Overview

This volume uncovers the ways in which trust and mistrust affected people’s lives in premodern Europe and the Mediterranean. Trust is a fundamental part of human relationships. It forms the basis of our connections with people and institutions in a variety of ways. But without reference to the great variety of meanings and experiences of trust in history, particularly the premodern past, we fail to grasp both the subtleties and the true significance of the topic. Through exploration of the nuances of the construction, maintenance, and breakdown of trust and trusting relationships, this volume demonstrates that trust functions in different ways in different contexts. It illuminates how the study of trust today points to new interpretations of life in the past, and how study of the past can offer valuable perspectives on life in the present.

Full Product Details

Author:   Annabel Laura Hancock (University of Oxford) ,  Ian Forrest (University of Glasgow)
Publisher:   Arc Humanities Press
Imprint:   Arc Humanities Press
Edition:   New edition
ISBN:  

9781802702842

ISBN 10:   1802702849
Pages:   214
Publication Date:   31 October 2025
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

List of Illustrations Introduction. ""Trust and Mistrust Across Time: Exploring Historical Perspectives and Interdisciplinary Approaches"" by Annabel Laura Hancock Chapter 1. ""Trust in Conversation: An Interview with Teresa Morgan and Justyna Wubs Mrozewicz"" by Annabel Laura Hancock Chapter 2. ""Phantom Notarial Contracts and Social Resilience after the Sack of Marseille, 1423"" by Ryan K. Low Chapter 3. ""Trust Across Seas: Genoese Official Representatives in Tunis, 1288–1289"" by Susannah Bain Chapter 4. ""Quoniam almanus non esset: (Mis)trust at the Fifteenth-Century University of Paris"" by Teresa Barucci Chapter 5. ""Little Shops of Horror? Fear and Distrust in Late Medieval Surgical Encounters"" by Fiona Knight Chapter 6. ""Trust and Time in Sixteenth-Century Italian Mediterranean Commerce"" by Nicholas Scott Baker Chapter 7. ""A Taxonomy of Trust: Contracting and Conspiring in the Premodern World"" by Sheilagh Ogilvie Chapter 8. ""Trust, Mistrust, and the Premodern: A Reflection on the Contribution of History to a Multidisciplinary Field"" by Ian Forrest and Annabel Laura Hancock Index

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Author Information

Annabel Laura Hancock is a Postdoctoral Associate Member of the Faculty of History at the University of Oxford.  Ian Forrest is Head of Humanities and Professor of Social and Religious History at the University of Glasgow. He has published widely on ideas, inequality, and institutions in the Middle Ages.

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