Overview

The Emergence of the Nobility in East Central Europe between the Eighth and Thirteenth Centuries explores the formation and evolution of medieval elites in the frontier and peripheral regions of the Frankish/East Frankish Empire and East Central Europe between the eighth and thirteenth centuries. It addresses the dynamics of elite emergence during a transformative era marked by the interaction of established centres and developing borderlands. By focusing on regions such as Saxony, Poland, the Baltic, Bavaria, Carinthia, the Czech lands, Great Moravia, Hungary, and Croatia, the book offers a geographically broad perspective on the mechanisms of power and social hierarchy in early and high medieval Europe. This book presents the results of comparative research into how elite status was constructed and legitimised, investigating whether this occurred through centralised imposition or organic processes of alliance-building, gift exchange and negotiation. It draws on Pierre Bourdieu’s Theory of Practice to analyse the economic, cultural, social and symbolic capital that defined elite status. The volume also considers the influences of indigenous development versus cultural transfer in shaping elite identities and practices. Each contribution offers a case study or regional focus, collectively illustrating both shared patterns and local specificities in elite transformation across centuries. Targeted at scholars and students of medieval archaeology and history, this interdisciplinary work is equally relevant to researchers interested in social structures, cultural exchange and political power in premodern Europe. Its synthesis of theory, comparative methodology and empirical data makes it a valuable resource for both academic study and future research on elite formation in medieval frontier societies.

Full Product Details

Author:   Robert Antonín ,  Jiří Macháček
Publisher:   Taylor & Francis Ltd
Imprint:   Routledge
Weight:   0.800kg
ISBN:  

9781032948775

ISBN 10:   1032948779
Pages:   334
Publication Date:   24 November 2025
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  Undergraduate ,  Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
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Table of Contents

Introduction Chapter 1 From Kinship to Nobility: The Emergence of the Elite in Early Medieval Croatia Ante Alajberg Chapter 2 Governance and Social Structures in the Early Medieval Eastern Alpine Region Stefan Eichert and Nina Richards Chapter 3 Transforming the Might of the Mighty in Northeast Bavaria in the Early and High Middle Ages Jan Hasil Chapter 4 The Formation of a New Type of Medieval Elite on the Eastern Frontier of the Frankish Empire: The Great Moravian Case from an Archaeological Perspective. Jiří Macháček Chapter 5 Great Moravian Nobility? From confusion of concepts to the search for continuity of early medieval elites Robert Antonín Chapter 6 From clan bosses to medieval nobility. Bohemia of the eighth–twelfth centuries and archaeological challenges Ivo Štefan Chapter 7 The Elites of tenth to twelfth-century Bohemia (The perspective of a historian) David Kalhous Chapter 8 The development of elites in Polish lands between the eighth and eleventh centuries Aleksandra Pankiewicz Chapter 9 Dynamics of diversification. Medieval elites on the territory of the first Polish state (Second half of the tenth–fifteenth century) Przemysław Wiszewski Chapter 10 The Elites of the Northwestern Slavs in the Early Middle Ages Felix Biermann Chapter 11 The development of medieval elites in the territory of Romania Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu Chapter 12 Emerging elite in the early Lithuanian state: from debates about origin to the search for sources of power Nerijus Babinskas Chapter 13 Continuity or Significant Shift? The Evolution of Ruling Elites in the Early Grand Duchy of Lithuania Yanina Ryier Conclusions: The emergence of the medieval nobility in East Central Europe and the sources of their power: cultural, symbolic, economic and social capital

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Author Information

Robert Antonín is a professor of medieval history at the Department of History of the Faculty of Arts, the University of Ostrava (Czech Republic), where he has also been the dean since 2018. His long-term research interests focus on the issues of political, social, economic and cultural development of Central Europe during High Middle Ages and on the topics related to the limits of interpretation of (not only) medieval historiography. He is the author of several monographs, including The Ideal Ruler in Medieval Bohemia (2017); numerous research articles on medieval history and the main editor of the collective monograph The Fourth Lateran Council and the Czech Lands in 13th and 14th Centuries (2020). Jiří Macháček is a professor at Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic. He specialises in medieval archaeology, archaeological methods and computer applications in archaeology. His work has been published in international journals such as the Journal of Archaeological Science, the Journal of World Prehistory, Medieval Archaeology, and the Praehistorische Zeitschrift, as well as by publishing houses including Brill, Leiden-Boston; Habelt, Bonn; and BAR Publishing, Oxford. He studied archaeology at universities in Brno, Bamberg and Vienna. He has been a visiting professor at the University of Bamberg and a fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Frankfurt am Main and Göttingen.

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