1. The best of these literature reviews are Kopitzsch, Franklin, “Bemerkungen zur Sozialgeschichte der Reformation und des Bauernkrieges,”Google Scholar in Wohlfeil, Der Bauernkrieg, pp. 177–218; Kopitzsch and Wohlfeil, “Neue Forschungen zur Geschichte des Deutschen Bauernkrieges,” in Wehler, pp. 303–54; Sabean, David, “Der Bauernkrieg—ein Literaturbericht für das Jahr 1975,” Zeitschrift für Agrargeschichte und Agrarsoziologie 24 (1976): 221–28Google Scholar; Wolgast, E., “Neue Literatur über den Bauernkrieg,” Blätter für deutsche Landesgeschichte 112 (1976): 424–40Google Scholar; and R. S. Elkar, “Forschungen in der DDR zur Geschichte der ‘deutschen frühbürgerlichen Revolution,’ ” ibid., pp. 382–423. See also the impressive bibliography of 331 titles by Volz, Ingrid and Brather, Hans-Stephan, “Der deutsche Bauer im Klassenkampf (1470 bis 1648): Auswahlbibliographie der Veröffentlichungen in den sozialistischen Staaten aus den Jahren 1945 bis 1972,” in Heitz, Gerhard et al. , Der Bauer im Klassenkämpf: Studien zur Geschichte des deutschen Bauernkrieges und der bäuerlichen Klassenkämpfe im Spätfeudalismus (Berlin, 1975), pp. 573–603.Google Scholar

2. See, e.g., Scribner, Bob, “Is There a Social History of the Reformation?” Social History 4 (1977): 483–505.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3. It seems remarkable that a full, critical edition of Engels's famous book has never been published. Such an edition would contain all of Engels's later comments and notes for revision of the book. For the charge that Engels's work has been “almost canonized” by the East Germans, see Nipperdey, Thomas, Reformation, Revolution, Utopie (Göttingen, 1975), p. 87Google Scholar; for a recent East German view of Engels, see the biting remarks of Engelberg, Ernst in Bak, pp. 103–7Google Scholar; Engels's accuracy is defended on p. 107. The most recent critique of Engels as historian is Friesen, Abraham, Reformation and Utopia: The Marxist Interpretation of the Reformation and Its Antecedents (Wiesbaden, 1974).Google Scholar

4. Laube et al.

5. Steinmetz, Max, “Reformation und Bauernkrieg—Höhepunkte der Geschichte des deutschen Volkes,” Sächsische Heimatblätter 19 (1973): 97–102, at p. 101Google Scholar; excerpts reprinted in Wohlfeil, Der Bauernkrieg, pp. 37–45.

6. Laube et al., p. 173.

7. Ibid., p. 159.

8. Ibid., p. 206.

9. Ibid., p. 207.

10. Ibid., p. 207.

11. Rammstedt, Otthein, “Stadtunruhen 1525,”Google Scholar in Wehler, pp. 239–76, examines Frankfurt a.M., Mainz, Cologne, Münster, and Osnabrück.

12. An unpublished paper by Thomas W. Robisheaux, “Ackerbürger and Town Revolts during the Peasants' War,” summarizes the literature on this important problem.

13. A point also made by Kopitzsch, “Bemerkungen zur Sozialgeschichte” (above, n. 1), p. 198. See also the shrewd remarks of Becker, Winfried, Reformation und Revolution (Münster, 1974), pp. 100–101.Google Scholar

14. See the two volumes edited by Wohlfeil, Ranier, Reformation oder frühbürgerliche Revolution? (Munich, 1972)Google Scholar, and the one reviewed here; and see the acerbic remarks of Scribner, “Is There a Social History of the Reformation?” (above, n. 2). For the notion of separate historical modes of thought, see the pathbreaking analysis of White, Hayden, Metahistory: The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Europe (Baltimore, 1973).Google Scholar Such a broad conclusion does not, of course, preclude cooperation on smaller questions like the meaning of the Twelve Articles or the economic condition of peasants in various regions; cf. Steinmetz, Max, “Positionen der Forschung: Kritische Bemerkungen zur Bauernkriegsforschung in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland,” in Blickle, Revolte und Revolution, pp. 115–26, at p. 120.Google ScholarElkar, Rainer S. has observed a parallelism of accepted facts behind the theoretical divergence between East and West, “Geschichtsforschung der Frühen Neuzeit zwischen Divergenz und Parallelität,” in Wohlfeil, Der Bauernkrieg, pp. 219–45.Google Scholar

