Ronald G. Asch. Nobilities in Transition, 1550-1700: Courtiers and Rebels in Britain and Europe. London: Arnold Publishers, 2003. xii + 223 pp. $19.95 (paper), ISBN 978-0-340-62528-6.
Reviewed by Brian S. Weiser (Newark, New Jersey)
Published on H-Albion (May, 2004)
Aristocrats Adapting
Ronald G. Asch's Nobilities in Transition, 1550-1700, in a mere 150 pages, surveys the transformations that the European noble classes experienced during this turbulent period. Asch's solution to the prodigious task of covering so many countries is to "address a limited number of problems which affected most noble elites in different ways" (p. ix), placing paradigmatic case studies of nobles in certain countries (most often France and Germany) against the backdrop of the general experience of nobles throughout Europe. Among the problems that Asch investigates are the influence of new ideas such as humanism and post-reformation theology, the emergence of the royal court as the focus of noble endeavors, and the roles nobles played in rebellions and state formation.
But the European noble class is a slippery fish to grasp. As Asch himself readily admits, "the social meaning of 'being noble' depended very much on a national or even a regional context, and ... one can speak of a European nobility in only a limited sense" (p. 9). Furthermore, the definition of nobility changed during this era; both noble cathedral chapters and national governments tried to limit and delineate nobility. Asch defines nobility as each country did, but this reader, while understanding the motivation for such a choice, wishes that the author would have restricted himself to nobles that fit specific criteria such as legal privileges or the ability to command deference. Asch's more amorphous definition of nobility forces him to include every inhabitant of Basque--who did not all command deference--and the gentry of England who had no legal privileges. This lack of a clear definition diminishes the value of his cross-cultural comparisons and, furthermore, prevents him from presenting a strong central argument.
Despite this one quibble, this book has much merit. Perhaps its most important contribution is to argue against the many monographs and textbooks that, following the work of Norbert Elias, see the age of absolutism as a time when the nobility became--against their will--tame, civilized servants of the monarchy.[1] Asch contends, to the contrary, that while private warfare did decrease and nobles did acquire courtly manners, nobles adapted because it was in their interest to do so. Facing military innovation, new ideas of virtue, and falling grain prices, nobles changed. In sixteenth-century Germany and France, for instance, nobles willingly gave up private warfare which had "made it impossible for them to compete successfully with rival elites" (p. 70), and in seventeenth-century France the Société de Saint Sacrement, a private society of nobles, moved against the duel as actively as Cardinal Richelieu. Nobles adapted fine manners to separate themselves from their social inferiors and took up the idea of sprezzatura to belittle university pedants. Although the ritualization of court in Versailles did weaken nobles to the advantage of the king, attendance at court increased their status and provided them with opportunities to restore their fortunes which had been eroded by falling grain prices. Ritualization, Asch further contends, was not always against noble interest. In Spain, under Charles II, the ritualization of the court maintained a façade of royal rule, but nobles controlled most of the state machinery and policy.
Asch also questions the view of noble rebellion as a signal of the decrease of noble power at the hands of university-trained bureaucrats. He reminds the reader that most monarchs "remained very conscious of the fact that kingship or princely rule was only the pinnacle of a social and political hierarchy unsustainable without a powerful hereditary nobility" and that most nobles "saw royal or princely authority as the most important safeguard of their own status and privileges and accepted that honor and loyal service to the crown were closely linked" (p. 102). Citing the work of Arlette Jouanna, Asch further maintains not only that the interests of nobility and monarchy often jibed, but also that rebellion sometimes originated in royal weakness, not strength.[2] The last chapter deals with state formation and, following the recent work of Michael Braddick and Steve Hindle, Asch contends that state formation was not imposed solely from above, but rather was a "process fueled by the interests of social groups which benefitted from the resources the state put at their disposal" (p. 149).[3] Nobles, of course, were prominent among such social groups.
This brief synopsis of one strand of argument fails to capture the nuance of Asch's work. Asch constructs his survey from a staggering array of secondary sources and is quick to point out exceptions to his general assertions, whether such exceptions occurred in Poland or England. The interesting snippets of information about nobles in countries off the beaten track makes this work a worthwhile read, and his discussion of the change in nobility from flamboyant display to self-control is persuasive. The book should aid historians interested in placing their research in a pan-European perspective, whether their research is concerned specifically with the nobility or with the changes in European society that the nobility encountered. It might be useful to read this book along with Jonathan Dewald's The European Nobility, which covers a broader period and takes a more argumentative stand.[4]
Notes
[1]. Norbert Elias, Court Society, trans. Edmund Jephcott (Oxford: Blackwell, 1983).
[2]. Arlette Jouanna, Le devoir de revolte. La noblesse Francaise et la gestation de l'Etat moderne, 1559-1661 (Paris: Fayard, 1989).
[3]. Michael Braddick, State Formation in Early Modern England c. 1550-1700 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000); and Steve Hindle, The State and Social Change in Early Modern England (New York: Palgrave, 2002). [Editor's note: The latter is reviewed on H-Albion at http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.cgi?path=16716966265590.]
[4]. Jonathan Dewald,The European Nobility, 1400-1800 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).
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Citation:
Brian S. Weiser. Review of Asch, Ronald G., Nobilities in Transition, 1550-1700: Courtiers and Rebels in Britain and Europe.
H-Albion, H-Net Reviews.
May, 2004.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=9386
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