Local History Author(s): Pierre Goubert Source: Daedalus, Vol. 100, No. 1, Historical Studies Today (Winter, 1971), pp. 113-127 Published by: The MIT Press on behalf of American Academy of Arts & Sciences Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20023993 . Accessed: 30/04/2015 04:15
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This content downloaded from 122.108.194.54 on Thu, 30 Apr 2015 04:15:55 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions PIERRE GOUBERT
Local History
shall concerns a or a We call local history that which village few a or town or a villages, small middle-sized (a large harbor capital is the or a area not beyond local scope), geographical greater than common as an an the provincial unit (such English county, Italian a sl or contado, German Land, French bailiwick pays). Local his was even tory, which practiced long ago with carefulness, zeal, and was in the pride, later despised (especially the nineteenth and first half centuries the of the twentieth ) by supporters of general history. But, since the middle of this century, local history has risen again new some even and acquired meaning; indeed, maintain that only can true local history be and sound. a For long period?at least until the time when ideas circulated faster the and when men to move (in eighteenth century) began frequently and quickly (during the revolution of the railways in the most was nineteenth century)?the setting of Europeans the parish in or town the country the small and the surrounding district?that in a is, roughly speaking, the stretch of land covered day's walk, ten ten or in a two or from kilometers to miles, day's ride, about three times more. same in The laws (local custom) prevailed this as as same place, well the cultural habits (methods of cultivating the soil, quality of crops, shapes of tools, date of opening for mead ows and woods), the same social and economic habits (date of hiring servants, date of weekly markets and quarterly and yearly same same fairs), the seignorial rules, the judicial and administra tive and the same beliefs. Most never went area, religious people beyond the boundaries of their districts; their children remained a a a a a there; priest, judge, seigneur, notary, and market were within reach. The cultured part of the population moved about some easily: prospective lawyers would take of their degrees in 113
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the went to semi neighboring universities, future priests diocesan not naries when they existed, nobles, when they did travel far away a or because of war, went to their parents' their suzerains' castles or situated outside the bailiwick, sometimes outside the province were course. itself. There also vagrants and beggars, of But all of were them felt they first of all citizens of their native towns and Amiens and provinces?from Dijon and Burgundy, from Picardy, from Nimes and Languedoc, from Aix and Provence, from Saint were Brieuc and Brittany?and secondly they French, though they as always acknowledged themselves the king's faithful and obedient stratum subjects. Only small segments of society?the highest and the lowest?could have felt no association with a particular region or as as place. The great financiers and captains, well the gangs of were beggars along highways, not purposely adrift from their homes; all of them knew (especially when the police questioned the came beggars )what province, diocese, and parish they from. In such a confined life, the intellectual activities of the small on minority dealt with either meditations ancient texts, especially or Roman and Greek, with the history of the region, the region being as understood the land of the family. When they tried to produce histories?as histories were written before Voltaire's Essai sur les
Moeurs?antiquities, particularities, and the famous exploits of the or were city province emphasized. By the end of the sixteenth cen were tury, provincial histories?which merely lists of noble fami lies, castles, fiefs, abbeys, and cathedral chapters?or histories of towns and cities?which were enumerations of charters, privileges, famous people, and gossip about the writer's native town?were commonplace. Later, the strongest institutions in the provinces ( the Estates, the parlements), because of their corporate feelings, and as a way of protecting their interests, published their histories. Monks dedicated to research ( for example, the Benedictines ) often decided to and a of documents gather publish corpus regarding own was their provinces; and such work frequently carefully done.1 or These generally contained legislative administrative acts, the concern founding charters, feudal documents, and other evidences ing the great noble families, the pious priests, and abbots who had been influential. were sometimes They apologies, nearly hagiog But cannot even re raphies. they be dismissed, today. They often to text fer the of lost documents and give the only extant version of them. The nineteenth at in was century, least France, the golden age 114