15. Despite recent efforts, East German historians have not yet succeeded in overcoming the “vulgar Marxism” so easily parodied and attacked in the West. See the remarks of Engelberg in Bak, pp. 106–7, and Scribner, “Is There a Social History of the Reformation?” (above, n. 2), p. 488, who seems to overestimate the sophistication of East German Marxist history. This situation means in turn that Western Marxist syntheses of European history in the sixteenth century have been remarkably silent or vapid when they come to Germany. See, e.g., Wallerstein, Immanuel, The Modern World System: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World Economy in the Sixteenth Century (New York, 1974)Google Scholar, and Brenner, Robert, “Agrarian Class Structure and Economic Development in Pre-Industrial Europe,” Past & Present no. 70 (02 1976): 30–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For recent developments in East Germany, see Kocka, J., “Theoretical Approaches to Social and Economic History of Modern Germany: Some Recent Trends, Concepts, and Problems in Western and Eastern Germany,” Journal of Modern History 47 (1975): pp. 101–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16. Franz, Der deutsche Bauernkrieg. Postwar editions have omitted much of the foreword and the entire afterword. For a brief summary of Franz's views on the Peasants' War, see his Geschichte des deutschen Bauernstandes vom frühen Mittelalter bis zum 19. Jahrhundert (Stuttgart, 1970), pp. 131–50.Google Scholar For a sharp attempt to discredit Franz see Rosenberg, Hans, Probleme der deutschen Sozialgeschichte (Frankfurt, 1969), p. 147.Google Scholar

17. Franz, Der deutsche Bauernkrieg, pp. 19, 28, 30, 36, 41–42, 47, 80–84, 86; Geschichte des deutschen Bauernstandes, pp. 131, 134, 136.

18. Franz, Der deutsche Bauernkrieg, pp. 86–90.

19. Ibid., p. 125; Geschichte des deutschen Bauernstandes, p. 138.

20. Franz, Geschichte des deutschen Bauernstandes, p. 143.

21. Ibid., pp. 141–42.

22. Franz, Der deutsche Bauernkrieg, pp. 227–38. He concedes the involvement of Ackerbürger in some rebellions, e.g., Rothenburg: ibid., p. 180.

23. Ibid., p. 288.

24. Ibid., pp. 294–300; Geschichte des deutschen Bauernstandes, p. 146.

25. Franz, Der deutsche Bauernkrieg, pp. 297–98; Laube et al., p. 314. Cf. Elkar, “Geschichtsforschung der Frühen Neuzeit zwischen Divergenz und Parallelität” (above, n. 14). A similar point is made by Hartmut Boockmann, “Zu den geistigen und religiösen Voraussetzungen des Bauernkrieges,” in Moeller, pp. 9–28, at pp. 9–10; and Stalnaker, John C., “Auf dem Weg zu einer sozialgeschichtlichen Interpretation des Deutschen Bauernkriegs,” in Wehler, pp. 39–60, at pp. 40–41.Google Scholar

26. Blickle, Die Revolution von 1525, pp. 39–50. And serfdom was not on the rise in some regions. See Rudolf Endres, “Zur sozialökonomischen Lage und sozialpsychischen Einstellung des ‘Gemeinen Mannes’: Der Kloster- und Burgensturm in Franken 1525,” in Wehler, pp. 61–78; and Walter Miller, “Freiheit und Leibeigenschaft—soziale Ziele des deutschen Bauernkriegs?” in Blickle, Revolte und Revolution, pp. 264–72.

