Pere Benito Monclús (University of Lleida): Beyond Climate: War, Crusade, and the Making of Famine in Mediterranean Europe, 11th-13th Centuries
Over the last two decades, the paleoscientific revolution has had a profound impact on the way we make history, generating new narratives that have challenged older historiographical paradigms. Studies on premodern food crises have been undergoing a similarly important renewal, spearheaded by specialists in the social and economic history of the Atlantic and Mediterranean worlds. Emerging new works integrate theories derived from the New Institutional Economics as well as the literature on contemporary famines, with emphasis on Amartya Sen's entitlement theory of famine.
Famine has been shown to be closely related instead to urbanization, development, market integration, and warfare. Where the latter is concerned, recent studies suggest that between the eleventh and the mid-thirteenth centuries supra-regional famines were closely related to the projects of crusade. The aim of this talk is to examine this hypothesis in the context of the First and Second Crusades, the Catalan-Pisan crusade against Mallorca (1113-1115), and the first campaigns of conquest of the Kingdom of Valencia by the armies of James I (1234-1235).
LOCATION:Robinson Hall Basement Seminar Room (Room B21) STATUS:CONFIRMED DTSTART:20240322T203000Z DTEND:20240322T220000Z END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR