Medievalism -the appropriation of elements of medieval culture - has a long history: every century since the sixteenth has remade the Middle Ages in its own image. But different generations look back to the medieval period for different reasons, and each successive generation finds a different 'Middle Ages', a Middle Ages that says more about that generation's own aspirations and anxieties than it does about the medieval period itself. What does eighteenth-century medievalism tell us about France at the end of the Ancien regime? The cliche is well known: in Enlightenment France, the Middle Ages - those 'temps grossiers' dividing Classical times from the Renaissance - were universally despised as a dark age of bigotry and barbarism. But historical cliches are often the result of reading the past backwards. Relegated to the dust-heap of history by Enlightenment intellectuals, the Middle Ages in fact held a remarkable attraction for readers and audiences of the time. This wide-ranging book charts some aspects of the surprisingly broad influence of medievalism on the scholarship and popular culture of eighteenth-century France.

Examination of the striking new style of writing history in the twelfth century, by men such as Gaimar, Wace and Ambroise. The mid-twelfth century saw the sudden appearance of a remarkable group of writers: the "new historians", authors such as Geffrei Gaimar, Benoit de Sainte-Maure, Wace, Jordan Fantosme and Ambroise, who were the earliest historicalwriters to use French. Each had his own style and authorial persona; yet together, despite their considerable differences, they pioneered a common form of historical writing which is quite distinct from the styles of previous vernacular writers. This book studies some of the more characteristic elements of the common style used by the vernacular historians. Their detached and "self-conscious" authorial presentation is particularly notable: it is seen both in the prologues and epilogues to their works, where they present their source materials as reliable, themselves as serious scholars, and their works as worthy of belief, and constantly throughout the text as the historians direct audience response to their work. The author shows how this "historical" style fits into both the vernacular and the Latin literature current in the period: the vernacular historians borrowed elements from both the learnedand the popular traditions to produce their own successful and vigorous hybrid, one which was still producing new shoots as late as the fifteenth century and which was widely copied and imitated by both writers of courtly romanceand by writers of prose history. Dr PETER DAMIAN-GRINT teaches at Brasenose College, Oxford.

Latest volume in leading forum for research on the Anglo-Norman world. This most recent volume of papers contains the usual wide range of papers and topics. The Memorial lecture concerns St Anselm, a personality particularly dear to R. Allen Brown. There is a particular emphasis on the writing of history, with papers on regional identity in early Normandy, Henry of Huntingdon, the Anglo-Norman Estoire and the definition of racial identity in post-Conquest England; other topics include language in a colonial society, Anglo-Norman aristocracy (with studies ofindividual families), and the history of the church. Norman Southern Italy is represented by a study of the family structure in the principality of Salerno. Contributors: D.E.. LUSCOMBE, EMMA COWNIE, R. BEARMAN, P. DAMIAN-GRINT, JOANNA DRELL, DIANA GREENWAY, VANESSA KING, CASSANDRA POTTS, IAN SHORT, KATHLEEN THOMPSON, H. TSURUSHIMA