Staff profile

I studied History as an undergraduate at the University of Cambridge and as a graduate student at the University of Oxford. After completing my doctorate, I held a lectureship at Oxford and a research fellowship at Trinity College, Cambridge, before I moved to Durham in 2018. I have also been a visiting research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory, Frankfurt am Main. During my research leave in the academic year 2022–23, I will be a visiting professor at the École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS) in Paris.

Research interests

I work on the social and cultural history of early modern Europe, with a particular focus on France in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. My first book, Pierre de L’Estoile and his World in the Wars of Religion, was published by Oxford University Press in the Past & Present book series, and was shortlisted for the R. Gapper Prize for the best book in French Studies.

Currently I am completing my second book, A Widow's Vengeance: Violence and Justice in Late Renaissance France, under contract with Oxford University Press. My article on this subject, published in French History, was awarded the Nancy Lyman Roelker Prize by the Sixteenth Century Society. My critical edition of the trial at the heart of the book is published with Criminocorpus.

Pursuing this research has led me to develop wider interests in the role of criminal justice in the legal culture of the Old Regime. My recent and forthcoming publications on this subject have focused on hearsay and oral evidence, magic and witchcraft, public execution rituals, political crime and sedition, the sexual crimes labelled as ‘sodomy’, and visual depictions of criminal law.

Research supervision

I am happy to supervise graduate students working on topics in early modern French history, and in early modern social and cultural history more generally. I particularly welcome interest from applicants working on projects involving archival and manuscript sources; violence and peacemaking; social hierarchies in local and regional perspectives; gender relations between norms and practices; the social and cultural history of religious change; the circulation and reception of print; and interdisciplinary approaches to history, literature, and visual culture.

• Britain and Continental Europe
• Early Modern
• Economic and Social History
• Gender and Sexuality
• Visual and Material Culture

Authored book

• Hamilton, Tom (2017). Pierre de L'Estoile and his World in the Wars of Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Chapter in book

• Hamilton, Tom (2021). Political Crime in the Wars of Religion: François Brigard's Sedition. In Sedition: The Spread of Controversial Literature and Ideas in France and Scotland, c.1550-1610. O'Brien, John & Schachter, Marc Turnhout: Brepols. 195-212.
• Hamilton, Tom (2019). 'Food and War' and 'Food Theft'. In Feast & Fast: The Art of Food in Europe, 1500-1800. Avery, Victoria & Calaresu, Melissa London: Bloomsbury. 54-57.
• Hamilton, Tom (2018). The Impact of Jacques Gillot’s Actes du Concile de Trente (1607) in the Debate Concerning the Council of Trent in France. In The Council of Trent: Reform and Controversy in Europe and Beyond (1545-1700). Vol. 2: Between Bishops and Princes. François, Wim & Soen, Violet Göttingen: Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 2: 345-365.
• Hamilton, Tom (2015). Contesting Public Executions in Paris Towards the End of the Wars of Religion. In Cultures of Conflict Resolution in Early Modern Europe. Cummins, Stephen & Kounine, Laura Farnham: Routledge. 179-202.

Edited Journal

• Hamilton, Tom & Linden, David van der (2020). Remembering the French Wars of Religion. French History, 34 (4).
• Hamilton, Tom & Hammond, Nicholas (2019). Soundscapes. Early Modern French Studies, 41 (1).

Journal Article

• Hamilton, Tom (Accepted). The Crisis and Recovery of Criminal Justice in Late Sixteenth-Century France. Sixteenth Century Journal
• Hamilton, Tom (2022). The Saint Bartholomew's Day Massacre Up Close. French History 36(4): 467-470.
• Hamilton, Tom (2022). The Evidence of Hearsay in Criminal Proceedings from Late Renaissance France. Renaissance Studies 36(3): 377-394.
• Hamilton, Tom (2021). A Sodomy Scandal on the Eve of the French Wars of Religion. The Historical Journal 64(4): 844-864.
• Hamilton, Tom (2020). Sodomy and Criminal Justice in the Parlement of Paris, c.1540-c.1700. Journal of the History of Sexuality 29(3): 303-334.
• Hamilton, Tom (2020). Adjudicating the Troubles: Violence, Memory, and Criminal Justice at the End of the Wars of Religion. French History 34(4): 417–434.
• Hamilton, Tom & Hammond, Nicholas (2019). Introduction: Voulez ouyr? Early Modern French Studies 41(1): 2-6.
• Hamilton, Tom (2016). Recording the Wars of Religion: The ‘Drolleries of the League’ from Ephemeral Print to Scrapbook History. Past & Present 230 (S11): 288-310.
• Hamilton, Tom (2016). ‘Bigarrures folatres et mesdisantes’ A Curio from Pierre de L’Estoile’s Cabinet? French Studies Bulletin 37 (139): 43-46.
• Hamilton, Tom (2016). The Procession of the League: Remembering the Wars of Religion in Visual and Literary Satire. French History 30 (1): 1-30.

Scholarly Edition

• Hamilton, Tom (orig.) (2023). Un 'cas exécrable' devant le Parlement de Paris à la fin des guerres de Religion (1599-1600) .