The concept of east central Europe as a separate entity is relatively recent. Though it has roots in medieval times as the area east of German-and Italianspeaking territory and west of Russia, it is only since the collapse of the Soviet Empire and the subsequent reorientation of most of the countries in the area west of Russia (i.e. central Europe) that east central Europe emerged as a politically self-conscious part of Europe. Nevertheless, its frontiers are not easily drawn.

The book under review, East Central Europe in the Middle Ages, is the third in the ten-volume series, A History of East Central Europe, under the general editorship of Peter F. Sugar and the late Donald W. Treadgold. It is comparable to W. Conze's posthumous Ostmitteleuropa: Von der Spatantike bis zum 18. Jahrhundert (Munich, 1993), although the German historian's chronological range was wider and his focus narrower. Most of the ten volumes in the East Central Europe series have already appeared: only volume ii, on the beginnings of history in east central Europe, volume iv, on the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, 1386‒1795, and volume x, on east central Europe since 1939, have yet to be published.

The volume by Sedlar, although somewhat arbitrarily limited to the period 1000‒1500, covers its complex theme less chronologically than by topics. To be sure, chapter 1 deals largely with the first millennium ad, and at least two major events occurred in the year 1000: Emperor Otto III visited Poland and the arch-diocese of Gniezno was established, and Hungary converted to Christianity. The cut-off year of 1500, however, boasts no such momentous events.

The book is divided into fifteen chapters: ‘Early Migrations’; ‘State Formation’; ‘Mon archies’; ‘Nobles and Landholders’; ‘Peasants, Herders, Serfs, and Slaves’; ‘Towns and Townspeople’; ‘Religion and the Churches’; ‘The Art and Practice of War’; ‘Governments’; ‘Laws and Justice’; ‘Commerce and Money’; ‘Foreign Affairs’; ‘Ethnicity and Nationalism’; ‘Languages and Literatures’; and ‘Education and Literacy’.