PETITIONS AND STRATEGIES OF PERSUASION IN THE MIDDLE AGES The English Crown and the Church c.1200-c.1550. This item is unavailable.PETITIONS AND STRATEGIES OF PERSUASION IN THE MIDDLE AGES The English Crown and the Church c.1200-c.1550

An important new contribution to the emerging field of late medieval supplicatory cultures. Late medieval petitions, providing unique insights into medieval social and legal history, have attracted increasing scholarly attention in recent years. This wide-ranging collection brings two approaches into dialogue with each other: the study of royal justice and secular petitions presented to the English crown, and the study of papal justice, canon law and ecclesiastical petitions (emphasising the international dimension of petitioning as a legal device exercising authority across Latin Christendom). In so doing, it crosses the traditional demarcation lines between secular and ecclesiastical systems of justice, of particular importance, given the participation by many litigantsand legislators in both of those legal spheres. A major focus is the mechanics of petitioning - who were the intermediaries in this process, and what were the "strategies of persuasion" they employed? The essays also re-examine the relationship between petitioners and their advisors, and the specific legal, rhetorical and linguistic choices they made in the composition of these texts. In so doing, the volume makes an important new contribution to theemerging field of late medieval supplicatory cultures. THOMAS W. SMITH is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at the University of Leeds; HELEN KILLICK is a post-doctoral researcher at the ICMA Centre, University of Reading.

Thomas W. Smith gained his PhD from Royal Holloway, University of London; he is presently Keeper of the Scholars and Head of Oxbridge (Arts and Humanities) at Rugby School.

ANTHONY MUSSON is Head of Research at Historic Royal Palaces.

GWILYM DODD is Associate Professor of History at the University of Nottingham, UK.

HELEN LACEY is Associate Professor in Late Medieval History at Mansfield College, University of Oxford, UK.

KIRSI SALONEN is a professor of medieval history at the University of Bergen.