Introduction Lex Heerma van Voss; 1. Voices from the 'silent masses': humble petitions and social conflicts in early modern Central Europe Andreas Würgler; 2. Supplications between politics and justice: the northern and central Italian states in the early modern age Cecilia Nubola; 3. The power of petitions: women and the New Hampshire provincial government, 1695–1770 Marcia Schmidt Blaine; 4. Officially solicited petitions: the Cahiers de Doléances as a historical source Gilbert Shapiro and John Markoff; 5. Revolt, testimony, petition: artisanal protests in colonial Andhra Potukuchi Swarnalatha; 6. Deference and defiance: the changing nature of petitioning in British naval dockyards Ken Lunn and Ann Day; 7. Petitions and the social context of political mobilization in the revolution of 1848/49: a microhistorical actor-centered network analysis Carola Lipp and Lothar Krempel; 8. The image of Jews in Byelorussia: petitions as a source for popular consciousness in the early twentieth century Aleg G. Bukhovets; 9. 'Begging the sages of the party-state': citizenship and government in transition in nationalist China, 1927–37 Rebecca Nedostup and Liang Hong-Ming; 10. Private matters: family and race and the post-World-War-II translation of 'American' Nancy K. Ota.