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of local history. Following and enlarging upon the example given in the cen by provincial academies the second half of eighteenth or tury, many "societies" that called themselves "scholarly" learned were on some (and occasionally so) appeared the scene, existing a were times for only few years. Their members typical elements of bourgeois society: magistrates, notaries, priests, spinsters, rentiers, a minor few teachers, nobility. Among thousands of papers and hundreds of volumes issued in France from the middle of the a is a nineteenth century, tenth perhaps worth glancing through, hundredth worth keeping.2 This "petit bourgeois" social science from serious and would profit sociological psychological analysis. weakness ex The of many of these pseudohistorical works partly the plains contempt with which professional historians of the early twentieth century regarded local history?a jumble of chance genealogies, usurped glories, proofless assertions. Professional historians disdained such local history also be cause of their own of what chose to see as conception they "gen eral" General was history. history political, military, diplomatic, and a administrative, ecclesiastical. Studying the state involved of war a of study statesmen; studying permitted study the military feats of generals; studying foreign relations involved the publica tion of ambassadors' to a memoirs; studying religion led recounting of the achievements of and popes bishops, generally holy and pious; studying administrative history (written from the records of offices located in was as the a Paris) represented being history of whole people. A retrospective psychoanalysis of the historians of the nineteenth century would probably reveal that many of the historians who to more or chose write about monarchy less identi fied with the a themselves monarch, that the historian of particular minister sometimes was imagined he himself governing the country. An Freudian elementary interpretation could explain many of the were curious histories that published. the first serious at were Yet, attempts local history made by historians and rank intellectuals who with the best. They under stood that a thesis or interpretation, however ingenious, needs to be a supported by precise facts; precise facts have space as well as a time dimension. S?bastien Thus, Vauban, pleading for fiscal used the reform, precise examples of the Vezelay election, his native pays, and Normandy, where he had often been.3 Thus a Messance, demographer,4 rightly opposing the thesis of French so depopulation brilliantly advanced by intellectuals as famous 115
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as as though unqualified demographers Montesquieu and Voltaire, a numerous in proved with strictly regional analysis of parishes the Lyonnais, Auvergne, and Upper Normandy that the French risen population had markedly between the end of the seventeenth the century and end of the eighteenth. Alexis de Tocqueville, with was to at same his great design, which understand the time the dying Ancien R?gime and the French Revolution, used the provincial in ex record offices, particularly Tours, and illustrated with actual states But can amples the accomplishments of the of Languedoc.5 a men historical form depend upon the work of of genius? was more common more com Alphonse Feillet's technique and an in monly used. Feillet, often-neglected historian of the misery was a France at the time of the Fronde,6 contemporary of III. He not Napol?on believed that the French people did suffi ciently know the misdoings of "legitimate" Bourbon monarchies. his to To support rather simple thesis, having do with the misery of the French before, during, and after the Fronde, Feillet used in num memoirs, letters, monographs, and essays published large in one a bers the nineteenth century: could always find French was or village where somebody dying of the plague malnutrition, or where soldiers' violence had created massive disorder in every same month between 1640 and 1660. A careful reading of the docu a ments by historian who wished to prove the opposite would certainly have been equally compelling. It is quite possible to prove that France was or it was flourishing that miserable during Louis one to XIII's reign: needs only choose one's evidence carefully in the sea of published local histories. never The Feillet method (though Feillet thought of founding a was con method; this still a time when few laid claim to being in used. cerned with methodology) has fact become very widely is or Any thesis, if it brilliant, unexpected, paradoxical, may be old supported by selected examples chosen from scholarly studies a of different provinces. History becomes game where the guilt less amateurs of local history provide others with materials they find useful. a new Only in the last twenty years has kind of local history The return to the archives of a become possible. unexploited given a was back into fashion his region and given period brought by torians were not born in the studied and were who generally region new not therefore expressing filial piety. This trend derived from dissatisfaction with current historical methods, and a concern to 116
