

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The first Creighton Lecture took place on 4 October 1907, almost seven years after the death of the scholar and bishop whom it honoured. Apart from being delivered by a lifelong friend, its published version stands in no discernible relation to Mandell Creighton himself, except for treating of his narrower patria, the Anglo-Scottish border. In fact the whole subsequent lecture series has been a second-best, a way of expending revenue from the fund (£650 at that time, half of it donated by Creighton’s widow Louise) until such time – so the enabling decree prescribed – as a chair, or at least a permanent lecturership, could be created.1 At any rate it has clearly served the memory of Creighton, not so much as a remarkable prelate and public figure, but in his earlier and lasting avocation, as historian. Mandell Creighton was, and felt himself to be, very English. He gave a famous address, to which I shall return, on English ‘national character’.2Yet he ranks, equally and inseparably, as a ‘European’, indeed as one of the earliest of them in our profession. Let me identify three strands in that Europeanness. First, the five stout volumes of Creighton’s account of the late medieval papacy. This magnum opus was (needless to say) no narrowly Catholic or institutional survey; on the contrary, Creighton called it ‘materials for a judgment of ... the Reformation’. Rather it constitutes one of the first great attempts to introduce the British to explicitly modern andEuropean history. In his preface the author is quite definite about both those interlocking purposes: ‘I have taken the history of the Papacy as the central point of my investigation, because it gives the largest opportunity for a survey of European affairs as a whole ... The object of the following pages is to trace ... the working of the causes which brought about the change from medieval to modern times.’3This enterprise earned Mandell the newly established Dixie chair at Cambridge (and a full three-quarters of a century later a distinguished successor in that office would remarkably devote his entire inaugural to Creighton).4 It also led to Creighton’s role in a second manifesto of European intent: the English Historical Review, of which he became founding editor when it was launched in 1886. The title connoted a local habitation (‘England’) for an openly international journal, designed to match Germany’s Historische Zeitschrift or France’s Revue Historique. The preface announced universal concerns and sought the aid of continental scholars; and Creighton was eager to secure foreign books for attention in its columns.5Once he was appointed bishop (of Peterborough, then of London), other priorities imposed themselves upon Creighton. However, his European horizons continued to expand, even – and third, in our sequence – as far as Russia, where he paid an official visit as British representative at the coronation of Tsar Nicholas II in 1896. Mandell covered the event extensively in correspondence to his wife (whose father had been born in Reval, in the guberniya of Estonia). He was bowled over by the lavishness of the ceremonial, religious and secular intermingling, and by popular fervour at what would prove to be the last great spectacle of Russia’s ancien regime. Moreover, this liberal Anglican bishop was hugely impressed by the regime’s reactionary éminence grise, Konstantin Pobedonostsev, whose ‘powerful mind, clear vision and large knowledge’ made him ‘one of the ablest men I have ever met’. The letters were preserved like relics among the family papers; and on the occasion of the English Historical Review’s centenary in 1986, I had the opportunity to consult them, courtesy of Mandell’s grandson.

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Ketersediaan

Informasi Detail

Judul Seri

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No. Panggil

907 BAT t

Penerbit

London : University of London Press., 2020

Deskripsi Fisik

338 hlm

Bahasa

English

ISBN/ISSN

9781912702749

Klasifikasi

907

Tipe Isi

text

Tipe Media

computer

Tipe Pembawa

online resource

Edisi

-

Subjek

Education and Research of History

Info Detail Spesifik

-

Pernyataan Tanggungjawab

-

Versi lain/terkait

Lampiran Berkas

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