By the early modern period, libelling a private individual had been legally redefined and was being tried at the court of Star Chamber, alongside cases relating to the monarch or government. This brought the ruination of individual reputations by spreading false rumours into the same realm as the circulation of nationally significant false news. Private libels typically took the form of verses, impersonations, mock ceremonies or visual symbols that were read, sung, posted, and published; they exploited the defamatory potential of fictional reconstructions of local disputes in order to exacerbate conflicts within provincial communities. This chapter argues that private libels provide evidence for a novel multimedia practice of circulating disinformation that blended fact and fiction amongst the social networks of early modern England. It examines two cases, one centred upon a libellous verse and the other on mock proclamations, to establish the significance of literary and performance techniques in libellous disinformation. The chapter also explores the significance of ‘disreputation’ for the categories of private and public. It argues that private libels were a crucial feature of the social backdrop to established forms of oral, print and manuscript communication, which impacted upon common perceptions of trustworthiness of information and public official figures.

中文翻译：

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各省的诽谤：现代早期英格兰的虚假信息和“名誉”

到了近代早期，诽谤私人的行为已经在法律上被重新定义，并在星庭法庭与与君主或政府有关的案件一起受审。这通过将虚假谣言传播到与全国性重大虚假新闻传播相同的领域，从而破坏了个人声誉。私人诽谤通常以诗歌、模仿、模拟仪式或视觉符号的形式被阅读、演唱、张贴和出版；他们利用虚构的地方争端重建的诽谤潜力，以加剧省级社区内的冲突。本章认为，私人诽谤为传播虚假信息的新颖多媒体实践提供了证据，该实践在现代早期英格兰的社交网络中混合了事实和虚构。它研究了两个案例，一个以诽谤性的诗句为中心，另一个以模拟宣言为中心，以确定文学和表演技巧在诽谤性虚假信息中的重要性。本章还探讨了“声誉”对于私人和公共类别的意义。它认为，私人诽谤是已建立的口头、印刷和手稿交流形式的社会背景的一个重要特征，这影响了对信息和公职人员可信度的普遍看法。