Imagining a Territory. Constructions and representations of late medieval Brabant
Research Question
How did the interaction between prince, nobles and urban elites influence the construction, perception, and representation of a territory in the later Middle Ages? That is the main research question of the book that I hope to write at NIAS. The test case will be the late medieval duchy of Brabant, which still has historical and territorial significance for many people in present-day Belgium and the Netherlands. In that sense the project responds also to a relevant societal question: what constitutes Brabant as a meaningful historical entity?
Project Description
This book project analyses how the interaction between prince, nobles and urban elites influenced the construction, perception, and representation of a territory. The test case will be the late medieval duchy of Brabant, which still has historical and territorial significance for many people in present-day Belgium and the Netherlands. To underscore the fluidity and multiplicity of the concept of territory, this book project sets out to disentangle the divergent, though sometimes overlapping, conceptions of what exactly the duchy of Brabant was (or was perceived to be) in the eyes of different political actors. In this way, the book provides a new perspective on the concept of territory before cartography and state formation turned boundaries and territories into more fixed (but still changeable) geographical entities.
Selected Publications
1) ‘The town as a stage? Urban space and tournaments in late medieval Brussels’, Urban History 43 (2016) 47-71.
2) (with A. Mann and J. Haemers), Political representation: communities, ideas and institutions in Europe (c. 1200 – c. 1650) (Leiden, Boston, 2018).
3) Prelaten, edelen en steden. De samenstelling van de Staten van Brabant in de vijftiende eeuw (Brussels 2016).