Steven J. Reid – författare

James VI and Noble Power in Scotland explores how Scotland was governed in the late sixteenth century by examining the dynamic between King James and his nobles from the end of his formal minority in 1578 until his accession to the English throne in 1603. The collection assesses James’ relationship with his nobility, detailing how he interacted with them, and how they fought, co-operated with and understood each other. It includes case studies from across Scotland from the Highlands to the Borders and burghs, and on major individual events such as the famous Gowrie conspiracy. Themes such as the nature of government in Scotland and religion as a shaper of policy and faction are addressed, as well as broader perspectives on the British and European nobility, bloodfeuds, and state-building in the early modern period. The ten chapters together challenge well-established notions that James aimed to be a modern, centralising monarch seeking to curb the traditional structures of power, and that the period represented a period of crisis for the traditional and unrestrained culture of feuding nobility. It is demonstrated that King James was a competent and successful manager of his kingdom who demanded a new level of obedience as a ‘universal king’. This volume offers students of Stuart Britain a fresh and valuable perspective on James and his reign.

Most early modern scholars know that Petrus Ramus (1515-1572) is important, but may be rather vague as to where his importance lies. This new collection of essays analyses the impact of the logician, rhetorician and pedagogical innovator across a variety of countries and intellectual disciplines, reappraising Ramus in the light of scholarly developments in the fifty years since the publication of Walter Ong's seminal work Ramus, Method, and the Decay of Dialogue. Chapters reflect the broad impact of Ramus and the Ramist 'method' of teaching across many subjects, including logic and rhetoric, pedagogy, mathematics, philosophy, and new scientific and taxonomic developments in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. There is no current work that offers such a broad survey of Ramus and Ramism, or that looks at him in such an interdisciplinary fashion. Ramus' influence extended across many disciplines and this book skillfully weaves together studies in intellectual history, pedagogy, literature, philosophy and the history of science. It will prove a useful starting point for those interested in Ramus and his impact, as well as serving to redefine the field of Ramist studies for future scholars.

Across early-modern Europe the confessional struggles of the Reformation touched virtually every aspect of civic life; and nowhere was this more apparent than in the universities, the seedbed of political and ecclesiastical society. Focussing on events in Scotland, this book reveals how established universities found themselves at the centre of a struggle by competing forces trying to promote their own political, religious or educational beliefs, and under competition from new institutions. It surveys the transformation of Scotland's medieval and Catholic university system into a greatly-expanded Protestant one in the decades following the Scottish Reformation of 1560. Simultaneously the study assesses the contribution of the continentally-educated religious reformer Andrew Melville to this process in the context of broader European social and cultural developments - including growing lay interest in education (as a result of renaissance humanism), and the involvement of royal and civic government as well as the new Protestant Kirk in university expansion and reform. Through systematic use of largely neglected manuscript sources, the book offers fresh perspectives on both Andrew Melville and the development of Scottish higher education post-1560. As well as providing a detailed picture of events in Scotland, it contributes to our growing understanding of the role played by higher education in shaping society across Europe.

Andrew Melville is chiefly remembered today as a defiant leader of radical Protestantism in Scotland, John Knox’s heir and successor, the architect of a distinctive Scottish Presbyterian kirk and a visionary reformer of the Scottish university system. While this view of Melville’s contribution to the shaping of Protestant Scotland has been criticised and revised in recent scholarship, his broader contribution to the development of the neo-Latin culture of early modern Britain has never been given the attention it deserves. Yet, as this collection shows, Melville was much more than simply a religious reformer: he was an influential member of a pan-European humanist network that valued classical learning as much as Calvinist theology. Neglect of this critical aspect of Melville’s intellectual outlook stems from the fact that almost all his surviving writings are in Latin - and much of it in verse. Melville did not pen any substantial prose treatise on theology, ecclesiology or political theory. His poetry, however, reveals his views on all these topics and offers new insights into his life and times. The main concerns of this volume, therefore, are to provide the first comprehensive listing of the range of poetry and prose attributed to Melville and to begin the process of elucidating these texts and the contexts in which they were written. While the volume contributes to an on-going process that has seen Melville’s role as an ecclesiastical politician and educational reformer challenged and diminished, it also seeks to redress the balance by opening up other dimensions of Melville’s career and intellectual life and shedding new light on the broader cultural context of Jacobean Scotland and Britain.

Most early modern scholars know that Petrus Ramus (1515-1572) is important, but may be rather vague as to where his importance lies. This new collection of essays analyses the impact of the logician, rhetorician and pedagogical innovator across a variety of countries and intellectual disciplines, reappraising Ramus in the light of scholarly developments in the fifty years since the publication of Walter Ong's seminal work Ramus, Method, and the Decay of Dialogue. Chapters reflect the broad impact of Ramus and the Ramist 'method' of teaching across many subjects, including logic and rhetoric, pedagogy, mathematics, philosophy, and new scientific and taxonomic developments in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. There is no current work that offers such a broad survey of Ramus and Ramism, or that looks at him in such an interdisciplinary fashion. Ramus' influence extended across many disciplines and this book skillfully weaves together studies in intellectual history, pedagogy, literature, philosophy and the history of science. It will prove a useful starting point for those interested in Ramus and his impact, as well as serving to redefine the field of Ramist studies for future scholars.

