Conflict, Bargaining, and Kinship Networks in Medieval Eastern Europe takes the familiar view of Eastern Europe, families, and conflicts and stands it on its head. Instead of a world rife with civil war and killing, this book presents a relatively structured environment where conflict is engaged in for the purposes of advancing ones position, and where death among the royal families is relatively rare. At the heart of this analysis is the use of situational kinship networksrelationships created by elites for the purposes of engaging in conflict with their own kin, but only for the duration of a particular conflict. A new image of medieval Eastern Europe, less consumed by civil war and mass death, will change the perception of medieval Eastern Europe in the minds of readers. This new perception is essential to not only present the past more accurately, but also to allow for medieval Eastern Europes integration into the larger medieval world as something other than an aberrant other.

Christian Raffensperger is associate professor of history at Wittenberg University.

Introduction
Chapter 1: The Importance of Conflict
Chapter 2: Conflict as Bargaining
Chapter 3: Everyone Goes Home Alive
Chapter 4: The Kinship Web in Theory and Practice
Chapter 5: Iaroslav Sviatopolchichs Kinship Web in Action
Chapter 6: Géza II in the Center of a European Kinship Web
Conclusion: Kinship, Religion, and Nation: Alternate Identity Issues in Medieval Eastern