(Apologies for the grumpy review -- but I'll let it stand. Future readers should read the comment section, which has more value than my current hrrruumphs!)
This book is too long and there is much too much of the author's psycho-social speculation in it - some of it is fairly good, a little of it is quite useless, and very, very little of it is absolutely essential or compelling.
The abundant and detailed evidence collected and adduced throughout this volume, on the other hand, is by far the best part of this book -- though is often surrounded by the aforementioned generalities.
The book should have been 1/3 shorter, and so it is not certain that the editors of the earlier American version (Waning of the Middle Ages) erred (with Huizinga's consent, remember) in presenting a shorter version -- which was itself modeled on the French edition.
I will spend another day or two with this book - but the rating suffers as a result.
That said, this was a revolutionary piece of work, and is justly famous and deserves a reading.