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new establish kinds of historical questions. Historians of the preced were ing generation overwhelmingly preoccupied with the prob use it lems of the upper classes. To French examples, would be correct to say that the old school was interested in lawmakers and not in law in and not in enforcement, those who governed the in not in governed, the clergy and the faithful, in the memoirs of men letters their not in of describing countries and the realities of the The return to a new country itself. local history proceeds from in a interest social history?that is, the history of whole society, not the few who it or only happy governed it, judged it, ground down, taught it?the history of groups of men, sometimes called orders, was as classes, ?tats, who lived together. This history keenly in terested in the bodies and minds of the many as in the world-wide or as plans profound thoughts of the few; concerned with the his wine as tory of bread, oil, and with the history of corporate statutes But a and military rules. history that undertakes all aspects of in men a human life all classes of meets first major obstacle: num bers. It is not too to or difficult study thirty French intendants twenty ambassadors; trying to study the hundreds of thousands townsmen of and millions of countrymen in all aspects of their lives presents insuperable difficulties. Historians concerned with such matters do not complain of the lack of documents but of their number. Lacking any adequate sampling techniques, and given the state of the historians tried to limit their archives, difficulties by to a rec restricting their gaze particular geographic region whose ords were well and one man gathered could be analyzed by work as as ing alone. Lucien Febvre, early 1911, did this for the Franche Gaston did the same ten Comt?; Roupnel years later for the Dijon works went region.7 These early unnoticed, probably because they were too strictly regional. In the French universities of that time even of the such was (and years following), history thought too limited. But these soon were soon pioneers had followers, and they so others that a sort joined by others, many of overproduction of at least in is a regional history, France, real threat today. were these Why regional monographs important? They estab lished certain limited in some none proofs, instances, but proofs their with a theless; statistics, compiled safety-margin, challenged some of the "general" ideas, prejudices, and approximations that had held in the of more sway absence precise investigation. A few serve examples may to suggest what has been achieved. 117
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It common a com had been for long time ( and it is still too often to to mon) oppose unconditionally the nobility of the "sword" the to a to a nobility of the "robe," that is say, hereditary nobility conferred to certain nobility by appointment important judicial were functions. The judges of the French parlements sometimes as on characterized bourgeois. The careful thesis of Jean Meyer the in the Breton nobility eighteenth century8 proved irrefutably that was not a in there single bourgeois and very few former bourgeois the of and Parlement Brittany, that the difference between nobility was mem of the sword and nobility of the robe nonexistent. The bers of the Breton Parlement were the descendants of the oldest noble families that had dispensed justice in their province. Obvi not true ously, what holds for Brittany may be equally of other the is to as a provinces; historian's task make painstaking study of as the membership of these other French provincial parlements has been made in Brittany. take a the To very different example, growth of the seignorial system (which the Marxists call feudal) in France seemed to be an Louis XIV was to quite common; edict by sometimes cited show how the last allodial tenures fared under that king. R. Boutruche, in his on allodial tenure in the has our study Bordeaux region, drawn to some attention the fact that completely free lands and peasants times survived the Middle Ages.9 In his book on the Lower Auvergne, Abel Poitrineau shows, on the basis of notarial docu that tenures ments, the proportion of allodial sometimes approached 50 cent in communities per many rural of eighteenth-century to Auvergne.10 This phenomenon will probably be found have been common in as other parts of the country well (mainly in central, eastern, and southern France). The result of these many researches a is the inescapable (but unanticipated) conclusion that part of France during the Ancien R?gime (and, by definition, the Middle as not Ages well) did undergo the seignorial system. It was known that certain feudal customs such as mortmain had in remote eastern once survived parts of France. Voltaire spoke of the "serfs du Mont the in the Jura"; king eighteenth century liber on was ated the last serfs who lived the lands of which he seigneur. New researches Abel and by Poitrineau Pierre de Saint-Jacob sug were gest that important groups of peasants subject to mortmain to in on be found central France; the study by R?gine Robin north ern more Burgundy (Auxois) reveals many of them. It is possible a a that fifth of the peasants of this small region lived under system 118
