Denys Hay – författare

This lively, first-hand narrative of the turning-point in the affairs of the Council of Basle was written by Aeneas Sylvius (later Pope Pius II) during his unregenerate conciliar period. It provides us with an important contemporary account of the personalities and principles involved in the election of the anti-pope Felix V.Originally published in 1967, this volume offers the first critical edition and English translation of this work. Unavailable in recent years, it has now been revised by Denys Hay and reissued by the Oxford University Press.

Originally published in 1953 From Roman Empire to Renaissance Europe looks at the broader picture of the Middle Ages, drawn in terms of the men and women and the situations that they had to face. The constant theme of change is revealed not by detailed narrative of elements but by commentary and examples that show how ideas and systems developed, and how theses affected the patterns of everyday life. The book looks at how the Roman Empire of the West gave way to a decentralized society, vigorous, brutal and inventive for which the only unifying factor was a universal acceptance of Latin Christianity. In turn Christendom began to lose its coherence during the 13th and 14th centuries and by the fifteenth century Europe had emerged as a rival term, a Europe in which the landed magnates had capitulated to the omnipotent and ubiquitous prince, commerce, as well as land now being a source of wealth. This is not a static picture of the ‘Middle Ages’ with fixed characteristics, but of real men and women facing genuine situations.

Originally published in 1953 From Roman Empire to Renaissance Europe looks at the broader picture of the Middle Ages, drawn in terms of the men and women and the situations that they had to face. The constant theme of change is revealed not by detailed narrative of elements but by commentary and examples that show how ideas and systems developed, and how theses affected the patterns of everyday life. The book looks at how the Roman Empire of the West gave way to a decentralized society, vigorous, brutal and inventive for which the only unifying factor was a universal acceptance of Latin Christianity. In turn Christendom began to lose its coherence during the 13th and 14th centuries and by the fifteenth century Europe had emerged as a rival term, a Europe in which the landed magnates had capitulated to the omnipotent and ubiquitous prince, commerce, as well as land now being a source of wealth. This is not a static picture of the ‘Middle Ages’ with fixed characteristics, but of real men and women facing genuine situations.

Professor Hay provides a clear picture of what the Renaissance was, what it meant and how it spread. He shows the Renaissance as a growing and changing series of attitudes and ideas, rooted firmly in the general history of the period, and not as a static and isolated phenomenon. Most current ideas of the Italian Renaissance are derived from Burckhardt's Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, published in 1860. Professor Hay provides a completely fresh appraisal which goes back to the basic texts, to the great monuments of art and architecture, to the men - Boccaccio, Petrarch and the others - and their achievements: the essence of which historical movements are made. He has taken note of recent Italian scholarship and provides a fresh and readable account of one of the great epochs in European history. There is no other book in English, except the translation of Burckhardt, which embraces the political history of the Renaissance period as well as the history of art and ideas. The book will appeal to the general reader as well as to students of history and art. In this second edition, which has been revised and brought up to date by the author, a more ample treatment of the 'reception' of the Renaissance in England is given in the concluding chapter.

The century before the Reformation in Italy has generally been treated with either neglect or recrimination. Protestants tended to see the Church becoming ever more corrupt; Roman Catholics assumed that it was 'paganised' by the Renaissance. Indisputably it was becoming more Italian in its leadership. This book attempts a dispassionate survey of the popes and the clergy of the peninsula during the hundred years prior to Luther and the Sack of Rome. There is no book in Italian (or in any other language) which tries to describe what the Italian clergy and their parishioners were like at this time. The resulting picture will perhaps offend traditionalists; it will give no comfort to 'modernists'. It aims to be about 'life as it was lived'. There are many saints and sinners, and if there are more of the latter, there always are in history books, for that is how the historian invariably finds his material.

The second edition of this highly successful textbook analyses the structure of later medieval society in Europe, identifies its main groups and their political programmes, and examines their impact on the political, economic and social history of the major European states. There are many additions and expansions in this new edition, and the important chapter on the Central Monarchies (of Poland, Hungary, Bohemia, Rumania and Lithuania) has been newly contributed by Professor J M Bak of the University of British Columbia.

The second edition of this highly successful textbook analyses the structure of later medieval society in Europe, identifies its main groups and their political programmes, and examines their impact on the political, economic and social history of the major European states. There are many additions and expansions in this new edition, and the important chapter on the Central Monarchies (of Poland, Hungary, Bohemia, Rumania and Lithuania) has been newly contributed by Professor J M Bak of the University of British Columbia.

This book, originally published in 1977, is a survey of European historiography from its origins in the historians of Greece and Rome, through the annalists and chroniclers of the middle ages, to the historians of the late eighteenth century. The author concentrates on those writers whose works fit into a specific category of writing, or who have inlfuence the course of later historical writing, though he does deal with some of the more specialist forms of medieval historiography such as the crusading writers, and chivalrous historians like Froissart. He maintains that ‘modern’ history did not develop until the 18th Century.