The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400-1580 [Paperback]

This prize-winning account of the pre-Reformation church recreates lay people’s experience of religion, showing that late-medieval Catholicism was neither decadent nor decayed, but a strong and vigorous tradition. For this edition, Duffy has written a new introduction reflecting on recent developments in our understanding of the period.

“A mighty and momentous book: a book to be read and re-read, pondered and revered; a subtle, profound book written with passion and eloquence, and with masterly control.”—J. J. Scarisbrick,The Tablet

“Revisionist history at its most imaginative and exciting. . . . [An] astonishing and magnificent piece of work.”—Edward T. Oakes,Commonweal

“A magnificent scholarly achievement, a compelling read, and not a page too long to defend a thesis which will provoke passionate debate.”—Patricia Morison,Financial Times

“Deeply imaginative, movingly written, and splendidly illustrated.”—Maurice Keen,New York Review of Books

Winner of the Longman-History TodayBook of the Year Award A magnificent scholarly achievement, a compelling read, and not a page too long to defend a thesis which will provoke passionate debate. Patricia Morison,Financial Times

Deeply imaginative, movingly written, and splendidly illustrated. Maurice Keen,New York Review of Books

Duffy wants to show the vitality and appeal of late medieval Catholicism; and to prove that it exerted a diverse and vigorous hold over the imagination and loyalty of the people up to the very moment of Reformation. He suceeds triumphantly. Susan Brigden,London Review of Books

[This book] at last gives the culture of the late Middle Ages in England its due, and helps us to see the period as it was and not as Protestant reformers and their intellectual descendants imagined it tolÃ=