War, Politics and Finance in Late Medieval English Towns
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Relations between town and crown in late medieval England examined through two of its most important towns, Bristol and York.
The strengthening of ties between crown and locality in the fourteenth century is epitomised by the relationships between York and Bristol (then amongst the largest and wealthiest urban communities in England) and the crown. Thisbook combines a detailed study of the individuals who ruled Bristol and York at the time with a close analysis of the texts which illustrate the relationship between the two cities and the king, thus offering a new perspective onrelations between town and crown in late medieval England. Beginning with an analysis of the various demands, financial, political and commercial, made upon the towns by the Hundred Years War, the author argues that such pressures facilitated the development of a partnership in government between the crown and the two towns, meaning that the elite inhabitants became increasingly important in national affairs. The book goes on to explore in detail thenature of urban aspirations within the kingdom, arguing that the royal charters granting the towns their coveted county status were crucial in binding their ruling elites into the apparatus of royal government, and giving them a powerful voice in national politics.
Dr Christian D. Liddy is Senior Lecturer in the Department of History, University of Durham.
David Ormrod
War, Trade and the State
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A reassessment of the Anglo-Dutch wars of the second half of the seventeenth century, demonstrating that the conflict was primarily about trade.
This book re-examines the history of Anglo-Dutch conflict during the seventeenth century, of which the three wars of 1652-4, 1665-7 and 1672-4 were the most obvious manifestation. Low-intensity conflict spanned a longer period. From 1618-19 hostilities in Asia between the Dutch and English East India Companies added new elements of tension beyond earlier disputes over the North Sea fisheries, merchant shipping and the cloth trade. The emerging multilateral trades of the Atlantic world added new challenges. This book integrates the European, Asian, American and African dimensions of the Anglo-Dutch Wars in an authentically global view. The role of the state receives special attention during a period in which both countries are best understood as 'fiscal-naval states'. The significance of sea power is reflected in the public history of the Anglo-Dutch wars, acknowledged in the concluding chapters. The book includes important new research findings and imaginative new thinking by leading historians of the subject.
Lisa Jefferson
Wardens' Accounts and Court Minute Books of the Goldsmiths' Mistery of London, 1334-1446
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The two earliest Goldsmiths' record books reveal details of working practices, financial accounts, apprentices, civic events such as pageants, misdeeds broght before the wardens, and much else besides.
The goldsmiths of London had formed an organised guild, or mistery (in the medieval sense of "craft" or "profession") by the twelfth century. Granted their first royal charter in 1327 by Edward III, they are one of the twelve great livery companies, and still oversee the work of goldsmiths, silversmiths and jewellers. Published here for the first time are their two earliest record books, presented in the original languages, French (Anglo-Norman), Englishand Latin, with a facing-page translation into modern English. From these full records valuable and lively detail emerges: the working practices of gold and silversmiths, the financial accounts of the wardens, apprentices admitted, participation in civic events such as pageants, and records of offences (both professional and personal) brought before the disciplinary court. The edition is accompanied by a full introduction, a bibliography, a subject index and a complete name index.
LISA JEFFERSON, MA, D Phil, FSA, is a medievalist who works both in Oxford and in France.
Sergio Boffa
Warfare in Medieval Brabant, 1356-1406
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An account of the causes, combatants and course of events in the successive conflicts which troubled the duchy for half a century.
The medieval duchy of Brabant was one of the most powerful principalities of the Low Countries. During the second half of the fourteenth century, it underwent a particularly dramatic period in its history: the House of Leuven wason the point of disappearance, the duchy was coveted by Philip the Bold of Burgundy, who was already dreaming of extending the "Burgundian Empire" and, by a network of alliances, Brabant was drawn into the Hundred Years' War. Theauthor reviews the successive conflicts which troubled the duchy between 1356 and 1406; the different authorities which influenced the course of military operations (the duchess and the duke, their officers, and the Estates of Brabant); describes the combatants, in particular the nobility and the urban militias; considers the practical aspects of warfare; and analyses the military obligations and contracts which bound the men at arms to the duke.
SERGIO BOFFA is currently researching in the department of Maps and Plans, Bibliotheque Royale de Belgique, Brussels.
David S. Bachrach
Warfare in Tenth-Century Germany
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A complete survey of the military campaigns of the early Saxons, tactics, strategy, and logistics, demonstrating in particular the sophistication of the administration involved.
Over the course of half a century, the first two kings of the Saxon dynasty, Henry I (919-936) and Otto I (936-973), waged war across the length and breadth of Europe. Ottonian armies campaigned from the banks of the Oder in the east to the Seine in the west, and from the shores of the Baltic Sea in the north, to the Adriatic and Mediterranean in the south. In the course of scores of military operations, accompanied by diligent diplomatic efforts, Henry and Otto recreated the empire of Charlemagne, and established themselves as the hegemonic rulers in Western Europe. This book shows how Henry I and Otto I achieved this remarkable feat, and provides a comprehensive analysis ofthe organization, training, morale, tactics, and strategy of Ottonian armies over a long half century. Drawing on a vast array of sources, including exceptionally important information developed through archaeological excavations,it demonstrates that the Ottonian kings commanded very large armies in military operations that focused primarily on the capture of fortifications, including many fortress cities of Roman origin. This long-term military success shows that Henry I and Otto I, building upon the inheritance of their Carolingian predecessors, and ultimately that of the late Roman empire, possessed an extensive and well-organized administration, and indeed, bureaucracy, whichmobilized the resources that were necessary for the successful conduct of war.
David S. Bachrach is Associate Professor of History at the University of New Hampshire.
David S. Bachrach
Warfare in Tenth-Century Germany
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$130.00
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A complete survey of the military campaigns of the early Saxons, tactics, strategy, and logistics, demonstrating in particular the sophistication of the administration involved.
Over the course of half a century, the first two kings of the Saxon dynasty, Henry I (919-936) and Otto I (936-973), waged war across the length and breadth of Europe. Ottonian armies campaigned from the banks of the Oder in the east to the Seine in the west, and from the shores of the Baltic Sea in the north, to the Adriatic and Mediterranean in the south. In the course of scores of military operations, accompanied by diligent diplomatic efforts, Henry and Otto recreated the empire of Charlemagne, and established themselves as the hegemonic rulers in Western Europe. This book shows how Henry I and Otto I achieved this remarkable feat, and provides a comprehensive analysis ofthe organization, training, morale, tactics, and strategy of Ottonian armies over a long half century. Drawing on a vast array of sources, including exceptionally important information developed through archaeological excavations,it demonstrates that the Ottonian kings commanded very large armies in military operations that focused primarily on the capture of fortifications, including many fortress cities of Roman origin. This long-term military success shows that Henry I and Otto I, building upon the inheritance of their Carolingian predecessors, and ultimately that of the late Roman empire, possessed an extensive and well-organized administration, and indeed, bureaucracy, whichmobilized the resources that were necessary for the successful conduct of war.
David S. Bachrach is Associate Professor of History at the University of New Hampshire.
Georgios Theotokis
Warfare in the Norman Mediterranean
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Analyses of different aspects of the history of warfare in the Mediterranean in the eleventh and twelfth centuries.
The kingdom of Sicily plays a huge part in the history of the Norman people; their conquest brought in a new era of invasion, interaction and integration in the Mediterranean, However, much previous scholarship has tended to concentrate on their activities in England and the Holy Land. This volume aims to redress the balance by focusing on the Hautevilles, their successors and their followers. It considers the operational, tactical, technical and logistical aspects of the conduct of war in the South throughout the eleventh and twelfth centuries, looking also at its impact on Italian and Sicilian multi-cultural society. Topics include the narratives of the Norman expansion, exchanges and diffusion between the "military cultures" of the Normans and the peoples they encountered in the South, and their varied policies of conquest, consolidation and expansion in the different operational theatres of land and sea.
Stephen Morillo
Warfare under the Anglo-Norman Kings 1066-1135
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An interwoven study in many ways refreshing and original... A good book, the first major product of one of the more vital debates in recent early medieval scholarship. HISTORY A major re-statement of the nature of Anglo-Norman warfare, with special emphasis on the role of the familia regis, the King's military household.
This study of the battles waged between 1066 and 1135 by the Anglo-Norman kings of England - William the Conqueror, William Rufus and Henry I -is a major restatement of the nature of medieval warfare in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Bringing together the two major trends in recent medieval military history, the study of military organisations and the study of campaigns, Stephen Morillo illuminates the interrelationship of military organisation and social and political structures and brings many new perceptions to bear, such as the central role of the familia regis, the King's military household. The roles of armies and castles and the normal activities of warfare are examined to show why sieges were far more common than pitched battles. Siege and battle tactics are analysed in the context of social and political influences, administrative structures and campaign patterns, and a connection is proposed in most pre-modern warfare between government strength and infantry quality. Dr STEPHEN MORILLOteaches at Wabash College, Indiana. He has published numerous articles on Anglo-Norman warfare.
Craig M. Nakashian
Warrior Churchmen of Medieval England, 1000-1250
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An examination of the actions of clerics in warfare in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, looking at the difference between their actions and prescriptions for behaviour.