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was a that in fact form of extenuated serfage.11 Other discoveries same nature of the may be expected for eastern France. This phe nomenon was neither known nor understood until minute studies carried on at the and were undertaken. village level seignioral level Our in image of rural France this period has been substantially new altered by these insights. Thus, for example, the penetration of corn in old Indian into Aquitaine the eighteenth century (an that even Fernand to is assertion Braudel thought repeat recently ) now to is dated the seventeenth century. This knowledge based on an wholly the research of young historians who took interest in the small corn markets of southeast France.12 The idea, often re a peated, that the southern half of France used biennial rotation corn was a system in its fields blasted when diary of the journeys an made by J. F. Henry de Richeprey, agronomist and officer of the was a is now king, published by regional learned society.13 It known was not were that biennial rotation the rule; all types of rotations in an even used the south (and greater variety in the west). The very different attitudes of the peasants with respect to the have been to rate clergy explained by referring the of tithe that a was existed in particular region. The tithe very low in Lower Brittany (3 per cent) and very high in the southeast (from 10 to one 12.5 per cent).14 The clericalism of region and the anticlerical ism of the other has roots that are more ancient than is sometimes on to new re realized. One could go endlessly indicate what the and to our searches, local rural, have contributed altering per ceptions of Europe's past. It must be said that the researches have not on been only those of French historians working French mention must be made materials; of the renewal of English, Belgian, and Dutch as a history result of the local studies undertaken by W. G. Hoskins on on Leicestershire, Joseph Ruwet the Herve pays, van on and B. Slicher Bath Overijssel.15 The careful practice of local history and the multiplication of on monographs specific regions may lead much further; they may serve to once destroy many of the general conceptions that seemed so were strong and embodied in so many books, papers, and lec tures. Thus, for example, the so-called "crisis" of the seventeenth and the so-called revolution" century "agricultural of the eighteenth are certain to be in century reconsidered the light of the material now being developed. A whole book would be to out probably needed bring the nuances let alone to of, destroy the myth of the seventeenth 119
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century "crisis," at least in France. The word "crisis" is itself unsuit in means a able; crise French violent but brief phenomenon; the use of term sense seems In own the in this to be disappearing. my no study of Beauvaisis, I found justification for the idea that there was a severe crisis in the period previous to the Fronde except for the on incidence of epidemics and high mortality attendant these, common in the seventeenth century (as well as the sixteenth). was were Population rising, prices going up, though slowly, the incomes of were landowners rising, and textile production had new in was reached levels in Beauvais the 1630's. It only in the second half of the century that conditions seemed to deteriorate. is areas It interesting that subsequent local studies in other sug a gested other patterns. In thorough study of the northern textile cities, particularly Amiens, Pierre Deyon showed with impressive of in that in statistics the character industrial growth area; doing he comments the "blissful so, supported my about reign" of Louis was came XIII. After 1660, when Colbert minister, textile activity to was life again; the industrial "crisis" put off, and rightly, to the last years of Louis XIV's reign.16 In his blunt, strange, but sub stantial thesis, Ren? Baehrel discarded for rural Lower Provence a in the conception of there having been crisis the seventeenth a century: he advanced the idea of general improvement in condi a more tions interrupted by difficult period every thirty years.17 in on E. Le Roy Ladurie, his researches focused the neighboring a region of Provence, postponed the coming of depression till the new years following the Holland war?that is, till the 1680's. His use research, especially his methodical of documents relating to the ecclesiastical tithe, lead him to the conclusion that prosperity a continued during Colbert's age, and reached sort of climax, with in the 1660 1680. greater agricultural production years between and was never as were In southern France the Fronde important; there no in seven famines the fifties and sixties, nearly the whole of the or teenth century?at least until 1680 1690?was characterized by in expansion.18 Michel Morineau discovered through his studies the Dutch record offices and libraries that the American treasures more into in seven poured lavishly Europe the second half of the so teenth century than they did in the sixteenth century, dear to a E. J. Hamilton and P. Chaunu.19 Thus, series of local studies has to a led serious questioning of the oft-repeated thesis about the it came at general crisis in the seventeenth century. If occurred, it at the very end of the century, least in France. The subject, obvi 120
