Subaltern city?

About this book

The first detailed attempt to examine critically the concept of 'subaltern' or alternative and peripheral spaces in the pre-modern city. "The purpose of this volume is to question traditional notions of city space in pre-modern Europe (with its stress on space being incorporated, regulated and integrated, dominated by its merchants and crafts), and to investigate how far it was in fact economically and politically pluralistic with a great variety of functions and juridictions. The volume examines comparatively the range of different urban spaces in and outside the medieval and early modern city from gardens, farmland and wasteland to industrial sites, poor and rich suburbs, shooting grounds, green space, grey space and military zones. Case studies cover cities in France, Germany, Italy, the Low Countries, England, Portugal and the Middle East . We ask: how far was the pre-modern city a compact city? Or was it in fact a ?subaltern city?, as geographers have recently proposed, where many urban spaces were contested and the municipality has to be seen as only one key spatial actor? Peter Clark is Emeritus Professor of European Urban History at the University of Helsinki. From 1985 to 1999 he was director of the Centre for Urban History at Leicester University UK. He is one of the co-founders of the European Association for Urban History. Denis Menjot is Emeritus Professor of Medieval History at the University of Lyon, president of the Société Française d'Histoire Urbaine, director of Histoire Urbaine, one of the co-authors of the 'Histoire de l'Europe Urbaine'."--Back cover.