Christianity has had a problematic relationship with warfare throughout its history, with the middle ages being no exception. While warfare came to be accepted as a necessary activity for laymen, clerics were largely excluded frommilitary activity. Those who participated in war risked falling foul of a number of accepted canons of the church as well as the opinions of their peers. However, many continued to involve themselves in war - including active participation on battlefields. This book, focusing on a number of individual English clerics between 1000 and 1250, seeks to untangle the cultural debate surrounding this military behaviour. It sets its examination into a broader context, including the clerical reform movement of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the development of a more comprehensive canon law, and the popularization of chivalric ideology. Rather than portraying these clerics as anachronistic outliers or mere criminals, this study looks at how contemporaries understood their behaviour, arguing that there was a wide range of views - which often included praise for clerics who fought in licit causes. The picture which emerges is that clerical violence, despite its prescriptive condemnation, was often judged by how much it advanced the interests of the observer.
Craig M. Nakashian is Associate Professor of History at Texas A&M University-Texarkana.
Craig M. Nakashian
Warrior Churchmen of Medieval England, 1000-1250
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An examination of the actions of clerics in warfare in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, looking at the difference between their actions and prescriptions for behaviour.
Christianity has had a problematic relationship with warfare throughout its history, with the Middle Ages being no exception. While warfare came to be accepted as a necessary activity for laymen, clerics were largely excluded frommilitary activity. Those who participated in war risked falling foul of a number of accepted canons of the church as well as the opinions of their peers. However, many continued to involve themselves in war - including active participation on battlefields. This book, focusing on a number of individual English clerics between 1000 and 1250, seeks to untangle the cultural debate surrounding this military behaviour. It sets its examination into a broader context, including the clerical reform movement of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the development of a more comprehensive canon law, and the popularization of chivalric ideology. Rather than portraying these clerics as anachronistic outliers or mere criminals, this study looks at how contemporaries understood their behaviour, arguing that there was a wide range of views - which often included praise for clerics who fought in licit causes. The picture which emerges is that clerical violence, despite its prescriptive condemnation, was often judged by how much it advanced the interests of the observer.
CRAIG M. NAKASHIAN is Associate Professor of History at Texas A&M University-Texarkana.
Robert Malcolmson
Wartime in West Suffolk
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Detailed and engaging diary entries throw new light on what it was really like to live in wartime Suffolk.
Winifred Challis (1896-1990) spent most of her life in West Suffolk. Born in Newmarket, during the Second World War she was working in Bury St Edmunds for the Public Assistance Committee and was one of nearly 500 people who at some point during the war kept a diary for the social research organization, Mass Observation. From November 1942 she wrote at length about her everyday life, her feelings, and the social and political attitudes of both herself and others. Winifred, while often introspective, was also a close observer of the world around her, a free thinker, and an accomplished and penetrating writer, with a questioning mind and a quick wit. For several months in 1942-1943 she immersed herself in her diary-writing, producing on some days at least a couple of thousand words of perceptive commentary on the wartime scene - rationing, shortages, the often bleak texture of daily life, the sometimes disconcerting presence of outsiders in Bury, but with various moments of satisfaction and pleasure. Her diaries provide an unusual and fascinating record of a critical period of Suffolk's history.
Robert Malcomson is Professor Emeritus of History, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario; Peter Searby was until his retirement Fellow at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge.
Martin Carver
Wasperton
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The newest research on a major Anglo-Saxon site paints a vivid picture of the beginnings of England.
[Edited by Martin Carver] For decades scholars have puzzled over the true story of settlement in Britain between the fifth and eight centuries. Did the Romans leave? Did the Anglo-Saxons invade? What happened to the British? Newlight on these questions comes unexpectedly from Wasperton, a small village on the Warwickshire Avon, where archaeologists had the good fortune to excavate a complete cemetery and its prehistoric setting. The community reused an old Romano-British agricultural enclosure, and built burial mounds beside it. There was a score of cremations in Anglo-Saxon pots; but there were also unfurnished graves lined with stones and planks in the manner of western Britain. In a pioneering analysis, including radiocarbon and stable isotopes, the authors of this book have put this variety of burial practice into a credible sequence, and built up a picture of life at the time. Here there were people who were culturally Roman, British and Anglo-Saxon, pagan and Christian in continuous use of the same graveyard and drawing on a common inheritance. Here we can see the beginnings of England and the people who made it happen- not the kings, warriors and preachers, but the ordinary folk obliged to make their own choices: choices about what nation to build and which religion to follow.
MARTIN CARVER is Professor Emeritus of Archaeology at the University of York; Dr CATHERINE HILLS is Senior Lecturer in Anglo-Saxon Archaeology at the University of Cambridge; Dr JONATHAN SCHESCHKEWITZ is Officer with the Ancient Monuments authority of Stuttgart.
Amy Faulkner
Wealth and the Material World in the Old English Alfredian Corpus
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WINNER: 2025 Beatrice White Prize
A new, materialistic reading of the Alfredian corpus, drawing on diverse approaches from thing theory to Augustinian principles of use and enjoyment to uncover how these works explore the material world.
The Old English prose translations traditionally attributed to Alfred the Great (versions of Gregory's Regula pastoralis, Boethius' De consolatione philosophiae, Augustine's Soliloquia and the first fifty Psalms) urge detachment from the material world; but despite this, its flotsam and jetsam, from costly treasures to everyday objects, abound within them.
This book reads these original and inventive translations from a materialist perspective, drawing on approaches as diverse as thing theory and Augustine's principles of use and enjoyment. By focussing on the material, it offers a fresh interpretation of this group of translations, bringing out their complex, often contradictory, relationship with the material world. It demonstrates that, as in the poetic tradition, wealth in Alfredian literature is not simply a tool to be used, or something to be enjoyed in excess; rather, in moving away from these two static binaries, it shows that wealth is a current, flowing both horizontally, as an exchange of gifts between humans, and vertically, as a salvific current between earth and heaven. The prose translations are situated in the context of Old English poetry, including Beowulf, The Wanderer, The Seafarer, the Exeter Book Riddles and The Dream of the Rood.
Eric McElroy
Weird Music: Reading John Ireland and Arthur Machen
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Using John Ireland's fascination with Arthur Machen as case study, this book challenges our perception of the correspondence between music and literature in twentieth-century Britain.
The composer John Ireland (1879-1962) declared repeatedly that no one could understand his music until they had first read the work of his favourite writer, Arthur Machen (1863-1947). This book is the first study to take Ireland at his word. Revolving around Machen's classification as a founding figure of 'weird fiction', it uses weird aesthetics as an interpretative lens with which to understand Ireland's notoriously cryptic life and music. Its four chapters deal respectively with Machen's and Ireland's parallel explorations of weird art's relationship with eroticism; with fin-de-siècle London; with the English pastoral tradition; and with unsettling implications of alternative historiography.
The resulting portrait reveals Ireland to be one of Britain's pre-eminent 'weird artists', placing Ireland in the aesthetic context with which he wished to be associated. It therefore fills a significant gap in British musicology, while at the same time contributing to a growing appreciation of Machen as a major figure in British culture, one whose influence exceeds far beyond the literary sphere to which he is traditionally confined. Using Ireland's fascination with Machen as its case study, this book makes a timely and necessary connection between the literary weird and its musical doppelgänger, enriching and challenging our perception of the correspondence between music and literature in twentieth-century Britain.
Adrian Pettifer
Welsh Castles
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History of and gazetteer to all surviving Welsh castles - the majority 13c - arranged by county, with full OS details.
The medieval castles of Wales are an imposing group of monuments. Although there are examples from the Norman period, the vast majority of the surviving castles date from the thirteenth century, a dramatic and turbulent period when Wales was nearly united under native rule before succumbing to Edward I's conquest: Caernarfon, Conway, Harlech and Beaumaris are justly famous, but equally fine examples can be found elsewhere, including Pembroke, Kidwelly andChepstow in south Wales; native Welsh castles feature prominently. This book provides a brief account and complete gazetteer of every surviving castle in Wales, from the impressive earthworks raised by the Norman invaders to the castle-palaces of the later middle ages, and including the remarkable town fortifications of Wales; it is arranged by county for convenience of reference, and offers full Ordnance Survey details. Lavishly illustrated. ADRIAN PETTIFER gained his degree in ancient and medieval history from Birmingham University.
Rhys Kaminski-Jones
Welsh Revivalism in Imperial Britain, 1707-1819
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Reframes the study of Welsh cultural revivalism, highlighting transnational and imperial contexts.
In the long eighteenth century, as Britain grappled with the aftermath of the 1707 Acts of Union and consolidated a global empire, Welsh 'Cambro-Britons' developed a movement of cultural awakening, reinventing their traditions for a new age. Amid profound local, national and imperial transformations, Welsh authors and activists sought to reimagine their history, language and literature, claiming a place for Wales and the Welsh diaspora in the British imperial order. Far from being an insular phenomenon, this revival intersected with key debates of the era, from enlightenment science and radical politics to colonial expansion, transatlantic abolitionism and metropolitan sociability.
This study reframes Welsh cultural revivalism, revealing its fundamentally international and archipelagic dimensions. Nationally significant Welsh authors like Lewis Morris, David Samwell, Thomas Pennant, and Iolo Morganwg are placed in their transnational, imperial, and global contexts. Examined alongside Thomas Gray's British bardism, William Jones's Orientalism, and the imperialism of Cook's voyages, their writings demonstrate how Welsh thinkers engaged with - and shaped - shifting ideas of Britishness, empire, race, and identity. Drawing on new archival research, and giving equal attention to Welsh - and English - language texts, Rhys Kaminski-Jones challenges traditional narratives of Welsh cultural nationalism as a simple precursor to modern Welsh nationhood, instead positioning the revival as central to transatlantic intellectual currents. With its pathbreaking bilingual and interdisciplinary approach, this book offers fresh insights into the complexities of nationhood, empire, and cultural memory.
