Barbarism and Religion: Volume 1, the Enlightenments of Edward Gibbon, 1737-1764 (Barbarism and Religion 2 Volume Hardback Set) - Hardcover

Pocock, J. G. A.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0521633451 ISBN 13: 9780521633451

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1999

Synopsis

'Barbarism and Religion' - Edward Gibbon's own phrase - is the title of an acclaimed sequence of works by John Pocock designed to situate Gibbon, and his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, in a series of contexts in the history of eighteenth-century Europe. This is a major intervention from one of the world's leading historians of ideas, challenging the notion of any one 'Enlightenment' and positing instead a plurality of enlightenments, of which the English was one. In this first volume, The Enlightenments of Edward Gibbon, John Pocock follows Gibbon through his youthful exile in Switzerland and his criticisms of the Encyclopédie, and traces the growth of his historical interests down to the conception of the Decline and Fall itself.

About this title

Review:

'Pocock manages to place Gibbon within these larger cosmopolitan movements without diminishing the historian's extraordinary accomplishment.' Tim Breen, New York Times Review of Books

'Pocock the historian of political thought has not been altogether useless to Pocock the historian of Gibbon's Roman Empire.' Peter Burke, European Legacy

'... the grandeur of Pocock's conception amazes, but it is often the asides and apercus that linger longest in the mind.' David Armitage, Lingua Franca

'Thus we come back to the English Protestant Enlightenment and the point from which John Pocock set out on his magnificent tour de force.' Nicholas Tyacke, The Times Literary Supplement

'He has penned two very important volumes.' Jeremy Black

'There can be few scholars who can match the range and depth of Pocock's scholarship ...'. History of Political Thought

Book Description:

This is the first in a sequence of works by John Pocock designed to situate Edward Gibbon, and his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, in a series of contexts in the history of Europe. This is a major intervention from one of the world's leading historians of ideas.

About this edition

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0521633451
• ISBN 13: 9780521633451
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 356