The Fourteenth Century, 1307-1399 by May McKisackReview by: Joseph R. StrayerThe American Historical Review, Vol. 65, No. 4 (Jul., 1960), pp. 876-877Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Historical AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1849420 .

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876 Reviews of Books cost to both Byzantium and the West, Justinian missed a great historical oppor- tunity, that of winning over and seizing political leadership in the West through an alliance with the Germanic kingdoms, notably with Ostrogothic Italy. Yet the Hitler period has also left its imprint on Rubin's work in less desirable ways. The style is often metaphorical and prolix in the extreme and makes considerable demands on the reader's powers of perseverance. The lessons of the Nazi and postwar periods guide Rubin in the posing of historical problems, in his narrative, and in his analysis-surely a legitimate procedure. They also give occasion to footnotes, excursuses, and even lengthy insertions in the text, a practice that is highly questionable as it distracts the reader's attention from sixth-century Byzan- tium. More dangerous is a tendency to apply racial theories: Justinian belongs to the Dinaric race; Theodora's appearance demonstrates that she did not have "Nordic blood"; a very favorable evaluation of the potentials of the Germanic world, especially of the Ostrogoths, permeates the volume and affects its main thesis as explained above. The work, then, must be used with caution, but it is safe to predict that it will become an indispensable tool for students of late antiquity and be a notable challenge to research. It is hoped that Rubin will be able to com- plete his great project within a reasonable time.

University of AMichigan PAUL J. ALEXANDER

THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY, 1307-1399. By May McKisack. [The Oxford History of England, Volume V.] (New York: Oxford University Press. I959. PP. Xix, 598. $8.oo.)

THE great gap in the Oxford History of England, which covered all the later medieval centuries, is at last almost filled. With the appearance of Professor McKisack's volume only the fifteenth century is left, and Dr. Jacob is well on his way to completing this difficult assignment.

Professor McKisack has written the best survey of fourteenth-century England that we possess. Her book is clear, well organized, and very readable. Though she has limited herself to little more than five hundred pages, she has dealt with all the important problems, and her chapters never seem compressed or hurried.

The author's own research has made her an expert on many phases of four- teenth-century politics. In addition, she has consulted all the important works on the period; the only apparent omission is Gray's Influence of the Commons on Early Legislation. Her judgments on controversial issues are always moderate, which means that they have a good chance of being sound. In spite of her gener- ously acknowledged debt to Maude Clarke, Professor McKisack does not accept all her teacher's theories about the origins of impeachment or the significance of the Modus Tenendi Parliamentum. She likewise rejects the extreme interpreta- tions of other scholars of the Statute of York or the crisis of I340-I34I. In short,

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Wilkins: Petrarch's Later Years 877 the student can be sure that in most cases this book gives him the opinion held by the majority of scholars.

Yet while there is good authority for each separate statement in the text, the over-all impression left by the book seems to me somewhat misleading. There is no sense of strain or crisis, no suggestion that the foundations of English govern- ment and English society were threatened. Professor McKisack is quite aware that there were serious political, economic, and social problems in fourteenth-cen- tury England, but she treats each one as a separate episode instead of placing them in a general pattern of deterioration. As a result everything seems to be developing smoothly and normally with only transitory setbacks, and the fourteenth century looks much like the thirteenth.

To be specific, Professor McKisack apparently does not believe that there was a dangerous increase in the power of the aristocracy or that the aristocracy used this power unwisely and with little sense of responsibility. She praises the ability of Edward III to hold the loyalty of his magnates without admitting that he did this by yielding to them at home and by waging futile wars abroad. She admires the efficiency of the new system of military indentures without mentioning its dangers. She minimizes the influence of the magnates on the Commons. She notes the rise of the justices of the peace without suggesting that this may have weakened the control of the central government over local affairs.

This all depends, of course, on the feeling that each scholar develops about the characteristics of a given period. It is quite possible that the fourteenth century was less disastrous than I think and that Professor McKisack is right in stressing continuity rather than instability. In any case, she has written an interesting book, and one that will be useful for a long time to come.

Princeton University JOSEPH R. STRAYER

PETRARCH'S LATER YEARS. By Ernest H. Wilkins. [Mediaeval Academy of America Publication Number 70.] (Cambridge, Mass.: the Academy. 1959. PP. xiv, 322. $8.oo.)

THIS work is a continuation of the author's Petrarch's Eight Years in Milan (I958) and carries out with equal success the task of determining the chronological order of Petrarch's literary work and the spiritual experiences that shaped it dur- ing the years I361-I374. Petrarch was most active during this closing period of his life in revising and sifting, with an eye to the judgment of posterity, the literary production of a lifetime. The chronological succession of the letters of these years (the later Familiares and the Seniles) was disturbed on occasion by the poet's efforts to obtain a topical grouping or to link variations of a central theme. The personal experiences and impressions that encouraged such groupings may be best illustrated, perhaps, from the years 136I-1362. During his mission to Paris in 136i Petrarch had contended, in conversations with his friend Pierre Bersuire,

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