Adam Chapman
Welsh Soldiers in the Later Middle Ages, 1282-1422
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Examines the role of Welsh soldiers in English armies, from the conquests under Edward I through to the Battle of Agincourt.
Not only the leaders but the entire nation are trained in war. Sound the trumpet for battle and the peasant will rush from his plough to pick up his weapons as quickly as the courtier from the court. So wrote Gerald of Wales atthe end of the twelfth century; and war continued to define the experiences of Welshmen in the succeeding years. This book explores the role of the Welsh in England's armies and in England's wars between Edward I's conquest of Wales in the 1280s, through the wars in Scotland and France and the revolt led by Owain Glyndwr, concluding with Henry V's conquest of Normandy following his victory at Agincourt in 1415. It examines the structure and composition of armies and the social networks and hierarchies which underpinned them: what sort of Welshmen became soldiers? How was Welsh society organised for war? What impact did wider political considerations have upon Welshmen in England's armies? These questions are answered using both well-known sources, such as the financial records of the English crown, and others less familiar, including the records of local administration and the large surviving corpus ofWelsh-language poetry.
Adam Chapman is Editor and Training Coordinator with the Victoria County History of the Counties of England at the Institute of Historical Research, London.
David N. Dumville
Wessex and England from Alfred to Edgar
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An important study of the emergence of the kingdom of England in the first half of the 10th century.
This book is concerned with aspects of the revival of English military,ecclesiastical, and intellectual strength in the period from King Alfred's defeat of the Great Danish Army at Edington in 878 to that of the triumph of Benedictinism in the of Edgar, king of England959-975. Studying intellectual developments of the first half of the10th century, Dr Dumville argues that those decades were a period of continuation of the Alfredian renascence and he looks back into that king's troubled but productive reign to discover new aspects of his thinking and to offer some new interpretations of his actions.These were also the years in which the kingdom of England was formed:attention is therefore given to King Æthelstan, its creator. This series of new studies draws on fresh manuscript-evidence as well as reinterpreting texts long known to historians. By bringing together the testimonies of a wide variety of sources, it seeks to provide the basis on which a new history of the period may be written.
DAVID N. DUMVILLE is Reader in the Early Mediaeval History and Culture of the British Isles at the University of Cambridge.
John Allan
West Country Households, 1500-1700
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Essays on the development of the post-medieval house, its contents and decoration.
During the last forty years, South-West England has been the focus of some of the most significant work on the early modern house and household in Britain. Its remarkable wealth of vernacular buildings has been the object of muchattention, while the area has also seen productive excavations of early modern household goods, shedding new light on domestic history. This collection of papers, written by many of the leading specialists in these fields, presents a number of essays summarizing the overall understanding of particular themes and places, alongside case studies which publish some of the most remarkable discoveries. They include the extraordinary survival of wall-hangings in a South Devon farm, the discovery of painted rooms in an Elizabethan town house, and a study of a table-setting mirrored on its ceiling. Also considered are forms of decoration which seem specific to particular areas of the West Country houses. Taken together, the papers offer a holistic view of the household in the early modern period.
John Allan is Consultant Archaeologist to the Dean & Chapter of Exeter Cathedral; Nat Alcock is EmeritusReader in the Department of Chemistry, University of Warwick; David Dawson is an independent archaeologist and museum and heritage consultant.
Contributors: Ann Adams, Nat Alcock, John Allan, James Ayres, Stuart Blaylock, Peter Brears, Tania Manuel Casimiro, Cynthia Cramp, Christopher Green, Oliver Kent, Kate Osborne, Richard Parker, Isabel Richardson, John Schofield, Eddie Sinclair, John R.L. Thorp, Hugh Wilmott,
Adrian Wright
West End Broadway
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A history and re-evaluation of the American musical in London between 1945 and 1972, a unique panoramic essay on British theatre of the Golden Age.
West End Broadway is the first book to deal specifically with the 'Golden Age' of American musicals in London. Here is a history and a re-evaluation not only of the British productions of Broadway's most popular product butof the works themselves, beginning with a brief account of the origins of the genre and of the shows seen during World War II. The difficult conditions of war-torn Britain prepared the ground for changes that would come with peace. While Britain clung to tried formulas, a refreshing breeze was blowing in from the Atlantic, altering the nature of British theatre by sending New York's commercially successful musicals to the West End. The wider relevance ofthis history is underscored, as is the fact that these works effectively imported American social history into the culture of a Britain coping with the aftermath of conflict. In London, critical reaction to Broadway musicals was often strikingly different from that awarded in New York, and Broadway success could result in West End failure, while off-Broadway shows struggled to gain hold in Britain. West End Broadway discusses every American musical seen in London between 1945 and 1972. As the final works of Cole Porter and Irving Berlin made way for a new wave of writers and composers, the arrival of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma! was celebrated as a breakthrough,heralding a period that included important works by Jule Styne, Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden and Adolph Green, Robert Wright and George Forrest, Harold Rome, Frank Loesser, Alan Jay Lerner, Frederick Loewe, and the first stirrings of the next generation in Stephen Sondheim. Offering a unique panoramic essay on British theatre of the Golden Age, West End Broadway is an authoritative, challenging and diverting contribution to an understanding of aforgotten aspect of the Broadway musical.
ADRIAN WRIGHT is the author of Foreign Country: The Life of L.P. Hartley (1996), John Lehmann: A Pagan Adventure (1998), The Innumerable Dance: The Life and Work of William Alwyn (2008) and the novel Maroon (2010). His previous book, A Tanner's Worth of Tune (Boydell & Brewer, 2010), told the story of the post-war British musical. He lives in Norfolk, where he runs MustClose Saturday Records, a company dedicated to British musical theatre.
Emma Mason
Westminster Abbey and its People c.1050-c.1216
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Detailed investigation into a transitional period of the Abbey's history, covering the whole community.
This book surveys the monastic community at Westminster from the time when Edward the Confessor [1042-1066] adopted it as his burial church down to the end of the reign of king John. Originating according to legend during the Roman occupation, the West Minster was converted from a little collegiate church into a Benedictine monastery around 970. However, the growth of its significance largely dates from its massive endowment by king Edward, who commissioned a lavish rebuilding of the abbey church, a focal point in his programme of monarchical propaganda.
Dr Mason covers every aspect of the abbey community in detail examining the careers of the abbots and priors, whilst ensuring that lesser figures are not neglected: monks; craftsmen; lay servants; the personnel of the royal court who were closely associated with the abbey. The author also considers the community's dealings with the growing ecclesiastical bureaucracy; the management of its properties, including its parochial churches; and its relationship with other religious houses.
Dr EMMA MASON teaches in the Department of History, Birkbeck College.
Gareth Williams
Weston Park
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Considering its territorial and social influence and the superlative nature of its furnishings and collections, Weston Park is not as well known as one might expect.
The house and contents, with its thousand acre landscape park, was gifted to the nation in 1986 by Richard, 7th Earl of Bradford. Until then, the house had always passed by descent, often through the female line, and it had stood at the centre of an estate with a wide geographical spread, linking it with neighbouring counties and with the urban centres of Walsall, Bolton and Wigan. Weston Park's owners and staff had a pivotal role in the development of these places, whilst the family were involved in national affairs, in politics, the legal profession, and the military. Their seat at Weston Park provided not only a fitting home, visited by royalty and politicians, but also became a repository of important patronage and of collections. These included, in 1735, the highly significant late seventeenth and early eighteenth century collection of paintings that had been assembled by Francis Newport, 1st Earl of Bradford and his younger son, Thomas. Meticulously researched and beautifully illustrated, this book seeks to tell the story of the house, its setting, extraordinary collections, and the influence that it has had on wider communities through the history of those who have owned and cared for it.
E.A. Thompson
Who was St Patrick?
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The classic study of the saint's life, presented with new introduction and bibliography.
Everyone knows of St Patrick, but what do we know about him? Simply that it was he who `converted the Irish to Christianity'. The strange fact is that for two hundred years or so after his death, although his name was remembered with respect, everything else about him was forgotten. E.A. Thompson pieces together the story of his life, drawing his evidence from the only real clues that exist, Patrick's own writings, not from the later Lives. He reveals him as coming from a well-to-do nominally Christian family in Britain, being captured by Irish raiders and forced into slavery in Co Mayo, converting to a most earnest Christianity, and eventually escaping from Ireland to the fulfillment of his calling. As a bishop, he is shown to have been a man of profound originality, and his writings - his Confession and his Letter to Coroticus - further display his character. It is no surprise that a host of legends became attached to his name, and the biography is completed with a look at some of those early legends. Preface to paperback edition by COLMAN ETCHINGHAM, Maynooth. E.A. THOMPSON was Professor of Classics at Nottingham University.
Beatrice Moring, Richard Wall
Widows in European Economy and Society, 1600-1920
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A deeply researched and geographically wide-ranging study that reveals that widows were much more economically and socially active than is often thought.
2017 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title
"A terrific piece of work". JANE HUMPHRIES, Professor of Economic History and Fellow of All Souls College, University of Oxford
Widows are often viewed as being marginalised in society, struggling to make a living and in need of financial and other support. However, as this extensively researched and wide-ranging book reveals, widows did, in fact, engage very effectively in economic activity, often being in charge of families, households and commercial enterprises. The book outlines how extensive widowhood was; examines the provisions made for the support of widows, including in the form of marriage contracts, dowries andcharitable assistance; and provides numerous examples of widows being economically active, paying their way and involving themselves energetically in society - one notable example being Barbe-Nicole Clicquot, who established a very successful company producing La Veuve Clicquot champagne. Using statistical analysis and individual case studies, the book contrasts the situation in different parts of Europe, and between rural and urban areas, and shows how provision for widows both in law and in practice evolved over time. Overall, it contributes a great deal to women's history, helping to correct the image that women were victims of male society, and to family history, showing thatexceptions to the "ideal" nuclear family were very common.
