Europe

Testament of an Elite Wife during the Black Death

The following will belongs to the butcher Phylippinus' wife. The butcher and his wife were a well-off couple, owning at least two shops in Bologna's central meat market as well as land outside of Bologna in Borgo Panigale.

Testament of an Elite Husband during the Black Death

The following will belongs to the butcher Phylippinus. The butcher and his wife were a well-off couple, owning at least two shops in Bologna's central meat market as well as land outside of Bologna in Borgo Panigale.

Alexander Herzen’s My Past and Thoughts

Autobiographical writing as a rich source for the exploration of European childhood and youth is self evident; in many cases, it is one of the most nuanced ways to understand historical actors' earliest experiences.

Holocaust Girls/Closet

This short story by fiction writer, S.L. Wisenberg, sheds light on the influence of Anne Frank on the imagination and identity of Jewish girls growing up in postwar America.

Marxists Internet Archive

Sieyès, "What Is the Third Estate?" (1789)

Emmanuel–Joseph Sieyès was born at Fréjus, 3 May 1748. He was educated at a Jesuit school, became a licentiate of the canon law, and was appointed vicar–general by the bishop of Chartres.

Antislavery Agitation: Abbé Raynal, Philosophical and Political History of the Settlements and Trade of the Europeans in the East and West Indies (1770)

Abbé Guillaume–Thomas Raynal (1711–96), known by his clerical title [abbé refers to ecclesiastical training], first published his multivolume history of European colonization anonymously in French in 1770.

Zalkind–Hourwitz, Vindication of the Jews (1789)

In 1789, 40,000 Jews lived in France, most of them in the eastern provinces of Alsace and Lorraine. In some respects, they were better treated than Calvinists under the laws of the monarchy; Jews could legally practice their religion, though their other activities were severely restricted.

Rousseau’s The Social Contract

Jean–Jacques Rousseau was the maverick of the Enlightenment. Born a Protestant in Geneva in 1712 (d. 1778), he had to support himself as a music copyist. Unlike Voltaire and Montesquieu, both of whom came from rich families, Rousseau faced poverty nearly all his life.

Montesquieu, "The Spirit of the Laws"

In The Spirit of the Laws published in 1748, Montesquieu took a less playful tone. Rather than lampooning French customs as he did in The Persian Letters, he offered a wide–ranging comparative analysis of governmental institutions.