The Control of Power
In his book Gerd Althoff examines the different forms and rules of political counselling in the Middle Ages. Counsel and advice is a well-known procedure in medieval politics. That lordship was founded on the consent of the followers is an often used phrase used by the mighty. But exact knowledge about procedures of counselling and the chances of advice to be followed doesn’t exist until today. The main reason for this is that procedures of decision-making were mostly informal and secret. Contemporaries did not lift the ‘arcana imperii.’ This book is a first attempt to systematically collect sources which lifted the curtain a little bit and allowed the recognition of forms and rules of counselling. This made it possible to answer the question on a relevant basis of sources to what extent control of power could be established in medieval politics and how many possibilities remained to the mighty to get only the advice they wanted to get.