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new ously, is far from exhausted; researches will perhaps bring new ones. opinions and will revive old It is quite certain, however, that without serious provincial monographs (written by profes not a sional historians and by amateurs) general revision of the kind would not have been suggested possible. The "agricultural nonrevolution" associated with Michel a even to us in Morineau involves period closer time. A careful accounts and study of the of ecclesiastical tithes agricultural prop over centuries to come to a erties several allow Morineau striking set same are in of conclusions: the agricultural yields observable even the Middle Ages, the sixteenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries where same and the conditions of climate, political order, in some good farming prevail; where, periods, outputs decline, are reasons: con there always easily identifiable war, bad climatic a ditions, social unrest, closing down of markets. The eighteenth century generally combined fairly favorable conditions, but the were not outputs substantially higher than they had been; they the best of earlier times. A merely reproduced outputs young his same in a torian of Sicily, Maurice Aymard, using the methods maintains corn quite different place, that the yields of good Sicilian are same as fields the in the eighteenth century in Cicero's time. An and limit of to upper unvarying agricultural output would appear can have existed. No rapid growth be observed before the nine teenth or the twentieth The century. changes that historians thought were were or they discovering changes of short duration, geographi cal variances between different regions.20 Not all historians are to ready accept the rather startling theses propounded by to Morineau. They try discover other regional examples to refute are more him; often, they comparisons of the bad periods of the seventeenth century with the best periods of the eighteenth. The of a to most cer idea technological limit appropriate regions has to be in The rise a tainly kept mind. slight and fall between maxi mum and a minimum one yield (the and the other being proper to was true different regions ) probably expresses what most of the time. The real to agrarian revolution began "take off" very late? nearly everywhere in the second half of the nineteenth century or even even more later; sometimes, recently. A now branch of very lively history?historical demography? owes its to the narrowest development type of local history. This field was with rumors and as its vegetating, proofless theories staples, before historians and statisticians became interested in modest, neg 121
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lected, and widespread documents: parish registers. Using parish registers from Gien (on the Loire River) and from several other to link economic places, Jean Meuvret pointed the between crises cen and demographic crises in northern France in the seventeenth and to the tury weakening of these crises after the middle of the An examination of in eighteenth. about thirty parishes Beauvaisis was the first to a a attempt make serious demographic analysis of whole region. Louis Henry, using the register of Crulai (in Nor new to use mandy), gave impulse the professional of such data; soon afterwards, he laid down the well-defined rules of method are (now unquestioned) that appropriate for such study. Recogni a tion of the value of parish documents ( at time when, in France, censuses were rare, not well known, and not easy to use) allowed to made of studies be fecundity, marriage, and infantile mortality, a never with possibility of accuracy previously attained. The grow soon that ing monographic literature demonstrated neither France nor or Europe looked like either Crulai Beauvaisis, but it allowed a new ex historians to raise whole series of questions: thus, for nurs ample, about the beginning of birth control procedures, about more ing practices, about mobility generally. The problem of ille to so gitimacy and sexual intercourse prior marriage, with patterns as so different between France and England, and perhaps typical a not of kind of modern mentality,21 could have been examined censuses before the arrival of good methodical ( 1840 in France ). Only the parish registers provide the key to all such problems for an such not even earlier period; without them, problems could be tackled. success con The of local and regional historical studies has been reason success siderable in France. The for the is not explicable terms the used. it must be seen how simply in of methods Rather, come much of the inspiration for such study has from the Annales school. That school, severely critical of traditional ideas and elitist to new prejudices, drew attention social groups and provided felicit ous and in interdisciplinary associations between historians scholars A re economics, sociology, psychology, biology, and demography. new was generation of historical studies, with methods and ideas, a new that had talent to made possible by generation sufficient make itself heard. success excess. in is All brings with it As historical work France it carried out mainly within universities, tends to reproduce the 122
