Joachim W. Stieber

Professor

Joachim W. Stieber is a professor of the history of Late Medieval, Renaissance and Reformation Europe. His research and writing have centered on the conciliar movement and European constitutional history in the later Middle Ages and the Early Modern period, focused on the interaction of theological and political thought and the practice of government in the Church and in secular society. His publications have dealt with the Council of Basel and the German Empire (1978), Nicholas of Cusa (1990) and Duke Amadeus VIII-Pope Felix V, the anti-pope of the Council of Basel (1992). His current major work in progress is the preparation of a critical edition and English translation of the decrees and letters of the Council of Basel that deal with the council's conception of constitutional monarchy in the Church. The volume will be accompanied by an edition and translation of the Libellus apologeticus of Pope Eugenius IV, a major counter-statement by the Roman Curia, defending absolute papal monarchy.

His teaching program normally consists of two intermediate-level survey courses on the Italian Renaissance in its late medieval setting and on Europe in the Age of the Reformation, with a focus on religious and constitutional history. In most years, a colloquium on the Middle Ages and the Renaissance in European thought from the mid-eighteenth to the later nineteenth century is offered. A seminar on a selected aspect of European history from 1300 to 1660 is regularly taught; recent topics included the Theory and Practice of Limited Monarchy and a comparison of governance in the Old World and the New. From time to time, a seminar on the Patronage of Music in Renaissance Europe has been team-taught with Richard Sherr, of the Music Department.

Phone: 413-585-3715
Office: Wright Hall 113
Email: jstieber@smith.edu

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