A new book on A Global History of Early Modern Violence, edited by Erica Charters, Marie Houllemare, and Peter H. Wilson, has been published by Manchester University Press.

The book description at Manchester University Press’s website reads: “This is the first extensive analysis of large-scale violence and the methods of its restraint in the early modern world. Using examples from Asia, Africa, the Americas and Europe, it questions the established narrative that violence was only curbed through the rise of western-style nation states and civil societies. Global history allows us to reframe and challenge traditional models for the history of violence and to rethink categories and units of analysis through comparisons. By decentring Europe and exploring alternative patterns of violence, the contributors to this volume articulate the significance of violence in narratives of state- and empire-building, as well as in their failure and decline, while also providing new means of tracing the transition from the early modern to modernity.”

This collective volume grew out of a conference on early modern violence at All Souls College, Oxford University in the summer of 2017.

I was pleased to have the opportunity to participate in the conference and to publish a chapter in the collective volume.

My essay in the volume is: Brian Sandberg, “Ravages and Depredations: Raiding War and Globalization in the Early Modern World,” in A Global History of Early Modern Violence, ed. Erica Charters, Marie Houllemare, and Peter H. Wilson (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2020), 88-102.

Manchester University Press provides further information about the book.