BEATRICE MORING is Associate Professor in the Department of Political and Economic Studies at the University of Helsinki.
RICHARD WALL was a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of History at the University of Essex.
Roger Allen
Wilhelm Furtwängler
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A pathbreaking, new intellectual biography of the composer and conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler.
Wilhelm Furtwängler (1886-1954) has entered the historical memory as a renowned interpreter of the canon of Austro-German musical masterworks. His extensive legacy of recorded performances of Beethoven, Brahms, Bruckner and Wagneris widely regarded as unsurpassed. Yet more than sixty years after his death he remains a controversial figure: the complexities and equivocacy of his high-profile position within the Third Reich still cast a long shadow over hisreputation. This book builds an intellectual biography of Furtwängler, probing this ambiguity, through a critical examination of his extensive series of essays, addresses and symphonies. It traces the development of his thought from its foundations in late nineteenth-century traditions of Bildung and associated discourses of conservative-minded nationalism, through the turbulent years of the Weimar Republic and the cultural and moral dilemmasof the Nazi period, to the post-World War II years of Bundesrepublik reconstruction, in which the beleaguered idealist found himself adrift in an alien cultural environment overshadowed by the unfolding narrative of the Nazi holocaust. The book will be of interest not only to music scholars but to cultural and intellectual historians as well.
ROGER ALLEN is a Fellow of St Peter's College, Oxford and author of Richard Wagner's Beethoven (1870): A New Translation (Boydell Press, 2014)
Wyman H. Herendeen
William Camden
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A comprehensive analysis of the life of William Camden (1581-1623), historian, herald, and leading literary figure of the Elizabethan period and of the context in which he lived.
William Camden [1551-1623] was one of the most notable historians of the Elizabethan period; his works include Britannia the first description of Britain county by county. A herald by profession, he moved in the literary and political circles of London in an age when history and the study of the past interacted with present politics, and was well-connected with many leading figures of the time; his involvement with the precursor of what is now the Society of Antiquaries of London is of especial importance.
This book provides the first major analytical biography of Camden's life and career since that of Thomas Smith in 1691. It offers a comprehensive analysis of Camden's life and of the context in which he lived, including in its great scope a wide range of aspects of English and European learned culture during the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries; and examines the nature of his extraordinary impact on writers both of his own and later generations.
WYMAN H. HERENDEEN is Professor and Department Chair in the Department of English at the University of Houston, Texas.
R.M. Thomson
William of Malmesbury
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William was a historian, biblical commentator, biographer and classicist; his intellectual achievement is studied here.
William of Malmesbury (c.1090-c.1143) was England's greatest historian after Bede. Although best known in his own time, as now, for his historical writings (his famous Deeds of the Bishops and Deeds of the Kings of Britain), William was also a biblical commentator, hagiographer and classicist, and acted as his own librarian, bibliographer, scribe and editor of texts. He was probably the best-read of all twelfth-century men of learning. This is a comprehensive study and interpretation of William's intellectual achievement, looking at the man and his times and his work as man of letters, and considering the earliest books from Malmesbury Abbey library, William'sreading, and his "scriptorium". Important in its own right, William's achievement is also set in the wider context of Benedictine learning and the writing of history in the twelfth century, and on England's contribution to the "twelfth-century renaissance". In this new edition, the text has been thoroughly revised, and the bibliography updated to reflect new research; there is also a new chapter on William as historian of the First Crusade.
RODNEY M. THOMSON is Professor Emeritus and Honorary Research Associate in the School of History and Classics, University of Tasmania.
David Boyd Haycock
William Stukeley
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Stukeley's antiquarian researches, particularly into the great stone circles of Stonehenge and Avebury, were the first to reveal their great antiquity. Friend of Newton, his life embodies the classic Enlightenment confrontation between science and religion.
Dr William Stukeley (1687-1765) was the most renowned English antiquary of the eighteenth century. This study discusses his life and achievements, placing him firmly within his intellectual milieu, which he shared with his illustrious friend Isaac Newton and with other natural philosophers, theologians and historians. Stukeley's greatest memorial was his work on the stone circles of Stonehenge and Avebury: at a time when most historians believed theywere Roman or medieval monuments, he proved that they were of much greater antiquity, and his influence on subsequent interpretations of these monuments and their builders was enormous. For Stukeley, these stone circles - the work of "Celtic Druids", were a link in the chain that connected the pristine religion of Adam and Noah with the modern Anglican Church. Historians today belittle such speculations, but Stukeley shared his vision of lost religious and scientific knowledge with many of the great minds of his day; this account shows how throughout his distinguished career his antiquarian researches fortified his response to Enlightenment irreligion and the threat he believed itposed to science and society.
DAVID BOYD HAYCOCK is a Junior Research Fellow at Wolfson College, Oxford.
Stephen Lloyd
William Walton: Muse of Fire
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This acclaimed biography draws on first-hand accounts, including new material on Walton's circle of the 20s and 30s; the composer's work in film a particular focus.
When in June 1923 a bewildered audience in London's Aeolian Hall heard Edith Sitwell declaim her Façade poems through a megaphone, the 21-year-old William Walton - conducting behind a painted backcloth - stood on the threshold of fame. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s he was regarded as the white hope of British music, and a succession of works including the Viola Concerto, Belshazzar's Feast and the First Symphony more than fulfilled that early promise; he was also one of the first serious composers to be involved in films. Using first-hand accounts, this book explodes the myth of Façade's riotous reception, examines Walton's work in both films and radio and, through contemporary correspondence, articles and interviews - wherever possible in his own words - explores Walton's life and troubled times. It brings to the fore his complex personality - "remote, removed, distant" in Laurence Olivier's words, in dynamic contrast with music of such vitality and drama. Composition for him was an arduous, often painful, process riddled with difficulties, uncertainties and self-doubts, and further complicated by severallove affairs (one being with Italy) that inspired his finest works.
STEPHEN LLOYD's previous books include a biography of H. Balfour Gardiner and a collection of Eric Fenby's writings on Delius, which he edited. In addition to record sleeve notes, programme notes, reviews and articles, he has contributed to the Percy Grainger Companion, the Studies in Music Grainger Centennial Volume, An Elgar Companion, and volumes on Delius, Waltonand Bliss.
Virginia Davis
William Waynflete
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Study of the life of bishop of Winchester (1447-86), one of the great educationalists and patrons of learning of late medieval England.
This is the first modern study of William Waynflete, powerful and influential bishop of Winchester from 1447 to 1486. Waynflete was one of the great educationalists and patrons of learning of late medieval England, and his careerwas dominated by an interest in education. He played a leading role in some of the changes which transformed education in 15th-century England: the emergence in Oxford and Cambridge of new and larger colleges; the influence of continental humanist ideas which reshaped English thought; the introduction of the teaching of Greek; the composition of new grammars; and the introduction of printing as a means of disseminating the new learning. Through her examination of Waynflete's career, Davis challenges the received view of the gangrenous corruption of the medieval church and instead supports recent research which suggests the truth to have been far more complex. As this biographyrecords, Waynflete himself was politically linked to Henry VI and the Lancastrian administration and most of his time was spent in southern England, However, he retained close links with his native Lincolnshire, and his committments there are also fully considered.
VIRGINIA DAVIS is lecturer in history at Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London.
Peter Northeast
Wills of the Archdeaconry of Sudbury, 1439-1474
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Suffolk wills of ordinary inhabitants illustrate all aspects of the social conditions of the time.
ARCHIVES: The making and registering of wills by ordinary people became widespread in East Anglia a century earlier than parts of midland and western England. It is of enormous value therefore to have one of the earliest surviving registers from an archdeaconry made available. [The volume] provides us with a window into rural society in mid-fifteenth-century East Anglia. It was a society bustling with small farmers, craftsmen involved in the cloth industry, and other artisans and traders. The wills record their concern for religion, the local community and the future welfare of wives, children, godchildren and even servants. There is a wealth of information here for the historianof religion, the family, material culture, agriculture and industry. This volume contains abstracts, in English, of nearly nine hundred wills made by residents of the western part of Suffolk in the mid-fifteenth century, together with a further five hundred 'probate sentences' - details of the granting of probate, without the associated wills. These are the earliest surviving wills of ordinary inhabitants of that part of Suffolk, excluding the titled, the wealthy and the clergy. They illustrate in considerable detail the social conditions of the time, including housing and household possessions, landholding and farming patterns, and provision for the poor. They are especially rich in references to the religious practices of the day. The introduction outlines the probate system of the area at that time and examines the form and content of a medieval will.
Marion E. Allen
Wills of the Archdeaconry of Suffolk, 1627-1628
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Wills of early Stuart England provide fascinating local and domestic details of life at the time.
With the publication of this volume the Suffolk Records Society completes the coverage of wills of the 1620s and 1630s, two decades of great interest to those who study trans-Atlantic migration from eastern England and the foundation of the godly republic of New England. Written soon after the accession of Charles I and at a time of mounting political and religious tension, they offer a mine of personal, social and economic information. The book contains abstracts of 286 wills proved in the court of the archdeacon of Suffolk in the years 1627 and 1628. This court was the place to prove the third and humblest category of wills of testators whose real estate was situated in onlyone parish. The court's jurisdiction covered the eastern half of the county, an extensive and rich area of farming and industrial parishes, market towns, coastal ports and the large town of Ipswich. The varied economy of the region is well illustrated by the impressive range of occupations pursued by testators. The wills have been fully abstracted, preserving their introductory religious clauses and the flavour of the original language, but cutting or condensing certain repetitive words and phrases. The contents have been extensively indexed by testator, other people mentioned (mainly legatees and witnesses), occupation, place and subject.
Marion Allen gained an MAfrom the University of Wales for a study of Aldeburgh between 1547 and 1660. She was formerly assistant archivist at the then Ipswich and East Suffolk Record Office.
Peter Bloore
Wingfield College and its Patrons
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The 650th anniversary of the foundation of Wingfield College was the occasion for a special two-day symposium marking the culmination of a three-year UEA-funded research project into the college and castle. The building projects of the late medieval aristocracy focused on their homes and the monasteries, churches or chantry foundations under their patronage where their family were buried and commemorated. This commemoration allowed a visual celebration of their achievements, status and lineage, the scale and prestige of which reflected on the fortunes of the family as a whole. Wingfield is explored in the context of both the actual building of the castle, chantry chapel and the college, and that of the symbolic function of these as a demonstration ion of aristocratic status. The contributions to this book examine many topics which have hitherto been neglected, such as the archaeology of the castle, which had never been excavated, the complex history of the college's architecture, and the detailed study of the monuments in the church. The latest techniques are used to reconstruct the college and castle, with a DVD to demonstrate these. And the context of the family and its fortunes are explored in chapters on the place of the de la Poles in fifteenth century history, as soldiers, administrators and potential claimants to the throne.
K. Dawn Grapes
With Mornefull Musique: Funeral Elegies in Early Modern England
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This book looks at the musical culture of death in early modern England.
This book looks at the musical culture of death in early modern England. In particular, it examines musical funeral elegies and the people related to commemorative tribute - the departed, the composer, potential patrons, and friends and family of the deceased - to determine the place these musical-poetic texts held in a society in which issues of death were discussed regularly, producing a constant, pervasive shadow over everyday life. The composition of these songs reached a peak at the end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth centuries. Thomas Weelkes and Thomas Morley both composed musical elegies, as did William Byrd, Thomas Campion, John Coprario, and many others. Like the literary genre from which these musical gems emerged, there was wide variety in form, style, length, and vocabulary used. Embedded within them are clear messages regarding the social expectations, patronage traditions, and class hierarchy of late Elizabethan and early Jacobean England. En masse, they offer a glimpse into the complex relationship that existed between those who died, those who grieved, and attitudes toward both death and life.
K. DAWN GRAPES is Assistant Professor of Music History at Colorado State University.
Aleksander Pluskowski
Wolves and the Wilderness in the Middle Ages
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The complex attitude to the wolf in the Middle Ages re-evaluated, bringing together historical and other evidence.
The wolf, a common metaphor for vice in medieval Christian literature, is today an iconic symbol of the intense fear and insecurity that some associate with the middle ages. In reality, responses to wolves varied across medieval Europe. Although not dependent on the wilderness, wolves were conceptually linked to this environment - which although on the fringes of medieval society, became increasingly exploited from the eighth to fourteenth centuries, so bringing people and livestock closer to the wolf. This book compares responses to wolves, focusing on two regions, Britain and southern Scandinavia. It looks at the distribution of wolves in the landscape, their potential impact as predators on both animals and people, and their use as commodities, in literature, art, cosmology and identity. It also investigates the reasons (both practical and cultural) for the eradication of wolves in England, but their survival on the Scandinavian peninsula.
ALEKSANDER PLUSKOWSKI is Associate Professor, Department of Archaeology, University of Reading,
John C. Appleby
Women and English Piracy, 1540-1720: Partners and Victims of Crime
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Drawing on a wide body of evidence, the book argues that the support of women was vital to the persistence of piracy around the British Isles at least until the early seventeenth century. The emergence of long-distance and globalized predation had far reaching consequences for female agency.
Piracy was one of the most gendered criminal activities during the early modern period. As a form of maritime enterprise and organized criminality, it attracted thousands of male recruits whose venturing acquired a global dimension as piratical activity spread across the oceans and seas of the world. At the same time, piracy affected the lives of women in varied ways. Adopting a fresh approach to the subject, this study explores the relationships and contacts between women and pirates during a prolonged period of intense and shifting enterprise. Drawing on a wide body of evidence and based on English and Anglo-American patterns of activity, it argues that the support of female receivers and maintainers was vital to the persistence of piracy around the British Isles at least until the early seventeenth century. The emergence of long-distance and globalized predation had far reaching consequences for female agency. Within colonial America, women continued to play a role in networks of support for mixed groups of pirates and sea rovers; at the same time, such groups of predators established contacts with women of varied backgrounds in the Caribbean and the Indian Ocean. As such, female agency formed part of the economic and social infrastructure which supported maritime enterprise of contested legality. But it co-existed with the victimisation of women bypirates, including the Barbary corsairs. As this study demonstrates, the interplay between agency and victimhood was manifest in a campaign of petitioning which challenged male perceptions of women's status as victims. Against this background, the book also examines the role of a small number of women pirates, including the lives of Mary Read and Ann Bonny, while addressing the broader issue of limited female recruitment into piracy.
JOHN C. APPLEBY is Senior Lecturer in History at Liverpool Hope University.
Julie Hotchin
Women and Monastic Reform in the Medieval West, c. 1000 – 1500
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New approaches to understanding religious women's involvement in monastic reform, demonstrating how women's experiences were more ambiguous and multi-layered than previously assumed.
Over the last two decades, scholarship has presented a more nuanced view of women's attitude to and agency in medieval monastic reform, challenging the idea that they were, by and large, unwilling to accept or were necessarily hostile towards reform initiatives. Rather, it has shown that they actively participated in debates about the ideas and structures that shaped their religious lives, whether rejecting, embracing, or adapting to calls for "reform" contingent on their circumstances. Nevertheless, fundamental questions regarding the gendered nature of religious reform are ripe for further examination.
This book brings together innovative research from a range of disciplines to re-evaluate and enlarge our knowledge of women's involvement in spiritual and institutional change in female monastic communities over the period c. 1000 - c. 1500. Contributors revise conventional narratives about women and monastic reform, and earlier assumptions of reform as negative or irrelevant for women. Drawing on a diverse array of visual, material and textual sources, it presents "snapshots" of reform from western Europe, stretching from Ireland to Iberia. Case-studies focussing on a number of different topics, from tenth-century female saints' lives to fifteenth-century liturgical books, from the tenth-century Leominster prayerbook to archaeological remains in Ireland, from embroideries and tapestries to the rebellious nuns of Sainte-Croix in Poitiers, offer a critical reappraisal of how monastic women (and their male associates) reflected, individually and collectively, on their spiritual ideals and institutional forms.
Edited by Julie Hotchin and Jirki Thibaut
Women and Monastic Reform in the Medieval West, c. 1000 – 1500
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New approaches to understanding religious women's involvement in monastic reform, demonstrating how women's experiences were more ambiguous and multi-layered than previously assumed.
Over the last two decades, scholarship has presented a more nuanced view of women's attitude to and agency in medieval monastic reform, challenging the idea that they were, by and large, unwilling to accept or were necessarily hostile towards reform initiatives. Rather, it has shown that they actively participated in debates about the ideas and structures that shaped their religious lives, whether rejecting, embracing, or adapting to calls for "reform" contingent on their circumstances. Nevertheless, fundamental questions regarding the gendered nature of religious reform are ripe for further examination.
This book brings together innovative research from a range of disciplines to re-evaluate and enlarge our knowledge of women's involvement in spiritual and institutional change in female monastic communities over the period c. 1000 - c. 1500. Contributors revise conventional narratives about women and monastic reform, and earlier assumptions of reform as negative or irrelevant for women. Drawing on a diverse array of visual, material and textual sources, it presents "snapshots" of reform from western Europe, stretching from Ireland to Iberia. Case-studies focussing on a number of different topics, from tenth-century female saints' lives to fifteenth-century liturgical books, from the tenth-century Leominster prayerbook to archaeological remains in Ireland, from embroideries and tapestries to the rebellious nuns of Sainte-Croix in Poitiers, offer a critical reappraisal of how monastic women (and their male associates) reflected, individually and collectively, on their spiritual ideals and institutional forms.
Laura Watson
Women and Music in Ireland
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Explores the world of women's professional and amateur musical activity as it developed on and beyond the island of Ireland.
In a story which spans several centuries, the book highlights representative composers and performers in classical music, Irish traditional music, and contemporary art music whose contributions have been marginalised in music narratives. As well as investigating the careers of public figures, this edited collection brings attention to women who engaged with and taught music in a variety of domestic settings. It also shines a spotlight on women who worked behind the scenes to build infrastructures such as festivals and educational institutions which remain at the heart of the country's musical life today. The book addresses and reconsiders ideas about the intersections of music, gender, and Irish society, including how the national emblem of the harp became recast as a symbol of Irish womanhood in the twentieth century.
The book is divided into four parts. Part 1 surveys women musicians in Irish society of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Part 2 discusses women and practice in Irish traditional music. Part 3 studies gaps and gender politics in the history of twentieth-century women composers and performers. Part 4 situates discourses of women, gender, and music in the twenty-first century. The book's contributors encompass musicologists, cultural historians, composers, and performers.
Frances Beer
Women and Mystical Experience in the Middle Ages
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Original and thought-provoking study of three medieval women mystics based on writings and biographical material.
`A wholly feminine voice within Catholicism-they express the inexpressible better than any amount of rational thinking about God.' THE TIMES The three women who are the subject of this fascinating study lefta rich legacyof medieval spirituality. Frances Beer explores their writings and draws on available historical evidence to bring the experience of all three women closer to a 20th-century audience. She sees Hildegard's perception of her Creator as informed by the heroic ideal, while Mechthild's erotic experience seems to show the influence of the minnesingers. Julian's experience of tender intimacy with her Lord demonstrates an egalitarian confidence in the ability of the individual soul to progress towards onenesswith the divine. Their individual natures are also further revealed through the author's examination of their resolution of a number of theological problems. In contrast, the works of two medieval men writing for women are also explored. FRANCESBEER is Associate Professor of English at York University, Toronto.
Lynn MacKay
Women and the British Army, 1815-1880
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This book explores the world of women who married, or dealt with British soldiers below the rank of officer during the nineteenth century, including fiancées, wives, mothers, sisters, and daughters, as well as the prostitutes they consorted with. It examines women's experiences over the time cycle of a soldier's service. It considers women's finances, how they struggled to make ends meet and how they appealed to the government for support, including in widowhood and after a soldier's service had been completed. It discusses how soldiers' women were viewed in the press, in literature and in society more widely, highlighting in particular issues concerning morality and independence, and outlines how the Crimean War and its aftermath brought about extensive army reforms and also a sharp revision of the reputation of soldiers' wives. The book includes an exploration of soldiers' relations with prostitutes and how prostitutes were regulated, and a consideration of the impact on soldiers' wives of physical arrangements such as barracks, and overall provides much insight into the nature of plebeian life in the nineteenth century. The women portrayed often emerge as exceptionally resolute, independent and canny.
Amanda L. Capern
Women and the Land, 1500-1900
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Women and the Land examines English women's legal rights to land and the reality and consequences of their land ownership over four centuries.
Women and the Land examines the pre-history of gendered property relations in England, focusing on the four-hundred-year period between roughly 1500 and 1900. More specifically, the book is about how gender shaped opportunities for and experiences of owning property, particularly for women. The focus is especially on land, residential buildings and commercial property, but livestock, common and personal property also feature. This project is drivenby an explicitly feminist agenda: the contributors directly challenge the idea that the existence of patriarchal property relations - including the doctrine of coverture and gendered inheritance practices - meant that property wasconcentrated in exclusively male hands. Here a very different story is told: of significant levels of female landownership and how women's desire to own property and manage its profits led to emotional attachments to land and a willingness and determination to fight for the right to legal title. Altogether, the chapters in this volume offer new histories of land and property which hold women's lives as their centre. Presenting the very latest qualitativeand quantitative research on women's landownership, the book will be of interest to those working in social, economic and cultural history, historical and cultural geography, women's studies, gender studies and landscape studies.
AMANDA CAPERN is Senior Lecturer in Early Modern Women's History at the University of Hull.
BRIONY MCDONAGH is Senior Lecturer in Historical and Cultural Geography at the University of Hull.
JENNIFER ASTON is Senior Lecturer in Modern British History at Northumbria University.
CONTRIBUTORS: Jennifer Aston, Stephen Bending, Amanda L. Capern, Janet Casson, Amy Erickson, Amanda Flather, Joan Heggie, Jessica L. Malay, Briony McDonagh, Judith Spicksley, Jon Stobart, Hannah Worthen
Shulamith Shahar, Yael Lotan
Women in a Medieval Heretical Sect
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Women Waldensians have been almost written out of studies of the heretical sect, but are here shown to have played a full role within it, regardless of gender.
Agnes and Huguette were two Waldensian women who were interrogated by the inquisitional court of Pamiers, in southern France, in 1319 and subsequently burnt at the stake for their heretical beliefs. Shahar uses the records of their inquisition as a basis for an examination of the Waldensian sect's attitude towards its women members, and their role within the sect, comparing their lives with women in the Catholic church and in other sects. She finds that ina persecuted voluntary group such as the Waldensians, gender was largely immaterial, subordinate to the fervent religious commitment of the members; nor did the court of inquisition distinguish between male and female, subjectingheretics of either sex to the same horrible punishment. This is the first book-length treatment of women Waldensians, who have been almost written out of studies of the sect, but are here shown to have played a full role within it. It throws light on women and gender in medieval society as well as on one of the main heretical movements in France in the early fourteenth century.
SHULAMITH SHAHAR is Professor Emeritus of Medieval History, TelAviv University.
Nicola Phillips
Women in Business, 1700-1850
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A reappraisal of the business enterprises of women in the `long' eighteenth century, showing them to be more flourishing than previously thought.
Orthodox opinion is that in the `long' eighteenth century women, especially of the middle classes, had very little involvement with business affairs and enterprises, and that as a group they were more usually characterised by their domestic roles. This book takes issue with this view, arguing that the major factors which supposedly prevented women's economic activity in this period had much less impact than has previously been thought. It demonstrates thatdespite the pressure of gendered cultural expectations, financial barriers and legal disabilities, many women participated extensively in entrepreneurial activity as integrated members of trading networks, exchanging money, credit, property and goods with male traders on a regular basis throughout the period. The author examines how women in business engaged with the tangled legal systems of common law, borough customs and equity, showing that the legal doctrine of coverture did not in practice curtail married women's ability to trade on their own account; she goes on to look at women's business practices, partnerships and credit networks, including their involvement in the insurance business and newspaper advertising. Finally, she considers the impact of domestic ideology, particularly on women in the feminine trades of millinery and dressmaking, and the languages women used to express their commercial interests.
Joanne Cusack
Women in Irish Traditional Music
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Traces the position, experiences and reception of women in Irish traditional music through detailed ethnographic and statistical findings.
This book is the first of its kind to engage with the larger subject of women in commercial Irish traditional music. It considers the experiences of performers in the various commercial arenas of the tradition, while also engaging in critical discussions of choice, agency, feminism and sexualisation. It reveals how the commercial music industry and Celtic music label continues to place women within a stereotypical idealised role or occupation.
The book provides new insight into the legacy of women-led bands and compilations as well as their impact on Irish traditional music over five decades. Its findings on commercial dance shows are equally significant. While these shows had a positive impact on performers, at the same time they enforced gendered, racial and heteronormative expectations.
Drawing on extensive ethnographic and statistical research, the book finds strong evidence that women and other marginalised practitioners continue to face greater challenges and different expectations when maintaining a professional career and participating in Irish traditional music. It also uncovers characteristics and dynamics related to the recreational and commercial spaces of the Irish traditional music and Irish dance scene that enable harmful and predatory behaviour.
The author's findings support understandings and aid future legislation for creating a safe, inclusive and equitable performance space for all.
Cover artwork by Claire Prouvost
Beatrice Moring
Women in the Factory, 1880-1930
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A rich and detailed picture, across Britain and many other European countries, of the nature of women's factory work, the problems which arose and how women factory inspectors understood and reacted to the problems.
Based on extensive original archival research both in Britain and in many European countries, this book is a comparative study of the large numbers of women who were engaged in industrial work in the western world in the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century, that is at a time when the industrial revolution was established and the problems caused by industrial work had become part of political debate and social discourse worldwide. It analyses the scope of female factory work, what the conditions were in such work, and what the motivations were for women to enter such employment. It reveals the composition of the female workforce as to age and marital status.
In addition, it considers the first generation of female industrial inspectors, outlining the background of these inspectors, assessing to what extent were they were capable of taking on the role of protectors of women in manual work, and discussing the actions and attitudes of the female inspectors as recorded in inspection reports, biographies and contemporary discourse. Overall, the book presents a rich, detailed, comparative picture of women's factory work, contributing much to the understanding of the history of gender and class.
Judith Jesch
Women in the Viking Age
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Through runic inscriptions and behind the veil of myth, Jesch discovers the true story of viking women.
Well-illustrated, closely argued and fascinating. GUARDIAN
This is the first book-length study in English to investigate what women did in the Viking age, both at home in Scandinavia and in the Viking colonies from Greenland to Russia. Evidence for their lives is fragmentary, but Judith Jesch assembles the clues provided by archaeology, runic inscriptions, place names and personal names, foreign historical records and Old Norse literature and mythology. These sources illuminate different aspects of women's lives in the Viking age, on the farms and in the trading centres of Scandinavia, abroad on Viking expeditions, and as settlers in places such as Iceland and the British Isles. Women in the Viking Age explores an unfamiliar aspect of medieval history and offers a new perspective on Viking society, very different from the traditional picture of a violent and male-dominated world.
JUDITH JESCH is Reader in Viking Studies at the University of Nottingham.
Ingrid H. Tague
Women of Quality
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An examination of the interaction between ideology and experience in the lives of English women during a period of great social and intellectual change.
Focusing on the complex relationship between discourse and experience, Women of Quality examines the role of gender in aristocratic women's daily lives during a period of significant cultural change. In the years followingthe Glorious Revolution, didactic writers and other social critics responded to a perceived crisis of gender relations by creating a new discourse of 'natural' feminine behavior in opposition to the luxury and decadence of fashionable women. Modern scholars have often portrayed this agenda as representing the rise of a middle-class ideology, but Ingrid Tague argues that the new rhetoric held enormous appeal for those women who would appear to be its greatest targets: wealthy, fashionable 'women of quality'. Using the correspondence and diaries of these women, Tague traces the ways in which they adopted, adapted, and exploited ideals of femininity. In their hands, feminine values could become powerful tools that enabled them to compete for status and reputation. Ironically, by identifying femininity with private, trivial concerns, these ideals created unique opportunities for elite women. Female participation in informal social and political activities placed women at the heart of aristocratic power in the early eighteenth century, even as they employed the language of wifely subordination and domesticity.
Ingrid Tague is Assistant Professor of History at the University of Denver.
Mark J. Crowley
Women's Experiences of the Second World War
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Using a very wide range of detailed sources, the book surveys the many different experiences of women during the Second World War.
Many existing studies on the role of women in the Second World War concentrate on women's increasing participation in the workplace and on their struggles to cope with rationing and shortages. This book goes further, exploring women's wartime experiences much more fully. Drawing on a wide range of sources including oral interviews, scrapbooks, personal letters, diaries, newspaper articles, Mass Observation files and memoirs, the book illustrates some of the similarities and differences of women's wartime experiences in different situations in different countries. Specific subjects covered include experiences of exile and living under occupation, of coping with proximity to fighting and to the frontline, and of dealing with everyday life in trying circumstances. The book draws out how factors such as political beliefs, nationalism, economics, religion, ability, geography and culture all had an impact. Overall, the book reveals a great deal about the complexities and nuances of women's experiences in this period of enormous upheaval.
Contributors: Patricia Chappine, Nupur Chaudhuri, Sylvie Crinquand, Beth Hessel, Sarah Hogenbirk, Regina Lark, Bernice Lindner, Alexis Peri, Kelly Spring, Michael Timonin, Angela Wanhalla, Wai-Yin Christina Wong.
Natasha R. Hodgson
Women, Crusading and the Holy Land in Historical Narrative
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Women's role in crusades and crusading examined through a close investigation of the narratives in which they appear.
Narratives of crusading have often been overlooked as a source for the history of women because of their focus on martial events, and perceptions about women inhibiting the recruitment and progress of crusading armies. Yet women consistently appeared in the histories of crusade and settlement, performing a variety of roles. While some were vilified as "useless mouths" or prostitutes, others undertook menial tasks for the army, went on crusade with retinuesof their own knights, and rose to political prominence in the Levant and and the West. This book compares perceptions of women from a wide range of historical narratives including those eyewitness accounts, lay histories andmonastic chronicles that pertained to major crusade expeditions and the settler society in the Holy Land. It addresses how authors used events involving women and stereotypes based on gender, family role, and social status in writing their histories: how they blended historia and fabula, speculated on women's motivations, and occasionally granted them a literary voice in order to connect with their audience, impart moral advice, and justify the crusade ideal.
NATASHA HODGSON is Lecturer in Medieval History at Nottingham Trent University..
Natasha R. Hodgson
Women, Crusading and the Holy Land in Historical Narrative
Regular price
$130.00
Save $-130.00
Women's role in crusades and crusading examined through a close investigation of the narratives in which they appear.
Narratives of crusading have often been overlooked as a source for the history of women because of their focus on martial events, and perceptions about women inhibiting the recruitment and progress of crusading armies. Yet women consistently appeared in the histories of crusade and settlement, performing a variety of roles. While some were vilified as "useless mouths" or prostitutes, others undertook menial tasks for the army, went on crusade with retinuesof their own knights, and rose to political prominence in the Levant and and the West. This book compares perceptions of women from a wide range of historical narratives including those eyewitness accounts, lay histories andmonastic chronicles that pertained to major crusade expeditions and the settler society in the Holy Land. It addresses how authors used events involving women and stereotypes based on gender, family role, and social status in writing their histories: how they blended historia and fabula, speculated on women's motivations, and occasionally granted them a literary voice in order to connect with their audience, impart moral advice, and justify the crusade ideal.
Dr NATASHA R. HODGSON teaches at Nottingham Trent University.
Lynneth Miller Renberg
Women, Dance and Parish Religion in England, 1300-1640
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$130.00
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A lively exploration of the medieval and early modern attitudes towards dance, as the perception of dancers changed from saints dancing after Christ into cows dancing after the devil.
The devil's cows, impudent camels, or damsels animated by the devil: late medieval and early modern authors used these descriptors and more to talk about dancers, particularly women. Yet, dance was not always considered entirely sinful or connected primarily to women: in some early medieval texts, dancers were exhorted to dance to God, arm-in-arm with their neighbors, and parishes were filled with danced expressions of faith. What led to the transformation of dancers from saints dancing after Christ into cows dancing after the devil?
Drawing on the evidence from medieval and early modern sermons, and in particular the narratives of the cursed carolers and the dance of Salome, this book explores these changing understandings of dance as they relate to religion, gender, sin, and community within the English parish. In parishes both before and during the English Reformations, dance played an integral role in creating, maintaining, uniting, or fracturing community. But as theological understandings of sacrilege, sin, and proper worship changed, the meanings of dance and gender shifted as well. Redefining dance had tangible ramifications for the men and women of the parish, as new definitions of what it meant to perform one's gender collided with discourses about holiness and transgression, leading to closer scrutiny and monitoring of the bodies of the faithful.
Lynneth Miller Renberg
Women, Dance and Parish Religion in England, 1300-1640
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$37.95
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A lively exploration of the medieval and early modern attitudes towards dance, as the perception of dancers changed from saints dancing after Christ into cows dancing after the devil.
The devil's cows, impudent camels, or damsels animated by the devil: late medieval and early modern authors used these descriptors and more to talk about dancers, particularly women. Yet, dance was not always considered entirely sinful or connected primarily to women: in some early medieval texts, dancers were exhorted to dance to God, arm-in-arm with their neighbors, and parishes were filled with danced expressions of faith. What led to the transformation of dancers from saints dancing after Christ into cows dancing after the devil?
Drawing on the evidence from medieval and early modern sermons, and in particular the narratives of the cursed carolers and the dance of Salome, this book explores these changing understandings of dance as they relate to religion, gender, sin, and community within the English parish. In parishes both before and during the English Reformations, dance played an integral role in creating, maintaining, uniting, or fracturing community. But as theological understandings of sacrilege, sin, and proper worship changed, the meanings of dance and gender shifted as well. Redefining dance had tangible ramifications for the men and women of the parish, as new definitions of what it meant to perform one's gender collided with discourses about holiness and transgression, leading to closer scrutiny and monitoring of the bodies of the faithful.
Nicole Pohl
Women, Transnational Networks and Patriotism in Northern and Central Europe, 1763-1814
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A gateway to the complex world of eighteenth-century sociability of elite women and of their lasting impact on modern concepts of national identity and community.
In the dynamic intellectual and social landscape of eighteenth-century Northern Europe, the interplay between patriotism, nationalism, and cosmopolitanism was pivotal in shaping the era's cultural and political discourse. This study delves into the intricate networks of elite women who navigated and influenced these concepts through their participation in salons and literary circles. By examining figures such as Anna Amalia of Weimar, Dorothea von Kurland, members of the Bluestockings, Friederike Brun and the grande Dame of eighteenth-century salon world, Mme de Staël, the narrative uncovers how these women fostered transnational dialogues and cultural exchanges that were crucial in redefining public spirit and national identity.
Grounded in extensive archival research and touching on the lives of over twenty-five individuals, the work highlights the nuanced roles these women played as cultural mediators and agents of change across national borders, challenging the traditional male-dominated historiography. The exploration of their contributions offers fresh insights into the interconnectedness of European intellectual life and the critical role of gender in shaping historical discourses. This book not only broadens our understanding of the Enlightenment but also provides a rich, interdisciplinary perspective on the socio-political transformations of the era.
Dorothea Link
Words About Mozart
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Published as a tribute to the late Stanley Sadie, these eleven essays look at compositional and performance matters, consider new archival research and provide an overview of work since the bicentenary in 1991.
Words About Mozart is published as a tribute to the late Stanley Sadie, musicologist, critic and editor of The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. Of the eleven essays presented here, three focus on compositional matters: Julian Rushton examines the dramatic meaning of a recurring motif in Idomeneo; Elaine Sisman sifts through the facts surrounding the genesis of Mozart's 'Haydn' quartets; and Simon Keefe matches up pairs of piano sonatas and concertos on the basis of their common compositional features. Cliff Eisen considers some problems of performing practice posed by the solo keyboard parts in Mozart's concertos, and Robert Philip surveys tempo fluctuations in a selection of historical recordings. Felicity Baker's detailed analysis of aspects of the Don Giovanni libretto is a welcome contribution from the field of literary criticism. Three studies offer new archivalresearch: Neal Zaslaw uncovers the background to one of Mozart's nonsense compositions; Dorothea Link examines the Viennese Hofkapelle and creates a new context for understanding Mozart's court appointment; and Theodore Albrecht proposes a candidate for Mozart's Zauberflötist. Christina Bashford considers an aspect of Mozart reception in 19th-century England connected with John Ella, and Peter Branscombe presents a comprehensive overview of research published since the bicentenary in 1991. The volume includes a full bibliography of Stanley Sadie's publications and broadcasts.
Contributors: THEODORE ALBRECHT, FELICITY BAKER, CHRISTINA BASHFORD, PETER BRANSCOMBE, CLIFF EISEN, SIMON P. KEEFE, LEANNE LANGLEY, DOROTHEA LINK, ANDREW PORTER, ROBERT PHILIP, JULIAN RUSHTON, ELAINE SISMAN, NEAL ZASLAW
Phyllis Weliver
Words and Notes in the Long Nineteenth Century
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A new wave of scholarship inspired by the ways the writers and musicians of the long nineteenth century themselves approached the relationship between music and words.
Words and Notes encourages a new wave of scholarship inspired by the ways writers and musicians of the long nineteenth century themselves approached the relationship between music and words. Contributors to the volume engage in two dialogues: with nineteenth-century conceptions of word-music relations, and with each other. Criss-crossing disciplinary boundaries, the authors of the book's eleven essays address new questions relating to listening, imagining and performing music, the act of critique, and music's links with philosophy and aesthetics. The many points of intersection are elucidated in an editorial introduction and via a reflective afterword. Fiction and poetry, musicography, philosophy, music theory, science and music analysis all feature, as do traditions within English, French and German studies. Wide-ranging material foregrounds musical memory, soundscape and evocation; performer dilemmas over the words in Satie's piano music; the musicality of fictional and non-fictional prose; text-setting and the rights of poet vs. composer; the rich novelistic and critical testimony of audience inattention at the opera;German philosophy's potential contribution to musical listening; and Hoffmann's send-ups of the serious music-lover. Throughout, music - its composition, performance and consumption - emerges as a profoundly physical and social force, even when it is presented as the opposite.
PHYLLIS WELIVER is Associate Professor of English, Saint Louis University.
KATHARINE ELLIS is Stanley Hugh Badock Professor of Music at the University of Bristol.
Contributors: Helen Abbott, Noelle Chao, Delia da Sousa Correa, Peter Dayan, Katharine Ellis, David Evans, Annegret Fauser, Jon-Tomas Godin, Cormac Newark, Matthew Riley, Emma Sutton, Shafquat Towheed, Susan Youens, Phyllis Weliver
David Bates
Writing Medieval Biography, 750-1250
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A survey both of medieval biographical writings, and the problems of recovering medieval lives.
Biography is one of the oldest, most popular and most tenacious of literary forms. Perhaps the best attested narrative form of the Middle Ages, it continues to draw modern historians of the medieval period to its peculiar challenge to explicate the general through the particular: the biographer's decisions to impose or to resist the imposition of order on biographical remnants raise issues which go to the heart of historical method. This collection, compiled in honour of a distinguished modern exponent of the art of biography, contains sixteen essays by leading scholars which examine the limits and possibilities of the genre for the period between 750AD and 1250AD. Ranging from pivotal figures such as Charlemagne, William the Conqueror and St Bernard, to the anonymous female skeleton in an Anglo-Saxon grave, from kings and queens to clerks and saints, and from individual to the collective biographies,this collection investigates both medieval biographical writings, and the issues surrounding the writing of medieval lives.
Professor DAVID BATES is Director of the Institute of Historical Research; Dr JULIA CRICK and DrSARAH HAMILTON teach in the Department of History at the University of Exeter.
Contributors: JANET L. NELSON, ROBIN FLEMING, BARBARA YORKE, RICHARD ABELS, SIMON KEYNES, PAULINE STAFFORD, ELISABETH VAN HOUTS, DAVID BATES,JANE MARTINDALE, CHRISTOPHER HOLDSWORTH, LINDY GRANT, MARJORIE CHIBNALL, EDMUND KING, JOHN GILLINGHAM, DAVID CROUCH, NICHOLAS VINCENT
Marcus Bull
Writing the Early Crusades
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A pioneering approach to contemporary historical writing on the First Crusade, looking at the texts as cultural artefacts rather than simply for the evidence they contain.
The First Crusade (1095-1101) was the stimulus for a substantial boom in Western historical writing in the first decades of the twelfth century, beginning with the so-called "eyewitness" accounts of the crusade and extending to numerous second-hand treatments in prose and verse. From the time when many of these accounts were first assembled in printed form by Jacques Bongars in the early seventeenth century, and even more so since their collective appearance in the great nineteenth-century compendium of crusade texts, the Recueil des historiens des croisades, narrative histories have come to be regarded as the single most important resource for the academic study of the early crusade movement. But our understanding of these texts is still far from satisfactory. This ground-breaking volume draws together the work of an international team of scholars. It tackles the disjuncture between the study of the crusades and the study of medieval history-writing, setting the agenda for future research into historical narratives about or inspired by crusading. The basic premise that informs all the papers is that narrative accounts of crusades and analogous texts should not be primarily understood as repositories of data that contribute to a reconstruction of events, but as cultural artefacts that can be interrogated from a wide range of theoretical, methodological and thematic perspectives.
MARCUS BULL is Andrew W Mellon Distinguished Professor of Medieval and Early Modern Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; DAMIEN KEMPF is Senior Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of Liverpool.
Contributors: Laura Ashe, Steven Biddlecombe, Marcus Bull, Peter Frankopan, Damian Kempf, James Naus, Léan Ní Chléirigh, Nicholas Paul, William J. Purkis, Luigi Russo, Jay Rubenstein, Carol Sweetenham,
Marcus Bull
Writing the Early Crusades
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$95.00
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A pioneering approach to contemporary historical writing on the First Crusade, looking at the texts as cultural artefacts rather than simply for the evidence they contain.
The First Crusade (1095-1101) was the stimulus for a substantial boom in Western historical writing in the first decades of the twelfth century, beginning with the so-called "eyewitness" accounts of the crusade and extending to numerous second-hand treatments in prose and verse. From the time when many of these accounts were first assembled in printed form by Jacques Bongars in the early seventeenth century, and even more so since their collective appearance in the great nineteenth-century compendium of crusade texts, the Recueil des historiens des croisades, narrative histories have come to be regarded as the single most important resource for the academic study of the early crusade movement. But our understanding of these texts is still far from satisfactory. This ground-breaking volume draws together the work of an international team of scholars. It tackles the disjuncture between the study of the crusades and the study of medieval history-writing, setting the agenda for future research into historical narratives about or inspired by crusading. The basic premise that informs all the papers is that narrative accounts of crusades and analogous texts should not be primarily understood as repositories of data that contribute to a reconstruction of events, but as cultural artefacts that can be interrogated from a wide range of theoretical, methodological and thematic perspectives.
MARCUS BULL is Andrew W. Mellon Distinguished Professor of Medieval and Early Modern Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; DAMIEN KEMPF is Senior Lecturer in Medieval History at the University of Liverpool.
Contributors: Laura Ashe, Steven Biddlecombe, Marcus Bull, Peter Frankopan, Damian Kempf, James Naus, Léan Ní Chléirigh, Nicholas Paul, William J. Purkis, Luigi Russo, Jay Rubenstein, Carol Sweetenham,
Susan Boynton
Young Choristers, 650-1700
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First full-length consideration of the role played by young singers, bringing out its full significance and its development over time.
Young singers played a central role in a variety of religious institutional settings: urban cathedrals, collegiate churches, monasteries, guilds, and confraternities. The training of singers for performance in religious services was so crucial as to shape the very structures of ecclesiastical institutions, which developed to meet the need for educating their youngest members; while the development of musical repertories and styles directly reflected the ubiquitous participation of children's voices in both chant and polyphony. Once choristers' voices had broken, they often pursued more advanced studies either through an apprenticeship system or at university, frequently with the help of the institutions to which they belonged. This volume provides the first wide-ranging book-length treatment of the subject, and will be of interest to music historians - indeed, all historians - who wish to understand the role of the young in sacred musical culture before 1700.
SUSAN BOYNTON is Associate Professor of Historical Musicology at Columbia University; ERIC RICE is Assistant Professor of Music at the University of Connecticut at Storrs.
CONTRIBUTORS: SUSAN BOYNTON, SANDRINE DUMONT, JOSEPH DYER, JANE FLYNN, ANDREW KIRKMAN, NOEL O'REGAN, ALEJANDRO PLANCHART, RICHARD RASTALL, COLLEEN REARDON, ERIC RICE, JUAN RUIZ JIMENEZ, ANNE BAGNALL YARDLEY
James Ross
`The Foremost Man of the Kingdom'
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First book to deal with de Vere's life and extraordinary career, during the Wars of the Roses and beyond.
Earl of Oxford for fifty years, and subject of six kings of England during the political strife of the Wars of the Roses, John de Vere's career included more changes of fortune than almost any other. He recovered his earldom afterthe execution of his father and brother for treason, but his resistance to Edward IV led to a decade in prison. He escaped in time to lead Henry Tudor's vanguard at Bosworth in 1485 and subsequently enjoyed twenty-five years as perhaps "the foremost man of the kingdom", virtually ruling East Anglia for the king. This is the first full-length study of de Vere's life and career. Through this lens it also tackles a number of broader themes. It reconsiders the role of the nobility under Henry VII, challenging the common perception of Henry as an anti-aristocratic king. It also explores East Anglian political society in the second half of the fifteenth century, how the earl came to dominate it, how successfully he exercised his power, and the personnel, including the Paston family, he used to run the region.
JAMES ROSS is Senior Lecturer in Late Medieval History at the University of Winchester.
Stephen Bull
`The Furie of the Ordnance'
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Shows how new developments in guns and artillery played a decisive role in the English Civil War.
NEW LOW PRICE The English Civil War has frequently been depicted as a struggle between Cavaliers and Roundheads in which technology played little part. The first-hand sources now tell us that this romantic picture is deeply flawed - revealing a reality of gunpowder, artillery, and a grinding struggle of siege and starvation.
As with naval warfare, developments in gun technology drastically changed land warfare in the years leading up to 1642. The Civil War was itself shaped largely by the availability of munitions. A failure to procure them in 1643 and 1644 - combined with abortive attempts on London - ultimately proved the downfall of the Royalists. Moreover afinal move away from fortified local garrisons reshaped both the nature of warfare in England, and the country itself.
STEPHEN BULL is Curator of Military History and Archaeology, Lancashire Museums.
