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© 2006 The Historical Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

in the communes. Through his examination of this dynamic process, Thompsonprovides a sense of the role that local agency played in the lived religion of theearly communes, especially in the period before these communes felt the fullimpact of the mendicant orders.

Part I of Cities of God, entitled ‘Sacred Geography’, maps the religious andcivic landscape of the commune. Chapter 1 examines the role of ecclesiasticalinstitutions in the formation of civic identity, while chapter 3 examines howcommunal institutions created new spaces in the sacred landscape through lan-guage, ritual and association with patron saints. Collectively, these two chaptersalong with chapter 4, which examines the use of ritual to create civic identity,paint a richly textured picture of how republican identity took shape, in partthrough the use of lived space and lived ritual. The two other chapters in partone focus on the prominence in the Italian communes of two types of holypeople: the conversi, lay penitents whose movement preceded and in some wayslaid the groundwork for the communal civic organizations, and local lay saints,who provided the foci for semi-official ‘charismatic’ landscapes in communallived religion.

Part II, entitled ‘Religious Observance’, examines religious practices andrituals from the varied perspectives of its participants both lay and clerical.Chapter 6 focuses on the key rituals of Divine Office and Mass. Chapters 7 and8 examine how groups within urban society experienced the liturgical year.The final two chapters examine prayer life and the experience of death in thecommunes. In the epilogue Thompson examines how the arrival of the mendi-cant orders profoundly altered the sacred geography and lived religion of theItalian communes.

Thompson’s focus on orthodox lived religion makes this work a welcomeaddition to the field and his conclusions, particularly on the influence of‘ordinary people’ on forms of devotion and on the religious dimensions ofcommunal government, offer new perspectives on the early developmentof Italian city-states.University of Southern Mississippi ERIC NELSON

The Book of Deeds of James I of Aragon: A Translation of the Medieval CatalanLlibre dels Fets. Edited and translated by Damian Smith and Helena Buffery.Ashgate. 2003. xviii + 405pp. £42.50.

The Llibre dels fets del rei en Jaume, or ‘Book of the Deeds of King James’, avernacular account of the reign of James I of Aragon (1213–76), is among themost remarkable works of historical writing to have survived from thirteenth-century Europe. Although it is conceivable that some sections of the Llibre,notably the preface, may have been either penned or refashioned by James’schancellor and later bishop of Huesca, Jaume Sarroca, the general consensusamong scholarly opinion is that the work, an intensely personal account of thereign composed in the first person plural, was written, or at least dictated, by theking himself. The Llibre is chiefly given over to a detailed narrative of the king’smilitary exploits, in particular the conquests of Majorca (1229–31) and Valencia(1232–45), and the campaign to recover Murcia on behalf of Alfonso X ofCastile (1264–6). Yet, it is a partial account, for there is much else that the kingeither glosses over or entirely ignores, notably his unsuccessful attempts to

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protect his dynastic interests in southern France, which culminated in the treatyof Corbeil. His account of his protracted negotiations with his nobles is bothpartial and misleading in many respects. Yet, James’s primary purpose in com-posing the work was not simply to trumpet his achievements to posterity, but toprovide his successors on the throne of Aragon with a practical guidebook onhow best to meet the challenges, military and political, that they would subse-quently encounter. This new English translation of the Llibre, the first sinceJohn Forster’s in 1883, is carried out with exemplary skill and accuracy by Dam-ian Smith and Helena Buffery. Particularly useful are the numerous detailednotes, which buttress the text throughout and help to elucidate many aspects ofthe work which might otherwise baffle the reader. The volume is supplementedwith maps, bibliography and glossary.University of Exeter SIMON BARTON

The Fifteenth Century, V. Of Mice and Men: Image, Belief and Regulation inLate Medieval England. Edited by Linda Clark. Boydell. 2005. ix + 181pp.£45.00.

The titles of fifteenth-century conference volumes have to be alliterative: alldevotees of the series know that. For years changes have been rung on the letters‘c’ and ‘p’; now it’s the turn of ‘m’. The editor tells us that the title is promptedby the title of Colin Richmond’s paper, ‘Mickey Mouse in Disneyland: How didthe Fifteenth Century Get That Way?’. Richmond’s piece is a plea for a less triv-ialized Mickey Mouse-style public presentation of the medieval past. Most read-ers looking at the title, however, will probably think of Robert Burns or JohnSteinbeck rather than Walt Disney; ‘best laid plans’ which come to nought willspring to mind. If that is the case, they will not be disappointed. There is muchto be found in this volume on the mutability of human fortunes. Alasdair Hawk-yard offers an exemplary discussion of Caister castle, Sir John Fastolf’s Norfolkpalace, showing just how magnificent the place was before the long decline fol-lowing his death. Paul Cavill, through a meticulous examination of court rollevidence, analyses the difficulties which governments and local administratorsfaced in regulating wage rates in the late fifteenth century. Jon Denton, in a stim-ulating essay, considers the reasons which might have led a Leicestershire gentle-man, Ralph Woodford, to commission a morbid cadaver slab for his tomb inAshby Folville church. Thomas Freeman, in a different take on the theme, showshow the disastrous Henry VI enjoyed a new life in Blacman’s Collectarium as aparadigm of elite lay piety. Other essays in the volume relate to the connectedthemes of belief and regulation. Jenni Nuttall considers the meanings whichmight have been attached to the earl of Northumberland’s use of the signature‘Vostre Mathathias’ (‘your Mattathias’) in a letter to Henry IV. Clive Burgess, inanother stimulating essay, shows how a decline in Bristol chantry foundations inthe early fifteenth century was reversed after 1440 in response to episcopal andgovernmental initiatives. S. A. Mileson offers a meticulous analysis of the role ofaristocratic parks in fifteenth-century social and cultural relations, while AnneSutton argues persuasively that Caxton’s decision to print a life of St Winifredwas prompted by the migration of Shrewsbury folk to London. For specialists infifteenth-century England, this is a rich and rewarding volume.Royal Holloway, University of London NIGEL SAUL