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faults of the universities. Soon, a servile imitation of innovation a new or a establishes tradition, negative and violent contestation which often ends in the reinforcing thing originally disputed. One can already foresee the birth of yet another novelty, which will owe much to contact between linguistics, psychoanalysis, and his as soon as to tory22 (just psychoanalysts and linguists agree study and historians to archives, agree study linguistics and psychoanaly A brutal sis). reaction, ideological and political, could also take French more. place, throwing historians back fifty years or In the most recent period, large numbers of advanced students and historians devoted themselves to young parish monographs. a For year ( for the certificate m?moires de ma?trises ) or for several the thesis of the troisi?me a kind years (for cycle, of Ph.D.), they analyzed, using the archives, different aspects of life in one or sev eral most in the cen parishes, frequently eighteenth century. That left abundant were were us tury archives, they varied, and they to read. The is ually easy work of novices generally worth about as much as their authors ( and the professor who advised them ) are worth. Most was often, they simply confirmed what already known. did contain certain new unex Some, however, ideas and provided on pected information?thus, for example, the early attitude toward birth control of the of the Ile de in winegrowers France the eight eenth or on the of communities in the century,23 composition villages of Brie to the east of Paris in the same new ( ) century,24 information has been It provided. had been thought that the communities of were Brie dominated by rich farm workers; one now finds that sev eral were dominated by the poor, numerous manouvriers, who united the rich the against peasants through help of the Intendant General of Paris. such are Many parish monographs poor; they de serve to are be forgotten; others excellent. Be that as it their may, multiplication approaches overproduc tion and at least presents three disadvantages. First, it is difficult to find read or a them, them, make synthesis, the more so as the of are not an majority them published. Second, advanced student or a historian is to a fledgling unlikely have sufficient competence to deal with the different elements to necessary good local analysis; are law, institutions, economics, demography, sociology, religion not mastered. In the last there is subjects easily analysis, always the a danger of return to amateurism. Third, even when the mono is the of an graph good, description isolated village raises more 123
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exact have problems than it resolves: Does the information provided or To decide such local, provincial, general significance? questions, one on would need to have other monographs neighboring parishes as are well. The questions and the demands endless. in a of The solution, obviously, lies systematization monographic this is assured study. In the demographic domain, systematization de in collaboration with by the Soci?t? D?mographique Historique the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, the Institut National and a of the first d'Etudes D?mographiques, number universities; assure of the fail two institutions publication best monographs ( or, at a At the ing that, of least r?sum? of them). Aix-en-Provence, work of advanced students has been directed toward social analysis in At Pierre of the rural communities the eighteenth century. Caen, same Chaunu follows the systematized effort for Normandy. At the Centre de Recherches sur les Civilisations de l'Europe Moderne de Paris, Roland Mousnier has centered the work of his students around several themes: revolts of the seventeenth century, gov Parisian the ernmental staff of the Ancien R?gime, society during same The is to achieve collabora period.25 difficulty genuinely good tive publications. to and Large provincial studies continue be undertaken, many are We studies on Nor nearing publication. expect Anjou, Upper mandy, the region south of Paris, Lorraine, Dauphin?, Provence, Toulouse, and Gascogne; others will follow somewhat later.26 These are means the major studies the only of verifying validity of old or new and ideas and propositions, of discovering problems hy new in view a is to examine one potheses. The trend, my good one, or in one or two for the in two problems regions. Thus, example, Lebrun on men and death teresting and original work by Fran?ois in the and centuries is Anjou during seventeenth eighteenth own students have awaited with great impatience. Two of my best on of mar recently chosen to concentrate their efforts the problem in in western riage Champagne and the problem of metayage France from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. Large pro on one vincial studies, concentrating important problem, analyzed over a or is the best long period (a century more)?this perhaps course to take for those who wish to remain faithful to the idea of
investigating local/provincial history.
