| Return to Contents Book Review BALLEINE’S HISTORY OF JERSEY by G. BALLEINE revised and enlarged by M. Syvret and J. Stevens (third edn, Phillimore & Co. Ltd, Chichester, 1998). ISBN 1 86077 065 7. Cost £29.99. The dust jacket of the latest Balleine claims that: "… Books are often described as ‘a classic’, but few justify the accolade as thoroughly as this great work, which enjoys an unrivalled preeminence in Jersey literature. This new edition will maintain its position as the book on Jersey well into the next millennium…" Nor is the publisher’s website coy: "To describe a book as a ‘classic’ is perhaps too often simply an easy way to imply that it enjoys a long-established reputation. Balleine certainly has that, but the book also possesses all the other attributes, of definitive scholarship, of unrivalled preeminence in its field, that make the term ‘classic’ almost an under-statement. Published in 1950, greatly enlarged and fully revised in 1981, its popularity has continued unabated and now a third, completely revised new edition has been prepared by the Société Jersiaise." How much this is a "completely revised new edition" must be questioned, since the foreword refers to a "reprint with corrections and with additions to the final chapter…." . Whatever the case in that regard, the other bold claims for the book demand rigorous and unembarrassed testing. How much is it a piece of "definitive scholarship" of "unrivalled preeminence", and will it truly be "the book on Jersey well into the next millennium"? An attempt to answer these questions may be made by recourse to a sample drawn from a limited historical period, in this instance Balleine’s treatment of the late Tudor and early Stuart periods. The Renaissance is stated to be a consequence of the Fall of Constantinople in 1453. This is linked to the rise of science, and in turn, we are told, "these new attitudes … led to the Reformation and this … had enormous influence on Jersey". The Reformation, it is asserted, had three causes: reaction to the abuses of the Catholic Church; "a rationalistic spirit [which] was astir" as a consequence of the Renaissance, created as just stated; and the popularity of the doctrine of Justification by Faith. No local evidence of abuses is adduced, beyond noting that the Dean of Jersey for some seven years, 1534-41, and the Prior of St Helier about the same time, were absentees. No symptoms of "a rationalistic spirit", nor of any popularity of the doctrine of Justification are presented. Nowhere is a groundswell for reform demonstrated to have existed. Recent historians of the English Reformation have found the same: Protestantism was not a response to popular dissatisfaction, but imposed by acts of state. Nor does Balleine suggest why rationalism, even if abroad, may have been associated with Protestantism, or that the somewhat sophisticated doctrine of Justification by Faith had popular appeal. Balleine’s work was taken to task over some of these matters by Jason St John Nicolle in a series of articles in The Pilot in 1991. In her Caen University maîtrise thesis, Helen Evans recently has demonstrated the vitality of local Catholic life at the eve of the Reformation. Such opinions have not been assimilated in this new edition, however, which presents a narrative making the triumph of Protestantism appear inevitable. Similarly, the book’s contention, founded on Margaret Murray’s assertions of the 1920s, that in the sixteenth century "a wave of devil-worship was sweeping through western Europe and had gained disciples", so much so that it amounted to an "organised religion", might have benefited from reference to more recent works on the subject, which demonstrate that no organised witch cult existed, and that only a very few people ever thought of themselves as witches. It is instead suggested that "each witch was given a fair trial" (p.129), implying that the crime was triable, ie. real. Balleine is wrong, also, to say that so-called witches were burned alive in Guernsey. As in Jersey, they were hanged first. Thus the book presents a Reformation which was "rational", progressive, and inevitable, and witchcraft as an organised religion, practised by criminals. These views do not go unchallenged today. Balleine will continue widely to be regarded as authoritative. Much of the local material is very interesting and the book tells a story well worth telling. The work is handsomely produced and well-illustrated. However in historical studies - as much in the legal profession - we are in an age of specialisation. Newly revealed source material and the deductions of contemporary historians might one day be employed by specialists - professional and independent - in a new, collaborative, general history of Jersey which goes beyond Balleine. The maritime history A People of the Sea already exists to show the standards such an enterprise can achieve. Works of scholarship are themselves subject to history and the opinions of posterity. Just as Balleine contains much which unwittingly places its original authorship in the first half of this century, history will tell whether or not it will remain "the book on Jersey well into the next millennium". Until the initiative for further work is seized, however, Balleine does remain preeminent, and the new edition is to be welcomed. D.M. Ogier |