Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Innovation and Medieval Communities: The Circulation of Ideas and Practices in and Out of the Town (1200-1500)

Innovation and Medieval Communities: The Circulation of Ideas and Practices in and Out of the Town (1200-1500)

Lecuppre-Desjardin, Elodie
Bock, Nils
Lecuppre-Desjardin, Élodie

Hardcover

Series: Studies in European Urban History (1100-1800), Book 63

Medieval & Renaissance HistoryGeneral World History

ISBN10: 2503596479
ISBN13: 9782503596471
Publisher: Brepols Publishers
Published: Jan 31 2026
Pages: 288
Weight: 1.70
Height: 0.93 Width: 7.31 Depth: 10.29
Language: English
It has to be said that when it came to innovation medieval culture demonstrated its mastery of the art of the paradox. Medieval people were compelled to innovate, driven by the dissatisfaction that is part of their nature, leading to changes that could generate not only enthusiasm, but also mistrust and sometimes fear. In a world where innovation was ordinarily perceived in a negative light, societies developed discursive strategies to legitimize such developments, even going so far as to make the old out of the new. This book interrogates this gap between cultural assumptions and practical necessity. Drawing on numerous examples from the towns and cities of Western Europe between the thirteenth and the fifteenth centuries, it examines in context and in practice both sophisticated conceptions and unexamined habits of thought concerning innovation. These offered a range of possibilities for dealing with the new, often imposing novelty quietly, as the only means of maintaining the old state of affairs... at least in appearance.

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