Aspects of power and authority in the Middle Ages

"The essays in this collection present a series of case studies that range widely both chronologically and geographically. While some papers deal with traditional royal, princely and ecclesiastical authority, they do so in new ways. Others examine groups and aspects less obviously connected to power and authority, such as the networks of influence centering on royal women of powerful ecclesiastics, the power relationships revealed in Anglo-Saxon and Old-Norse literature on the influence that might be exercised by needy crusaders, by Jews with the ability to advance loans or by parish priests on the basis of their local connections."--BOOK JACKET.