Early modern heraldry was far from a nostalgic remnant from a feudal past. From the Reformation to the French Revolution, aspiring men seized on these signs to position themselves in a changing society, imbuing heraldic tradition with fresh meaning. Whereas post-medieval developments are all too often described in terms of decadence and stifling formality, recent studies rightly stress the dynamic capacity of bearing arms. Heraldic Hierarchies aims to correct former misconceptions. Contributing authors rethink the influence of shifting notions of nobility on armorial display and expand this topic to heraldry's share in shaping and contesting status. Moreover, addressing a common thread, the volume explores how emerging states turned the heraldic experience into an instrument of power and policy. Contributing to debates on social and noble identity, Heraldic Hierarchies uncovers a vital and surprising aspect of the pre-modern hierarchical world. Contributors: Richard Cust (University of Birmingham); Dominique Delgrange (Lille); Luc Duerloo (University of Antwerp); Joseph McMillan (Alexandria VA); Camille Pollet (Universite de Nantes); Antoine Robin (Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes); Simon Rousselot (Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes); Clement Savary (Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes); Hamish Scott (Jesus College, Oxford); Steven Thiry (University of Antwerp); Jose Manuel Valle Porras (Cordoba); Nicolas Vernot (Universite de Cergy-Pontoise)

About the Author
Steven Thiry, PhD, is a voluntary member of 'Power in History: Centre for Political History' of the University of Antwerp. Luc Duerloo is professor at the Department of History of the University of Antwerp, where he teaches early modern political and institutional history.

Reviews

'Heraldic Hierarchies' occupies an important place in the large interdisciplinary literature on state formation in Europe. More precisely, it adds to existing work on the contingent nature of this state formation; it illustrates the complex interaction of state and society in the Early Modern period; and it demonstrates that governments were then seriously concerned about the social distribution of status and its symbolic imagery, including heraldry, the latter of which is today often dismissed, even by some historians, as a pretentious aristocratic pastime. The book also enhances our recognition of the evolution of status as consisting of processes that encompass more than one country. Hopefully this valuable volume will persuade scholars to broaden their research to include the role of heraldry in the social and political processes they are studying. Samuel Clark, European Review of History: Revue europeenne d'histoire, 2022, DOI: 10.1080/13507486.2021.2010899

Refreshingly, the present collection is focused on all that was new in what pertained to the nobility and the Crown in their relations with heraldry in the Early Modern period, and it does not even disdain genealogy. Its various contributors engage readily (and capably) with the key issues: the identification of certain families with the princely state, the increasing division of the nobility into fresh and more sharply delineated hierarchies, the expression of these rankings through heraldry, and the roles purportedly played by heralds - now almost all become servants of the Prince - in regulating heraldry.
Nigel Ramsay, Virtus 28 | 2021 | https://doi.org/10.21827/virtus.28.148-151

Book Information
ISBN 9789462702431
Author Steven Thiry
Format Paperback
Page Count 274
Imprint Leuven University Press
Publisher Leuven University Press
Weight(grams) 415g
Dimensions(mm) 234mm * 156mm * 15mm