The ‘revolution in semidurables’ (in objects made of earthenware or glass) was, as we contend in this chapter, one of the most visible aspects of the power attained by peasant consumers. The extent of the development of these industries to satisfy growing demand was a distinctive reaction by producers in the late medieval European context, for pottery and glass manufactures were more developed and had a longer tradition in the Mediterranean space. The Islamic inheritance and know-how provided Valencian craftsmen with a genuine means of attracting the attention of peasant consumers who possessed a growing desire for novelties. Such changes also had implications for durable materials, like objects made of wood, copper, and iron, leading some food-related objects made of them to be consumed less.

Chapter 3 focuses on the mechanisms through which certain special temple buildings were invested with an essential "prospective" role for empire and how in the face of crisis—especially the physical destruction of the buildings along with the challenge to the claims for continuity and security that came with them—those mechanisms were renewed or transformed.

The argument of this chapter is that it was a combination of emulation and assimilation that shaped the logic of Valencian peasants as consumers of food-related objects. In making this case, this chapter provides evidence on emulative attitudes through contemporary moral criticisms and sumptuary laws. It also explores the meanings of food-related objects and how peasants used such notions in their dwellings. The chapter concludes that peasant consumer behaviour was not solely and passively guided by a will to imitate others but by an interest in absorbing what was relevant from others into their lifestyles, and for their own aims. This deliberate, conscious assimilation led peasants to incorporate new objects into their own familial and social needs.

Buildings frequently change over their lifespans as they are adapted to new needs and affected by damage and decay, yet our approaches to architectural history often fail to account for the material and cultural effects of interventions on existing structures or to pursue the critical questions they raise about temporality and urban environments. The book’s Introduction orients readers to diachronic approaches to architectural history, that is, beyond the moment of initial construction, oriented to the perspective of historical actors. In recognizing moments of architectural revision and rebuilding as inflection points, it stresses the importance of accounting for architectural fabrics composed of variously dated elements and of examining the ways that architectural change shapes audience perception of the site’s history and their own era’s relationship to it. Close examination of two exceptionally long-lasting structures, the Pantheon in Rome and the Hagia Sophia/Ayasofia in Constantinople/Istanbul present a compelling contrast to most modern forms of architectural restoration and illustrate central themes of the book. The chapter situates study of historical architecture within current approaches to cultural time and to material culture and places architectural change in dialogue with text-based approaches to Roman temporality.

This chapter analyzes the controversy that arose after the assassination of Henry IV in 1610 between the Jesuits, especially Cardinal Robert Bellarmine and Jacques Davy du Peron, and Louis XIII and his royalist supporters in France. Peron claimed in print that the young Louis XIII was illegitimate becasue the pope had annulled the marriage of Henry IV to Marguerite de Valois.. He further claimed that the popes authority was superior to that of kings. This chapter demonstrates that the language used to denounce Bellarmine and Peron by Gallican supporters of the crown, especially at the Estates General of 1614, underscored the vocabulary of the royal state.

The purpose of this chapter is to estimate expenditure on consumption by cross-referencing the nominal prices of food-related objects with the quantified consumption levels obtained earlier in this book. This is an appropriate way to explore how far consumption increased in monetary terms, the changes in its composition over time and its impact on peasant incomes. Estimating expenditure on food-related objects proves also a good way of exploring how much these goods represented as a share of movable wealth, as well as what these types of items represented as compared to other goods owned by peasant households.

This conclusion summarises the main findings of this research and highlights its contributions to existing narratives and debates on the development of consumption, material culture, and living standards in European scholarship. The Valencian experience is placed within an international framework to examine the relationship between the late medieval and early modern ‘consumer revolutions’, between consumption and economic growth, and between the economic and the extra-economic driving forces of consumption. It is argued that late medieval consumer societies emerged not as a Malthusian inevitability caused by the Black Death, but as a result of social agency. The improvement of material culture was a deliberate choice to enhance living conditions, driven by existing preferences and aspirations. This silent demand, once met, had lasting effects. The spending power of peasants with higher disposable incomes sustained industries producing mass-consumption goods. The demand from ordinary people was a crucial economic force, stressing the transformative power of peasant consumers.

This chapter explores the key context in which food-related goods were used, seen, and kept by peasants: home. Attention is given to the physical appearance and internal organisation of peasant homes in late medieval Valencia, as well as to the place that daily meals occupied within peasants’ everyday activity, labour, and way of life. The purpose of this chapter is to set a basic framework for the rest of the chapters of Part I, on the usages and practices surrounding food-related objects.

This chapter examines the period from the Estates General of 1614 to the Fronde (1648–1651), especially the political discourse of the Assemblies of Notables in 1617 and 1626–1627, as well as the dozens of political pamphlets denouncing Anne of Austria, the young Louis XIVs regent, and his first minister, Jules Mazarin. These pamphlets, known as Mazarinades, use the clear vocabulary of absolutism and royal State, as the judges in the Parlement of Paris recognized the authority of the king in return for the judges elevation as first degree nobles.

Comparative regional analysis on consumption based on inventories does feature in the relevant scholarship, although mostly with a focus on the contrast between town and countryside. A common finding in that sense has been that consumers in more urbanised locations owned a wider set of possessions and novelties, particularly in regions with the presence of large metropolis. Little attention has been paid, however, to contrasts in the consumer behaviour of peasants across regions with different degrees of urbanisation and economic development. This is the perspective adopted in this chapter, with the purpose of assessing how far changes in consumption were experienced by Valencian peasants as a whole or, conversely, only by those living in particular regions.

The purpose of this chapter is to reconstruct trends in the price of food-related objects. This chapter is divided into three sections. The first section explains the available sources for studying the value of everyday objects and reveals how a sample of prices was built for this purpose. The next section explores differences in prices over the kingdom of Valencia, showing a remarkable trans-regional uniformity. This phenomenon will be the basis for the last section, in which price trends are reconstructed at the level of the realm.

The first set of chapters operates at the level of patrons and their communities—imperial and local—to grapple with architectural rebuilding as a mechanism through which shared pasts, presents, and futures were articulated and substantiated. Chapter 1 examines architectural rebuilding as an ideological virtue. In particular, it looks to evidence from Roman and late antique histories, coins, and inscribed statue bases to chart the place and shape of architectural rebuilding (in comparison with and juxtaposition to new construction projects) within the broader commemorative landscape of honor and virtue in cities across the Mediterranean.