While much attention has been paid to the commemoration of conflict in
the twentieth century, this book is the first to consider conflict
memory in the long term, arguing that modern practices were not
created out of the mud of the trenches, but evolved from much longer
practices. From the fourteenth century to the present day, this work
analyses the changing commemoration and memories of British
battlefields at home and overseas, from Bannockburn (1314) to Bosworth
(1485) to Basra (1914-1921). Across these seven centuries, there have
been a series of recurring post-battle rituals that have shaped and
continue to shape memories of conflict. Three distinct but overlapping
periods of memory can be delineated: In the later Middle Ages
battlefields were consecrated by the burial of the fallen and often by
the erection of a battlefield cross, or chapel or chantry to pray for
the dead. The second phase began with the Protestant Reformation in
the 1530s, when pilgrimage and prayers for the dead was abolished, and
battlefield chantries were dissolved and many battlefield crosses were
demolished. Memories shifted from the dead to the living, especially
the bodies of surviving veterans who commemorated the conflict by
their wounds, and from soil and stone to print and ink. The third
phase began in the eighteenth century when antiquaries and others
established new monuments on past battlefields. Monuments to survivors
and the dead were established on contemporary battlefields such as
Waterloo, once again hailed as sacred ground hallowed by bloodshed,
fit destinations for a pilgrimage. Not just officers but ordinary
soldiers began to be memorialized by name on the battlefield,
culminating in the cult of the names of the dead enshrined by the
creation of the War Graves Commission in 1917, and the idea that
battlefields should be preserved unchanged as seen in modern heritage
management. Drawing on a wide variety of literary and historical
sources and taking a uniquely longue durée approach, the book
explores and links memory-making practices from across the period to
reconsider the ways in which battlefields are commemorated and
re-commemorated. In so doing, it makes a unique contribution to a wide
range of historiographical fields: British history since the
fourteenth century, memory studies, heritage studies, landscape
history, conflict archaeology, and military history.
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War, Memory, and Commemoration since the Fourteenth Century
Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9780198912873
Publisert
2024
Utgave
1. utgave
Utgiver
Vendor
OUP Oxford
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter