Monarchy, Aristocracy and State in Europe 1300-1800 (Historical Connections) [Paperback]

Hillay Zmora (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0415150442 | ISBN-13: 978-0415150446 | Publication Date: October 19, 2000 | Edition: 1

Monarchy, Aristocracy and the State in Europe 1300 - 1800 is an important survey of the relationship between monarchy and state in early modern European history. Spanning five centuries and covering England, France, Spain, Germany and Austria, this book considers the key themes in the formation of the modern state in Europe.
The relationship of the nobility with the state is the key to understanding the development of modern government in Europe. In order to understand the way modern states were formed, this book focusses on the implications of the incessant and costly wars which European governments waged against each other, which indeed propelled the modern state into being.
Monarchy, Aristocracy and the State in Europe 1300-1800 takes a fascinating thematic approach, providing a useful survey of the position and role of the nobility in the government of states in early modern Europe.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Zmora's short, stimulating essay in Routledge's Historical Connections series, while echoing some of Dewald's conclusions, is a tightly argued interpretation of the interrelationship of the evolution of the modern state, the monarchy, and the aristocracy. Briefly, the expensive and brutally competitive European state system shaped the structure of the nobility, assimilating them and allowing a means of exercising power and gaining wealth. Zmora carefully examines the chief states of western Europe, including the exceptional English situation. Based largely on European scholarship, this title is recommended for upper division students and above..
–D.C. Baxter, Ohio University, July 2001

Product Details

• Paperback: 176 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; 1 edition (October 19, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415150442
• ISBN-13: 978-0415150446
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.4 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #935,158 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Rumours of Aristocracy's death had been greatly exaggerated, May 14, 2003

By 

César González Rouco (Madrid, Madrid Spain) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Monarchy, Aristocracy and State in Europe 1300-1800 (Historical Connections) (Paperback)

I read this book in two days' time, and I could not stop it till I finished. In that sense, I liked it a lot.

Pursuant to Hillay Zmora, until quite recently the reigning paradigm for approaching the various European nobilities has been one of a Crisis of Aristocracy but this paradigm is now itself in what looks like a terminal crisis.

Certainly, a wave of recent studies (e.g. Jonathan Dewald's European Nobility) shows that the nobles were dominant much longer than we suspected. Though small in absolute numbers, the nobility controlled most of the land and all of the politics on the Continent until well into the 19th century; facing similar probles, from one country and culture to the next nobles responded to them in very similar ways.

Throughout the period examined, we see in this book that the fisco-militaries exigencies of the age brought monarchy and nobility into close interdependence. The very oportunities, then, which the expansion of the state opened up for nobles to consolidate their hold on power, also enmeshed them in the structure and operation of the state, which was as much an arena for the regulation of conflicts inside the ruling class as an instrument of class domination (the exploitation of the population to the mutual profit of rulers and ruling classes underlay much of the co-operation between them).

In that line, Hillay Zmora, for instance, dispels the myth of the XVIIth century kings' absolutist power. In general, his work is a more accurate view of monarchy, nobility, and the state contrary to Historian Norbert Elias' classic works "Court Society" and "The Civilizing Process" which have presented a problematic view of the Early Modern court, and with it, a false view of Early Modern monarchy.

Other books that I would recommend to read would be Myths of Power. Norbert Elias and the Early Modern European Court " and "Vienna and Versailles : The Courts of Europe's Dynastic Rivals, 1550-1780 (New Studies in European History)" by Jeroen Duindam (whose books present a more accurate view of monarchy, nobility, the court and the state contrary to that provided by Elias's "The Court Society"); "State and Status: The "Rise of State and Aristocratic Power in Western Europe", by S. Clark;"Nobilities in Transition 1550-1700: Courtiers and Rebels in Britain and Europe" by Ronald G. Asch; and "The Persistence of the Ancient Regime" by Arno J. Mayer (covering approximately the 1815-1914 period.