27. Starn, Randolph, “Historians and ‘Crisis,’ ” Past & Present no. 52 (08 1971): 3–22CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Rabb, Theodore K., The Struggle for Stability in Early Modern Europe (New York, 1975), pp. 29–34.Google Scholar

28. Boockmann (“Zu den geistigen und religiösen Voraussetzungen,” above, n. 25) takes to task historians who rely on the “Reformation of Emperor Sigismund,” the “Upper Rhenish Revolutionary,” the supposed fears of the Council of Basel, the poetry, sermons, and paintings of the fifteenth century, all of which are dubious witnesses to the mentality of the peasantry. See, however, the cautious defense of late medieval “crisis” by František Graus, “Vom ‘schwarzen Tod’ zur Reformation: Der krisenhafte Charakter des europäischen Spätmittelalters,” in Blickle, Revolte und Revolution, pp. 10–30.

29. Marxist historians sometimes reject the distinction out of hand; cf. Steinmetz, “Positionen der Forschung” (above, n. 14), p. 118. But frequently they too find the distinction useful; cf. Steinmetz, “Zum historischen Standort des deutschen Bauernkrieges in der Geschichte der Bauernbewegungen beim Übergang vom Feudalismus zum Kapitalismus,” in Heitz, Der Bauer im Klassenkampf (above, n. 1), pp. 27–47, at pp. 35–36; Laube et al., p. 60. See also Stalnaker, “Auf dem Weg” (above, n. 25), p. 42.

30. Wunder, Heide, “ ‘Altes Recht’ und ‘göttliches Recht’ im deutschen Bauernkrieg,” Zeitschrift für Agrargeschichte und Agrarsoziologie 24 (1976): 54–66Google Scholar; translated in Bak, pp. 54–62. See also Karl Heinz Burmeister, “Genossenschaftliche Rechtsfindung und herrschaftliche Rechtssetzung: Auf dem Weg zum Territorialstaat,” in Blickle, Revolte und Revolution, pp. 171–85; and Winfried Becker, “‘Göttliches Wort,’ ‘göttliches Recht,’ ‘göttliche Gerechtigkeit’: Die Politisierung theologischer Begriffe?” in Blickle, Revolte und Revolution, pp. 232–63.

31. Stalnaker, “Auf dem Weg” (above, n. 25), pp. 42–43.

32. Press, Volker, “Der Bauernkrieg als Problem der deutschen Geschichte,” Nassauische Annalen 86 (1975): 158–66.Google Scholar

33. Buszello, , Der deutsche Bauernkrieg von 1525 als politische Bewegung, Studien zur europäischen Geschichte, vol. 8 (Berlin, 1969)Google Scholar; see also his “Gemeinde, Territorium und Reich in den politischen Programmen des Deutschen Bauernkrieges 1524/25,” in Wehler, pp. 105–28.

34. Buszello, “Die Staatsvorstellung des ‘gemeinen Mannes’ im deutschen Bauernkrieg,” in Blickle, Revolte und Revolution, pp. 273–95, at pp. 274, 286–87.

35. Sabean, David W., Landbesitz und Gesellschaft am Vorabend des Bauernkriegs, Quellen und Forschungen zur Agrargeschichte, vol. 26 (Stuttgart, 1972).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

36. Blickle, , Landschaften im Alten Reich: Die Staatliche Funktion des gemeinen Mannes in Oberdeutschland (Munich, 1973).Google Scholar

37. Die Revolution von 1525.

38. Ibid., p. 25. Günter Vogler adds considerable support to the thesis in “Der revolutionäre Gehalt und die räumliche Verbreitung der oberschwäbischen Zwölf Artikel,” in Blickle, Revolte und Revolution, pp. 206–31.

39. Die Revolution von 1525, p. 27.

40. Ibid., pp. 35, 39–50.

41. Ibid., pp. 78–79.

42. Ibid., p. 81, echoing Sabean, Landbesitz (above, n. 35), pp. 100–101.

43. Die Revolution von 1525, pp. 94–103.

44. Ibid., p. 104.

45. Ibid., p. 109.

46. Ibid., pp. 138–40.

47. Ibid., p. 141.

48. Martin Brecht, “Der theologische Hintergrund der Zwölf Artikel der Bauernschaft in Schwaben von 1525: Christoph Schappelers und Sebastian Lotzers Beitrag zum Bauernkrieg,” in Oberman, pp. 30–64.

49. Hillerbrand, Hans J., “The German Reformation and the Peasants' War,” in Buck, Lawrence P. and Zophy, John W., eds., The Social History of the Reformation (Columbus, Ohio, 1972), pp. 106–36, at pp. 125–26.Google Scholar

50. Rudolf Endres, “Zur sozialökonomischen Lage” (above, n. 26); and Endres, “Probleme des Bauernkrieges in Franken,” in Wohlfeil, Der Bauernkrieg, pp. 90–115.

