Course title: The comparative
microhistory of Hungary in the eighteenth century
Time: Wednesday, 14.00-15.30
Location: 6-8
Múzeum krt., 268.
szijarto.istvan@btk.elte.hu
Course homepage: www.szijarto.elte.hu/Comparative2024.htm
Maximum number of students admitted: 10
Educational
objectives
The
course will present the microhistory of 18th-century Hungary in a comparison
with microhistorical works about medieval and early modern Europe, from the
classics to the latest books. These will help the participants of the course
both to understand the 18th-century history of Hungary and to have a good
overview of the theory and practice of microhistory.
Course
content
1. 11
September 2024: Introduction
2. 18
September 2024: Army, society, and a love for details
3. 25
September 2024: Panna Rózsa’s wonderings
4. 2
October 2024: ’Let them flog you!
5. 9
October 2024: ’The return of Panna Rózsa
6. 16
October 2024: The miller’s case
7. 6
November 2024: Army and markets in Hungary
8. 13
November 2024: Enlightenment in Tiszabercel I.
9. 20
November 2024: Enlightenment in Tiszabercel II.
10. 27
November 2024: Historiography
11. 4
December 2024: Theories
12. 11
December 2024: Summary
Course requirements
As a minimum, two thirds of the courses are to be attended. For each class, two types of texts are to be read: first: a book in full or a chapter or two, second: a single chapter from a manuscript that is about Hungary in the eighteenth century. These two types of texts will be discussed first in themselves, then in a comparative perspective. For missed classes, readings should be made up by 20 December 2024 the latest. No essay is to be submitted.
Prescribed reading
2. Thomas V. Cohen: Roman Tales: A Reader's Guide to the Art of
Microhistory. Routledge: London –
New York, 2019. 16-39, 163-188. (Chapter 2: If a summer’s eve a traveller, or
two… and Chapter 8: Nicolina runs away)
3. Guðný
Hallgrímsdóttir: A Tale of a Fool? A Microhistory of an 18th-Century Peasant
Woman. Routledge: London – New York, 2019.
4. Tyge
Krogh: The great nightman conspiracy. A tale of the 18th century’s
dishonourable underworld. Routledge: London – New York, 2019.
5. Gene Brucker: Giovanni and
Lusanna: Love and Marriage
in Renaissance Florence. University of California Press: Berkeley - Los Angeles, 1986.
6. Carlo
Ginzburg: The Cheese and the Worms: The Cosmos of a Sixteenth-Century Miller. The Johns Hopkins University Press:
Baltimore, 1980.
7. Thomas V. Cohen: Roman Tales: A Reader's Guide to the Art of
Microhistory. Routledge: London –
New York, 2019. 142-162, 189-199. (Chapter 7: Black velvet’s odd adventure and
Chapter 9: A boy steals gold)
8. Giovanni Levi: Inheriting Power: The Story of an Exorcist.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988.
9. Sarah Maza: Private Lives and Public Affairs. The Causes Célebrès of Prerevolutionary France. University of California Press: Berkeley – Los Angeles – London, 1993. 112–167. (Chapter 3: Private Lives and Public Affairs: Upper-Class Scandal, 1774–1778)
10. Sigurður Gylfi Magnússon – István M. Szijártó: What is microhistory? Theory and practice. Routledge: London – New York,
2013. 1-76.
11. István
M. Szijártó: Probing the limits of microhistory. Journal of Medieval and
Early Modern Studies 47 (2017) 1: 193–198; idem: The paths of microhistory.
Quaderni storici 53 (2018) 917–928; idem:
Arguments for Microhistory 2.0. In: Hans Renders – David Veltman (eds): Fear
of Theory. Towards a New Theoretical Justification of Biography.
Leiden–Boston, 2021. 211–227.