Leo Strauss has a nice essay on Marsilius of Padua where he portrays him as the villain of intellectual history. Might be worth a look. On that score, Strauss has a lot to say about the relationship of De Cive to Leviathan that is relevant to your argument.
More broadly, if you haven't already read it. Quentin Skinner's 'The Foundations of Modern Political Thought' is good for tracing the different ingredients of European absolutism and revolutionism. His approach is quite philistinical, but in some mays more useful for that.
Leo Strauss has a nice essay on Marsilius of Padua where he portrays him as the villain of intellectual history. Might be worth a look. On that score, Strauss has a lot to say about the relationship of De Cive to Leviathan that is relevant to your argument.
More broadly, if you haven't already read it. Quentin Skinner's 'The Foundations of Modern Political Thought' is good for tracing the different ingredients of European absolutism and revolutionism. His approach is quite philistinical, but in some mays more useful for that.
Cheers for the recommendations; some of those will be very useful for future posts.