Annie Gresle for her assistance in the I warmly thank my daughter gentle English language. 124
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References
1. For example, the lawyer Guy Coquille (1523-1603) wrote the Histoire du pays et duch? de Nivernais (Paris: Vefue A. L.'Angelier, 1612); another wrote M?moire lawyer, Antoine Loisel (1536-1617), des pays, villes, commune et comt? et comtes, evesch? et evesques, pairrie, personnes de renom de Beauvais et de Beauvaisis (Paris: S. Thiboust, 1617). A pro is et vincial history of the seventeenth century Histoire du Berry du dioc?se de Bourges (1689). In the eighteenth century, the most famous provincial histories were: Claude Court?p?e and Edm? B?guillet, Descrip tion g?n?rale et particuli?re du duch? de Bourgogne, 7 vols. (Dijon, 1751 as 1767 ), and those by Benedictine historians such Dom Vaissete (Langue a doc), Dom Maurice (Bretagne), and Dom Plancher. For general knowledge of this kind of study, see French bibliographies such as: Henri Hauser, Les sources de Vhistoire de France, XVIe si?cle, 4 vols. (Paris: A. Picard, 1906-1915); Louis Andr?, Les sources de Vhistoire de France au XVIIe si?cle, 8 vols. (Paris: A. Picard, 1913-1935), esp. vol. 8, chap. XIV, et "Histoire provinciale locale." C 2. An almost exhaustive bibliography of this literature is in Robert de travaux his Lasteyrie- and Ren? Gandilhon, Bibliographie g?n?rale des et soci?t?s savantes de la France toriques arch?ologiques publi?s par les (Paris: Imprimerie nationale, 1944-1961).
3. d'une F. S?bastien Vauban, Projet dixme royale (Paris: Alean, 1933); for the memoir on see in the V?zelay election, pp. 274-295; for examples see Normandy, pp. 39-42 (and elsewhere).
4. sur Messance, Recherches la population des g?n?ralit?s d'Auvergne, de . . . re Lyon, de Rouen (Paris: Durand, 1766); Messance, Nouvelles sur . . . cherches la population de la France (Lyon, 1788 ).
see 5. Alexis de Tocqueville, L'Ancien R?gime et la R?volution; the Ap Des d'Etats et en pendice, pays particulier du Languedoc, especially the last lines.
6. au Alphonse Feillet, La mis?re temps de la Fronde et Saint Vincent de Paul (Paris :Didier, 1862 ).
7. Lucien Febvre, Phillipe II et la Franche-Comt? (Paris, 1911), to be re published shortly by the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes and the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme. Gaston Roupnel, La ville et la campagne au XVIIe si?cle, ?tude sur les populations du pays dijonnais (1922), 2d ?d. (Paris: Colin, 1955, by the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Section VI).
8. La noblesse bretonne au XVIIIe 2 vols. Jean Meyer, si?cle, (Paris: Impri merie nationale, 1966).
9. Robert Boutruche, L'alleu en Bordelais et en Bazadais du Xle au XVIIIe si?cle (Paris, 1947).
10. Abel La vie en au Poitrineau, rurale Basse-Auvergne XVIIIe si?cle, 1726 125
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1789, 2 vols. (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1965), esp. pp. 341 344.
11. vie en Pierre Les Poitrineau, La rurale Basse Auvergne; de Saint-Jacob, paysans de la Bourgogne du Nord au dernier si?cle de l'Ancien R?gime en (Paris, 1966), pp. 38-40; R?gine Robin, La soci?t? fran?aise 1789, Semur-en-Auxois (Paris, 1970), p. 120: "L'Auxois est terre de mainmorte, 20% sont des paroisses du bailliage mainmortables."
12. Fernand Braudel, Civilisation mat?rielle et capitalisme, I (Paris: Colin, 1967), 126 (Indian corn, eighteenth century); Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, 71 Les paysans de Languedoc (Paris: Flammarion, 1969), p. (Indian corn, des vins 1637-1678); Georges and Genevi?ve Fr?che, Le prix des grains, et de des l?gumes ? Toulouse, 1486-1868 (Paris: Presses universitaires 20-22 du ma?s dans la mer France, 1967), esp. pp. ("De l'apparition in in 1618 curiale," 1639 certainly, perhaps).
in 13. Journal des voyages en Haute-Guienne de J. F. Henry de Richeprey, H. Guilhamon, Archives historiques du Rouergue, XIX (Rodez, 1952); see the cases of Sainte-Eulalie du of especially Larzac, p. 140, Compeyre, p. 168, and many others.
en du XVle si?cle ? 14. For Brittany, Henri See, Les classes rurales Bretagne some la R?volution (Paris: V. Giard et E. Bri?re, 1906), and studies by my in not For the south former students Rennes, unfortunately published. see Les du dioc?se east, the excellent book by Armand Sarramon, paroisses en Documents in?dits sur l'histoire de Comminges 1786, in Collection de ?conomique de la R?volution Fran?aise (Paris, 1968).
