Mollat, Michel : The Poor in the Middle Ages - An Essay in Social History

Translated by Arthur Goldhammer.

Written by the world's leading authority on the subject, this sophisticated & comprehensive book traces the history of the poor from the 5th to the 15th century. Michel Mollat (professor of medieval history, the Sorbonne) examines the ways in which successive generations viewed poverty & the poor & surveys the monasteries & hospitals that were the chief organs of charity, paying particular attention to St. Francis & St. Dominic & the orders they established. Professor Mollat also explores how social, economic & political circumstances affected public perception of the poor. In addition, he vividly describes the poor themselves, showing that, while the poor shared the same moral & physical dependency, they were not alike. They were "Christ's paupers," those struck down by sickness, age or misfortune known as "suffering members of the Communion of Saints." There were the working poor, whose labor did not bring them enough to survive & they were the hermits, former monks or clerics, who voluntarily embraced poverty for religious reasons. Mollat examines the attitudes & lives of the poor, revealing their suffering, their resignation, & their occasional vengeance. His book, originally published in France in 1978 to great acclaim, is the fruit of a great tradition of French scholarship in the discipline of history & is a major & enduring contribution to social history.