Popular Resistance in the French Wars

"In the Napoleonic period, warfare ceased to be a matter for armies alone - it also became an affair of the people, or so runs the usual claim. In Spain, Portugal, Italy, Germany and Russia outraged peasants and townsfolk rose against the French armies and fell upon them without mercy. From these insurrections we get the modern word 'guerrilla', but did armed civilians really play an important role in the struggle? In this collection of essays specialists on the Napoleonic epoch tease out the question, and arrive at some starting conclusions."--Jacket.