In 1720s London, a well-known band of young ruffians gave themselves crescent tattoos and adorned turbans in honour of their so-called 'mohamattan [Muslim]' Indian namesakes, the Mohawk. Few Britons noticed the gang's mistaken muddling of North American and Indian subcontinent geographies and cultures. Even fewer cared in an age in which 'Indian' was a catch-all term applied to theatre characters, philosophies, and objects whose only common characteristic often was that they were not European. Yet just thirty years later, when the North American empire had entered centre stage, Londoners bought Iroquois tomahawks at auctions; provincial newspapers debated Cherokee politics; women shopkeepers read aloud newspaper accounts of frontier battles as their husbands counted the takings; church congregations listened to the sermons of American Indian converts; families toured museum exhibits of American Indian artefacts; and Oxford dons wagered their bottles of port on the outcome of American wars. Focusing on the question, 'How did the British who remained in Britain perceive American Indians, and how did these perceptions reflect and affect British culture?', Savages within the Empire explores both how Britons engaged with the peripheries of their Atlantic empire without leaving home, and, equally important, how their forged understanding significantly affected the British and their rapidly expanding world. It draws from a wide range of evidence to consider an array of eighteenth-century contexts, including material culture, print culture, imperial government policy, the Church of England's missionary endeavours, the Scottish Enlightenment, and the public outcry over the use of American Indians as allies during the American War of Independence. By chronicling and exploring discussions and representations of American Indians in these contexts, Troy Bickham reveals the proliferation of empire-related subjects in eighteenth-century British culture as well as the prevailing pragmatism with which Britons approached them.

'Barbarism and Religion' - Edward Gibbon's own phrase - is the title of a sequence of works by John Pocock designed to situate Gibbon, and his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, in a series of contexts in the history of eighteenth-century Europe. In the fourth volume in the sequence, first published in 2005, Pocock argues that barbarism was central to the history of western historiography, to the history of the Enlightenment, and to Edward Gibbon himself. As a concept it was deeply problematic to Enlightened historians seeking to understand their own civilised societies in the light of exposure to newly discovered civilisations which were, until then, beyond the reach of history itself.

Intended for the professional academic and graduate student, this book is the first to utilize the methodology of “New Stream” legal scholarship in an extended critical “exegesis” of Hugo Grotius’ De Indis (c.1604-6). De Indis is predicated upon a two-fold discursive strategy: (i) investing “private” Trading Companies with “public” international legal personality, and (ii) collapsing the distinction between “private” and “public” warfare. Governing the operation of textual interpretation is De Indis’ status as a republican treatise juridically legitimating an early modern Trans-National corporation (the VOC) that served as an agent of a “primitive” system of global governance, the early Capitalist World-Economy. The application of New Stream scholarship reveals that the republican signature of De Indis consists of a discursive “micro-oscillation” between the “thick” ontology of Late Scholasticism (“Utopia”) and the “thin” ontology of Civic Humanism (“Apology”) wholly appropriate to the governance requirements of the embryonic Modern World-System.

The Aventine Empire is crumbling under the attacks of savages armed with strange and dangerous powers. Exiled from the empire, a powerful telepath named Leonardo is captured by the savages, and finds himself in unfamiliar territory. Prepared for their brutality and mindless aggression, Leonardo learns their world differs from what he has been taught, and he is forced to question all of his previously held assumptions. This edition includes the first three works of the seven-volume Savage Empire series, last issued more than 10 years ago.

This second book in the Savage Empire series introduces two new continuing characters to the saga of the Savage Empire. Zanos the Gladiator and Astra, a master reader, are loyal citizens of the Aventine Empire. Nevertheless, one holds a deadly secret and the other is drawn into a high-level conspiracy that brings them together and propels them into a desperate flight to the Savage Empire. A prophecy of peace and hope might provide a new life for them there-if their pursuing enemies don't kill them first. One of Zanos and Astra's new friends in the Savage Empire is the blind reader Torio, who has unexpectedly gained the rare talent of prophecy. The cryptic messages of his new gift send Zanos, Astra, Torio, and his beloved Melissa on a danger-filled journey north to Zanos's homeland. There, each one finds a personal destiny, and all must pay a price for confronting the lethal Sorcerers of the Frozen Isles.

This book examines the multifaceted reactions of political and religious leaders to the Anabaptist reign in Münster (1534-1535). It takes as its point of departure Protestant Strasbourg, Catholic Cologne, as well as the Rhineland, and then broadens the perspective to imperial estates and the empire. The author analyzes the representations of the Münsterites and juxtaposes the fierce language with the actions that were taken to eliminate the Anabaptist menace at home and in Münster. The book is particularly important for scholars of Catholic Reform, of the empire and of confessionalization, of Cologne and Strasbourg, and of Anabaptism.

In Russia's cultural memory, the Caucasus is a potent point of reference, to which many emotions, images, and stereotypes are attached. The book gives a new reading of the development of Russia's perception of its borderlands and presents a complex picture of the encounter between the Russians and the indigenous population of the Caucasus. The study outlines the history of a region standing in between Russian reveries and Russian imperialism. (Series: Studies on South East Europe, Vol. 19) [Subject: History, Russian Studies, Ethnology]

"This study examines law enforcement within the context of Sung society. Professor McKnight shows that the group of criminals who were the core of the habitual criminal group in Sung China were young unattached males with few lifeskills. What became of the criminal after capture and conviction is also an important aspect of this study, which addresses basic questions in Chinese punishment. This work is the first comprehensive study of law enforcement in traditional China. The depth and rigor to which the subject is treated would make it most appropriate for scholars in legal history and East Asian studies."--Publisher's description.

From one of the world's leading experts on Native American law and indigenous peoples' human rights comes an original and striking intellectual history of the tribe and Western civilization that sheds new light on how we understand ourselves and our contemporary society. Throughout the centuries, conquest, war, and unspeakable acts of violence and dispossession have all been justified by citing civilization's opposition to these differences represented by the tribe. Robert Williams, award winning author, legal scholar, and member of the Lumbee Indian Tribe, proposes a wide-ranging reexamination of the history of the Western world, told from the perspective of civilization's war on tribalism as a way of life. Williams shows us how what we thought we knew about the rise of Western civilization over the tribe is in dire need of reappraisal.

Benjamin Hopkins develops a new theory of colonial administration: frontier governmentality. This system placed indigenous peoples at the borders of imperial territory, where they could be both exploited and kept away. Today's "failed states" are a result. Condemned to the periphery of the global order, they function as colonial design intended.