51. Henry Cohn, “Clerical Lords and German Peasants, 1525: The Economic Basis for Anticlericalism,” paper read at the meeting of the American Historical Association in Atlanta, Georgia, on Dec. 28, 1975. Cohn is working on a general study of the Peasants' War.

52. Heiko A. Oberman, “Tumultus rusticorum: Vom ‘Klosterkrieg’ zum Fürstensieg: Beobachtungen zum Bauernkrieg unter besonderer Berücksichtigung zeitgenössischer Beurteilungen,” in Oberman, pp. 157–72, at pp. 166–67. The article is reprinted in expanded form as “The Gospel of Social Unrest: 450 Years after the so-called ‘German Peasants' War’ of 1525,” Harvard Theological Review 69 (1976): pp. 103–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

53. Becker, Winfried, “Die Politisierung theologischer Begriffe?” (above, n. 30), pp. 243–45, 261–63.Google Scholar

54. Peter Baumgart, “Formen der Volksfrömmigkeit: Krise der alten Kirche und reformatorische Bewegung: Zur Ursachenproblematik des ‘Bauernkrieges,’” in Blickle, Revolte und Revolution, pp. 186–204. This is not the place to undertake an examination of Thomas Müntzer's position in recent literature, but one would be remiss in not at least noting the huge and impressive work of Elliger, Walter, Thomas Müntzer: Leben und Werk (Göttingen, 1975), which contains a thoroughly new appraisal of Müntzer's political views.Google Scholar

55. Blickle, Die Revolution von 1525, pp. 156–79.

56. Ibid., p. 176. For a critique of Blickle's new terminology, see Heinz Schilling, “Aufstandsbewegungen in der Stadtbürgerlichen Gesellschaft des Alten Reiches: Die Vorgeschichte des Münsteraner Täuferreichs, 1525–34,” in Wehler, pp. 193–238, at pp. 237–38.

57. See Rudolf Endres, “Zünfte und Unterschichten als Elemente der Instabilität in den Städten,” in Blickle, Revolte und Revolution, pp. 151–70; Otthein Rammstedt, “Stadtunruhen 1525” (above, n. 11); Buck, Lawrence P., “The Containment of Civil Insurrection: Nürnberg and the Peasants’ Revolt” (Ph.D. diss., Ohio State University, 1971)Google Scholar; Buck, Lawrence P., “Civil Insurrection in a Reformation City: The Versicherungsbrief of Windsheim, March 1525,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 67 (1976): 100–117.Google Scholar In addition, according to a recent count, only ca. 80 towns out of ca. 440 in the main region of the Peasants’ War participated in the war, and that number includes towns which involuntarily signed on with the peasants. See Klein, Thomas, “Die Folgen des Bauernkrieges von 1525: Thesen und Antithesen zu einem vernachlässigten Thema,” Hessisches Jahrbuch für Landesgeschichte 25 (1975): 65–116, at p. 99.Google Scholar

58. In Rothenburg o.T., for example. See Baumann, F. L., ed., Quellen zur Geschichte des Bauernkriegs aus Rothenburg an der Tauber (Tübingen 1878), pp. 226–31. I am grateful to Thomas W. Robisheaux for this reference.Google Scholar

59. Rammstedt, Otthein, “Stadtunruhen 1525” (above n. 11), pp. 244–54, dealing with Frankfurt, Mainz, Cologne, Münster, and Osnabrück.Google Scholar

60. Jürgen Bucking, “Der ‘Bauernkrieg’ in den habsburgischen Ländern als sozialer Systemkonflikt, 1524–1526,” in Wehler, pp. 168–92; this article has serious flaws, probably owing to the collapse of the author's health. Bücking's ideas are more cogently summarized in Hans-Christoph Rublack, “Der Bauernkrieg in den vorder- und oberösterreichischen Ländern und in der Stadt Würzburg: Ansätze zu einer Theorie des Bauernkrieges,” in Moeller, pp. 47–68, at pp. 47–58. On a less abstract level, Rublack's own conclusions concerning the phases of revolution in Würzburg are worth serious study, ibid., pp. 58–68; and in “Die Stadt Würzburg im Bauernkrieg,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 67 (1976): 76–100.Google Scholar

