Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- List of abbreviations
- Notes on the text
- Political map of sixteenth-century Ireland circa 1534
- CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN EARLY MODERN BRITISH HISTORY
- Introduction
- 1 Chimneys in summer
- 2 Martial men and their discontents
- 3 The limits of allegiance: English martial men, Europe and the Elizabethan regime
- 4 The captains and the Irish context
- 5 The limits of imperium: martial men and government
- 6 The limits of rhetoric: the captains and violence in Elizabethan Ireland to 1588
- 7 Unlimited indemnity: delegates versus viceroys
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
2 - Martial men and their discontents
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 July 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- List of abbreviations
- Notes on the text
- Political map of sixteenth-century Ireland circa 1534
- CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN EARLY MODERN BRITISH HISTORY
- Introduction
- 1 Chimneys in summer
- 2 Martial men and their discontents
- 3 The limits of allegiance: English martial men, Europe and the Elizabethan regime
- 4 The captains and the Irish context
- 5 The limits of imperium: martial men and government
- 6 The limits of rhetoric: the captains and violence in Elizabethan Ireland to 1588
- 7 Unlimited indemnity: delegates versus viceroys
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
My words are not well chosen; I care little for that. Merit shows well enough in itself. It is they who have need of art, who gloss over their shameful acts with specious words. Nor have I studied Greek letters. I did not care to know them, because they had not taught their teachers virtue. But I have learned by far the most important lesson for the good of my country – to strike down the foe, to keep watch and ward, to fear nothing save ill repute … to sleep on the ground, to bear privation and fatigue at the same time. It is with these lessons that I shall encourage my soldiers.
Marius to an assembly of the people in Sallust's Bellum Jugurthae.The Christian humanist case against the ‘martialist’ was straightforward. There was a place for everything, even fighting, but everything had to be in its proper place; those who followed soldiering tended to bring conflict back into society with them. Simply put, Christ had told His followers to turn the other cheek. But even the import of this non-violent maxim was contentious.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Martial Power and Elizabethan Political CultureMilitary Men in England and Ireland, 1558–1594, pp. 51 - 85Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009
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