Violence and punishment - Petrus Cornelis Spierenburg

This innovative book tells the fascinating tale of the long histories
of violence, punishment, and the human body, and how they are all
connected. Taking the decline of violence and the transformation of
punishment as its guiding themes, the book highlights key dynamics of
historical and social change, and charts how a refinement and civilizing
of manners, and new forms of celebration and festival, accompanied the
decline of violence.

Pieter Spierenburg, a leading figure in historical criminology,
skillfully extends his view over three continents, back to the middle
ages and even beyond to the Stone Age. Ranging along the way from murder
to etiquette, from social control to popular culture, from religion to
death, and from honor to prisons, every chapter creatively uses the
theories of Norbert Elias, while also engaging with the work of Foucault
and Durkheim.

The scope and rigor of the analysis will strongly interest scholars
of criminology, history, and sociology, while the accessible style and
the intriguing stories on which the book builds will appeal to anyone
interested in the history of violence and punishment in civilization.