This debut volume in the new series Minnesota Studies in Early Modern History brings a comparative approach to what, in recent years, has been a hotly debated topic within and across a number of academic disciplines: conversion to Christianity. These debates register the challenges inherent in attempting to understand a transformation that was at once personal and collective - a matter of inner conviction and outward conformity. The essays in this volume range from the late antique Middle East to medieval Western and Eastern Europe; from early modern Asia to the Americas and islands in the Central Pacific. Collectively, the ten authors encourage consideration of the conversion phenomenon comparatively across time and space. Felipe Fernandez-Armesto, Prince of Asturias Professor the History at Tufts University, frames the essays in a broader global perspective in light of the two other major world religions, Islam and Buddhism, in his Prologue, while John M. Headley, Distinguished University Professor, University of North Carolina, considers the various conversion processes and their broader impact within the cultural transformation of the societies involved, foreshadowing "the uncertain extension of the universal jurisdiction of humanity ... to the peoples of the globe" that is one of the transformative processes of the 21st century. The Center for Early Modern History (CEMH), established nearly a quarter-century ago at the University of Minnesota, is a major center for the study of the early modern world (ca. 1350-1800) from a comparative perspective. This period is of vital interest to scholars in a variety of disciplines and it is the essential background to understanding global interactions in the modern world. Minnesota Studies in Early Modern History is a natural outgrowth of CEMH's mission to encourage interaction and collaboration among and within the scholarly community and to disseminate the results of that collaboration to the wider audience beyond academe.

Conversion to Christianity from Late Antiquity to the Modern Age: Considering the Process in Europe, Asia, and the Americas

Center for Early Modern History

Dramatic events involving religious leaders and their more zealous followers have intruded on the world s stage in recent decades, bringing renewed attention to religion as a significant factor in modern society. This collection of essays, drawn from a conference inspired by the tragic events of September 11, 2001, explores religious conflict and accommodation in various places around the world in the early modern period. The individual studies, though focused on an earlier time, illuminate the challenges facing the early twenty-first-century world, some of which may be hauntingly familiar. Professor James Tracy discusses the battle between Christianity and Islam in Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean basin, what he calls the background war of the early modern period. His essay reminds us that these two groups of believers were long-standing enemies, both sides preoccupied with challenges to their own faith. The relationship between religion and politics played out much differently in other parts of the early modern world and the studies in this volume reflect a complexity and diversity of experience that ranges from the conflicts within Christianity during the French Wars of Religion to the Mughal emperor Akbar s attempts to forge mutual understanding among the varied cultures under his rule to the struggles between the Spanish and Chinese for supremacy in the Philippines. Religious conflict has long been a worldwide issue, as these essays attest, yet as they also demonstrate, accommodation was not only possible, it was often quite successful.

Religious Conflict and Accommodation in the Early Modern World

Timothy Brook

James D. Tracy

William D. Phillips Jr.

Jamie Rae Bluestone

Anne Marie Wolf

Stephen P. Blake

Denis Crouzet

Graeme Murdock

Luca Codignola

Frederick Asher

The founder of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), Zhu Yuanzhang, was one of the most colorful rulers in China's long imperial history. His rise from poverty, participation in a millenarian movement, expulsion of the Mongols, unification of the empire, three decades of tumultuous rule, paranoia, and bloody purges are all the stuff of legend. Ever since his death in 1398 popular stories and more formal accounts from across East Asia have sought to make sense of the Ming founder and deploy his memory for a wide range of uses. Long Live the Emperor! brings together twenty essays examining how his stormy career has been interpreted in politics, the arts, outside of China, and in our own time. Sarah Schneewind conceived the idea of surveying the historiographical heritage of the Ming founder and brought together a constellation of specialist, each with a different story to tell. Contributors to the volume include: Chan Hok-lam, Laurie Dennis, Peter Ditmanson, Anne Gerritsen, Deborah Sommer, Gang Zhao, Harry Miller, Jaret Weisfogel, Jian Yonglin, Zvi Ben-Dor Benite, Seung B. Kye, Par Cassel, John K. Whitmore, Rebecca Nedostup, Q. Edward Wang, Gray Tuttle, and Sarah Schneewind.

Long Live the Emperor! Uses of the Ming Founder across Six Centuries of East Asian History (Ming Studies Research, No. 4)

Local Administration in Ming China: The Changing Roles of Magistrates, Prefects, and Provincial Officals

Thomas G. Nimick

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