Past Sense — Studies in Medieval and Early Modern European History

Constantin Fasolt is the Karl J. Weintraub Professor of History and the College at the University of Chicago. He obtained his Ph.D. at Columbia University in 1981. He is the author of Council and Hierarchy: The Political Thought of William Durant the Younger (Cambridge, 1991) and The Limits of History (Chicago, 2004).

“There are many layers to this insightful, learned, and thought-provoking book. Taken individually, each essay is a masterful piece of research in the field of premodern political thought lato sensu and represents some of the methodological challenges and potentialities of intellectual history as a specific approach to people, ideas, and texts. Taken as a whole, this collection provides several important contributions to the wider historical and historiographical debate.”Stefania Tutino, University of California, Los Angeles. In: The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 88, No. 2 (June 2016), pp. 416-417.

• Acknowledgments ixIllustrations xiAbbreviations xiiPermissions xivChanges and Revisions xviManuscript Sigla xviiiIntroduction: A Program of Research 1PART 1 — Holding On: William Durant the Younger (ca. 1266–1330) 1071 The Manuscripts and Editions of William Durant the Younger’s Tractatusde modo generalis concilii celebrandi—Revised 1092 A New View of William Durant the Younger’s Tractatus de modogeneralis concilii celebrandi 1523 Research on William Durant the Younger’s Tractatus de modo generalisconcilii celebrandi: A Critical Review 1934 Quod omnes tangit ab omnibus approbari debet: The Words and theMeaning 2225 At the Crossroads of Law and Politics: William Durant the Younger’s‘Treatise’ on Councils 2586 The Reception of William Durant the Younger’s Treatises in LateMedieval and Early Modern Times 2707 William Durant the Younger and Conciliar Theory 294PART 2 — Moving On: Hermann Conring (1606–81) 3138 Conring on History 3159 From Helmstedt via Mainz to Paris: Hermann Conring and Huguesde Lionne 33910 A Question of Right: Hermann Conring’s New Discourse on theRoman-German Emperor 35011 Hermann Conring and the Republic of Letters 37412 Author and Authenticity in Conring’s New Discourse on theRoman-German Emperor: A Seventeenth-Century Case Study 38513 Political Unity and Religious Diversity: Hermann Conring’s ConfessionalWritings and the Preface to Aristotle’s Politics of 1637 41614 Hermann Conring and the European History of Law 445PART 3 — Come and Gone: Past Sense 46515 Visions of Order in the Canonists and Civilians 46716 Sovereignty and Heresy 49317 Empire the Modern Way 50318 The Limits of History in Brief 51219 Religious Authority and Ecclesiastical Governance 52520 Hegel’s Ghost: Europe, the Reformation, and the Middle Ages 546Works Cited 597Index 659