scholarly journals Kings' Briefs: Their Purposes and History

1882 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 1-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cornelius Walford

Kings' Briefs, under a variety of designations—as Kings' Letters, Orders in Council, Patents of Alms, Letters Patent, Fire Briefs, Church Briefs, Charity Briefs, Commissions, Royal Letters, &c, &c.—have played an important part in the social history of this country, and yet our national historians have been remarkably silent concerning them; as indeed they have been upon many other matters of great social interest. It seems hardly necessary to say that the term “Brief” has several significations. In its more common acceptation it is a short writing or epitome, as an abridgment of a law case, made out for instruction to counsel, or indeed any short statement of facts. But there are “Apostolical Briefs,” being letters or written messages of the Pope, addressed to princes or magistrates, respecting matters of public concern.* It is not to these exclusively that we must look for light in the present instance. The word was, in early times, written “Breve,” and Cowell, in his Law Dictionary, says, “Any writ or precept from the King was called Breve; which we still retain in the name of Brief, the King's Letters Patent to poor sufferers, for Collection.” The general title of “King's Briefs” used in England, is traceable to the fact that these documents, under whatever designation adopted, or for whatever purpose designed, were in later times issued under the direct authority of the sovereign; at first under his personal authority, but later under the authority of the Council, through the Lord Chancellor. But it will be made clear that the Church exercised the right of issuing them, not only prior to, but apparently coeval with the sovereign at one period.

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 601-616 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcela Cornejo ◽  
Carolina Rocha ◽  
Nicolás Villarroel ◽  
Enzo Cáceres ◽  
Anastassia Vivanco

The current memory struggles about the Chilean dictatorship makes it increasingly relevant to hear a diverse range of voices on the subject. One way of addressing this is to study autobiographical narratives, in which people construct a character to present themselves as the protagonists of a story by taking multiple positions regarding what is remembered. This article presents a study that analyzed the life stories of Chilean people (diverse in their generations, cities, experiences of political repression, political orientations and socio-economic levels) and that distinguished between the positions that they take when presenting themselves as the protagonists of an autobiographical story about the Chilean dictatorship. The results point to salient and recurrent positions that allow people to earn the right to be considered part of the social history of the dictatorship, that involve different definitions regarding those responsible and the victims of what happened, and that unveil a strong family and filial logic of remembering.


Author(s):  
James Crossley

Abstract This article takes a different look at the work of Burton Mack on apocalypticism and the post-historical Jesus crystallisation of the Christian ‘myth of innocence’ in terms of the social history of scholarship. After a critical assessment of previous receptions of Mack’s work from the era of the ‘Jesus wars’, there is a discussion of Mack’s place in broader cross-disciplinary tendencies in the study of apocalypticism with reference to the influence of liberal and Marxist approaches generally and those of Norman Cohn and Eric Hobsbawm specifically. Mack’s approach to apocalypticism should be seen as a thoroughgoing updating of Cold War liberal constructions of apocalypticism for an era of American ‘culture wars’, from Reagan to Trump. Part of this updating has also meant that, while much of his work against the apocalyptic Christian myth of innocence has been explicitly aimed at the de-legitimising the Right, it also continues the old Cold War intellectual battles by implicitly de-legitimising anything deemed excessively Marxist.


1998 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 159-162 ◽  
Author(s):  
Markus Dirk Dubber

Kenneth Ledford's and Michael Meranze's insightful comments raise important questions about the nature of legal history in general, and of the history of punishment in particular. According to Ledford and Meranze, modern legal history is social history, to be distinguished from “old-style intellectual history.” A product of the latter “historical method no longer in favor,” “The Right to Be Punished” draws Ledford's and Meranze's criticism for its insufficient “root[s]… in the soil of social history” and for its inadequate “account of the … social basis of the modern will to punish” and “the social embeddedness of punishment.”


2019 ◽  
Vol 52 (4) ◽  
pp. 713-730
Author(s):  
Michael E. O'Sullivan

Numerous past review articles by scholars of German history share ideas produced by the religious turn in historiography since the 1970s and 1980s. Although highlighting a still growing groundswell of work focused on the German Catholic minority, these essays typically express discomfort with the relation of their subspecialty to the rest of the discipline. Bemoaning the marginalization of Catholic history and the self-inflicted ghettoization of research narrowly focused on regional traditions, past reviewers have worried about the integration of Catholicism within a larger framework. These past articles summarize phases of research on German Catholicism that produced much scholarship and multiple conceptual frameworks through which to understand the enduring impact of the church. Scholars of the 1970s and 1980s pushed against the grain of Hans-Ulrich Wehler's Bielefeld School to prove that Catholicism contributed more to the liberal democratic development of Germany than had been previously assumed, and by the 1990s German Catholic research focused primarily on the social history of Catholicism. The field of German Catholic history underwent a period of uncertain change during the early 2000s. Many of the German-language monographs on the topic remained wedded to the milieu model, but some younger scholars responded to critiques of German Catholic history by studying women's history or deploying poststructuralist analysis.


This collection of essays, drawn from a three-year AHRC research project, provides a detailed context for the history of early cinema in Scotland from its inception in 1896 till the arrival of sound in the early 1930s. It details the movement from travelling fairground shows to the establishment of permanent cinemas, and from variety and live entertainment to the dominance of the feature film. It addresses the promotion of cinema as a socially ‘useful’ entertainment, and, distinctively, it considers the early development of cinema in small towns as well as in larger cities. Using local newspapers and other archive sources, it details the evolution and the diversity of the social experience of cinema, both for picture goers and for cinema staff. In production, it examines the early attempts to establish a feature film production sector, with a detailed production history of Rob Roy (United Films, 1911), and it records the importance, both for exhibition and for social history, of ‘local topicals’. It considers the popularity of Scotland as an imaginary location for European and American films, drawing their popularity from the international audience for writers such as Walter Scott and J.M. Barrie and the ubiquity of Scottish popular song. The book concludes with a consideration of the arrival of sound in Scittish cinemas. As an afterpiece, it offers an annotated filmography of Scottish-themed feature films from 1896 to 1927, drawing evidence from synopses and reviews in contemporary trade journals.


2008 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-7

In this opening issue of volume 31 we are presented with both nuanced and bold entry into several long enduring issues and topics stitching together the interdisciplinary fabric comprising ethnic studies. The authors of these articles bring to our attention social, cultural and economic issues shaping lively discourse in ethnic studies. They also bring to our attention interpretations of the meaning and significance of ethnic cultural contributions to the social history of this nation - past and present.


Author(s):  
Miguel Alarcão

Textualizing the memory(ies) of physical and cultural encounter(s) between Self and Other, travel literature/writing often combines subjectivity with documental information which may prove relevant to better assess mentalities, everyday life and the social history of any given ‘timeplace’. That is the case with Growing up English. Memories of Portugal 1907-1930, by D. J. Baylis (née Bucknall), prefaced by Peter Mollet as “(…) a remarkably vivid and well written observation of the times expressed with humour and not little ‘carinho’. In all they make excellent reading especially for those of us interested in the recent past.” (Baylis: 2)


Author(s):  
Christy Constantakopoulou

This chapter provides a methodological discussion on how to use the evidence included in the Delian inventories in order to write the social history of the dedicants. The inventories were produced by the Delian hieropoioi and recorded on an annual basis the dedications kept in the Delian treasuries. The chapter focuses particularly on dedications which are attached to named individuals and communities. It then discusses the material according to the parameters of gender, individual versus community dedications, elite dedicants, and distance of travel. Using the inventories we are able to reconstruct who came to the Delian sanctuary to dedicate objects.


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