61. Schilling, “Aufstandsbewegungen” (above, n. 56).

62. Kirchhoff, Karl-Heinz, Die Täufer in Münster 1534/35: Untersuchungen zum Umfang und zur Sozialstruktur der Bewegung (Münster, 1973), shows that the Anabaptists even had a slightly heavier proportion of wealthy members than was to be found in the town as a whole, p. 42.Google Scholar

63. Sea, Thomas S., “Schwäbischer Bund und Bauernkrieg: Bestrafung und Pazifikation,” in Wehler, , pp. 129–67.Google Scholar Sea reemphasizes the burden on peasants in “The Economic Impact of the German Peasants' War: The Question of Reparations,” Sixteenth Century Journal 8, no. 3 (10 1977): 75–97.Google Scholar

64. Schulze, Winfried, “Die veränderte Bedeutung sozialer Konflikte im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert,” in Wehler, , pp. 277–302Google Scholar; see also Schulze's, “Zur politischen Bedeutung des gemeinen Mannes' in ständischen Versammlungen des 16. Jahrhunderts,” Zeitschrift für Agrargeschichte und Agrarsoziologie 21 (1973): 48–64.Google Scholar

65. Blickle, Die Revolution von 1525, pp. 224–34.

66. Ibid., pp. 234–42. For an earlier outline of this sort of argument, see Rössler, Hellmuth, “Über die Wirkungen von 1525,” in Haushofer, Heinz and Boelcke, Willi A., Wege und Forschungen der Agrargeschichte: Festschrift zum 65. Geburtstag von Günther Franz (Frankfurt, 1967), pp. 104–14.Google Scholar

67. Klein, Thomas, “Die Folgen des Bauernkrieges von 1525” (above, n. 57).Google Scholar

68. Blickle, Die Revolution von 1525, p. 234.

69. Bak.

70. R. W. Scribner, “Images of the Peasant, 1514–1525,” ibid., pp. 29–48.

71. David Sabean, “German Agrarian Institutions at the Beginning of the Sixteenth Century: Upper Swabia as an Example,” ibid., pp. 76–88.

72. Rainer Postel confronts this important question with evidence from Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony and suggests that cultural differences may have been as important as the political and socioeconomic differences advanced (but not investigated) by Western and Eastern orthodoxies: “Zur Sozialgeschichte Niedersachsens in der Zeit des Bauernkriegs,” in Wehler, pp. 79–104; “Adel und Bauern in Schleswig-Holstein zur Zeit des deutschen Bauernkriegs,” in Wohlfeil, Der Bauernkrieg, pp. 116–42.

73. Heide Wunder has been developing a sophisticated method for studying peasant mentalities: “Zur Mentalität aufständischer Bauern: Möglichkeiten der Zusammenarbeit von Geschichtswissenschaft und Anthropologie, dargestellt am Beispiel des Samländischen Bauernaufstandes von 1525,” in Wehler, pp. 9–37; and “Der samländische Bauernaufstand von 1525: Entwurf für eine sozialgeschichtliche Forschungsstrategie,” in Wohlfeil, Der Bauernkrieg, pp. 143–76.

74. See the excellent survey by Sabean in “Der Bauernkrieg” (above, n. 1). For a model study of varying integration of peasants in the market, see de Vries, Jan, “Peasant Demand Patterns and Economic Development: Friesland, 1550–1750,” in Parker, William N. and Jones, Eric L., eds., European Peasants and Their Markets: Essays in Agrarian Economic History (Princeton, 1975), pp. 205–66.Google Scholar

75. See, e.g., the careful assessment of Davies, C. S. L., “Peasant Revolt in France and England: A Comparison,” Agricultural History Review 21 (1973): 122–34.Google Scholar The comparative study by Gerlach, Horst, Der englische Bauernaufstand von 1381 und der deutsche Bauernkrieg: Ein Vergleich (Meisenheim am Glan, 1969), has conceptual difficulties resulting from inadequacies in the German literature on which the author relied.Google Scholar