A detailed study of the political relations between England and the papacy from 1858 to 1861, the decisive years for the unification of Italy.

The book studies the use made by the British government of its envoy, immured inside the Vatican from 1940 to 1944, and what the envoy made of such opportunities during the Second World War to help the Allied cause. We see the Vatican, the Fascist Italy, from 'inside', and so gain a new and rare perspective into the predicament of the papacy. Owen Chadwick gives insight into the workings of the Vatican, including such questions as the struggle to keep Italy out of the war, the relations between the Vatican and the Fascist government, the use which the British sought to make of Vatican radio, the question of condemning atrocities, the bombing of Rome, the fall of Fascism, the armistice between the Allies and Italy, the German occupation of Rome, and the escape line for British prisoners of war. The author has used several groups of hitherto unexplored archives, and makes a fresh contribution both to the history of the Second World War and to the modern history of the papacy.

"Much has been written about the complex relationship between England and the papacy in the 14th century, yet the form (rather than the content) of the diplomatic intercourse between these two protagonists has not hitherto been examined in detail. Drawing on a wide range of unpublished sources, Pluger explores the techniques of communication employed by the Crown in its dealings with Clement VI (1342-52) and Innocent VI (1352-62). Methodologies of social and cultural history and of International Relations are brought to bear on the analysis of the dialogue between Westminster and Avignon, resulting in a more complete picture of 14th-century Anglo-papal relations in particular and of medieval diplomatic practice in general."

The lengthy period of the Avignon papacy in the fourteenth century created circumstances in which the burgeoning bureaucracy of the papal curia could flourish. Papal involvement in the everyday business of the church at local level reached its fullest extent in the years before the Great Schism. This book examines the impact of that involvement in Scotland and northern England, and analyses the practical effect of theories of papal sovereignty at a time when there was still widespread acceptance of the role of the Holy See. The nature and importance of political opposition, from both crown and parliament, is investigated from the standpoint of the validity of the complaints as indicated by local evidence, and a new interpretation is offered of the various statutory measures taken in England in Edward III's reign to control alleged abuses of papal power. Points of similarity and difference between Scotland and England are also given due emphasis. This is the first work to attempt to analyse the full breadth of papal involvement in late medieval Britain by utilising the rich local sources in association with material from the Vatican archives.

This study, beginning after Agincourt with Henry V's seeking of alliances and recognition for his gains and claims to the French throne through the Treaty of Troyes, describes the way in which the papacy's "plenitude of power" functioned through its representatives in England from 1417 to 1464.

This book offers a unique and fascinating examination of British and Irish responses to Italian independence and unification in the mid-nineteenth century. Chapters explore the interplay of religion, politics, exile, feminism, colonialism and romanticism in fuelling impassioned debates on the 'Italian question' on both sides of the Irish Sea.

England and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages: Papal Privileges in European Perspective, c. 680-1073 provides the first dedicated, book-length study of interactions between England and the papacy throughout the early middle ages. It takes as its lens the extant English record of papal privileges: legal diplomas drawn-up on metres-long scrolls of Egyptian papyrus, acquired by pilgrim-petitioners within the city of Rome, and then brought back to Britain to negotiate local claims and conflicts. How, why, and when did English petitioners choose to invoke the distant authority of Rome in this way, and how did this compare to what was taking place elsewhere in Europe? How successful were these efforts, and how were they remembered in later centuries? By using these still-understudied papal documents to reassess what we know of the worlds of Bede, the Mercian Supremacy, the West Saxon 'Kingdom of the English', and the Norman Conquest--locating them in the process within a comparative, Europe-wide setting--this book offers important new contributions to Anglo-Saxon studies, legal and documentary history, papal history, and the study of early medieval Europe more widely. It also includes an annotated handlist of the corpus of English papal privileges up to 1073--a critical reference work for future research in the field.