15. W. G. Hoskins, Studies in Leicestershire Agrarian History in Leicestershire Archeological Society ( 1949 ), and Essays in Leicestershire History (Liver et les pool: University Press, 1950). Joseph Ruwet, L'agriculture classes au sous rurales pays de Herv? l'Ancien R?gime (Li?ge, 1943). B. Slicher van van het Bath, Een samenleving onder spanning: geschiedenis platte land in Overijssel (Assen: Van Gorcum, 1957).
sur au 16. Pierre Deyon, Amiens, capitale provinciale, ?tude la soci?t? urbaine and XVIIe si?cle (Paris and The Hague: Mouton, 1967), esp. chap XIII, en France et ses in XVIIe La production manufacturi?re probl?mes, si?cle, no. 70-71 ( 1966), 47-63.
17. Ren? Baehrel, Une croissance, la Basse-Provence rurale, fin du XVIe si?cle 1789 (Paris: S.E.V.P.E.N, 1961).
and en 18. E. Le Roy Ladurie, Les paysans de Languedoc; "Enqu?tes cours, et net Annales: D?mes produit agricole," ?conomies, soci?t?s, civilisations, 24 (1969), 826-832.
l'histoire des 19. Michel Morineau, "D'Amsterdam ? Seville, de quelles r?alit?s miroir?" 23 prix est-elle le Annales: ?conomies, soci?t?s, civilisations, ( 1968), 178-205 (see p. 196 for the figures for 1661-1700).
see: M. "Y a-t-il eu une r?vo 20. On the agricultural nonrevolution Morineau, 126
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en au lution agricole France XVIIIe si?cle?" Revue historique, 92 (1968), Denis et en France du XVe au 299-326; Richet, "Croissance blocages XVIIIe si?cle," Annales: ?conomies, soci?t?s, civilisations, 23 (1968), E. Le 759-787; Roy Ladurie, quoted above in note 18; M. Morineau, en au et R?volutions invisibles France XVIIIe si?cle, agriculture d?mogra phie, to be published in Cahiers des Annales ( 1970 or 1971 ).
21. See article my forthcoming "Historical Demography and the Reinterpreta tion of Early Modern French History: A Research Review," Journal of no. Interdisciplinary History, 1 ( 1970).
22. en Robin, La soci?t? fran?aise 1789, pp. 229-343, "Le vocabulaire des cahiers de dol?ances."
23. Michel Tyvaert and Jean-Claude Giacchetti, Argenteuil, 1740-1790, ?tude de d?mographie historique, in Annales de d?mographie historique (1969), pp. 40-61.
sur communaux a l'Est 24. Maryvonne Brassens, "Recherches les biens de 1970. Paris," unpublished m?moire de ma?trise, Sorbonne, Paris,
25. See Annales de d?mographie historique (1969), pp. 11-292 (twenty monographical studies ) ;Michel Vovelle, "Etat pr?sent des ?tudes de struc ture en la Provence agraire Provence ? fin de l'Ancien R?gime," historique, no. 74 (1969), 450-484. Annales de Normandie and Cahiers des Annales de Normandie (studies directed by Pierre Chaunu). Publications of the sur Centre de Recherches les Civilisations de l'Europe Moderne, directed most recent are by Roland Mousnier; the publications Madeleine Foisil, La r?volte des Nu-Pieds et les r?voltes normandes de 1639 (Paris, 1970), and Roland Mousnier and others, Le Conseil du Roi de Louis XII-a la R?volution (Paris, 1970 ).
26. To on to be published soon, thesis Anjou by Fran?ois Lebrun; be pub lished in the coming years, south Paris region by Jean Jacquart, Upper Lorraine Normandy by G. Lemarchand, by G. Cabourdin, Dauphin? by B. Bonnin, Provence by M. Vovelle and R. Pillorget, Toulouse by G. Freche, Gascogne by Anne Zink.
127
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