RHN 24/2026 | Call
Panel Organiser: Davide Cristoferi (Université libre de Bruxelles-Universitat de València)
European Social Science History Conference
21– 24 April 2027, Lyon, France
Deadline for Submissions: 15 April 2026
Call for Papers for a Panel Proposal at ESSHC 2027:
Livestock owners, Entrepreneurs and Enterprises in Large-Scale Husbandry and Transhumance in Europe and the Mediterranean (14th-17th c.)
Historical scholarship has extensively examined the development of large-scale husbandry and transhumance between the late Middle Ages and the early modern period, particularly in the Mediterranean region. Research has predominantly focused on institutional, fiscal, and market structures, drawing on the rich archival documentation produced by state and privileged bodies such as the Italian Dogane, the Castilian Mesta, and the Aragonese Casa de Ganaderos of Zaragoza as well as by specific royal manors or monasteries belonging to Cistercian or military orders.
By contrast, a micro-historical perspective centred on the entrepreneurs, investors, and enterprises that actively shaped the expansion of large-scale husbandry between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries remains underdeveloped. This gap is partly due to the heterogeneity of the actors involved – ranging from major livestock and pasture owners (religious institutions, seigneurial lords, ruling dynasties) to merchant companies, individual entrepreneurs (including butchers and traders), producers of wool, leather, and livestock, small nobility and peasant elites, and small-scale breeders. It is also linked to the fragmentary nature of the sources: many contractual arrangements, such as share-leases of animals, were oral or short-term, while notarial and company and account registers often provide episodic and highly synthetic information.
Moreover, the constant circulation of capital, rent, and animals between urban and rural environments which was a common feature of large-scale farming and transhumance in the late medieval and early modern periods, makes it difficult to identify and reconstruct pastoral enterprises in the pre-industrial period. As a result, systematic studies remain rare and largely confined to isolated case studies. Additionally, the modern concept of enterprises is often difficult to apply to the period under study and specifically the husbandry sector.
Yet a deeper understanding of the economic rationale, organisational structures, and socio-economic impact of the expansion of large-scale husbandry between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries requires precisely this shift in perspective. To this end, our focus will be on entrepreneurs and enterprises, the latter being defined as “a unit that produces goods and services, has the capacity to combine them, is open to the market, and whose objective is to seek profit” (Verna, 2025). At the same time, we will also consider economic actors such as seigneurial (religious and lay) lords, who often occupied a position halfway between livestock owners and entrepreneurs in the aforementioned sense. Taking a broad approach to economic actors and enterprises in the large-scale husbandry sector will shed light on decision-making processes, investment strategies, risk management and networks of cooperation. It will also complement and refine the well-established institutional and macroeconomic frameworks developed by existing literature in this field.
This panel aims to provide an initial, comparative exploration of these issues by bringing together contributions that analyse specific case studies, categories of archival sources, or regional historiographies. We invite contributions focusing on Europe, particularly the Mediterranean region, between the late Middle Ages and the Early Modern period (14th-17th c.). Papers adopting either a long-term or short-term perspective are welcome. We particularly welcome papers that take a micro-historical, biographical, prosopographical or business history approach to pastoral entrepreneurs, livestock owners and enterprises specialising in husbandry and transhumance.
Panel Themes
We welcome contributions in medieval and early modern rural history adopting business-history, micro-historical, and biographical or prosopographical approaches. Topics include, but are not limited to:
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Sources and archival records of husbandry enterprises, including notarial, fiscal, judicial, and company sources, and methodological reflections on their use and limitations.
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Biographical and prosopographical analyses of the economic actors involved in husbandry and transhumance, such as large livestock owners, entrepreneurs, merchant-investors, institutional landlords, peasant elites, smallholders, and breeders.
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Micro-historical studies of the organisation, management, and internal structure of husbandry enterprises, whether owned by religious institutions, merchant companies, or individual proprietors.
The aim of this panel is to bring together scholars at various career stages who are investigating the history of pastoral entrepreneurs, livestock owners and enterprises.
Contributors will be asked to pre-circulate their papers.
The panel will take place during the ESSHC conference in Lyon, from 21 to 24 April 2027, with a connected peer-reviewed publication planned for late 2027.
Timeline
Deadline for proposal submission: 15 April 2026
Interested participants are invited to submit a paper proposal through the Oxford Abstract Platform: https://app.oxfordabstracts.com/auth?redirect=/stages/80252/submitter.
The guidelines for submitting the paper proposal are here: https://esshc.iisg.amsterdam/en/guidelines
Please send submissions in advance to: cristoferi.davide@gmail.com.
Conference Website: https://esshc.iisg.amsterdam/en/esshc-conference