Oxford’s own Robin Briggs has had a special issue of the French History published in his honour. As Mr Briggs is a former Chair of the Committee of Library Provision for History, it is a pleasure for the HFL to bring this special issue to our readers’ attention.

Vol. 25 (4) Dec 2011 publishes essays from present and past students and colleagues of Robin to pay tribute to his contribution to early modern history.

The first article “Robin Briggs—Historian” by David Parrot, Mark Greengrass and Lyndal Roper charts out Robin’s career, historical interests, achievements and contribution to research, ending with a useful bibliography of his publications.

Other articles are:

Suzannah Lipscomb: Crossing boundaries: women’s gossip, insults and violence in sixteenth-century France

Jan Machielsen: Thinking with Montaigne: Evidence, scepticism and meaning in early modern demonology

Maryse Simon: Rendering justice in witch trials: the case of the val de Lièpvre

Jean-Louis Quantin: A godly Fronde? Jansenism and the mid-seventeenth-century crisis of the French monarchy

Guy Rowlands: Moving Mars: The Logistical Geography of Louis XIV’S France