The Middle Ages as Subject and Object: Romantic Attitudes and Academic Medievalism Brian Stock in contemporary tastes and values cannot help but be struck by two interrelated changes that have come about since World War IL. On the one hand the scientific study of the Middle ‘Ages has made steady progress. Archival, diplomatic, and palaeo- ‘graphical research, together with the computer, the aerial survey, the soil analysis, and archaeology, have provided tentative answers to a number of much-debated questions. At the same time a wider set of factors having nothing to do with the professional historian has altered his relation to the less-developed stages of the European past. The ap- pearance of many new nations and the abundant literature on moderni- zation they have generated, despite profound differences from Western evolution, have dramatically heightened the awareness of long-buried patterns of thought and action. Under the influence of the social Sciences, history, like the medieval theologian’s conception of the deity, has often seemed like a sphera intelligibilis whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere. Yet the results have on the whole been beneficial. Man's psychological distance from the Middle Ages, which was radically increased by industrialization, has to some degree been shortened by the use of techniques and methods of inquiry derived from it. If older bias against the period has not evaporated, it has been subjected to a stronger critical light than ever before. Purged of the worst in Enlightenment and Romantic views, the present age would seem potentially freer from prejudice than any since the seventeenth century, when the serious study of the Middle Ages began. How has professional medievalism reacted to these possibilities? Paradoxically, by adopting their manner but rejecting their goals. In theoretical discussions it is now commonplace for medievalists to ad~ vocate some variety of what Marc Bloch years ago called the compara~ tive method, which, in today’s language, may be described as the union of the synchronic and the diachronic modes of thought. Yet clearly A ‘upENT of medieval cultural history who also takes an interest528 [NEW LITERARY 1118TORY. the field is not moving in this direction. Under the beguiling veil of interdisciplinary studies, it is in fact becoming more and more spe- ialized. Leaving aside that happily vanishing species, the textbook, ‘one observes a paucity of large and important theses and a prolifera- tion of minute and specific ones. The books and especially the foot- notes are longer, but the subjects invariably more limited in scope. For the academic medievalist, as for the classicist of the last century, the age of bold interpretation would appear to have yielded to that of the cautious advance. Even the social historian is not free from this trend, Although committed to the laudable notion that “homme en société constitue Yobjet final de la recherche historique,”! he too often em- ploys statistical methods applicable only to the nonreflective side of man, Confronted with individual experience in art, literature, or phi- losophy, he falls back on the aprioristic assumptions of mentalité? But he is better off than the traditional historian. The latter’s “rigorous command of the primary sources, distaste for theory and speculation, and proper aversion to the superficiality which a nodding acquaintance with other disciplines brings in its train”? are great strengths. But his 1 Georges Duby, Der soeétés médidoater. Legon inaugurale au Colldge de France ‘4 dleembre'1970 (Paris, 1971), P. 13, recalling Lucien Febyre and Mare Bioch'(p. 8). 2 See Duby's defense of mentalité, “Histoire des mentalits,” Encyclopédie de la Pliiade. L’hisoire et set méthode, ed. C. Samaran (Paris, 1961), pp. 937-56. [Recent bibliography is summarized briefly by R. Darnton, “Sociologie et histoire des mentaliés,” Minuit, 5 (1973), 50, n. 2.” Applications ‘of the theory have had ‘mixed results. Among the more suggestive are Jacques le Goll, Ler intellectuals ‘au moyen dge (Paris, 1962), and Duby’s own “La féodalité? ‘une. mentalité médiévale,” Annales, 13 (1958), 765-71, and “Les ‘jeunes’ dans la société arsto- tratique dans la Prance du Nord-Ovest au XU le sitele,” id, 19 (1964), 835-46. tis pethaps worth adding that, as a theory of social psychology, mentalitd was first applied to the French Revolution; see Lucien Febvre's reprinted esays, Combats pour Thistoire (Paris, 1965), pp. 207-39. The general achievement and Religion and Seventeenth: for further medieval research. The most active area of practical application is now the history of the family; see Diane Hughes, “Towards Historical Eihnography: ‘The Notarial Records and Family History in the Middle Ages,” to appear in Historiel Methods Newsletter (March 1974). The French, although les attuned to Beld-work, have been applying the results of anthropology for some time; tee, eg, Georges Dumméal, Mythe er epopee, $ vols (Paris, 1983-70).‘THE MIDDLE AGES AS SUBJECT AND OBJECT 529 resistance to outside influence has canonized a type of empiricism that is best described not as a method but as a theoretical prejudice. Tt isolated an historian like the late E. H. Kantorowicz who knew his facts but also maintained that history did not simply consist of muster- ing them one by one-* The gap between chartisme and Annales, between those who study a document or a period and those who focus ‘on a problem, has been quietly widening since it appeared just before the war. The situation could be summed up as follows: a few writers now devote a good deal of time to articulating their theoretical con- cerns; the majority go on cultivating their esoteric gardens; and the placid surface of medieval studies remains undisturbed. In these circumstances, what is called for is not yet another defense of the comparative method—phrases like the sociology of literature and Knowledge* long ago reached most medievalists’ ears—but rather an planation why, after constituting a possibility for two generations, still so far from being a reality. I ‘To begin, it may be instructive to examine the achievement of a uni- versally respected figure whose theoria and practica, by his own ad- mission, developed throughout the prewar period and crystallized dur- ing the conflict. Erich Auerbach died in 1957. A philologist, he saw matters dif- ferently from the general historian, but he had the inestimable ad- vantage of understanding roughly where he stood in the historiography of the Latin Middle Ages. ‘The clearest statement of his aims and methods is found in the introduction to a fragmentary group of essays brought together just before his death. Differing from Vossler, Curtius, 44, Compare the mance to theory lathe reviews of Kantorowicrs The King's “A Stayin Mediaeal Polical Theslogy. (Princeton, 1957) by Sots The Jaa of Eten ry oa) 8, ad ‘Smaley, Past and Pracn, 20 (1961), 30-3, wih the warmer reception of Walter Ulan, Mitangen des Oetemechaehe Gashichafonchung, 66 (938), 364-6. 3 or revinw of the modien! suiohay of lkerstos, ove Hams Robt Juss, A ittrtare médigvae ec thfode des genta” Potttguer' 1” (1970), 7os01. On the tocology of knowledge, seein gental the baltngripy in’ Gooner Cuvieh, Lis cadres ocans deta connatonte (Paty, 1966), Pps 230-310. ©. Lueyaturiproche nd Pablham in dev Utetnuchen Spltanibe und te. Mitel Stter (Berm, 1998). A bibliography of Averbach's writings wil be found in the Entsh trasltion of thi work, Literary Lamguage end Ts Public in Late Latin ‘ei andi ihe leer Rapin (Loony 1963) soso, “Cenmmetie alte att romanihon Phelegle (hom, nk Siac sy". 36-60