Description
Neil J. Cummins of LSE and his co-author use the full-texts of ~36,000 English wills to generate estimates of religiosity, 1300-1850. They distinguish between pro-forma performative statements of belief in a creator God in the preamble, which they term “nominal” religiosity, from “real” religiosity, non-template religious statements in the latter part of the will, and bequests to religious entities. They code wills algorithmically for a set of religious variables, such as mentions of God, Jesus, the Saints, a Soul, separately for the preamble, and the rest of the will. They then construct unitary indices using Principal Component Analysis. The broad picture as understood by historians is confirmed by the dramatic and large rise in nominal religiosity from 1400 to 1650, from an index value ~20 to ~60, on a 0-100 scale. This rise appears to track the cultural shift of the period well and quantitatively captures the social milieu that would result in the English reformation. During this webinar, Neil J. Cummins will explain this behavior change occurs at the same time as the decline in aristocratic violence (Cummins (2017)), and like violence, precedes the behavior change of the poor by many centuries. Here they find new evidence of the emergence of modern behavior, and the roots of the enlightenment, and the scientific and Industrial Revolutions.
Neil J. Cummins's co-author: Aurelius Noble (Transkribus)
Discussant: Ji Li, Associate Professor of History, HKU School of Modern Languages and Cultures and IHSS
*By registering for this webinar, you agree to receive free Quantitative History related materials, including event notices. You can also update your preferences at any time. Existing subscribers' newsletter preferences will not be affected.