In writing about sixteenth-century France, Lucien Febvre looked for those changes in human consciousness that explain the process of civilization—the most specific and tangible examples of men’s experience, the most vivid details of their daily lives. These essays, written at the height of Febvre’s powers and sensitively edited and translated by Marian Rothstein, are the most lucid, evocative, and accessible examples of his art.

Edited and translated by: Marian Rothstein