Walter Prevenier#

Dr. Walter Prevenier, born in 1934, defended his PhD at the Faculty of Philosophy and Litterature (Dept. of History) of the State University of Ghent in 1962. He continued his education by a postgraduate at the Ecole des Chartes (Paleography and Diplomatics) and the Law School of the Sorbonne (Canon Law) at Paris in 1959 1960. He has been teaching at the State University of Ghent, from 1967 to 1999, on the methodology of history and the social sciences, financial history, paleography and diplomatics and he gave practical courses on the late middle ages in the social and political area.

He is considered as an authority on the history of the social and cultural history of the Burgundian Netherlands (14th – 16th century), presented in several books in Dutch, English, French and German, and particularly in two syntheses, published by Cambridge University Press (‘The Burgundian Netherlands’, 1985) and Pennsylvania University Press (‘The Promised Lands’. 1999). A second area of interest is that of marriage and violence against women in the Middle Ages (‘Le Prince et le Peuple’, 1998; ‘Violence against Women in Fifteenth-Century France’, 1999). His third scientific territory is historiography and the methodology of the social sciences; on this issue he published a book in three languages, by Cornell University Press in English (‘From Reliable Sources’, 2001), in Dutch (‘Uit goede bron’, 1992), by Böhlau Verlag (Wien-Weimar) in German (‘Werkstatt des Historikers. Eine Einführung in die historischen Methoden’, 2004). He is also known as the author of many critical editions of medieval sources, such as the charters of the counts of Flanders and Hainaut (in three volumes), the accounts of the city of Ghent, the reports of the meetings of the Estates of Flanders and the Estates of Holland (medieval parliamentary institutions), from the 13th to the 15th century.

Dr. Walter Prevenier has been invited as a visiting professor by many institutions, especially the University of Utrecht (The Netherlands) in 1968, the University of California in Berkeley (1983 and 2004), Rutgers University (1987 and 1989), Pennsylvania University, Philadelphia (1989), the University of Columbia (New York) (1993), the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg (Virginia) (1999 - 2000), the University of Princeton, Program in Medieval Studies (2000), the University of Columbia (New York) (2001 and 2002), the University of Berkeley (2004), the University of Columbia (New York) 2007. He was a member of the School of Historical Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton in 1996 and in 1999. The area of his teaching included: the history of the Burgundian Netherlands, the Black Death in the 14th century, The Historian’s Craft (methodology of history), paleography.

Recognition came from several academies: he is a member of the Royal Flemish Academy of Sciences at Brussels since 1985; a member of the Academia Europea at Cambridge (UK) since 1989; a Corresponding Fellow of the Medieval Academy of America at Cambridge, Mass., since 1992; a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences at Amsterdam since 1996; a Corresponding Fellow of the Royal Historical Society at London since 1996. He was acting president of the Council of the Academia Belgica at Rome from 1996 to 1999. He has been secretary of the Commission Royale d'Histoire in Brussels from 1982 to 1999. He was the Secretary General, from 1990 to 1996, and the President of the Commission Internationale de Diplomatique, from 1996 to 2002. He was the Chair of the Belgian Section of the "International Commission for the history of representative and parliamentary institutions" from 1977 to 1990.

Reference persons

• prof. Dr. Jan De Vries, vice provost, University of Berkeley, Dept. Of History, 3229 Dwinelle Hall, Berkeley, CA, 94720-2550 (U.S.A.); devries@socrates.Berkeley.EDU

• prof. Dr. Barbara Hanawalt, University of Ohio, dept. of History, 269 Dulles Hall, 230 West 17th Avenue, Columbus, Ohio 43210 (U.S.A.) hanawalt.4@osu.edu

• prof. Dr. Martha Howell, Columbia University, Dept. History, Fayerweather 614, New York, New York, 2527 – 10027 (U.S.A.); mch4@columbia.edu

• prof. Dr. Olivier Guyotjeannin, Ecole des Chartes, 19 rue de la Sorbonne, F 75005 Paris ; ogj@wanadoo.fr ; oguyotje@enc.sorbonne.fr

• prof. Dr. Theo Koelzer, Universität Bonn, Konviktstraase 11, D – 53113 Bonn (Deutschland) ; t.koelzer@uni-bonn.de