James VI and Noble Power in Scotland explores how Scotland was governed in the late sixteenth century by examining the dynamic between King James and his nobles from the end of his formal minority in 1578 until his accession to the English throne in 1603. The collection assesses James’ relationship with his nobility, detailing how he interacted with them, and how they fought, co-operated with and understood each other. It includes case studies from across Scotland from the Highlands to the Borders and burghs, and on major individual events such as the famous Gowrie conspiracy. Themes such as the nature of government in Scotland and religion as a shaper of policy and faction are addressed, as well as broader perspectives on the British and European nobility, bloodfeuds, and state-building in the early modern period. The ten chapters together challenge well-established notions that James aimed to be a modern, centralising monarch seeking to curb the traditional structures of power, and that the period represented a period of crisis for the traditional and unrestrained culture of feuding nobility. It is demonstrated that King James was a competent and successful manager of his kingdom who demanded a new level of obedience as a ‘universal king’. This volume offers students of Stuart Britain a fresh and valuable perspective on James and his reign.

Mary Queen of Scots (1542-1587) was active as monarch of Scotland for just six years between 1561 and 1567, but her impact as a ruler in Scotland is much less important than her subsequent role in popular culture and imagination. Her story has enjoyed perpetual retelling and reached a global audience over the past four and a half centuries. This collection surveys the exceptionally varied range of objects, literature, art and media that have been produced to commemorate Mary between her own time and the present day. Why is her story so enduring, pervasive, and of such interest to so many different audiences? How have the narratives associated with these objects evolved in response to shifting cultural attitudes? The collection offers a much-needed novel perspective on the Queen of Scots, using an approach at the intersection of early modern, gender and cultural history, museum and heritage studies, and memory studies.

Mary Queen of Scots (1542-1587) was active as monarch of Scotland for just six years between 1561 and 1567, but her impact as a ruler in Scotland is much less important than her subsequent role in popular culture and imagination. Her story has enjoyed perpetual retelling and reached a global audience over the past four and a half centuries. This collection surveys the exceptionally varied range of objects, literature, art and media that have been produced to commemorate Mary between her own time and the present day. Why is her story so enduring, pervasive, and of such interest to so many different audiences? How have the narratives associated with these objects evolved in response to shifting cultural attitudes? The collection offers a much-needed novel perspective on the Queen of Scots, using an approach at the intersection of early modern, gender and cultural history, museum and heritage studies, and memory studies.

Across early-modern Europe the confessional struggles of the Reformation touched virtually every aspect of civic life; and nowhere was this more apparent than in the universities, the seedbed of political and ecclesiastical society. Focussing on events in Scotland, this book reveals how established universities found themselves at the centre of a struggle by competing forces trying to promote their own political, religious or educational beliefs, and under competition from new institutions. It surveys the transformation of Scotland's medieval and Catholic university system into a greatly-expanded Protestant one in the decades following the Scottish Reformation of 1560. Simultaneously the study assesses the contribution of the continentally-educated religious reformer Andrew Melville to this process in the context of broader European social and cultural developments - including growing lay interest in education (as a result of renaissance humanism), and the involvement of royal and civic government as well as the new Protestant Kirk in university expansion and reform. Through systematic use of largely neglected manuscript sources, the book offers fresh perspectives on both Andrew Melville and the development of Scottish higher education post-1560. As well as providing a detailed picture of events in Scotland, it contributes to our growing understanding of the role played by higher education in shaping society across Europe.

Andrew Melville is chiefly remembered today as a defiant leader of radical Protestantism in Scotland, John Knox’s heir and successor, the architect of a distinctive Scottish Presbyterian kirk and a visionary reformer of the Scottish university system. While this view of Melville’s contribution to the shaping of Protestant Scotland has been criticised and revised in recent scholarship, his broader contribution to the development of the neo-Latin culture of early modern Britain has never been given the attention it deserves. Yet, as this collection shows, Melville was much more than simply a religious reformer: he was an influential member of a pan-European humanist network that valued classical learning as much as Calvinist theology. Neglect of this critical aspect of Melville’s intellectual outlook stems from the fact that almost all his surviving writings are in Latin - and much of it in verse. Melville did not pen any substantial prose treatise on theology, ecclesiology or political theory. His poetry, however, reveals his views on all these topics and offers new insights into his life and times. The main concerns of this volume, therefore, are to provide the first comprehensive listing of the range of poetry and prose attributed to Melville and to begin the process of elucidating these texts and the contexts in which they were written. While the volume contributes to an on-going process that has seen Melville’s role as an ecclesiastical politician and educational reformer challenged and diminished, it also seeks to redress the balance by opening up other dimensions of Melville’s career and intellectual life and shedding new light on the broader cultural context of Jacobean Scotland and Britain.

This collection of essays, in honour of Professor Roger A. Mason, critically re-assesses what we understand by the terms "Renaissance" and "Reformation" in Scottish History.Roger Mason's research in the field of pre-modern Scottish history has proved ground-breaking and iconoclastic. He recast late-medieval Stewart kingship within the framework of renaissance monarchy and Christian humanism; led the application of intellectual- and literary-historical approaches to early modern Scottish studies; and produced novel and highly influential analyses of a wide canon of key texts, from Mair's History of Greater Britain to the writings of John Knox and George Buchanan. This volume celebrates his "rethinking" of the Renaissance and Reformation in Scotland by applying the core elements of his historical approach to a broader temporal period between the fourteenth and early seventeenth centuries and to a new range of texts. Its essays, by leading scholars of pre-modern Scotland, explore aspects of the cultural transition from medieval to renaissance, the role of historical memory in defining and redefining Scottish identity, the interface between literature, politics and religion in a period of confessional strife and, above all, the importance of ideas in shaping the political and religious outlook of pre-modern Scots.