The Holy Roman Empire, Reconsidered

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"There is a strong sense of Aufbruchstimmungabout this book, that is a readiness to explore pastures new, both in terms of launching an interdisciplinary publication series and in presenting an Anglophone audience with a survey of new departures in the historiography of German-speaking Europe. The result is a very welcome collection which will be useful for a range of purposes, be it general orientation about an innovative field of scholarship, framing new research questions in late medieval and early modern studies or adding fresh materials to courses for advanced students." * English Historical Review "This is a lively and stimulating collection which many will wish to read." * German Studies Review "If the editors of Spektrum: Publications of the German Studies Association were looking for an impressive collection with which to lead off their new series, they certainly succeeded admirably in choosing The Holy Roman Empire, Reconsidered - In sum, each individual paper in this collection repays careful reading. Taken as a whole, they reveal the vitality and variety of contemporary scholarship on the Holy Roman Empire." * Austrian History Yearbook "Over the last two decades historians have promoted the Holy Roman Empire from a creaking fossil ready for history's ax to a relatively effective government of a decentralized, highly diverse polity. This well-edited volume by a distinguished international corps of specialists offers the most current views on political Germany from around 1500 to around 1800. The perspectives range between two views: the Empire as the forerunner of modern German states; the Empire as an example of a typically premodern political culture. Readers who know only what textbooks say about Germany before 1800, are in for a surprise." * Thomas A. Brady Jr., University of California, Berkeley "Whereas a revised view of the Empire is now part of the historiography in Germany it is not yet widely known among Anglo-American scholars. [O]ne of the important contributions of [this volume] is that it makes some of these revisionist approaches to the Old Empire accessible...I know of no other work that offers such a rich spectrum of approaches to the Old Empire." * Thomas Robisheaux, Duke University