Ideal Government and the Mixed Constitution in the Middle Ages

James M. Blythe (Autor)

Buch | Softcover

362 Seiten

2014
Princeton University Press (Verlag)
978-0-691-60297-4 (ISBN)

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Ancient Greeks and Romans often wrote that the best form of government consists of a mixture of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy. Political writers in the early modern period applied this idea to government in England, Venice, and Florence, and Americans used it in designing their constitution. In this history of political thought James Blythe investigates what happened to the concept of mixed constitution during the Middle Ages, when the work of the Greek historian Polybius, the source of many of the formal elements of early modern theory, was unknown in Latin. Although it is generally argued that Renaissance and early modern theories of mixed constitution derived from the revival of classical Polybian models, Blythe demonstrates the pervasiveness of such ideas in high and late medieval thought. The author traces medieval Aristotelian theories concerning the best form of government and concludes that most endorsed a limited monarchy sharing many features with the mixed constitution.
He also shows that the major early modern ideas of mixed constitutionalism stemmed from medieval and Aristotelian thought, which partially explains the enthusiastic reception of Polybius in the sixteenth century. Originally published in 1992. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

PrefaceAcknowledgmentsPt. 1The Mixed ConstitutionCh. 1Introduction3Ch. 2The Mixed Constitution in Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages13Pt. 2Thomas Aquinas and His SuccessorsCh. 3Thomas Aquinas39Ch. 4Giles of Rome60Ch. 5Peter of Auvergne77Ch. 6Ptolemy of Lucca92Ch. 7Engelbert of Admont118Ch. 8John of Paris139Pt. 3The Fourteenth CenturyCh. 9Aristotelian Political Thought In the Fourteenth Century161Ch. 10Relativism and the Best Polity165Ch. 11Kingship, Popular Sovereignty, and the Mixed Constitution180Ch. 12Nicole Oresme and the Synthesis of Aristotelian Political Thought203Pt. 4The Fifteenth Century and the Early Modern PeriodCh. 13Conciliarism243Ch. 14Later Theories of Mixed Government in England and Northern Europe260Ch. 15The Mixed Constitution and Italian Republicanism278Ch. 16Conclusion301Bibliography309Index337

Erscheint lt. Verlag	14.7.2014
Reihe/Serie	Princeton Legacy Library
Verlagsort	New Jersey
Sprache	englisch
Maße	152 x 229 mm
Gewicht	482 g
Themenwelt	Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Mittelalter
Themenwelt	Sozialwissenschaften ► Politik / Verwaltung ► Staat / Verwaltung
ISBN-10	0-691-60297-2 / 0691602972
ISBN-13	978-0-691-60297-4 / 9780691602974
Zustand	Neuware