Most of the theoretical contributions to issues of Studies of Medievalism dedicated to “Political Medievalism,” like the many books that have proliferated on this topic over the last ten years, have focused on medievalist tropes revived by members of the English-speaking entertainment industry or deployed by right-leaning politicians as a “conceptual weapon.” In this brief contribution to the theoretical conversation, I would like to take a step backward, to examine medievalism and politics through the lens of a time (1871) and place (France) when episodes of medieval European history were distorted and “weaponized” by factions on left, right, and center alike. By focusing on French historian Numa Denis Fustel de Coulanges’s “diplomatic negotiations” (philosopher Bruno Latour’s metaphor for grappling with irreconcilable positions), I hope to encourage debate about public medievalism today.

The Imagined Middle Ages of 1871 France

In 1871, Fustel de Coulanges encouraged politicians forming a new government after the fall of the Second Empire (1851–70) to improve an inequitable justice system. He offered help in the form of a four-part essay, “The Historical Origin of Justice Systems from Antiquity to Modern Times,” which was published in La Revue des Deux Mondes. This venue – a French bi-weekly dedicated to culture, literature, economics, and politics – ensured a broad non-partisan readership.

Fustel could not have anticipated that a civil war would interrupt the publication of this essay. Only three days after the March 15 publication of his second installment (“Justice in the Feudal World”), fighting broke out in Paris between a left-leaning coalition of intellectuals and members of the working class and a recently elected (February 8) conservative government. The conflict resulted in the burning and vandalism of great swathes of Paris and in the establishment of a parallel government, named “The Commune,” which enacted a liberal agenda including expanded voting rights, the separation of Church and State, self-policing, and the abolition of child labor. The Paris Commune was short-lived, however (March 28 to May 28