Studies on Constantinople (review)

Short notices 251 by detaUed scholarly work in the interval. Mackie's summaries of the economy, of the structure of society, of the demography of the kingdom, and of the role of nobility and gentry are dated. His assessment of Thomas Cromwell as simply a brilliant parliamentary manager seems eccentric to a post-Eltonian generation. Moreover, straight political history of this sort has gone out of fashion, so that the emphasis and approach of the volume seem limited and its underlying historical philosophy, the product of an age in which historical study at the better universities, whether or not it was overtly acknowledged, was one which prepared students for government and administration. The work remains, however, an admirable example of the difficult art of overview with aU the problems of structure and balance which are involved in producing an integrated and readable narrative. Sybil M . Jack Department of History Unversity of Sydney Mango, Cyril, Studies on Constantinople (Collected studies series, 394), Aldershot Variorum, 1993; cloth; pp. xii, 274; R.R.P. £52.00. Once again an exttemely useful addition to the Collected studies series, and a revealing contrast to Mango's earlier Variorum volume, Byzantium and its image. There w e were given wide-ranging historical and literary studies. Here we find the archaeologist and art historian at work. Despite generations of assiduous combing through the sources and a certain amount of archaeological activity, summed up in the work of Janin and Guilland and now most usefully in Midler-Wiener's Bildlexikon of Constantinopolitan topography, there still remain uncertainties about sites in tbe great city of Constantinople, and more seriously about the stages of the city's growth over the centuries. Some of the problems of detail are tackled here with Cyril Mango's usual trenchant common sense, profound knowledge of the city, and unrivalled familiarity with the sources, both textual and material. Thus there are papers (two previously unpublished) on the monumental columns and statuary of Constantinople (III, IV, IX-XI, XVI) and on the dates and dedications of churches (XU.-XV). Paper II draws attention to the under-utilized evidence of sixteenth- and nineteenth-century drawings of Constantinople. Some of these papers are well V-^wn and readUy accessible, others (e.g. II, XV, X X ) less so. All offer the judicious combination of archaeological andtextualevidence that Mango has taught us 252 Short notices to expect from his multi-faceted pen. A foretaste of his projected analysis of the city's development is provided in Paper I, a summary of his 1983 College de France lectures. Let us hope that Mango will be able to bring that major and much needed work to fruition. Elizabeth Jeffreys Department of M o d e m Greek University of Sydney Pagliaro, Teresa, ed., The La Trobe Library Journal, Vol. 13, Nos. 51 & 52, Melbourne, The friends of the State Library of Victoria, 1993; paper; pp. 92; R.R.P. AUS$18 + $2.00 postage [available from Brian Hubber, State Library of Victoria]. This is a special issue of the La Trobe Library Journal devoted to the medieval manuscripts of the State Library of Victoria. It contains the following articles: Brian Hubber, ' "Of the numerous opportunities": the origins of the collection of medieval manuscripts at the State Library of Victoria'; Margaret M . Manion, "The Codex Sancti Paschalis"; Judith Oliver, 'Devotional images and pious practices in a psalter from Liege'; Michael Michael and Nigel Morgan, "The Sarum breviary in the BaUlieu and Bodleian libraries'; Joan Naugbton, "Tbe Poissy antiphonary in its royal monastic milieu'; John Stinson, "Tbe Poissy antiphonal: a major source of late medieval chant'; Hilary Maddocks, ' "Me thowhte as I slepte that I was a pilgrime":textand iUustration in DeguilleviUe's Pilgrimages in the State Library of Victoria'; Cecilia O'Brien, 'Lorenzo's book: a medicean manuscript of the Augustan History'; and Vera Vines, ' "The daily round, the common task": three books of hours in the State Library of Victoria'. John H. Pryor Departmentof History University of Sydney Strohm, Paul, Social Chaucer, Cambridge, Mass., and London, Harvard University Press, 1994; rpt; paper; pp. xiii, 236; R.R.P. US$15.95. Not only did the old U S S R and its...