Johann Sommerville
Professor

eMail: jsommerv@wisc.edu
Phone: (608)263-1863
Office: 5214 Mosse Humanities
Mailbox: 5032 Mosse Humanities

Website: http://history.wisc.edu/sommerville/

Curriculum Vitae: View PDF

Office Hours: TBA

Education: PhD: Cambridge; MA: Cambridge; BA: Cambridge

Bio Sketch:

I am a historian of early modern Britain, and of the History of Political Thought in Europe between the Middle Ages and the Enlightenment. I have written books on politics and political ideas in early seventeenth-century England, and on Thomas Hobbes and his historical context, and have edited the political writings of King James VI and I and Sir Robert Filmer (for the series Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought). I’ve also written articles and book chapters on topics including John Selden, John Donne, divine right episcopacy, literature and national identity, the history of lying, natural law, and Catholic political theory.

Research Interests:

Intellectual history and the history of political thought between the late Middle Ages and the Enlightenment; Thomas Hobbes; English political, social and economic history to 1688; early modern Europe.

Selected Publications:

Since 2000:

• "Hobbes, Selden, Erastianism, and the History of the Jews," in G. A. J. Rogers and Tom Sorell, Hobbes and History, Routledge, London and New York, 2000, 160-88.
• "Selden, Grotius, and the Seventeenth-Century Intellectual Revolution in Moral and Political Theory," in Victoria Kahn and Lorna Hutson, eds., Rhetoric and Law in Early Modern Europe, New Haven, Yale University Press, 2001, 318-44.
• “King James VI and I and John Selden: Two Voices on History and the Constitution,” in Daniel Fischlin and Mark Fortier, eds., Royal Subjects: Essays on the Writings of James VI and I, Detroit, Wayne State University Press, 2002, 290-322.
•  “An emergent Britain? Literature and national identity in Early Stuart England,” in D. Loewenstein and J. Mueller, eds., The Cambridge History of Early Modern English Literature, Cambridge 2003, 459-86.
• “John Donne the controversialist: the poet as political thinker,” in David Colclough, ed., John Donne's Professional Lives, D. S. Brewer, Cambridge, England, 2003, 73-95.
• “The modern contexts of George Mosse's Early Modern Scholarship," in What History Tells: George Mosse and the Culture of Modern Europe, ed. Stanley G. Payne, David J. Sorkin and John S. Tortorice, The University of Wisconsin Press, 2003, 25-38.
• “Hobbes, Behemoth, Church-State Relations, and Political Obligation,” in Filozofski vestnik 24/2(2003), 205-222.
• “Hobbes and Independency,” in Rivista di storia della filosofia 21(2004), 155-73.
• “Conscience, Law, and Things Indifferent: Arguments on Toleration from the Vestiarian Controversy to Hobbes and Locke,” in Harald Braun and Edward Vallance, eds., Contexts of Conscience in Early Modern Europe, 1500-1700, Houndmills, Palgrave Macmillan, 2004, 166-79, and notes at 222-6.
• “Papalist Political Thought and the Controversy over the Jacobean Oath of Allegiance,” in Ethan H. Shagan, ed., Catholics and the Protestant Nation, Manchester and New York, Manchester University Press, 2005, 162-84.
• “Thomas Hobbes’ Leviathan and its Anglican context,” in Patricia Springborg, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Hobbes’ Leviathan; Cambridge University Press; 2007), 358-74.
• “English and Roman Liberty in the Monarchical Republic of early Stuart England,” in John McDiarmid, ed., The Monarchical Republic of early Modern England, Ashgate, Aldesrhot, UK, 2007, 201-16.

Major publications before 2000:

• Politics and ideology in England 1603-1640, Longman, London and New York 1986;
                          (x+254pp).
• Thomas Hobbes: political ideas in historical context, London, Macmillan; New York, St Martin's Press 1992 (xiv+234pp).
• (ed.) Sir Robert Filmer, "Patriarcha and Other Writings", Cambridge University Press 1991 (in the series Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought; xlvi+327pp).
• (ed.) King James VI and I, "Political writings", Cambridge University Press 1994 (in the series Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought; xliv+329pp).
• Royalists and Patriots: Politics and Ideology in England 1603-1640. Second edition, Addison Wesley/ Longman, 1999. xiv + 304 pp
  

Awards:

• 1998-9: R. Stanton Avery Distinguished Fellow, Huntington Library, San Marino, CA.
• 1996-9: on Editorial Board of the Journal of Modern History.
• 1993: NEH long-term Fellowship at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington D.C.
• 1986- : Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.
• 1980-4: Fellow, St John's College, Cambridge.
• 1976-7: Joseph Hodges Choate Memorial Fellow, Harvard University.

Courses Taught:

Lecture Courses:

• History 123 - English History to 1688 - Syllabus 2007 (pdf)
• History 351 - Seventeenth-Century Europe - Syllabus 2008 (pdf) - Course Webpage
• History 361 - The Emergence of Modern Britain 1485-1660 - Syllabus 2008 (pdf) - Course Webpage
• History 367 - Society and Ideas in Shakespeare's England

Undergraduate Seminars:

• History 283 - Honors Seminar - Topics: "History of Political Thought from the Late Middle Ages to the Enlightenment"

Graduate Courses:

• History 831 - Early Modern Britain
• History 867 - Social and Political Ideas in early Modern Europe

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