MILITARY HISTORY OF MIDDLE AGES

The course aims at presenting the various historical dimension of warfare.The emphasis is more on the institutional and social aspects than on the purely technical ones, in order to understand the close interrelations between military institutions and society.

Students are expected to understand both the specifics of military history and its importance to understand the more general dynamics of society and the state

No prerequisite is requested.

The course deals with warfare from variuos points of view, institutional, technological, social and political as well. A long term approach, from the late middle ages to the First World War, will allow to examine wars' structural changes and their various implications.

Main topics:

Changes of warfare between the late middle ages to the early modern times
A military revolution?
State and war in Europe 1400-1900
The Great War, 1914-18

J. Keegan, Il volto della battaglia. Azincourt, Waterloo, La Somme, Milano, Il Saggiatore, 2010;
J. Keegan, La prima guerra mondiale. Una storia politico-militare, Roma, carocci, 2004;
J. Lynn, Battle: A History of Combat and Culture, Boulder, Basic Books, 2003
G. Parker, La rivoluzione militare. Le innovazioni militari e il sorgere dell'Occidente, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1999;
F. Tallett, War and Society in Early Modern Europe: 1495-1715, London, Routledge, 1992;
The Military Revolution Debate: Readings on The Military Transformation of Early Modern Europe, ed. by C.J. Rogers, Boulton, Westview 1995;
J. Chagniot, Guerre et societe a l'epoque moderne, Paris, Puf, 2001;
I. Glete, La guerra sul mare, 1500-1650, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2010;
La Guerra italo-austriaca (1915-18), a cura di N. Labanca e O. Ueberegger, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2014;
G. Breccia, 1915: l’Italia va in trincea, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2015;
M. Isnenghi e G. Rochat, La Grande Guerra, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2008;
A. Monticone, Gli italiani in uniforme 1915-1918, Bari, Laterza, 1972;
P. Melograni, Storia politica della Grande Guerra 1915-1918, Bari, Laterza, 1969
La Prima Guerra Mondiale, a cura di A. Gibelli, Torino, Einaudi, 2007

Students are expected to actively participate in class, deliver two written paper.

Frontal lectures and active participation of students

Italian

Students are requested to attend classes, for they will partly have a workshop-style character. Attending students must to make a presentation in class and write a paper. Non attending students must to read a text assigned by the teacher and to present two papers.
Evaluation criteria:
Attending 20%
Presentation 40%
Paper 40%

written and oral