J.A. Burrow & Ian P. Wei 
Medieval Futures 
Attitudes to the Future in the Middle Ages

Studies of varied ways in which medieval people imagined the future, reasons behind such representations, and the implications for an understanding of medieval society as a whole.


Medieval Futures explores the rich variety of ways in which medieval people imagined the future, from the prophetic anticipation of the end of the world to the mundane expectation that the world would continue indefinitely, permitting ordinary human plans and provisions. The articles explore the ways in which the future was represented to serve the present, methods used to predict the future, and strategies adopted in order to plan and provide for it. Different conceptions of the future are shown to relate to different social groups and the emergence of new mentalities, suggesting that changing conceptions of the future were related to general shifts in medieval culture.J.A. BURROW is Professor Emeritus and Senior Research Fellow at the University of Bristol; IAN P. WEI is Senior Lecturer in History and Director of the Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of Bristol.Contributors: PIERO BOITANI, PAUL BRAND, ELIZABETH A.R. BROWN, MARCUS BULL, JOHN BURROW, RHIANNON PURDIE, PHYLLIS B. ROBERTS, JEAN-CLAUDE SCHMITT, IAN P. WEI

Table of Content

Those who will call this time ancient: The Futures of Prophecy and Poetry – Piero Boitani

In perpetuum: the Rhetoric and Reality of Attempts to Control the Future in the English Medieval Common Law – Paul A Brand

The King’s Conundrum: Endowing Queens and Loyal Servants, Ensuring Salvation, and Protecting the Patrimony in Fourteenth-Century France France – Elizabeth A R Brown

The French Aristocracy and the Future, c.1000-c.1200 – Marcus Bull

The Third Eye of Prudence –

Dice-games and the Blasphemy of Prediction –

Prophecy, Hagiography and St Thomas of Canterbury – Phyllis B Roberts

Appropriating the Future – Jean-Claude Schmitt

Introduction –

Predicting the Future to Judge the Present: Paris Theologians and Attitudes to the Future –

About the author

MARCUS BULL is Andrew W. Mellon Distinguished Professor of Medieval and Early Modern Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill